81–90 of 188 posts
Interesting moral discussion: An estimated 8000 fewer births in 2017 attributed to a law that saved an estimated 57 lives in the same year.
It's the classical trolley problem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
Interesting moral discussion: An estimated 8000 fewer births in 2017 attributed to a law that saved an estimated 57 lives in the same year.
It's the classical trolley problem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
I imagine the typical car accident in which three 'car seat age' children are involved, and at least one is killed. Then I imagine the typical event where a family decide against a third child. I feel quite a substantial qualitative difference! I certainly wouldn't claim one offsets the other.
Personally I don't know if there's any multiplier I'd accept. I find reduction of suffering and trauma much more important to me than offset creation of life and opportunity.
Wow, talk about the law of unintended effects! Without going into the specifics of car seats, I do think we overemphasize safety. The article mentions saving 57 children. How much are 57 lives worth? The answer is not infinite - a life has a numeric value, ask any insurance company. Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do.
Sure, the value of 57 lives isn't infinite, but this particular comparison is a totally absurd one to make. Births and deaths are completely morally independent, it's not as if those 57 lives could be substituted using the surplus of births.
> Every safety regulation ought to pass a cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis. Few of them do.
Actually I'm pretty sure that is in fact how safety regulations work.
Nonetheless, the concept of a "cold-blooded cost/benefit analysis" is paradoxical. Values are intrinsically subjective, hence we have democracy.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also, socially conservative, multi-generational households (sharing labour and childcare between women relatives), less expectation for mothers of young kids to be away from the home, and a much lower expectation of what "housing" means in terms of both building quality and the amount of living space per person.
Who expects mothers of young kids in the US to be away from the home?
It's almost Darwinistic: Offspring has an increased potential of survival and faces less threats, so reproduction is organically adjusted to prevent overpopulation.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you aren't a slave to your car, you likely live in a walkable area where the cost of a 4-bedroom apartment or house is going to be pretty high. I'm not saying you can't raise kids in a 2 or 3 bedroom apartment, and when I lived in apartments many families had kids in a 1-bedroom apartment, but it's very tight and many people would consider it a significant hardship for both the kids and the parents. I would also a…
A __3-bedroom apartment__ is considered very tight for raising kids? How many bedrooms do you need to raise kids?
So a three-bedroom apartment might not be enough if you have three kids.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you aren't a slave to your car, you likely live in a walkable area where the cost of a 4-bedroom apartment or house is going to be pretty high. I'm not saying you can't raise kids in a 2 or 3 bedroom apartment, and when I lived in apartments many families had kids in a 1-bedroom apartment, but it's very tight and many people would consider it a significant hardship for both the kids and the parents. I would also a…
A __3-bedroom apartment__ is considered very tight for raising kids? How many bedrooms do you need to raise kids?
It's not that you can't, it's just that it's not the standard of living most western people expect.
It’s really a perfect allrounder - looks nice, is luxurious, more than enough space for us, even drives like a sports car (or at least as close to a CUV can hope to).
Then said cousin had a baby. People around him scolded him for not selling the car for something much bigger - like a Kia Telluride or a Honda Pilot. But he is doing just fine.