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IMHO a voluntary reduction in human population by a few billion through reduced birth is a perfectly viable, sustainable long-term strategy; all the drawbacks a

IMHO a voluntary reduction in human population by a few billion through reduced birth is a perfectly viable, sustainable long-term strategy; all the drawbacks and criticisms appear when someone wants to encourage that with various means (i.e. not fully voluntarily) or when it's posed as some solution to things which need a faster reduction than possible this way, e.g. climate change won't be prevented even if we went totally zero-birth for a decade but the current population kept the current emission rates.

unsupp0rted 4y ago
It doesn't even have to be voluntarily in the sense of "making a decision to". More like voluntary in the sense of "have no specific need to". In the most developed countries, children are now more of a burden than a gain, which is why women are having fewer of them every generation. Not only because they're expensive, but because they are often born unhealthy (physically, mentally, or both) and are a large, often unrecoverable blow to most careers. Since we don't need children to work on the farm or to let us move in with them when we're old (er, less than previous generations, anyway), it becomes purely a "nice-to-have" decision. And then if somebody does voluntarily have children, they don't have much of a leg to stand on when lecturing others about their impact on climate change.
- gpvos 4y ago
  You were doing so fine until the last sentence.
- allendoerfer 4y ago
  I get your point and am on neither side of the fence here, since I do not think, we should rely on individual action at all. I just want to add to the conversation, that somehow your reasoning strikes me as a bit selfish. It is of course true, what you are writing. Still reading it, makes me sad. I am missing some higher meaning. Who cares about a career in the end? A career in our system is just a story of someone, who exceeded at providing value. But for whom, if you do not have kids? I am missing a bit of Kant in there. A little bit of "You get one (life), you give one back." We (including you) just cannot all do it like that, if we do not want to end our lives rather uncomfortably. So again something about ultimate maximes and what they should be.
  - unsupp0rted 4y ago
    What's selfish about not having children? To whom or to what do I owe bringing a child into the world? It's more likely the opposite: a lot of people would agree that their parents' decision to have children, particularly at a time when they couldn't afford them or lacked the mental strength to care for them and raise them in psychological safety, was selfish.
    - nazgul17 4y ago
      To my children, who will labour to sustain you, too, in your late life.
      - unsupp0rted 4y ago
        I don't owe having children to your children, or to you. You can have children if you want, but I'm not requiring that of you. If your children take care of me late in life, it's because they're exchanging their work for money. And the reason they're obligated to exchange their work for money is because that's the economic system into which their parents decided to bring them.
        allendoerfer 4y ago
        You do not owe anything to anyone here. You just cannot construct a moral high ground based on your childlessness. It is not moral to not have children. Paraphrasing Kant: An action is moral, if the state improves when everyone does it. You cannot recommend everyone to not have children, since you depend on them. So why bring it up as an argument in a thread about climate change in the first place? The argument is hypocritical. It just does not make much sense. Do you see it as an optimization problem, where others have exactly enough children to care for you at old age, but so few that the climate suffers as little as possible? If so, you are still relying on the children and do not gain any more imaginary rights to pollute than those parents.
    - effingwewt 4y ago
      Accidents happen, and now with Roe V Wade repeal even more will. Not everyone gets to make the conscious choice. Sounds more like you've given up and are using it as the moral high ground. To turn your earlier phrase- 'Sorry, I don't take advice from people who are removed from the human race.' Sounds stupid, because it is. You do what you can, I will do what I can. But don't think for a second you are better than anyone else over a single choice you made.

unsupp0rted 4y ago

It doesn't even have to be voluntarily in the sense of "making a decision to". More like voluntary in the sense of "have no specific need to". In the most developed countries, children are now more of a burden than a gain, which is why women are having fewer of them every generation. Not only because they're expensive, but because they are often born unhealthy (physically, mentally, or both) and are a large, often unrecoverable blow to most careers. Since we don't need children to work on the farm or to let us move in with them when we're old (er, less than previous generations, anyway), it becomes purely a "nice-to-have" decision. And then if somebody does voluntarily have children, they don't have much of a leg to stand on when lecturing others about their impact on climate change.

gpvos 4y ago
You were doing so fine until the last sentence.
allendoerfer 4y ago
I get your point and am on neither side of the fence here, since I do not think, we should rely on individual action at all. I just want to add to the conversation, that somehow your reasoning strikes me as a bit selfish. It is of course true, what you are writing. Still reading it, makes me sad. I am missing some higher meaning. Who cares about a career in the end? A career in our system is just a story of someone, who exceeded at providing value. But for whom, if you do not have kids? I am missing a bit of Kant in there. A little bit of "You get one (life), you give one back." We (including you) just cannot all do it like that, if we do not want to end our lives rather uncomfortably. So again something about ultimate maximes and what they should be.
- unsupp0rted 4y ago
  What's selfish about not having children? To whom or to what do I owe bringing a child into the world? It's more likely the opposite: a lot of people would agree that their parents' decision to have children, particularly at a time when they couldn't afford them or lacked the mental strength to care for them and raise them in psychological safety, was selfish.
  - nazgul17 4y ago
    To my children, who will labour to sustain you, too, in your late life.
    - unsupp0rted 4y ago
      I don't owe having children to your children, or to you. You can have children if you want, but I'm not requiring that of you. If your children take care of me late in life, it's because they're exchanging their work for money. And the reason they're obligated to exchange their work for money is because that's the economic system into which their parents decided to bring them.
      - allendoerfer 4y ago
        You do not owe anything to anyone here. You just cannot construct a moral high ground based on your childlessness. It is not moral to not have children. Paraphrasing Kant: An action is moral, if the state improves when everyone does it. You cannot recommend everyone to not have children, since you depend on them. So why bring it up as an argument in a thread about climate change in the first place? The argument is hypocritical. It just does not make much sense. Do you see it as an optimization problem, where others have exactly enough children to care for you at old age, but so few that the climate suffers as little as possible? If so, you are still relying on the children and do not gain any more imaginary rights to pollute than those parents.
  - effingwewt 4y ago
    Accidents happen, and now with Roe V Wade repeal even more will. Not everyone gets to make the conscious choice. Sounds more like you've given up and are using it as the moral high ground. To turn your earlier phrase- 'Sorry, I don't take advice from people who are removed from the human race.' Sounds stupid, because it is. You do what you can, I will do what I can. But don't think for a second you are better than anyone else over a single choice you made.