4 ms·
Seems like natural selection would take care of this sort of thing quickly enough...
by carsongross 11y ago
Seems like natural selection would take care of this sort of thing quickly enough...
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y agoWould you care to explain.
- maskedinvader 11y agoI think he/she means, Those who feel the same way would not contribute to the gene pool and hence eventually only those who want to have kids will remain, He/She of course makes the assumption that there is a Genotype or Phenotype to select for in the first place. ps. edit gender
- Kristine1975 11y agoI doubt it's genetic, since there is a long history of people choosing not to have children: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childfree#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childfree#History
- brianwawok 11y agoThis is more reverse natural selection... i.e. the most intelligent career driven people seem much more likely to want to go kid free.
- Moshe_Silnorin 11y agoSo what will be selected for is intelligent people who explicitly value having children and people who are unable to follow the instructions on the back of the contraception packaging.
- puredemo 11y agoThat's the net effect of contraceptives in general. People with better future planning ability are the only ones who use birth control, by definition.
- fps 11y agoThere's no "reverse natural selection", the same as there's no "reverse evolution." If what you say is true (and I'm not certain that it is) then being intelligent and career driven is not a desirable trait for natural selection's purposes, and natural selection is working as expected.
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- hyperchase 11y agoThere is no such thing as "reverse" natural selection. It's just that intelligence and being career driven are not a favorable trait for natural selection. It's working just fine.
- facepalm 11y agocitation needed (Marissa Mayer and Sheryl Sandberg come to mind as immediate counterexamples).
- TheOtherHobbes 11y agoActually there's a mountain of evidence that the more educated you are, the more likely you are to delay or avoid parenthood. Here's just one paper: http://www.jstor.org/stable/585126?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents http://www.jstor.org/stable/585126?seq=1#page_scan_tab_conte... Individual women who happen to be relatively well known have nothing useful to tell you about social trends.
- facepalm 11y agoI'm not convinced that implies a want to be kids free.
- vikiomega9 11y agoI think you meant to say _inversion_ of natural selection.
- mattthebaker 11y agoIts time for humanity to realize that genes are no longer the only replicator driving our evolution. Having evolved consciousness, we now have the ability to spread ideas, inventions, values, etc. -- memes if you will. This is why humanity has beat all other species, and what drives progress on a societal scale. Memes evolve much faster than genes. The intelligent career driven people are busy replicating memes -- inventions, discoveries, institutions, influence, etc. The best memes survive and evolve. Is it better for humanity to discover penicillin or preserve a single bloodline?
- Zikes 11y agoTechnically you could say the same of homosexuality, but that only seems to be growing.