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Argues for the supply of food, fertilizers, technical assistance, and other aids to impoverishered countries. Presents data birth and food rates for areas of the world. (CP)

Describes three major sources of agreement and disagreement about population policy, i.e., the crisis environmentalists, the family planners, and the developmental distributivists. Discusses moral considerations relating to population policy. Lists types of policies suggested in the World Plan of Action at Bucharest (Population Council, 1974). (CS)

Analysis of Gallup Poll data of Junuary 1969 reveals weak association between concern about environmental deterioration and the recognition of need for eventual limitation of human population. Suggests that to increase favorable attitudes to population control, role of overpopulation in causing environmental deterioration needs to be presented to public. (AL)

Roles for existing government agencies in achieving goal of zero population growth by research and planning to predict growth rates, provide incentives and means to limit family size, and inform and educate public are described. A tabulation of types of research, planning, operations, and options are given. (AL)

Discusses why zero population growth in the United States will not be achieved by merely eliminating unwanted births or providing reliable contraception techniques. Suggests an explicit population policy to influence desired family size by decreasing institutional rewards for parenthood. (AL)

Cites examples of the contribution of basic research in evolutionary biology to the solution of problems facing society (1) by dispelling myths about human origins, the nature of the individual, and the nature of race (2) by providing basic data concerning the effects of overpopulation, the production of improved sources of food, resistance of pests to pesticides, radiation damage, and the evolution of urban pests. (AL)

Argues that perfected technology, not neo-Ludite response, is necessary for solution of world food and resource problems. Although energy supply will ultimately limit available food, reactors can supply sufficient power for 15 billion population. (AL)

Discusses the relationship between population size and pollution, and suggests that the optimal population level toward which we should strive would be that level at which man is in balance with the biosphere in terms of pollution production and degradation, coupled with a harmless steady-state background pollution level. (JR)

Describes development of environmental education programs for elementary and secondary schools by college students. (AL)

There is a particularly urgent need to analyze population policy debates because of the serious nature of the disagreements that exist and the serious consequences either of choosing the wrong policies or of choosing none. The significant sources of agreement and disagreement about population policy are described and include a description of 3 major groups whose population policy recommendations vie for acceptance: crisis environmentalists family planners and developmental distributivists. These 3 groups represent distinct policy orientations and priorities. The crisis environmentalists take the view that rapid population growth has already produced a serious crisis for the human species and the planet earth. They all agree that resources needed for the survival of the human species are finite and will be depleted unless population is held at a level that establishes a favorable balance between numbers of people and available resources. Family planners like crisis environmentalists also speak of overpopulation at times but their focus more often is upon unwanted fertility or rapid population growth. They favor complete voluntarism in the form of government investment in free-standing birth control clinics to offer all the available methods of birth control to those who would not otherwise be able to afford them. This is in contrast to the crisis environmentalists who recommend coercive government policies. The developmental distributivists believe that certain kinds of improvements in socioeconomic conditions lead to lower birthrates as observed in the demographic transition experienced in Western countries. This group regards unfavorable socioeconomic conditions as major causes of large families and rapid population growth. They argue that the key to lowering fertility lies in the extensiveness of the distribution of benefits.

Should rich countries provide food, fertilizers, technical assistance, and other aid to poor countries? The obvious answer is "yes." It is natural to want to fight poverty, starvation, and disease, to help raise living standards and eliminate suffering. Yet, after 25 years of aid, diets and living standards in many poor countries have improved little, owing partly to the population explosion that occurred during these same years. Death rates in poor countries dropped sharply in the 1940's and 1950's, to around 14/1,000 at present, while their birth rates declined very little, remaining near 40/1,000. Some populations are now growing faster than their food supply. As a result an apparently powerful argument against aid is increasingly heard. Its premise is simply stated. "More food means more babies"

Our world may be saved from overpopulation, starvation, pollution, resource depletion, and the other challenges of our current ecological crisis. If so, the biologists must be credited with sounding the alarm. The abundance of current descriptive articles and books by biologists demonstrate that they know well where the environmental troubles are, and are eager to tell others. It would seem that mere recitation of impending natural disaster would bring effective response to the alarm. Some biologists propose solutions to these troubles, but the immense and farreaching problems require the concern and expertise of both scientists and nonscientists. The challenge demands conceptualization of problems and implementation of solutions, issues transcending the scope of any single discipline such as biology. So far we have heard from the physical scientists and a few others, such as economist Kenneth Boulding (1966), historian Lynn White, Jr. (1967), landscape architect Ian McHarg (1969). and lawyer Raymond Haik (1970). Nonetheless, assuming man's future is at stake, where are the experts from other fields? Solutions to our environmental crises demand a new and broader understand

