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Personally, I'm investing in fertility companies/pharmaceuticals.

EGreg 8y ago
I didn’t downvote you. I think this is a relevant comment. What companies have you invested in and aren’t you worried about overpopulation?
- cimmanom 8y ago
  Most people who get fertility treatments are struggling to have one child, or at most a second - which is still below replacement rate. Fertility treatments for people who waited too long to have kids isn't going to contribute to overpopulation. In fact, if anything, by making it more viable to wait to have children until later in life, and thus increasing the age of first reproduction relative to lifespan (i.e. slowing the reproductive cycle), fertility treatments could contribute to a slowing of population growth.
- YinglingLight 8y ago
  When women get educated in a country, the 'overpopulation threat' becomes a comedic punchline in said country. Every. time.
- beat 8y ago
  Overpopulation isn't an actual problem. The rate of new births has been steady for decades now, and will remain steady into the foreseeable future. There are about 2 billion children in the world now; the UN expects there will be about 2 billion children in 2100. The population growth we're seeing today is a result of increased life expectancy, not increased birth rate, and it will flatten out in a few decades. High birth rates are a product of extreme poverty, where child mortality is a problem. It doesn't take a lot of wealth for a country to solve most of the basic child killers (sanitation and access to clean water, vaccination, and most importantly, mothers who can read). And the extreme poverty rate is plummeting - from 29% in the 1990s to just 9% today. Fertility treatments are a luxury, something that only the wealthiest tenth or so of the world can even afford. It's for people who are struggling to have one child, not trying to get their fifth.
  - dudul 8y ago
    Aren't studies predicting that Africa is gonna double in population size over the next 50 years? Are they anticipating massive depopulation of some countries/continents to even it out then?
    - pitaj 8y ago
      It wouldn't be overpopulated, even if that happened. It would take orders of magnitude of population growth to overpopulate the Earth.
      - dudul 8y ago
        I wasn't talking about the idea of overpopulation. I was surprised to see that the total count of kids was predicted to be so stable, while at the same time we're expecting ~1 billion more people in Africa.
        beat 8y ago
        You have to think about the math in terms of generations. It takes a couple of generations for the processes that reduce child mortality rates and increase adult lifespans to take hold. So there's a boom generation that will be much larger and live much longer than originally expected. As the life expectancy changes from 50 to 70, that's a lot more people - people born a half-century earlier.
      - EGreg 8y ago
        Just because the rate of growth is declining doesn’t mean the absolute numbers - when extrapolated out - won’t exceed some given threshold. You need to be more specific with your numbers.
      - mirimir 8y ago
        I guess that depends on how one defines "overpopulated". As it is, total biomass of livestock exceeds that of all wild mammals. Certainly, if we were clever enough, we could have a world with very little biodiversity. Basically, just humans, livestock, pets, managed trees and food crops, and associated pests. But that would arguably be a tragedy. And it would be extremely fragile, and prone to disasterous collapse.
- bobmarley1 8y ago
  Malthusian overpopulation stopped being a serious scientific theory years ago. https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_...
  - overkalix 8y ago
    > And if, but only if, we invest in the right green technology Key sentence of the presentation. Population overshoot is a fact.

I didn’t downvote you. I think this is a relevant comment. What companies have you invested in and aren’t you worried about overpopulation?

cimmanom 8y ago
Most people who get fertility treatments are struggling to have one child, or at most a second - which is still below replacement rate. Fertility treatments for people who waited too long to have kids isn't going to contribute to overpopulation. In fact, if anything, by making it more viable to wait to have children until later in life, and thus increasing the age of first reproduction relative to lifespan (i.e. slowing the reproductive cycle), fertility treatments could contribute to a slowing of population growth.
YinglingLight 8y ago
When women get educated in a country, the 'overpopulation threat' becomes a comedic punchline in said country. Every. time.
beat 8y ago
Overpopulation isn't an actual problem. The rate of new births has been steady for decades now, and will remain steady into the foreseeable future. There are about 2 billion children in the world now; the UN expects there will be about 2 billion children in 2100. The population growth we're seeing today is a result of increased life expectancy, not increased birth rate, and it will flatten out in a few decades. High birth rates are a product of extreme poverty, where child mortality is a problem. It doesn't take a lot of wealth for a country to solve most of the basic child killers (sanitation and access to clean water, vaccination, and most importantly, mothers who can read). And the extreme poverty rate is plummeting - from 29% in the 1990s to just 9% today. Fertility treatments are a luxury, something that only the wealthiest tenth or so of the world can even afford. It's for people who are struggling to have one child, not trying to get their fifth.
- dudul 8y ago
  Aren't studies predicting that Africa is gonna double in population size over the next 50 years? Are they anticipating massive depopulation of some countries/continents to even it out then?
  - pitaj 8y ago
    It wouldn't be overpopulated, even if that happened. It would take orders of magnitude of population growth to overpopulate the Earth.
    - dudul 8y ago
      I wasn't talking about the idea of overpopulation. I was surprised to see that the total count of kids was predicted to be so stable, while at the same time we're expecting ~1 billion more people in Africa.
      - beat 8y ago
        You have to think about the math in terms of generations. It takes a couple of generations for the processes that reduce child mortality rates and increase adult lifespans to take hold. So there's a boom generation that will be much larger and live much longer than originally expected. As the life expectancy changes from 50 to 70, that's a lot more people - people born a half-century earlier.
    - EGreg 8y ago
      Just because the rate of growth is declining doesn’t mean the absolute numbers - when extrapolated out - won’t exceed some given threshold. You need to be more specific with your numbers.
    - mirimir 8y ago
      I guess that depends on how one defines "overpopulated". As it is, total biomass of livestock exceeds that of all wild mammals. Certainly, if we were clever enough, we could have a world with very little biodiversity. Basically, just humans, livestock, pets, managed trees and food crops, and associated pests. But that would arguably be a tragedy. And it would be extremely fragile, and prone to disasterous collapse.
bobmarley1 8y ago
Malthusian overpopulation stopped being a serious scientific theory years ago. https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_...
- overkalix 8y ago
  > And if, but only if, we invest in the right green technology Key sentence of the presentation. Population overshoot is a fact.