> Over time, everyone becomes atheistic. It isn't universally true. There is no evidence the Haredim are becoming atheistic, nor the Old Order Amish. Yes, ther

> Over time, everyone becomes atheistic. It isn't universally true. There is no evidence the Haredim are becoming atheistic, nor the Old Order Amish. Yes, there are defectors from both (mostly not to atheism, mostly to more moderate versions of the respective religion), but not enough to counteract the high birth rates. > Not having children is a function of a society's wealth (which is then correlated to education which is the correlated to non-religiosity), not (necessarily) their religiosity. The Exclusive Brethren [0] are notoriously well-off, yet they continue to have large families, and there's no evidence of a high defection rate of their children. > when in reality the entire world's population is dropping, and it's distributed mostly equally, even in areas where there are some of the highest birth rates in the world historically, like India, China, and Nigeria. According to OECD data, [1] in 2005, Israel's TFR was 2.84. By 2017, it had grown to 3.11. From there, it declined to a low of 2.90 in 2020 (probably in part COVID-related), but by 2021 had rebounded to 3.00, and I expect it will probably be above 3.00 when the 2022 data is released. Israel's TFR in 2017 (3.11) was higher than its TFR in 1981 (3.06). So Israel is at least one counterexample to the narrative of a uniform global population decline. [0] https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/the-great-brethren-migration-church-in-mass-exodus-from-windsor-20221214-p5c6ew.html https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/the-great-brethren-migr... [1] https://data.oecd.org/pop/fertility-rates.htm https://data.oecd.org/pop/fertility-rates.htm