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Yeah maybe that’s why women live longer in order to help with the exhausting process of raising their grandchildren [1]. We love to take care of babies, regard

Yeah maybe that’s why women live longer in order to help with the exhausting process of raising their grandchildren [1]. We love to take care of babies, regardless of (or maybe because of) how clingy and dependent they are. From an Evolutionary point of view, This relationship between needy babies and abnegated caregivers might have given rise to a complementary schimogenesis according to Gregory Bateson, in which babies might have evolved to be more and more dependent, because having more and more invested caregivers produces fitter offspring. Parenthood is a self-inflicted sabotage and I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. 1. The Gardener and the Carpenter: Alison Gopnik, Erin Bennett: 9781536617832

bnlxbnlx 3y ago
Yes, parenthood is intense, both both ways. It intensifies the highs and the lows. There's more strain and there's more joy. And there's a lot less strain when moving out of nuclear family structures. It all becomes easier for the children and the parents.
- lumost 3y ago
  Can you elaborate? Curious how the stress profile differs in alternative family structures.
  - Apocryphon 3y ago
    It’s in TFA but pretty self-evident: in traditional non-nuclear families, extended kin (especially grandparents) help with childcare, reducing the burden.
  - bnlxbnlx 3y ago
    i'm living with two other families in a house (separate apartments). it lifts the hyper dependency of children on their parents and creates more room to attend to needs for both adults and children. it also makes it possible to stack many things, like grocery shopping or cooking (one person cooking for 12 people does not require three times as much time as cooking for four people). plus, there's usually always other adults at the house that you can hang out with plus many other kids for your kids to play with, so less stress with playdates etc.
- amrocha 3y ago
  I disagree that there's more joy to parenthood. I think that's a lie parents tell themselves to justify their decision. I'm happy for you if you're happy to have children. That doesn't mean people without children aren't as happy as you.
  - Proziam 3y ago
    This stance strikes me as odd. Every parent was once a non-parent, and therefore can compare their own experience before and after. I'm sure parents are a little (intentionally) delusional at times, nobody wants to seem like a 'bad' or 'uncaring' parent. But to assume that the extreme majority of parents are lying about enjoying an experience that they've been evolutionarily primed for seems like flat-earth level reality-denial.
    - amrocha 3y ago
      My issue is not with the fact that some parents are happy with their decision. My issue is the implication that the joy of parenthood is above every other joy. For comparison, you don't see programmers claiming the joy of programming is superior to all other jobs. Mountaineers don't claim that you haven't enjoyed life unless you climb mountains. Why? Because those things are obviously joyful, but not accessible to everyone. Not everyone can climb, not everyone can program, but everyone can find their own joy. So why do parents feel okay saying that? If you can come up with any other reason then please let me know because I'm still searching.
      - fardinahsan 3y ago
        The reason is quite straightforward. The survival of the human species depends on it being this way.
      - Proziam 3y ago
        The same reason sex is pleasurable. We would not be here if it were not this way. Put in different terms, there are many experiences which have an evolutionary origin. Disgust reactions to certain sights/smells are a near-universal experience, for example. Individuals that don't share these experiences (or who are attracted to them) are considered weird or degenerate precisely because they are so universal.
ClumsyPilot 3y ago
> I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. Because the best thing you can do for the world is to raise children well. If they raise theirs, etc. its a cycle of good over thousands of years, that will have more positive impact than anything you could do in your life as an individual.
- makeitshine 3y ago
  Given that we're quickly destroying the environment we need to survive and have enough nuclear weapons pointed at one another to annihilate civilization multiple times over, it seems that a lot of people thousands of years ago didn't raise their kids well enough. Maybe instead of having more children as the OP notes, we can take care of the tens of millions of neglected ones we already have, or try to work towards providing a healthier environment for those who are already here. The idea that we need more, when we're currently screwing up the ones we have, is silly.
- 15457345234 3y ago
  > Because the best thing you can do for the world Is to not have any children so the population gets back down to sustainable levels
  - Dig1t 3y ago
    We could 10x the human population and still be sustainable. Your idea of sustainable is a common misconception.
  - Erratic6576 3y ago
    What makes humanity unsustainable is not the amount of human but the unleashed greed of a minority. 100 billion aborigines would pollute less than a handful of western oligarchs
  - throwaway6734 3y ago
    massive population collapse will be disastrous for modern societies. Who will do the work required to care for the elderly population?
lo_zamoyski 3y ago
> Yeah maybe that’s why women live longer in order to help with the exhausting process of raising their grandchildren. Except that men become more important, especially for boys, but also as exemplars for girls, the older children get. Nurturing is more important earlier on, which is also the specialty of women. Men are generally terrible at it and generally hate it, while women tend to have a much greater affinity. > We love to take care of babies, regardless of (or maybe because of) how clingy and dependent they are. We must be careful with words like "love", because in our day and age, we have assumed a very reductive and immature understanding of it (as that which gives us pleasure or sensuous delight and "good feelings"). Love toward children is dominated by the hard work of charity. The aim is to guide a human being into adulthood for that other person's sake, for the sake of their true end, not for ourselves (hence the self-centeredness of thinking one is entitled to having children, resorting to all sorts of immoral technologies to have them). Disinterested charity, of course, has the effect of actualizing us as people, and nothing is as actualizing as parenthood, as that is our essential identity (one that can be exercised in surrogate ways, of course). > babies might have evolved to be more and more dependent, because having more and more invested caregivers produces fitter offspring. The major reason human beings require more investment is intelligence. Many species are born or hatched ready to go, and perhaps never meet their parents. Some require only a relatively short period of parental support. But human beings must go through a long period of formation. Intelligence is also the reason why we lack all sorts of anatomical features that other animals have. Why? Because intelligence allows us to pursue all sorts of ends, while other animals are quite limited in this regard. Thus, we lose the baggage and instead make technology, like clothing, that allows us to adapt to any environment. Fur or scales or whatever are far more limited. > Parenthood is a self-inflicted sabotage and I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. What a freakish statement. Sabotage of what, and how? If anything is being sabotaged, is it our nature to be parents by the culture of mindless, emtpy distractions of hedonistic and superficial consumerism. This antinatalism is an attack on the human person. It destroys the common good. Attack parenthood and you attack the raison d'etre almost all of the activity of humankind.
- juletide 3y ago
  > hence the self-centeredness of thinking one is entitled to having children, resorting to all sorts of immoral technologies to have them Huh? I'm confused how you reconcile this (seeming) attack on fertility treatment with the pro-natalist sentiment expressed later in your comment. Who or what principle is transgressed by what technologies?
ruined 3y ago
>I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. one might call it a survival bias
- vacuity 3y ago
  Hi to you too, Darwin.

