In 1985 British engineer Paul Birch (1956-2012) published an article in which he defends the eternal growth of human population. Birch criticizes people like the club of Rome who believe there fundamental limits to growth, both of population and economy. The main point of critique in his article is that neo-Malthusians only take terrestrial resources into consideration and ignore the potential of space colonization.

Of course, Birch acknowledges that the resources in our Solar System are also limited, but he points that the universe is much larger than just our Solar System. But then the next question is whether the universe does contains unlimited resources? Though the universe does definitely vast amounts of matter, it is not unlimited. Continue reading →