In the mid-twentieth century, the rampant population growth worried many who feared imminent overcrowding, overpopulation, and societal collapse.Ĭalhoun’s early experiments involved a 28-month study of a colony of Norway rats in a 10,000-square-foot outdoor pen. It was the stuff of nightmares – at least to the nervous 1970s audience. He coined the term “behavioral sink” to describe the so-called aberrant behaviors resulting from overcrowded population densities. Known as the neo-Malthusians (after 18 th-century scholar Thomas Malthus), they predicted a terrifying future if the rollercoaster of human population growth rose ever higher they dared to look down.Įthologist John Calhoun’s Rat Utopia experiments fueled these fears, pointing towards a spiraling degradation of normal social interactions. Short stories like Billennuim warned of a world of box-like apartments and pedestrian congestion lasting days, where every inch of land is devoted to housing or farming. In the mid-twentieth century, the rampant population growth worried many who feared imminent overcrowding, overpopulation, and societal collapse. The soaring trajectory of human population growth over the past two centuries is now an accepted fact – an ascending rollercoaster without any sense of down. Surely, such a startling statistic should be front-page news. That’s more people than have ever existed! In fact, a jaw-dropping 7pc of people who have ever lived are alive today.

Global population estimates exceeded 8 billion people in November 2022. John Calhoun Inside Universe 25 – The Biggest Mouse Utopia.

Mouse utopia experiment john calhoun