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>I was wondering which pet issue you were a doomer about. Fertility is the most ridiculous of them all. There is no plausible mechanism by which low fertility r

>I was wondering which pet issue you were a doomer about. Fertility is the most ridiculous of them all. There is no plausible mechanism by which low fertility rates could lead to extinction, Most people who think they are clever say this. I don't even doubt that you are, it's that you're lazy and never bothered to think about it. Yes, sub-replacement fertility inevitably leads to extinction and especially so for a species like humanity (given the root causes). If each generation is inevitably smaller than the last, then at some point the only smaller number is zero. And if the rate of fertility decline continues to accelerate, it isn't thousands of years in the future either. Since each youngest generation is raised by the older generations who had low fertility themselves, that youngest generation internalizes it at norm... so population can't plateau and drop no more (which would require the women in that youngest generation to grow up and all decide to have 2.1 children on average). >Come on, just think about this for a minute. Is your model that we're just going to have fewer children, In my model, each generation adopts the anthropological norms of western civilization which includes low fertility, but inevitably sets it as their ceiling. They can have fewer than that norm for any reason (bad luck, economic woes, whatever), but they'll never have more. And if they *do* have fewer, they've just set the norm even lower for the subsequent generation. This and dozens of other factors are quite alarming.

greygoo222 8mo ago
I guarantee you I've spent more time thinking about this than you have. Massive decreases in population change culture. The Western cultural context we have today won't just magically persist, converting new people, until we run out of people. At worst, we'll end up in a world where the majority of the population consists of the descendants of current high-fertility subcultures. Even that is extremely unlikely. Fertility rates only become a population-level problem a few generations down the line, at which point we are almost guaranteed to have artificial wombs and other technology that changes the dynamics of reproduction entirely. Fertility is worth worrying about because it may cause fewer resources for the elderly, particularly in some acutely affected nations. It is not an extinction risk.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 8mo ago
  > Massive decreases in population change culture. Plagues, wars, yeh. But this decline works differently. You don't wake up 3 years later with tens of million missing. You just get older, everyone about your age gets older. You die of old age at about the right time... maybe a little more than life expectancy estimated. And the generation younger than you, same thing, just you're ahead of the race. There's never anything big enough to change culture here. Not in any way that matters. And for all the thinking you've done, the best you can come up with is "nyuh uh, something will magically make it all change just before it'd get REAL bad". >At worst, we'll end up in a world where the majority of the population consists of the descendants of current high-fertility subcultures. These aren't little dots of mold in a petri dish. The high-fertility subcultures don't survive this any more than anyone else does. The Duggars don't get to have 400 grandchildren, even if they had 20 children. The Amish don't get to stay the Amish... too dependent on their host culture. Sure, they can build a barn in a day but there's not a single fucking Amish nail factory (or iron foundry, or ore mines) anywhere. They don't weave their own cloth. They're doomed too. >Fertility rates only become a population-level problem a few generations down the line, at which point we are almost guaranteed to have artificial wombs Science fiction magic will save us! Nevermind that Xi will be able to grow entire clone armies, that's a small price to pay for magic that will save us from our own inability to fuck. >It is not an extinction risk. Says the guy whose best idea comes from bad genre novels.
  - greygoo222 8mo ago
    Let me try this again. High fertility is the rule, not the exception, of human behavior. Human population has, give or take, consistently increased since the invention of agriculture. Modern trends of society-wide low fertility are an unusual phenomenon specific to a cultural context enabled by advanced technology and high global populations. Imagine your prediction pans out until there are 10 million people worldwide, the size of a large city. It won't, because this entire premise is deeply ridiculous, but imagine. How is this society going to maintain the same culture we have now? Are all these people unable to recognize that low fertility is leading to extinction, despite the very obvious historical data, or do they just not care? How long do you think people will even have the capacity to keep producing and distributing birth control?

greygoo222 8mo ago

I guarantee you I've spent more time thinking about this than you have. Massive decreases in population change culture. The Western cultural context we have today won't just magically persist, converting new people, until we run out of people. At worst, we'll end up in a world where the majority of the population consists of the descendants of current high-fertility subcultures. Even that is extremely unlikely. Fertility rates only become a population-level problem a few generations down the line, at which point we are almost guaranteed to have artificial wombs and other technology that changes the dynamics of reproduction entirely. Fertility is worth worrying about because it may cause fewer resources for the elderly, particularly in some acutely affected nations. It is not an extinction risk.

NoMoreNicksLeft 8mo ago
> Massive decreases in population change culture. Plagues, wars, yeh. But this decline works differently. You don't wake up 3 years later with tens of million missing. You just get older, everyone about your age gets older. You die of old age at about the right time... maybe a little more than life expectancy estimated. And the generation younger than you, same thing, just you're ahead of the race. There's never anything big enough to change culture here. Not in any way that matters. And for all the thinking you've done, the best you can come up with is "nyuh uh, something will magically make it all change just before it'd get REAL bad". >At worst, we'll end up in a world where the majority of the population consists of the descendants of current high-fertility subcultures. These aren't little dots of mold in a petri dish. The high-fertility subcultures don't survive this any more than anyone else does. The Duggars don't get to have 400 grandchildren, even if they had 20 children. The Amish don't get to stay the Amish... too dependent on their host culture. Sure, they can build a barn in a day but there's not a single fucking Amish nail factory (or iron foundry, or ore mines) anywhere. They don't weave their own cloth. They're doomed too. >Fertility rates only become a population-level problem a few generations down the line, at which point we are almost guaranteed to have artificial wombs Science fiction magic will save us! Nevermind that Xi will be able to grow entire clone armies, that's a small price to pay for magic that will save us from our own inability to fuck. >It is not an extinction risk. Says the guy whose best idea comes from bad genre novels.
- greygoo222 8mo ago
  Let me try this again. High fertility is the rule, not the exception, of human behavior. Human population has, give or take, consistently increased since the invention of agriculture. Modern trends of society-wide low fertility are an unusual phenomenon specific to a cultural context enabled by advanced technology and high global populations. Imagine your prediction pans out until there are 10 million people worldwide, the size of a large city. It won't, because this entire premise is deeply ridiculous, but imagine. How is this society going to maintain the same culture we have now? Are all these people unable to recognize that low fertility is leading to extinction, despite the very obvious historical data, or do they just not care? How long do you think people will even have the capacity to keep producing and distributing birth control?