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"scientific, technological and cultural achievements" are not a brute force effort.

• TeMPOraL 3y ago
  They're stochastic in nature and driven mostly by us hitting actual limits, both of which improve with growing population. Things may be different now, because we've crossed a meaningful threshold in how the world operates, but - AFAIK - at least until recently, overall development level and rate of advancement closely tracked population size.
  • nonrandomstring 3y ago
    > closely tracked population size65;5402;1c They tracked it. That's all. I see no convincing argument that advanced civilisations occur only in a pool of enormous labour surplus. The utilitarian in me, and the compassionate human, prefers a world that takes 50,000 years to reach a sustainable, comfortable technological society with a smaller population, than one that grows in 5,000 years to far beyond it's capacity, overproducing consumerist junk, poisoning its planet and seeing billions dying in wars and famines so that a few of us can bow down before the altar of "growth", Maybe the fact that we have to kill so many of our own kind in order for one percent to live in luxury and pat themselves on the back about "achievements" means we're not really as smart as we think we are as a species?