Limitless Possibilities

So many people, so many ways, and so many paths. Which one to take isn’t clear.  Should we use our minds to set boundaries or depend on biological instincts to lead the way?

Oh, Rats!

    Is the human species so messed up that we’ve started to mimic rats in overcrowded cages? Considering that we are biological animals, it isn’t surprising that the aggressive and deviant behaviors we see on the street are responses that mimic rat behavior in crowded situations. The world’s population grew dramatically since Thomas Malthus wrote his 1798  Essay of the Principle of Population. He thought the problems Industrial European society suffered from ——poverty, malnutrition, and disease were all attributable to overpopulation. If growth were left unrestricted, the population would grow at an exponential rate, exceeding its ability to produce resources to support itself.  He cautioned that if action wasn’t taken, the growing population would self-correct through war, famine, and disease. Social scientists say his prediction didn’t come true because humans have the foresight and the ability to plan for the future.  New agricultural technologies put Malthus’ theories on the back burner for the next two-hundred years.

The conversation returned to the forefront when Stanford University Professor Paul Ehrich wrote The Population Bomb with environmental issues part of the discussion. In 1968, 3.55 billion people occupied the globe, increasing by 2.09 percent a year.  Ehrich was an optimist though. He too thought that human foresight and emerging Ag technologies would keep the population safe from disaster. After revisiting his predictions fifty years later, he said that the most serious flaw in his writing was that it was too optimistic about the future. Fresh water is one of the greatest limitations facing the world. Today there are over 8 billion people on the globe, and though the rate of increase has dropped to less than 1 percent, the base number is high. The UN predicts that in seven years the earth will have to support 600 million more people. 

Rats! Where will they all go? What will happen to the United States? An estimated 83 percent of the population already resides in urban areas, increasing urban land by 15 percent. That’s up from the 64 percent recorded in 1950. By 2050, metropolitan occupancy is expected to reach 89 percent, causing double the need for urban land by 2060. More than 300 urban areas today have a population of over 100,000. The average urban population density is 283 people per square mile. New York, a city with 8.8 million inhabitants, has 27,012 people in every square mile.

Back in 1962, animal ecologist John Calhoun foresaw a future of overcrowded cities and devised a population experiment by introducing five pregnant rats in a quarter-acre pen that could accommodate as many as 5000. The animals were given adequate food, water, and shelter. To his surprise, the rat population grew rapidly at first, but over time subsided and leveled off at 150.  Following is a description of what he saw.

“Dominant males became aggressive, some moving in groups, attacking females and the young. Mating behaviors were disrupted. Some became exclusively homosexual. Others became pansexual and hypersexual, attempting to mount any rat they encountered. Mothers neglected their infants, first failing to construct proper nests, and then carelessly abandoning and even attacking their pups. In certain sections of the pens, infant mortality rose as high as 96%, the dead cannibalized by adults. Subordinate animals withdrew psychologically, surviving in a physical sense but at an immense psychological cost. They were the majority in the late phases of growth, existing as a vacant, huddled mass in the centre of the pens. Unable to breed, the population plummeted and did not recover. The crowded rodents had lost the ability to co-exist harmoniously, even after the population numbers once again fell to low levels. At a certain density, they had ceased to act like rats and mice, and the change was permanent.”

Since Calhoun’s experiment, social scientists and biologists in the fields of ecology and mental health continued studying issues around urban crowding. They investigated prisons, mental health hospitals, refugee camps, and slums. Recent research focuses on destination communities where the quality of life for the residents plummeted as tourism increased.  

Though there is some variation in results, overall studies show that crowded conditions increase the risk of the spread of infectious diseases, cause stress, and create mental health problems and sleep disorders. Home injuries multiply since many crowded areas are in poor repair. And, urban sprawl brings traffic congestion, air and water pollution and in some cases flooding. The demand for energy rises and water quality decreases. An urban heat effect from so much cement and high- rise buildings, causes temperatures to rise and greenhouse gas emissions to get trapped in the atmosphere. The average annual temperature in metropolitan areas is 1-7 degrees higher than in rural regions.

Given these conditions, it is not surprising that there are so many mass shootings, suicides, and unsheltered people. Wealthy families reside in dwellings with adequate per-person space. They live near parks and shop in neighborhoods that are relatively safe. Since the pandemic, they’ve taken even more control over their lives by demanding their employers let them work from home on flexible work schedules.   

The majority of the population is not so fortunate. Their wages are low and they have little control over their hours and work week.  They arrive at their jobs stressed by living in crowded apartments in crowded neighborhoods.  Some become disturbed and exhibit behaviors like those in Calhoun’s experiments. They self-medicate with drugs and alcohol, become aggressive drivers, develop deviant sexual behaviors, commit suicide, join gangs, steal, riot, and murder. Their aggression crosses neighborhood boundaries to impact others who live and work in the city. They create fear throughout the nation and sometimes the world.

Human brains are capable of designing housing and community areas for dense populations. Theoretically, we should be able to build livable cities that don’t impact the environment. We should understand the impact eight billion people have on global resources and the psychological problems that occur when it is too crowded.  

We should, but we don’t. The wealthy don’t want to foot the bill to make cities equitable for all. And, I don’t see our citizens as having the will to tackle problems caused by urban living. I don’t see them making the leaps needed to protect the environment. 

I am always hopeful that we’ll wake up and change.  Since the world’s population is still growing and ever more people are migrating to urban areas, cities will become more dysfunctional, putting more pressure on residents to remain sane. 

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Art is always for sale. For information about Limitless Possibilities contact me at marilynne@eichingerfineart.com

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