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So your claim is that evolution will make _any form_ of birth control impossible?

by finnh 7y ago

burfog 7y ago
Birth control would go unused. People who crave huge families are going to win out over those who would rather not have huge families. There probably will be some reproductive organ changes to sometimes defeat some forms of birth control, but mostly this will be brain changes. If people actually want birth control they can invent things faster than we can evolve past them, but if people just want kids then it doesn't matter how effective birth control might be. Non-voluntary measures are possible, but again the evolutionary winners will be the ones who evade that. If the desire for kids is strong enough, people will bribe their way out of mandatory birth control.
- pavel_lishin 7y ago
  I'm not sure that "craving huge families" is a genetic trait.
  - benjohnson 7y ago
    It could be cultural trait that survives from generation to generation. I'm an example: I wanted a large amount of children, and taught my children the joys of a larger family. So far, they think along the same lines.
    - souprock 7y ago
      Nice! I'm the same, with a dozen kids so far. I don't think one can determine if the trait is or isn't cultural by guessing. How could you possibly know the origin of your own mental preferences? Even political affiliation, which sure looks cultural at first glance, has been shown to be under genetic influence.
      - skissane 7y ago
        Some people with large families do so for religious reasons. (Not everyone, obviously.) There is evidence that there are certain genes which promote religiosity. They don't guarantee it – somewhere out there, there is probably an atheist with lots of religiosity promoting genes, and a devout believer with none of them – but they do make religious belief more likely. People who have large families for religious reasons will pass on both their religious beliefs to their children, and also in many cases their genetic predispositions to greater religiosity. Of course, there is no guarantee that the child will stay in the parent's religion, but so long as the retention rate is decent (say >= 70%) the religious belief (and the genetic predisposition to adopt it) will be spread widely through the population. Even though organised religion isn't looking very healthy at the moment (at least in developed countries), this is reason to believe that its long-term prospects are actually quite bright.
  - quotemstr 7y ago
    All traits are heritable.
  - concordDance 7y ago
    Like any craving there's no reason it couldn't become one. It's well accepted that many childless women in their 30s will start to crave having children. Someone with a mutation that causes this craving to happen in their 20s as well will have more kids on average.
paradox242 7y ago
Not quite, he is saying the type of person that birth control selects for is the type of person that wouldn't use it for whatever reason. You can probably imagine these sorts to include those that have some sort of religious objection, those that simply want a large family, or those who are simply irresponsible or unable to use it properly. Given enough time these people are the dominant group remaining in the population. This will take care of the population cap that birth control has imposed. To paraphrase, evolution finds a way.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  That presumes that those traits are hereditable, though.
  - concordDance 7y ago
    Whether or not those traits are currently caused by genes in practice, it is certainly possible for genes to arise that would cause them. Admittedly, for some of those traits the mutation required might be too complicated to be on a relevant time scale. But things like poor impulse control could easily be caused by a mutation (brain injuries can cause poor impulse control, so a mutation that damages those same circuits also could), which would be transmitted and potentially selected for.
tejtm 7y ago
As long as _any_ segment of a population has exponential growth; the population has exponential growth. It is true with bacterial antibiotic resistance, true with cancer cell adaptation to chemo, true on our little blue marble.

So your claim is that evolution will make _any form_ of birth control impossible?

by finnh 7y ago

So your claim is that evolution will make _any form_ of birth control impossible?

Birth control would go unused. People who crave huge families are going to win out over those who would rather not have huge families. There probably will be some reproductive organ changes to sometimes defeat some forms of birth control, but mostly this will be brain changes. If people actually want birth control they can invent things faster than we can evolve past them, but if people just want kids then it doesn't matter how effective birth control might be. Non-voluntary measures are possible, but again the evolutionary winners will be the ones who evade that. If the desire for kids is strong enough, people will bribe their way out of mandatory birth control.

pavel_lishin 7y ago
I'm not sure that "craving huge families" is a genetic trait.
- benjohnson 7y ago
  It could be cultural trait that survives from generation to generation. I'm an example: I wanted a large amount of children, and taught my children the joys of a larger family. So far, they think along the same lines.
  - souprock 7y ago
    Nice! I'm the same, with a dozen kids so far. I don't think one can determine if the trait is or isn't cultural by guessing. How could you possibly know the origin of your own mental preferences? Even political affiliation, which sure looks cultural at first glance, has been shown to be under genetic influence.
    - skissane 7y ago
      Some people with large families do so for religious reasons. (Not everyone, obviously.) There is evidence that there are certain genes which promote religiosity. They don't guarantee it – somewhere out there, there is probably an atheist with lots of religiosity promoting genes, and a devout believer with none of them – but they do make religious belief more likely. People who have large families for religious reasons will pass on both their religious beliefs to their children, and also in many cases their genetic predispositions to greater religiosity. Of course, there is no guarantee that the child will stay in the parent's religion, but so long as the retention rate is decent (say >= 70%) the religious belief (and the genetic predisposition to adopt it) will be spread widely through the population. Even though organised religion isn't looking very healthy at the moment (at least in developed countries), this is reason to believe that its long-term prospects are actually quite bright.
- quotemstr 7y ago
  All traits are heritable.
- concordDance 7y ago
  Like any craving there's no reason it couldn't become one. It's well accepted that many childless women in their 30s will start to crave having children. Someone with a mutation that causes this craving to happen in their 20s as well will have more kids on average.

paradox242 7y ago

Not quite, he is saying the type of person that birth control selects for is the type of person that wouldn't use it for whatever reason. You can probably imagine these sorts to include those that have some sort of religious objection, those that simply want a large family, or those who are simply irresponsible or unable to use it properly. Given enough time these people are the dominant group remaining in the population. This will take care of the population cap that birth control has imposed. To paraphrase, evolution finds a way.

AnimalMuppet 7y ago
That presumes that those traits are hereditable, though.
- concordDance 7y ago
  Whether or not those traits are currently caused by genes in practice, it is certainly possible for genes to arise that would cause them. Admittedly, for some of those traits the mutation required might be too complicated to be on a relevant time scale. But things like poor impulse control could easily be caused by a mutation (brain injuries can cause poor impulse control, so a mutation that damages those same circuits also could), which would be transmitted and potentially selected for.

tejtm 7y ago

As long as _any_ segment of a population has exponential growth; the population has exponential growth. It is true with bacterial antibiotic resistance, true with cancer cell adaptation to chemo, true on our little blue marble.