(cont'd from yesterday's post)
Thanos thinks that there's only a finite amount of resources (like iron ore, petroleum, etc.) which must be divided up among all the people. "Too many mouths" means they will "face extinction" unless he murders half of them.
Thanos is not the only one who believes this. Way back in 1798, Thomas Malthus wrote an essay with the same idea: "The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race."
The earth had about a billion people in his time and he thought they were in trouble. But in the 300 years since then earth's population has grown to over 7 billion -- and we are much wealthier in material goods than his generation was.
What happened? Why do people have more material wealth today, in spite of the population being 7 times bigger?
(cont'd tomorrow)
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