A Metaphor for Human Overreach

By Geoffrey Holland

“Collapse is what happens when denial meets biology.” – Jared Diamond, author of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

There is a true story that reveals the consequences of human neglect, exploitation, and overreach. It happened during World War Two. Saint Mathews is an island in the Aleutian chain off the coast of Alaska. During the war, the U.S. Navy set up a radio and navigation station on Saint Mathews, which had been uninhabited until that time. The island was a tundra covered almost entirely with a thick, flourishing layer of lichen. When the Navy arrived, they imported 29 reindeer to St. Mathews to assure there would be a food supply for the sailors manning the station there. There had never been reindeer on the island till the Navy arrived.

At first, St. Matthews was a paradise for the reindeer. A rich and abundant food supply, no predators; they had no limits. So, the reindeer did what life does in such conditions—the reindeer multiplied. Exponentially.

At the end of the war, the Navy decommissioned its station on Saint Matthews Island. The reindeer were left on their own.

But this island, like our Earth, had ecological boundaries. The reindeer food supply that seemed limitless was not. The lichen the reindeer fed on grew slowly. As the reindeer surged in numbers, they devoured the island’s living skin, its rich carpet of lichen.

In just two decades, the reindeer population exploded from 29 to more than 6,000. As time went on, the reindeer were left with nothing to sustain them. By 1966, only 42 reindeer remained; by 1980, there were no reindeer left on St. Matthews, Island.

Within a generation, the reindeer population on the island collapsed from mass starvation – resulting in extinction.

“What happened to the reindeer on St. Matthew Island is what happens when a population grows beyond the carrying capacity of its environment. It’s a microcosm of the path humanity is now on.” -  William Catton, Author, Overshoot

What to Take from the Plight of the Reindeer

Trapped on an island, the reindeer ate their way to oblivion. There is a big lesson in this for humans. The Earth is our island. In just the past 100 years, the human population has quadrupled in size, from two billion to more than eight billion. While human fertility has begun to decline, we are still adding about 75 million more humans to the total population annually. That amounts to about 25 cities the size of Chicago added every passing year.

Humans have to contend with their own island—our Earth—with  public policy that continues to be about growth and exploitation, while discouraging cultural constraints. We squander our living topsoil; we cut down our forests, exhaust our oceans, and flood our atmosphere with hydrocarbon pollution. We are taking all of our planet’s valuable natural resources for ourselves.

But our living biosphere, too, has boundaries. Coral reefs bleach. Bees and other pollinators vanish. The climate is increasingly destabilized. Top soil is disappearing. Our aquifers and freshwater supplies are shrinking as demand increases. And yet, human numbers continue to grow unchecked.  

Like the reindeer, humans consume mindlessly. We assume we are entitled to take without limits on a planet with resources being pushed toward exhaustion. 

“Nature has a carrying capacity. When it is exceeded, collapse is not a possibility—it is a certainty.” – Donella Meadows, Author, The Limits of Growth

The Answer for Human Overreach

St. Matthew Island did not fail the reindeer. The reindeer did what came naturally. They took until there was nothing left to take. They failed to live within their home’s natural limits.

The question for humanity now is, will we learn from the fateful life events that occurred on St. Matthews Island in Alaska.

Our Earth is a lonely island in the vast cosmic expanse. Unlike the reindeer, we can see the consequences of our own behavior. We have it in us as a global human culture to correct our course in the best way. That can happen if we choose restraint, stewardship, and sustainable balance over entitlement and relentless consumption. 

Let the plight of the reindeer on St. Matthews Island be a primary lesson for every schoolchild. As our planet’s most consequential species, we humans can and must do better. We must teach our children to be the best kind of caring and compassionate people they can be.

“The reindeer were not evil, just unaware. Humanity, on the other hand, has no such excuse.” – Richard Heinberg, Author, Peak Everything