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Human population will also change a lot. Subpopulations with very high fertility (like fundamentalist Christians or hassidic Jews or the population of Chad) wil
by concordDance 3y ago
Human population will also change a lot. Subpopulations with very high fertility (like fundamentalist Christians or hassidic Jews or the population of Chad) will be a much larger proportion of the population while groups like the South Koreans decline.
I expect this to have pretty large effects,though predicting what those will be seems difficult.
- krona 3y agoThe Past is a Future Country: The Coming Conservative Demographic Revolution explores the possible consequences in great detail. It's happened many times before, though never on this scale.
- rayiner 3y agoInterestingly, global religiosity is projected to increase by 2050, because most of the atheist/secular societies (especially China) are in a state of population decline: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/12/25/460797744/a-religious-forecast-for-2050-atheism-is-down-islam-is-rising https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/12/25/4607977...
- amanaplanacanal 3y agoI don’t think we can assume that children will continue in their parents religion though. The US, for instance, is much less religious than it used to be.
- krona 3y agoThe genetics (and heritability more generally) of religiosity are fairly well understood.
- jfengel 3y agoFairly, but Western countries started as very religious and are losing that at varying rates. Heritability is real but far from absolute. All other things being equal I'd expect it to reach an equilibrium. I don't think all other things are equal in this case, and nonbelief becomes more attractive over time (for better or worse).
- ascar 3y agoAre they? Would you elaborate on it or link some reading material? I've never heard of religion being heritary and your claim is pretty strong to just throw out there without any additional information.
- skissane 3y agoOne 2005 twin study [0] found religiosity was approximately 40% genetic. [1] argues that pro-religion alleles are likely to become more common over time, since in the contemporary world religious people (on average) have more children than the non-religious It seems unlikely there is any single "God gene". Rather, certain personality traits (such as agreeableness) increase the likelihood of a person accepting religion, and genetics contributes to those traits, which in turn indirectly contributes to religiosity [0] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15745438/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15745438/ [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3125629/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3125629/
- rayiner 3y agoThe western world is an exception to the general norm. Virtually everyone in the country where I’m from follows their parent’s religion, for example. Anyway, the folks at Pew are pretty smart. I’m sure they’re accounting for that.
- jlokom 3y ago>The western world is an exception to the general norm I see this quoted a lot, but I don't think it's true: + There are plenty of places (and with a significant population) outside the western world that are quite secular and have become more secular in the past decades + There are places in the West that have become more religious. If by "Western" you mean just "Western Europe", then, yeah, that's a specially secular place but it's also a tiny place in both population and area. China, Japan and South Korea are quite secular in many ways. A big chunk of Latin America is now quite secular too. You already have ~1.5B people fairly secular people that are non western. On the other hand, countries like Poland or Hungary (which I'm guessing we would classify as Western) are becoming more religious.
- slaw 3y ago> On the other hand, countries like Poland or Hungary (which I'm guessing we would classify as Western) are becoming more religious. That is not true. Where did you get that idea?
- randomdata 3y agoThe US is much less religious with respect to the traditionally recognized religions (e.g. Christianity), but it seems that religious energy is still ever present in non-traditional religions.
- satvikpendem 3y ago> religious energy is still ever present in non-traditional religions. Which would those be? Are you talking about stuff like the rise of astrology and numerology in the US?
- Game_Ender 3y agoI think they are talking about the fervent fringe political ideologies, like trumpism or being very woke.
- Barrin92 3y agoIn a nominal sense this is true because people fairly rarely renounce their religious identity, qualitatively it's almost certainly not the case. On paper 84% of the Irish population are still Christian, de facto the country is much more secular than it was decades ago resulting in legalization of abortion, gay marriage, removal of blasphemy laws, the world's fifth gay head of state etc. Secularization within formally religious groups is progressing much faster than change in demographics.
- rayiner 3y agoA few hundred million Europeans are becoming more secular. While a billion Indians are becoming more religious.
- tuatoru 3y agoA billion Indians are becoming more religious? Really? Politics is polarising along lines of religious identity, yes, but increasing religious behaviour? Going to temples more, donating more of their incomes? Are you sure?
- wslh 3y agoIt is not a subpopulation but Islam followers also have high fertility rates that challenges politics in countries such as France.
- rayiner 3y agoIslam is especially potent on the fertility front because marriage and having children are considered a central moral obligation: https://www.alislam.org/book/pathway-to-paradise/islamic-marriage-system https://www.alislam.org/book/pathway-to-paradise/islamic-mar.... Even among relatively secular muslims, the concept of “child free” would be something you wouldn’t say out loud.
- emodendroket 3y agoThe same thing appears in the Bible so forgive my skepticism that Muslims will be unique among followers of Abrahamic religions in not facing the same pressures of the modern world everyone else does.
- teaearlgraycold 3y agoI think it’s likely that within a few decades they go through a similar cultural change to what Christians went through.
