He here pulled out a pencil of curious make and with his middle left hand dashed off some strange looking characters on a blank space on the profile. He was evidently figuring, for in a moment he went on to say that he found that when the 40,000,000 square miles of habitable land on the earth were divided equally between 12,000,000,000, of people they would have about two acres each.
I ventured to say, I did not think two acres enough to furnish an individual with food, taking his chances of bad seasons from droughts, floods etc. Besides men could hardly live without timber and they could have none if all the land were cultivated. Moreover, they must have animals to furnish leather, wool etc., and land would be required for their sustenance.
Land must be also devoted to cotton, flax hemp and so on for clothes etc. When you allow for such things as these, I said, I thought the area devoted to the production of food would not be much over one acre to the individual by the year 2070, if he was right about the number of people there would then be.
“You are only thinking of the crude methods people had in your day of getting their food from the earth,” said he. “They were at the mercy of the uncontrolled action of natural forces and accidents. The rain and sunshine naturally falling on an acre of land enabled them to raise so many bushels of wheat or beans or carrots or beets. But if the rain did not fall or the sun failed to shine or there was too much rain or too much sunshine or the weather was too cold or the wind too boisterous, the farmer was at the mercy of the fickle elements and his crop a failure. In a few places irrigation was practiced, men got a partial control of the conditions, but these places were limited, and the control incomplete.
“If you will call to mind the information I have given you of the artificial production of food and other necessaries of existence among the Lunarians, you will readily see that the resources of the earth to sustain its population do not depend altogether on the amount of land surface that men can cultivate to beets and potatoes—the amount on which the sun shines and the rain falls. Surface you must have of course for people to live and to move on. But when you learn how to utilize it there is material under every acre on an average, more than sufficient for the sustenance of all the people that could stand on it. The soil in which you plant your seeds is nothing but the disintegrated rock of a thin layer of the surface of the earth. Below it are rocks of the same sort in quantities enough to make millions of such soils. If you knew how, you could make your food products out of the soil directly instead of waiting for the growth of plants in it, and if the soil should give out you could make them from the rocks below.”
“Yes,” said I, “but will mankind ever find out how to do this? Will you wise and experienced Lunarians show us?”
“No, it is not necessary that we should. You will find it out fast enough yourselves. Your chemists even in your day had begun to take lessons in chemical synthesis, and as time went on, and the necessity increased, their efforts were stimulated and constantly became more successful until now they can produce a number of artificial foods from the original elements without the necessity of raising vegetables or animals by the action of natural growth. Looking over into the twenty-first century, we see that they will easily be able to produce food from the elements as fast as required. Their abilities and facilities will keep pace with the population. This implies that the race will not have to be checked in its expansion by lack of food. The feature of evolution and selection of the fittest by means of a struggle for food will be entirely eliminated. The matter will be entirely in the hands of the people themselves.”
“How about clothing,” I asked, “will they produce that too by the aid of chemistry?”
“Yes they will. Sheep will not be required for their wool any more than their flesh. A substitute will be found for leather as well as beef. Better and more durable clothing will be made directly from minerals than were produced in your time from vegetable and animal substances. Metals and artificial mineral products began early in the twentieth century and even before, to supplant wood in buildings and many other structures. So at present the use of wood is greatly reduced and during the coming century it will be almost discontinued; a great many things are now made of Alumina that were formerly made of wood, and that metal has become cheaper and more abundant than iron. Glass is also very much used, and methods have been discovered of giving it any desired temper, so that it is made flexible and tough like pewter or firm and elastic like steel. It can also be made fibrous and soft as cotton and can be spun and woven into textile fabrics.”
“But what are they going to do for power and fuel?” I asked. “If there is to be such an increase of population, an enormous consumption of fuel and power will follow. Of course they will use the coal while it lasts, but the supply of that limited, and if that is the only dependence, all industries will sooner or later be brought to an end.”