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Aside from prickly, politicized discussions about gender and identity... it might not be a bad thing altogether to reduce our fertility. We're exhausting the re

Aside from prickly, politicized discussions about gender and identity... it might not be a bad thing altogether to reduce our fertility. We're exhausting the resources of the planet enough as it is.

bpodgursky 5y ago
I don't know if you're really out of date, but the current crisis is that populations in the developed world are about to collapse, and nothing good is going to come of it. But there are 5 billion people in the developing world about to become middle class... you having fewer kids is going to accomplish nothing. We're already going to have to engineer our way through this.
rablackburn 5y ago
We’re projected to stabilise off at about 10 billion I believe. Which while a huge number, is not unsustained exponential growth. As countries get richer and women gain better access to education and improved rights, the countries seem to go through an inflection point where suddenly no one wants to have children and the birth rate falls below replacement (2.0, two children to replace two parents) For us as a species to survive we need to try and stabilise that at 2.0 + some small safety margin (to make up for infertility, people who really don’t want children, or physically can’t). While we’re bound to one planet (which it looks like is going to be for awhile, “sending people to Mars” is very different from “sizeable % of the total human population living on Mars”) it’s preferable for that stable population point to be as small as possible. 10 billion is a lot, but it looks stable at least. If we bring our replacement rate down more to peak the total population earlier, we have this weird problem where the replacement rate is well below 2.0, so no one is having children, and we suddenly have to convince people to start having more. It feels like everything else in life; the birthrate would keep yo-yo-ing above and below replacement rate, and we really don’t want it above while it’s so cramped here and we’re messing up fundamental environmental systems that we rely on. Like everything else these days it seems like it kind of comes back to “well, if you want to do something, first we’ve got to deal with climate instability”. /shrug
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  > 10 billion is a lot, but it looks stable at least. The relevant metric is 10 billion at what level of consumption? Hong Kong style? Maybe. Western developed country style with detached homes with garages, 2 cars, 10k+ (16k+ km) miles of driving, and flying to destinations? I would guess not.
AndrewBissell 5y ago
You're welcome to snip your own gonads if you'd like. Surreptitiously sterilizing entire generations of people without their consent is a bit more morally fraught.

Aside from prickly, politicized discussions about gender and identity... it might not be a bad thing altogether to reduce our fertility. We're exhausting the resources of the planet enough as it is.

bpodgursky 5y ago

I don't know if you're really out of date, but the current crisis is that populations in the developed world are about to collapse, and nothing good is going to come of it. But there are 5 billion people in the developing world about to become middle class... you having fewer kids is going to accomplish nothing. We're already going to have to engineer our way through this.

rablackburn 5y ago

We’re projected to stabilise off at about 10 billion I believe. Which while a huge number, is not unsustained exponential growth. As countries get richer and women gain better access to education and improved rights, the countries seem to go through an inflection point where suddenly no one wants to have children and the birth rate falls below replacement (2.0, two children to replace two parents) For us as a species to survive we need to try and stabilise that at 2.0 + some small safety margin (to make up for infertility, people who really don’t want children, or physically can’t). While we’re bound to one planet (which it looks like is going to be for awhile, “sending people to Mars” is very different from “sizeable % of the total human population living on Mars”) it’s preferable for that stable population point to be as small as possible. 10 billion is a lot, but it looks stable at least. If we bring our replacement rate down more to peak the total population earlier, we have this weird problem where the replacement rate is well below 2.0, so no one is having children, and we suddenly have to convince people to start having more. It feels like everything else in life; the birthrate would keep yo-yo-ing above and below replacement rate, and we really don’t want it above while it’s so cramped here and we’re messing up fundamental environmental systems that we rely on. Like everything else these days it seems like it kind of comes back to “well, if you want to do something, first we’ve got to deal with climate instability”. /shrug

lotsofpulp 5y ago
> 10 billion is a lot, but it looks stable at least. The relevant metric is 10 billion at what level of consumption? Hong Kong style? Maybe. Western developed country style with detached homes with garages, 2 cars, 10k+ (16k+ km) miles of driving, and flying to destinations? I would guess not.

AndrewBissell 5y ago

You're welcome to snip your own gonads if you'd like. Surreptitiously sterilizing entire generations of people without their consent is a bit more morally fraught.