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India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

science.org

321–330 of 427 posts

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This pandemic has killed an estimated 10-12 million people, according to the Economist. Every time I see such claims, I still cringe at the thought of figuring out what it actually means. The details are gory, and can be summarized simplistically by saying "death with COVID ≠ death from COVID". In other words, figuring out true disease toll is a rather ambiguous problem, as stated. Can someone point me to a referenc…

The easy way to get a rough answer here is simply to compare the death rate from the same time of year a couple of years back. Assuming no other events that would cause a large swing in death rate, most of the variance can likely be explained by COVID.

Assuming no other events that would cause a large swing in death rate

It's not obvious this is a tenable assumption, though. Depression and isolation can also increase mortality for things not directly related to depression and isolation, for example.

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better than stay-at-home mothers not re-entering the workforce. Which is the alternative.

I don't get why mothers not being at home is seen as bad. As though it's a greater good for society that instead they're punching in numbers into a spreadsheet at a widget factory. Sounds to me like the only winner there is the widget factory. It didn't used to have to be this way and maybe we should figure out why it has to be that way now, then fix that.

It's not seen as bad. There's nothing wrong with mothers being at home, if they want to be. The observation is that women, like all beings with agency, don't always want to be at-home mothers and we (modern, liberal societies) broadly agree that people shouldn't be forced or economically coerced into doing things they don't want to do.

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#323
post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>you could say that global warming is one of its legacies Considering that the majority of emissions came from a select few countries(over half from the EU & USA) that don't make up the majority of the population, and they majority of those emissions have happened while there's been smaller population growth, I don't think it's unfettered population growth that's the problem.

As countries get wealthier, their CO2 emissions have also trended upwards. The world is clearly trending toward catching up to the wealthy countries. If everyone trends toward similar emissions per-person, then the raw number of people will be what matters most.

It'd also be interesting to know what assumptions the climate change models themselves are constructed around. Do they assume by 2050 that less developed countries will continue at the same population trajectory there on today and then multiply that number by the annual carbon output of a person in a developed country today?

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get why mothers not being at home is seen as bad. As though it's a greater good for society that instead they're punching in numbers into a spreadsheet at a widget factory. Sounds to me like the only winner there is the widget factory. It didn't used to have to be this way and maybe we should figure out why it has to be that way now, then fix that.

It's not seen as bad. There's nothing wrong with mothers being at home, if they want to be. The observation is that women, like all beings with agency, don't always want to be at-home mothers and we (modern, liberal societies) broadly agree that people shouldn't be forced or economically coerced into doing things they don't want to do.

I agree with this.

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#325
post #290

So sad to see this happen. Paul Ehrlich made a similar prognostication that never came to pass. There are many places in the world that did a similar thing and had to work to reverse it (S. Korea, Russia), by actually paying families to have children, and China recently reversed its draconian one child policy because they have seen first hand the problems it creates. Hopefully India doesn't run into the same problem…

Population growth clearly can't continue forever; we may as well get it to zero now instead of kicking the can down the road.

Someone will need to replace the socio-feminist countries, why not India?

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#326
post #82

> When famine struck, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson initially refused to deliver food aid, citing the country’s high birth rate. I hope there is more context with that statement, because it sounds downright evil.

Here is what I've heard argued from that ideological standpoint.

One off famines should be remedied with relief efforts which mandate the recipient country increase its food storage to be able to absorb the next one.

Chronic food shortages are a symptoms of overpopulation of the area, either because of lack of farming technology, terrain, etc. Supplying food aid only compounds the problem by increasing an unsustainable population. The remedy is to remove the mismanagement and relocate, and reducate the willing population and let nature take its course for those unwilling to adapt.

Sounds harsh but a famine of 1 million people being supplied with aid turns to 1.2 million the next time and 2 million the time after. A net increase in misery and suffering.

In reality faced with a starving person face to face, I believe most people would feed the hungry.

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume people not consuming as much as the people in the EU and USA have a goal of consuming as much as the people in the EU and USA.

They very much do, but now they have to pay "carbon tax" invented by people who were responsible for most of the pollution until China

Also responsible for basically all technological innovation which makes it even possible to have viable "green energy".

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These can be difficult to get for younger, childless men. Even younger men (<40) with children receive push back from physicians in getting the procedure because it can be difficult to reverse.

Then you can assume alternatives would also be difficult to get approval for. I can't imagine some chemical option would be preferable to a physical disconnection anyway.

I think the point is other options (vasogel or something for example) are easily reversed and are non-surgical

Re: India defuses its population bomb: fertility falls to two children per woman

#330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prices show that people in the US have a goal of living lower-footprint lifestyles in walkable urban areas. We can't always get what we want. But which goals are attainable depends on policy choices.

You're definitely in a filter bubble.

I recognize it's a filter bubble that talks about these things a lot on the internet, but $1000+/sqft for NY and SF condos aren't lying. People want these things, badly.
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