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Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

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Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#341

Post by toasterlovin »

ck425 wrote: post #334
toasterlovin wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think about the kind of life you think would have been better off not existing. Surely there are people alive whose life fits your criteria. Now imagine telling one of these people that it would have been better if they never existed. Probably they'll tell you where you can stick your notions.

I'm not suggesting someone goes and tells them, that would just cause more pain. I'm suggesting we stop that life from existing in the first place.

If you have other reasons for not wanting a life to exist, that’s another matter. But if your only reason is that, in your estimation, that person would have a life not worth living, that seems awfully presumptuous. Life is optional. Let them decide if they want to be alive.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#342

Post by toasterlovin »

mkirklions wrote: post #319
toasterlovin wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When thinking about having children and about the level of care and attention you’ll be able to give them, I think it’s useful to have the right comparison in mind. If you’re considering having another child, that child’s choices are not between your limited time and attention on the one hand and, on the other, parents who can shower them with time and attention. Instead, the alternative to your limited time and atte…

>the alternative to your limited time and attention is never getting to be alive. Eh, if anyone should have kids, it should be the financially well off and educated people. Remember that your logic isnt going to stop impoverished people from having 4 kids and welfare.

Yeah, you and I might not want impoverished people from having kids that they can't afford (since guilt will compel us to step in and assist). But I would bet that 99 out of 100 people who grew up in the worst kind of poverty would happily do so again rather than never have existed. So, from the child's point of view it's a good tradeoff.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#343

Post by toasterlovin »

ck425 wrote: post #335
toasterlovin wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think that life insurance, disability insurance, and a social safety net are good things, then you think that siblings are a good thing.

I don't expect my siblings to be any of those for me. It's incredibly unfair to put those expectations on family.

Yeah, nobody wants to burden other people with dependence. But shit happens. The history of our species is basically one conflagration after another. If I were to die with dependent children–which, up until about 80 years ago was a common occurrence—I know that my siblings would help care for my children. Or even if I just fell ill and needed assistance, my siblings would be there as a safety net.

And it goes both ways: I would do the same for them.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#344

Post by toasterlovin »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #338
toasterlovin wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, if you care about the environment, the right move is to have kids. All species expand to fill their ecological niche. If you abstain from having children, their spots will just be taken up by other people's children. We are powerless to influence the number of people, but we can influence the proportion of people who have an environmentalist bent. I hear you about the career thing. I have sacrificed immensely t…

> FWIW, if you care about the environment, the right move is to have kids. This couldn't be more wrong. Every new life is another body consuming resources. > All species expand to fill their ecological niche. This doesn't apply to humans. Unlike other animals, we've mastered agriculture and can produce our own food. But there are still non-renewable resources that we're constantly consuming and will eventually run ou…

The thing is that, after you decide to not have kids, time keeps up it's inexorable march. The earth has a carrying capacity for humans. We haven't hit it yet. But we will. This is the one absolute of life: species expand in population until there's no more niche left to occupy.

So after you decide not to have children, other people will have children. Eventually, their descendents will take up the space in the earth's carrying capacity that your descendants would have taken up. There is nothing you can do to stop this. So the best strategy is to change the proportion of people who have an environmentalist bent. Children are an effective way to accomplish that.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#345

Post by AnimalMuppet »

jetrink wrote: post #36
sandworm101 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Births" ... not pregnancies. There is a monumental difference. We know about the births because they are vital stats. But for the pregnancies, at best, we know about the reported pregnancies, the girls who went to doctors and those doctors contributed to the stats. That doesn't cover the girls who did not see doctors nor those who, for whatever reason, did not carry the child to term. >> less than 15% of teenage bir…

That would imply 15-20% of teenagers aged 15-17 having abortions annually. I find that hard to believe.

In 1958. I find that unbelievable, not just hard to believe.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#346

Post by AnimalMuppet »

toasterlovin wrote: post #343
ck425 wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't expect my siblings to be any of those for me. It's incredibly unfair to put those expectations on family.