Because of dwindling supplies, a constant flow of live frogs to the laboratory may soon be impossible. But more important, during recent years there has also been a steady decline in the quality of life represented by a "live" frog. We have found that, in spite of special precautions related to the selection of conscientious suppliers and the means of shipment, it is commonplace for most of the frogs in routine shipments to be in extremely poor health. The shipments are also frequently mixtures of frogs from many geographic origins. If this situation is widespread, and we believe it is, then the averaging of experimental results or pooling of tissue samples must give us values somehow representative of nonexistent chimeras suffering from apparently unexplained seasonal variations in the frequency of paroxysmal systemic disorders! The "frog farmer" is not entirely responsible for this situation. It is an extremely complex matrix of causes and effects from which one can draw two useful generalizations. First, the frog is a victim, as are many other wild creatures, of man's overpopulation, pollution, and economic progress. Second, we as scientists have failed to take the time to understand an animal which is not only extremely important to our individual studies but is also an important predator and regulator in the ecosphere. Our programs in physiology (Gibbs, 1964

The U.S. and the world have 3 options regarding population: 1) to do nothing until war famine and disease take over to limit population; 2) to delay action now until such repressive techniques as government intervention in family fertility are necessary; or 3) to control population voluntarily now. The federal government already has the authority and resources to take many actions in research planning and operations for such policy. The various agencies concerned with energy transportation manpower and employment housing resources and health and welfare can analyze the impact of population trends in their specific areas and incorporate such data into their annual reports. Alternatives of population could be considered in such resource management problems as water planning. A range of populations should be given for each river basin. This would make people more aware of alternatives. The Government Printing Office and the Dept. of Health Education and Welfare could maintain lists of available government publications charts exhibits films and such on population planning. The Postal Service could issue stamps focusing on population issues provide space for posters and materials and increase employment of housewives. All agencies need to increase employment for women. If we do not take advantage of our opportunities now our lack of foresight will increase the likelihood of manipulation repression war famine and disease.

standard of living seem destined to be one of the major domestic political issues of the 1970s. Increasing numbers of scientists and public officials appear to be voicing concern over the extent and intensity of the damage to the ecological system upon which the human species depends not only for its existence but also for the maintenance of its style of living. The damage has been of such magnitude that many have been led to refer to the existence of an "ecological crisis." At a symposium on the problem in late 1968, for instance, Rep. Melvin Laird stated

Zero population growth (ZPG) is viewed as a mandatory goal of modern man and the feasibility of achieving this goal through fertility limitation rather than through mortality increase is discussed. It is estimated that all women in the United States would have to start immediately having no more than 2.1 live births in a lifetime to achieve ZPG in the United States within 70 years and by then the countrys population would have reached 280 million. This low average birth rate would have to be maintained without baby booms and regardless of marriage rates or age and implicitly pronatalist government policies. Merely eliminating unwanted births by effective and widespread birth control rather than by consciously changing family size desires is rejected as not as readily attainable as is claimed and inadequate to make more than a fractional reduction in the countrys rate of natural increase. Implicit government policies and societal norms encourage and support pronatalist actions and explicit antinatalist policies are needed to reorient reproductive behavior in a controlled rather than disorganized manner.

now facing biologists is the rapid increase in the rate of destruction of tropical biota and the realization that we will probably not be able to study even a small portion of it before it is destroyed. The geometrical growth rate of the human populations of tropical countries, which were in the past largely underpopulated except in coastal areas, now threatens to destroy most natural populations of plants and animals (Kostermans, 1960; Bennett, 1968; World Population Data Sheet, June 1971). Some of these are endemic species which will be lost to science altogether (Lewis, 1970). It is believed by some experts that the tropical rain forest will all but disappear by the turn of the century (Richards, 1952). In my opinion this is an over-optimistic prediction. My travels in tropical areas of Central America and in the Amazon Basin lead me to believe that the current disturbance by man throughout much of the tropics has already dealt these delicate ecosystems a serious blow. In the Republic of Panama, the area with which I am most familiar, the situation is particularly acute. Until recent years large areas of the country, particularly the Atlantic coast and much of the eastern part of the country in the province of Darien, were sparcely inhabited (Atlas de Panama, 1965). Now large parts of these previously pristine areas have been destroyed or are in danger of being destroyed (Porter, 1970). In the past 4 years I have made trips into all provinces of Panama and have had the opportunity to fly over much of the area under discussion. It has been

Most laymen will agree that there must be some optimal population size for any given country and for the world as a whole. Also, most people are aware to some degree that there is an increasing problem with pollution in the world, and especially in the industralized countries. However, Barnett (1970) has reported a study where only 54% of individuals who were deeply concerned with environmental deterioration considered population control to be necessary, and Dolan (1969) has argued against the notion that population and pollution are closely linked, referring to this concept as the "population-pollution fallacy." Ehrlich and Holdren (1971) propose just the opposite; that population and pollution are inseparable, a view that I share.