- johnnymorgan 3y agoAnd you would be correct, if people drilled down into the data you'd see the birth rate drops off massively by 2nd/3rd gen when they hit the modern world. It's the Amish and Mennonites that seem to retain people well by having it be optional. America is more likely to be Amish than anything else if we got solely by the trend. I'd say there is a lot more too it than that
- teaearlgraycold 3y agoGood old linear extrapolation
- diego_moita 3y ago> or hassidic Jews or the population of Chad Which, BTW, live close to the centre of Global Warming's bullseye. We might need to add extra variables on such forecasts.
- kingkawn 3y agoThose religious populations have always had high fertility, and also always had high rates of departure from the religious communities. I wouldn’t make any bets on their worldviews suddenly dominating the world anew
- bhouston 3y agoConservative Judaism is essentially replacing liberal/secular Judaism in both the us and Israel while the population is still growing. So at least in the near term this is a real thing. Religious populations out reproducing non religious is a real thing.
- catlover76 3y agoTo be clear, there is a difference between "Conservative Judaism" and Hassidic Judaism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Judaism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Judaism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasidic_Judaism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasidic_Judaism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Orthodox_Judaism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Orthodox_Judaism I think the general point you're making probably still stands, but I think the distinction is more than merely pedantic.
- Racing0461 3y agoChad the country, or chad the Chad.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- datavirtue 3y agoNo joking, singing, or dancing allowed on HN.
- huytersd 3y agoMiddle easterners and Muslims in general have a lot of kids.
- wolverine876 3y agoWho exactly? Where? Can you show a correlation between the geography (where? from Iran and Egypt?) and birth rate? Religion and birth rate? Vague, non-specific, evidence-free comments in highly sensitive areas lead to all sorts of bad stuff.
- csomar 3y agoBoth Egypt and Iran have relatively high birth rate. Especially when you consider the difficult geography they live in.
- langitbiru 3y agoYes, Egypt has a high fertility rate, 2.9. But Iran does not. It only has 1.6. For comparison, Japan has 1.26.
- abenga 3y agoTrue. Rich and stable ME states (UAE, …) have very low birth rates. The ones that have undergone turmoil like Yemen have higher birthrates.
- logicchains 3y agoSaudi Arabia has a birthrate of around 2.5, and it's quite stable.
- huytersd 3y ago[flagged]
- shmde 3y agoIslam is the fastest growing religion in the world. Their growth rate is more than Christianity and Hinduism combined. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2017/04/06/why-muslims-are-the-worlds-fastest-growing-religious-group/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2017/04/06/why-musli... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_population_growth https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_population_growth
- standardUser 3y agoThe problem with those high-fertility groups is that they usually come with a lot of baggage - specifically they require belief in the made-up nonsense that tends to fade away as the demographic shift advances. So, they may maintain higher fertility rates, but I'd wager more and more of their kids will break away from a religion/belief system that appears increasingly absurd and stifling as the rest of the world moves on.
- influx 3y agoWhich belief system is more absurd, one which the adherents maintain or gain in population, or one which they go extinct? Which one is more fit to the environment?
- standardUser 3y agoIf you have a point to make, feel free to make it.
- geraldwhen 3y agoAll belief systems are equally absurd.
- wizofaus 3y agoSounds like one of those "having no belief system is a still a belief system" type arguments...
- 3y ago
- narrator 3y agoI think the influence of religion is people who are religious have lower expectations for life and think having kids is enough. Most secular people think they ought to be rich first and then have kids.
- Teever 3y agoI've had similar thoughts, and I think that we're gearing up to see a showdown between the populations you describe and the populations that embrace things like embryo selection, artificial wombs, and vaccines. What's going to be really interesting are the intersection between these two populations -- At some point some heavy breeding religious people are going to realize that as good as their heavy birthrate strategy is a heavy birthrate strategy combined with the technological advances I describe above is even better. Imagine a near future where some ambitious and forward thinking Mennonites/Hutterites/Doukhobors/Amish are pumping out legions of productive, obedient and consistent workers in rural North America while urban and educated urban dwellers waste their time and economic opportunities away while being terminally online and outraged to the point that the economic and political balance of power shifts to these rural groups.
- mensetmanusman 3y agoSounds like a fun sci fi!
- smeej 3y agoIt's not (just) the actual carrying of the children that people are rejecting. It's parenthood. It's the idea of committing to someone unconditionally for at least 18 years, but really for their whole life. Artificial wombs don't change this. Embryo selection doesn't change this. Vaccines will increase the chances that whatever children are produced survive to adulthood, but childhood mortality from vaccine-preventable illness isn't high enough to compensate for a worldview that doesn't want to have children. If you believe you're part of something much more significant than yourself, dedicating your life to moving it forward by producing other people who will outlive you and do the same makes sense. But if you're all that matters? If your scorecard is measures in dollars or followers or something else that dies with you? You don't have kids even if you do have access to artificial wombs.
- jlokom 3y ago>But if you're all that matters? If your scorecard is measures in dollars or followers or something else that dies with you? This sounds like a strawman. Many people don't want to have kids for different kinds of reasons (personal objectives, couple style of life, they don't like kids, etc). You seem to have a very low opinion of people that don't want to have kids and, on the other hand, a very high opinion of people that do have kids.
- Exoristos 3y agoThe kind of thing that makes the Amish the fastest-growing Christian denomination in the U.S., some years, although they don't really make converts.