Yeah, nobody wants to burden other people with dependence. But shit happens. The history of our species is basically one conflagration after another. If I were to die with dependent children–which, up until about 80 years ago was a common occurrence—I know that my siblings would help care for my children. Or even if I just fell ill and needed assistance, my siblings would be there as a safety net. And it goes both wa…

Family are the people who, when you need help, they have to try to give it.

Just had this with my brother. He's got a fairly expensive illness. I asked if he needed help. It never even occurred to him to ask - he's pretty independent. But if he has to have help, I'll try to help.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#347

Post by AnimalMuppet »

nostrademons wrote: post #22
Robotbeat wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is ridiculous. Wages have never been higher, and there have never been more people. There are incredibly strong network effects from having more people (in cities, etc), and the benefit of international trade relies on more people to enable better specialization. All kinds of incredibly important markets, like semiconductors (including computer chips, solar power) and even mining rely on having a lot of people t…

It's not untrue, but it is nuanced. Basically, Malthus was right for some people . More people tends to benefit capital and harm labor, because it increases both the potential labor pool and potential market size for capitalists & entrepreneurs but increases competition for laborers. It tends to benefit specialists and harm generalists, because specialists can more easily find buyers for their skills while generalist…

The linked article nowhere mentions the Renaissance, except in the title of an article mentioned as a reference.

Also, I don't think that the Renaissance depended a whole lot on the middle class. The middle class was critical to the economic changes that transformed Europe, sure, but that was kind of separate from the Renaissance itself.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#348

Post by CalRobert »

toasterlovin wrote: post #344
Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FWIW, if you care about the environment, the right move is to have kids. This couldn't be more wrong. Every new life is another body consuming resources. > All species expand to fill their ecological niche. This doesn't apply to humans. Unlike other animals, we've mastered agriculture and can produce our own food. But there are still non-renewable resources that we're constantly consuming and will eventually run ou…

The thing is that, after you decide to not have kids, time keeps up it's inexorable march. The earth has a carrying capacity for humans. We haven't hit it yet. But we will. This is the one absolute of life: species expand in population until there's no more niche left to occupy. So after you decide not to have children, other people will have children. Eventually, their descendents will take up the space in the earth…

Umm... at the risk of being dramatic..

In addition to worrying about the carbon footprint of another kid, I have a much bigger concern that

* We will do nothing regarding climate change (seems likely)

* The predictions for Business as Usual will have been too conservative (seems likely given that the Arctic is melting well ahead of schedule, and who knows how clathrates pan out)

* Temps rise by a good 8C or so in the next 8 decades

* My child, or their children, will die horribly in a new global Holodomor as our resource chains (webs, really) collapse and the world's civilizations implode.

Anyway, I already had one. But I have a deep, pervasive dread that I have doomed them to the above. However, I also might be wrong! Maybe it just gets a bit warmer and they can open a nice winery in Sweden and it's all fine.

Re: Birth Rates Dropped Most in U.S. Counties Where Home Prices Grew Most

#349

Post by CalRobert »

toasterlovin wrote: post #294
mkirklions wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope to have a large family for this reason. I dont know if I'll have the time to give kids my full attention. I found my brother was/is the reason I'm a nerd. Sure my dad was a database manager, but I spend hours daily with my brother gaming. I dont even think I wanted to spend a half hour with my 'boring' dad.

When thinking about having children and about the level of care and attention you’ll be able to give them, I think it’s useful to have the right comparison in mind. If you’re considering having another child, that child’s choices are not between your limited time and attention on the one hand and, on the other, parents who can shower them with time and attention. Instead, the alternative to your limited time and atte…

"is never getting to be alive."

I suppose we may differ on this but I don't really view that as a negative. I don't think there's a pool of "potential people" from which we draw when making a new person. An infinite number of beings don't exist, and won't. I actually would love to see more work on the nature of consciousness and the self, and what exactly gives a new foetus or baby its awareness of the fact that it exists.

And yet I'm not entirely consistent internally because even though "I want someone to hang out with when I'm old" is part of the reason kids sound fun, most of it is "bringing a new being capable of experience joy into the universe", so I guess I sort of agree, in a roundabout sense.

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