81–90 of 1001 posts
> One study showed how the arrival of cable television in Indian villages in the 2000s led to a moderate fall in fertility. Soap operas depicting urban, middle-class women with small families may have changed norms (though some wonder whether people were just watching TV rather than having sex). The latter part seems like the most meaningful cause world wide. Sex is a boredom activity and we just aren't bored in the…
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This has happened to every single society [*] as it industrializes [0], and offering extensive support and incentives to parents (e.g. as has been tried in Scandinavian countries) does very little to reverse this trend [1, 2]. My hypothesis is that as societies industrialize, they afford their population more and more activities that are simply more fun and rewarding than having children. So many people I know put of…
That's like, the complete opposite of the hedonistic young couple not using protection and accidentally getting pregnant.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
a large organism (human populaton on earth) reaching equilibrium and ceasing to grow does not equal to human extinction... it far more likely is just a temporary contraction that will then reverse when the conditions are set for it.
Ya but I’m 28 and have had enough with these contractions. For Christ sake can I get a sane decade so I can actually build a career. :)
The last transition was British Empire to US and that was 1900-1945.
We can only hope for something better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Shot in the dark but my sense is that a lot of our economics presumes growth and, if we don’t get it, a lot of terrible stuff happens. I feel pretty confident that ai will eventually be a large driver of growth but I do worry about whether it'll come soon enough.
>a lot of our economics presumes growth and, if we don’t get it, a lot of terrible stuff happens What does this actually mean? Every time I try to wrap my head around why it's bad e.g. for a business to make a constant profit, rather than an increasing profit; or for the population to dip to some number and settle there, rather than increase; the explanations seem to become circular very quickly. I know it's partiall…
I invest my wages to take advantage of compound interest. It’s kind of my only hope of having a family / owning a home / retiring. If stuff stops compounding, I’m fucked. Multiply by however many millions of people are on the same position.
I don’t necessarily think the theories are making any assumption about what is good (except for the “greed is good dicks”)but more acknowledging that this is how our system currently works and the first generation to step off this ride will have a horrible time.
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The other 99% is even more dependent on the machine than the top 1%. They can build themselves reinforced bunkers, just in case. What is your plan if, say, the food distribution infrastructure breaks down? Does that sound like an extremely unlikely outcome? Back in 2008, we came within hours of credit cards stopping working. Projections say that if credit cards stop working, food distribution breaks down. Mass hunger…
This is a call for community and durable systems that serve the human instead of traditional systems built to aggregate and funnel capital to a few. The fertility crisis is a capital crisis (taxpayers needed to pay back debt issued today decades into the future, workers for corporate profits), not a crisis for the individual. I see it as an exciting opportunity to maintain and improve quality of life for humans while…
That said, like Democracy, capitalism is the worst economic system, except all of the others that have been tried. And there have been enough alternate experiments that I wouldn't want to literally bet my life on the next one working better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ya but I’m 28 and have had enough with these contractions. For Christ sake can I get a sane decade so I can actually build a career. :)
its unlikely that will happen. If you read Arrighi, his hegemonic cycle narrative says that the interregnum between two hegemons is decades of chaos as the system reorganises. We seem to be heading for a US to China transition. The last transition was British Empire to US and that was 1900-1945. We can only hope for something better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a call for community and durable systems that serve the human instead of traditional systems built to aggregate and funnel capital to a few. The fertility crisis is a capital crisis (taxpayers needed to pay back debt issued today decades into the future, workers for corporate profits), not a crisis for the individual. I see it as an exciting opportunity to maintain and improve quality of life for humans while…
I could rant about the stupidity of spending fossil fuels, to grow biofuels, for no net gain in energy. But with a definite cost in engine wear. That said, like Democracy, capitalism is the worst economic system, except all of the others that have been tried. And there have been enough alternate experiments that I wouldn't want to literally bet my life on the next one working better.
The demographic future of humanity: facts and consequences [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44866621 - August 2025 (400 comments)
(~71% of the world’s population now lives in countries with birth rates below the replacement level needed to maintain population size, the remainder will follow in time)
This has happened to every single society [*] as it industrializes [0], and offering extensive support and incentives to parents (e.g. as has been tried in Scandinavian countries) does very little to reverse this trend [1, 2]. My hypothesis is that as societies industrialize, they afford their population more and more activities that are simply more fun and rewarding than having children. So many people I know put of…
This has happened to every single society [*] as it industrializes [0], and offering extensive support and incentives to parents (e.g. as has been tried in Scandinavian countries) does very little to reverse this trend [1, 2]. My hypothesis is that as societies industrialize, they afford their population more and more activities that are simply more fun and rewarding than having children. So many people I know put of…
Is it hedonism if a child-free adult gets fulfillment out of nurturing and caring for others, mentoring, caring for themselves and their community? That's like, the complete opposite of the hedonistic young couple not using protection and accidentally getting pregnant.
These are all real examples of why people I know delayed having kids, curtailed the number they had, or never had them altogether.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it hedonism if a child-free adult gets fulfillment out of nurturing and caring for others, mentoring, caring for themselves and their community? That's like, the complete opposite of the hedonistic young couple not using protection and accidentally getting pregnant.
I'd call it hedonism if a couple wants to be able to go out on a date on a whim, easily take a vacation, watch adult-appropriate movies on a big TV in the living room, maintain good sleep/health habits, keep a flexible schedule unconstrained by school pickups/staying home with a sick kid, etc. These are all real examples of why people I know delayed having kids, curtailed the number they had, or never had them altoge…
Hedonism has negative connotations, colloquially (and colloquially is how we are speaking).