"We aren't good at long term planning, but great at short term fixes to problems."

Also at finding long term ways of doing things better.

"It's foolish to think that the earth can support unlimited numbers of humans."

I think it is foolish to suggest anyone is making the argument that the earth can support unlimited numbers of humans. I have not seen a single person suggest that.

The point being made was that human progress isn't always easy, pretty or in a straight line. It is often two steps forward, one step back. When one problem is fixed to allow more growth it will create other problems elsewhere that slow things down. Oftentimes bigger problems elsewhere. Then those problems will get fixed and we will get even more growth. And so on and so on.

If you went back to the Emperor of China, in say 1700, and told him that in less than 300 years his country was going to need to support 1 billion people (up from less than 100 million, after he consulted with his advisors he would have panicked. His advisors would tell him that there was no way his lands and the seas around them could feed that many people. Where are they going to house all of those people? What were they all going to do for jobs? How would it me possible to effectively govern a country of a billion people.

Yet here they are. China easily supports 1 billion people. There is enough food, enough places to live, and enough people working.

If you would have went back to a Native American chief and told him that 330 million people were going to live off of the land he currently leads his tribe on, he would have doubted you. There weren't going to be enough bison to hunt or enough horses to ride for everyone. Yet here we are.

The point is, Doomers always look at is where humankind is right now and then project population growth out and then predict doom because the world as it currently is constructed cannot support that many people. They somehow forget that knowledge, technology, etc. are not going to just stay like they are right now either. Just like the population grows, technology and knowledge will advance. It won't always be easy or pretty and I am quite certain there are going to be lots and lots of local dislocations, but there is still plenty of room and resources for the population to grow.

From the 30,000 foot view, humans need three things to survive (and even thrive): Food, water, and energy. Right now, the world has plenty of food. We have more of an obesity epidemic than we do a starvation epidemic. Plus there is plenty of room to grow more food if we need it. In fact, we have been dedicating less space to growing food because we have become so efficient at it. As for water, there is plenty of it. Over 70% of the earth's surface is covered in it. It is just sitting there ignored. It is so plentiful that we haven't even spent that much time thinking how to more efficiently use it. The earth has plenty of water. When water truly gets scarce it will rise on price and when it rises in price some smart person will figure out how to use it more efficiently. As for energy, we still have that huge fusion reactor 93 million miles away bombarding the earth with a ridiculous amount of energy each and every day.

Some people just want to be negative Doomers. So they turn off their brain and pretend technology is never going to advance.