bnlxbnlx 3y ago

Yes, parenthood is intense, both both ways. It intensifies the highs and the lows. There's more strain and there's more joy. And there's a lot less strain when moving out of nuclear family structures. It all becomes easier for the children and the parents.

lumost 3y ago
Can you elaborate? Curious how the stress profile differs in alternative family structures.
- Apocryphon 3y ago
  It’s in TFA but pretty self-evident: in traditional non-nuclear families, extended kin (especially grandparents) help with childcare, reducing the burden.
- bnlxbnlx 3y ago
  i'm living with two other families in a house (separate apartments). it lifts the hyper dependency of children on their parents and creates more room to attend to needs for both adults and children. it also makes it possible to stack many things, like grocery shopping or cooking (one person cooking for 12 people does not require three times as much time as cooking for four people). plus, there's usually always other adults at the house that you can hang out with plus many other kids for your kids to play with, so less stress with playdates etc.
amrocha 3y ago
I disagree that there's more joy to parenthood. I think that's a lie parents tell themselves to justify their decision. I'm happy for you if you're happy to have children. That doesn't mean people without children aren't as happy as you.
- Proziam 3y ago
  This stance strikes me as odd. Every parent was once a non-parent, and therefore can compare their own experience before and after. I'm sure parents are a little (intentionally) delusional at times, nobody wants to seem like a 'bad' or 'uncaring' parent. But to assume that the extreme majority of parents are lying about enjoying an experience that they've been evolutionarily primed for seems like flat-earth level reality-denial.
  - amrocha 3y ago
    My issue is not with the fact that some parents are happy with their decision. My issue is the implication that the joy of parenthood is above every other joy. For comparison, you don't see programmers claiming the joy of programming is superior to all other jobs. Mountaineers don't claim that you haven't enjoyed life unless you climb mountains. Why? Because those things are obviously joyful, but not accessible to everyone. Not everyone can climb, not everyone can program, but everyone can find their own joy. So why do parents feel okay saying that? If you can come up with any other reason then please let me know because I'm still searching.
    - fardinahsan 3y ago
      The reason is quite straightforward. The survival of the human species depends on it being this way.
    - Proziam 3y ago
      The same reason sex is pleasurable. We would not be here if it were not this way. Put in different terms, there are many experiences which have an evolutionary origin. Disgust reactions to certain sights/smells are a near-universal experience, for example. Individuals that don't share these experiences (or who are attracted to them) are considered weird or degenerate precisely because they are so universal.

