A new poll of American scientists suggests that a large majority of them (82 percent) regard population growth as a major challenge, almost as many as those who believe that climate change is mostly due to human activity (87 percent). The poll, which was conducted by the Pew Research Center, indicates that a clear majority of the American public (59 percent) are concerned that there won’t be enough food and resources to accommodate a growing world population, but the level of concern in the scientific community, as with climate change, is noticeably higher. On one level, the poll results are not surprising. For decades now leading scientists have been warning that humanity is overusing planetary resources and inflicting dangerous harm on the environment. Earlier this month 18 scientists authored a paper in the journal Science warning that humanity is encroaching on nine “planetary boundaries,” and that we have already […]