There is a huge amount of space between "not really an issue" and "it will not lead to humanity’s demise".

Like how folks cherry picks reports on health by focusing on fatalities rather than incidents.

It is like how you can have a car crash much safer nowadays than ever before, doesn't make car crashes fine or good.

Please also cite where he allegedly said that it's a doomsday event before you put up the strawman and debunk it with "look even this guy changed his mind"

Edit: The only concrete thing I've found in trying to seek through your tedious video links for 10 minutes (idk why I'm spending my time on this but here we are) is the claim that, instead of living healthily, we'd be "constantly dealing with the human and financial crises at a historic scale". That's in line with the text you've quoted: it'll not be the end of all humans but it's a serious consequence for all of us (but not evenly distributed, even if it affects everyone to some degree)

Sorry, I didn’t double check indeed. I posted the wrong TED talk from him, see [1] at 4:21. There he says we need to limit climate change by limiting population growth. I think this is quite a hypocritical stance from someone who flies private jet all year.

[1]: https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I

New strawman! Now it's no longer "Gates changed his mind on it being an existential crisis" but "Gates wants population control"

The source again doesn't check out. He says:

- the formula at ~4:21: more people use more energy (I think that stands to reason)

- you hear laughter as he then says "one of these factors [in the formula] will have to get pretty near to zero". It seems exceedingly obvious to me that the next slide being about the people term of the formula is either a joke (and recognised as such by the other listeners) or a mistake about switching the slide too soon. If this is your evidence that Bill Gates wanted to solve climate by eradicating populations, it's going to need to be backed up somewhere else, preferably also by actions as he has put a lot of his money where his mouth is, that shouldn't be hard to find tangible evidence of

- 4:47 mentions how much we could reduce population growth by e.g. offering condoms and pills to people that otherwise don't have access to them, and by offering vaccinations to people that can't afford them (since better survival of parents causes lower birth rate)

As for whether it's hypocritical that he flies jets (to an unspecified amount), idk, if I could offset my emissions to negative a gigaton per year then I'd also feel like I'm doing my bit. It would still be better if he didn't fly, I can see how one calls him a hypocrite for that part and perhaps even agree, but in this context it seems like yet another angle to this argument seemingly designed to hate him no matter what he really says and does

Excellent reply. Having children is great, but no one can deny that when we had ours, times were different in almost every way. Our grandchildren have much more to think about and different ways to think about it. Governments, on the other hand, look at families with an agenda in mind. (As in future tax payers, soldiers and consumers. Personal freedoms be damned, like the over turning of RvW.) Population growth in my lifetime has not been good in almost every way. The lack of all birth control (if some governments have their way) will threaten all future generations.