Current Biology has an article (open access, DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2016.08.049) about the extent of wilderness areas around the world (except Antarctica). The authors found a decrease of 9.6% in the extent of those areas in the 2010s, as compared to the early 1990s.
For 3 of the 14 biomes (kinds of ecosystems)—"Tropical and Subtropical Coniferous Forests, Mangroves, and Tropical and Subtropical Dry Broadleaf Forests"—there remain no contiguous areas of at least 10,000 km2, say the authors. However, such large contiguous areas do comprise 82.3% of all wild lands.
They note that
the total stock of terrestrial ecosystem carbon (~1,950 petagrams of [c]arbon (Pg C)) is greater than that of oil (∼173 Pg C), gas (∼383 Pg C), coal (∼446 Pg C), or the atmosphere (∼598 Pg C), and a significant proportion of this carbon is found in the globally significant wilderness areas of the tropics and boreal region.
and recommend legal protection for wild lands as part of efforts against emission of carbon dioxide.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 15 2016, @08:35PM
Please name one ecologic/environmental problem that is made BETTER by larger populations.
JoeMerchant did mention scientific progress and technology development. But I have to ask, did you read my post? I wasn't defending growing population. I was criticizing terrible development models that can never be falsified.