Hi all - I am currently working on an abstract about global climate
change for a regional biology meeting in the southeast, and I wanted to
say something about the control of natural populations of organisms, but
I am not sure if the statement I want to make is true, so I’m asking for
some advice and counsel on this.
Here’s the question: */Has any population of organisms (humans excluded)
regulated and reduced their population size by lowering their birth rate
instead of increasing their death rate/*?And have any slowed their rate
of increase by raising the age at first birth?Most of the examples I
know of natural population control do so by increasing the death rate.
Some further comments: If resources get scarce as populations increase
in density then behavioral changes could lead to reductions in the birth
rate, but under resource scarcity I would assume that the death rate
would go up also. I know about density-dependent and density-independent
controls on population growth, but here, I’m looking for explicit
examples where populations decrease birth rate without increasing the
death rate.
You may wonder why I’m asking this. It's because I’m wondering if
humans can, in the long-term, reduce their population by lowering the
birth rate without increasing the death rate.Yes, some countries are
already on that path (Japan, for example), but economists and social and
political scientists seem to have a problem with such demographic
changes, particularly in a free-market situation where an aging
population, even if sustainable, is viewed as less competitive and
therefore at risk of losing out (whatever that means) to younger, more
dynamic populations.It suggests to me that ecology and society are
fundamentally at odds here, and that future societies may require
paradigm shifts in the way they operate if humans are to actually create
a sustainable society.But that’s another story.
For now, I’d be really interested to hear explicit examples if anyone
has any.
Thanks.
Howie Neufeld
--
Dr. Howard S. Neufeld, Professor
Director, Southern Appalachian Environmental Research and Education Center
(SAEREC)
Chair, Appalachian Interdisciplinary Atmospheric Research Group (AppalAIR)
Mailing Address:
Department of Biology
572 Rivers St.
Appalachian State University
Boone, NC 28608
Tel: 828-262-2683; Fax 828-262-2127
Websites:
Academic: http://biology.appstate.edu/faculty-staff/104
Personal: http://www.appstate.edu/~neufeldhs/index.html
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Fall Colors:
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