The Theory of Population

Flora Lau
11/18/19
The Theory of Population
  1. According to Malthus, what is the general nature of all animated life?
     That is the constant tendency of all animated life to increase beyond the nourishment provided for it.

  2. According to Malthus, what is the most positive check on human population growth that has existed in history?
    The positive checks to population are extremely various, and include every cause, whether arising from vice or misery, which in any degree contributes to shorten the natural duration of human life.

  3. Describe Malthus’ idea of arithmetic growth of food supply v geometric growth of human population. 
  4. Discuss Malthus’ idea of positive and preventive checks on human population. Provide examples of both.  
    The preventative check, peculiar to man, arises from his reasoning faculties, which enable him to calculate distant consequences. He sees the distress which frequently presses upon those who have large families; he cannot contemplate his present possessions or earnings, and calculate the amount of each share, when they must be divided, perhaps, among seven or eight, without feeling a doubt whether he may be able to support the offspring which probably will be brought into the world. The positive checks to population are extremely various, and include every cause, whether arising from vice or misery, which in any degree contributes to shorten the natural duration of human life. Under this head may be enumerated all unwholesome occupations, severe labor, exposure to the seasons, extreme poverty, bad nursing of children, great towns, excesses of all kinds, the whole train of common diseases, wars, plagues, and famines

  5. RESEARCH: Was Malthus Right? Read the article and do some outside research if necessary and decide whether or not Malthus was right.  

     Yes and no. No, if only because no one thing in the complex real world can have such singular explanatory power. And no, more specifically to his argument, because subsistence is no longer an issue.

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