ClumsyPilot 3y ago

> I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. Because the best thing you can do for the world is to raise children well. If they raise theirs, etc. its a cycle of good over thousands of years, that will have more positive impact than anything you could do in your life as an individual.

makeitshine 3y ago
Given that we're quickly destroying the environment we need to survive and have enough nuclear weapons pointed at one another to annihilate civilization multiple times over, it seems that a lot of people thousands of years ago didn't raise their kids well enough. Maybe instead of having more children as the OP notes, we can take care of the tens of millions of neglected ones we already have, or try to work towards providing a healthier environment for those who are already here. The idea that we need more, when we're currently screwing up the ones we have, is silly.
15457345234 3y ago
> Because the best thing you can do for the world Is to not have any children so the population gets back down to sustainable levels
- Dig1t 3y ago
  We could 10x the human population and still be sustainable. Your idea of sustainable is a common misconception.
- Erratic6576 3y ago
  What makes humanity unsustainable is not the amount of human but the unleashed greed of a minority. 100 billion aborigines would pollute less than a handful of western oligarchs
- throwaway6734 3y ago
  massive population collapse will be disastrous for modern societies. Who will do the work required to care for the elderly population?

lo_zamoyski 3y ago

> Yeah maybe that’s why women live longer in order to help with the exhausting process of raising their grandchildren. Except that men become more important, especially for boys, but also as exemplars for girls, the older children get. Nurturing is more important earlier on, which is also the specialty of women. Men are generally terrible at it and generally hate it, while women tend to have a much greater affinity. > We love to take care of babies, regardless of (or maybe because of) how clingy and dependent they are. We must be careful with words like "love", because in our day and age, we have assumed a very reductive and immature understanding of it (as that which gives us pleasure or sensuous delight and "good feelings"). Love toward children is dominated by the hard work of charity. The aim is to guide a human being into adulthood for that other person's sake, for the sake of their true end, not for ourselves (hence the self-centeredness of thinking one is entitled to having children, resorting to all sorts of immoral technologies to have them). Disinterested charity, of course, has the effect of actualizing us as people, and nothing is as actualizing as parenthood, as that is our essential identity (one that can be exercised in surrogate ways, of course). > babies might have evolved to be more and more dependent, because having more and more invested caregivers produces fitter offspring. The major reason human beings require more investment is intelligence. Many species are born or hatched ready to go, and perhaps never meet their parents. Some require only a relatively short period of parental support. But human beings must go through a long period of formation. Intelligence is also the reason why we lack all sorts of anatomical features that other animals have. Why? Because intelligence allows us to pursue all sorts of ends, while other animals are quite limited in this regard. Thus, we lose the baggage and instead make technology, like clothing, that allows us to adapt to any environment. Fur or scales or whatever are far more limited. > Parenthood is a self-inflicted sabotage and I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. What a freakish statement. Sabotage of what, and how? If anything is being sabotaged, is it our nature to be parents by the culture of mindless, emtpy distractions of hedonistic and superficial consumerism. This antinatalism is an attack on the human person. It destroys the common good. Attack parenthood and you attack the raison d'etre almost all of the activity of humankind.

juletide 3y ago
> hence the self-centeredness of thinking one is entitled to having children, resorting to all sorts of immoral technologies to have them Huh? I'm confused how you reconcile this (seeming) attack on fertility treatment with the pro-natalist sentiment expressed later in your comment. Who or what principle is transgressed by what technologies?

ruined 3y ago

>I cannot understand how come there are so many parents bearing children worldwide. one might call it a survival bias

vacuity 3y ago
Hi to you too, Darwin.