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Why are there so many humans?

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Re: Why are there so many humans?

#71

Post by redis_mlc »

requin246 wrote: post #67
redis_mlc wrote: post #16

> “Then two technologies were introduced that changed these Maya’s lives and, ultimately, their population: a gas-powered water pump and two gas-powered maize grinders. [..] By 2003, women who started reproducing in the 1970s had eight to 12 children.” Gotta wonder if the women thought that was progress, or not.

This is a (very recent) anachronism. Most people in antiquity saw children as a blessing. The more children you had, the larger your bloodline would be. In fact, being unable to have children was a point of shame for a woman. It wasn’t until the rise of the modern era in the west that people started wanting small families or no children at all. You can still see this idea of children as a blessing present in some com…

If you read the article, that group is subsistence gatherers, basically trying to find enough calories daily to survive.

A very different situation than pondering one's bloodline.

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#72

Post by cmrdporcupine »

davidstone wrote: post #64
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first one is an attribute of homo sapiens, but not other, extinct, humans like neanderthal. Spearthrowing appears to be an adaptation that is unique to our kind of human. Sportsball fans everywhere rejoice!

Do you have a source for this claim? It is contradicted by https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6347593/ "Evidence-based debates around the origins of thrusting and throwing spear use in human evolution have typically focused on hominin skeletal evidence. Proposals that features of the upper limbs of different species of Homo indicate that throwing only comes into play with H. sapiens23,35 are hampered by mul…

Interesting, I don't have a specific source as I have read about it for years and it was definitely discussed in my wife's physical anthro courses in her recently completely anthro degree.

And I seem to remember this in a display the Museum of Natural History in NY. Neanderthal using speers at close range, but not able to throw an atlatl or speer.

Sounds like people (and I) have been wrong!

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#73

Post by thefz »

pengaru wrote: post #37
redis_mlc wrote: post #16

> “Then two technologies were introduced that changed these Maya’s lives and, ultimately, their population: a gas-powered water pump and two gas-powered maize grinders. [..] By 2003, women who started reproducing in the 1970s had eight to 12 children.” Gotta wonder if the women thought that was progress, or not.

> Gotta wonder if the women thought that was progress, or not. It's not like women don't tend to love children...

That's horribly reductive and I imagine that if some of these women had the choice or even knew better, would have dedicated their own lives to something other than child rearing.

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#74

Post by thefz »

requin246 wrote: post #67
redis_mlc wrote: post #16

> “Then two technologies were introduced that changed these Maya’s lives and, ultimately, their population: a gas-powered water pump and two gas-powered maize grinders. [..] By 2003, women who started reproducing in the 1970s had eight to 12 children.” Gotta wonder if the women thought that was progress, or not.

This is a (very recent) anachronism. Most people in antiquity saw children as a blessing. The more children you had, the larger your bloodline would be. In fact, being unable to have children was a point of shame for a woman. It wasn’t until the rise of the modern era in the west that people started wanting small families or no children at all. You can still see this idea of children as a blessing present in some com…

> Most people in antiquity saw children as a blessing.

2003 is antiquity?

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#75

Post by JoeAltmaier »

Supermancho wrote: post #21
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't believe that makes sense. Being human is defined by existing humans. Change the genes too much, it non-human. Not sure how to draw a line.

> Being human is defined by existing humans. That's a philosophy, not a fact. Individuals and organizations define things by all sorts of criteria. eg temporally, consensus and differentiation are just a few. It's not as simple as "we all agree this zebra is a human".

Disagree. Change the genes enough, a human becomes a chimpanzee (and not very many genes either). Or change more, and you have a pig.

So is a pig that started with human genes, still human? Of course not. What about a human that started from pig genes? Hm.

That's what I mean, by being defined by existing humans. Because that's all we really have to go by.

You add wings to a person, lots of folks would be happy to call it a new kind of being. Some would argue its non-human. The proposal is to add disease resistance or other blood factors or cellular machinery, which are invisible and not obvious. But isn't it similar to adding wings?

"All humans that are possible" has to include the pig-human, and the winged-human, and so on. Clear to me, they are non-human.

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#76

Post by abfan1127 »

requin246 wrote: post #67
redis_mlc wrote: post #16

> “Then two technologies were introduced that changed these Maya’s lives and, ultimately, their population: a gas-powered water pump and two gas-powered maize grinders. [..] By 2003, women who started reproducing in the 1970s had eight to 12 children.” Gotta wonder if the women thought that was progress, or not.

This is a (very recent) anachronism. Most people in antiquity saw children as a blessing. The more children you had, the larger your bloodline would be. In fact, being unable to have children was a point of shame for a woman. It wasn’t until the rise of the modern era in the west that people started wanting small families or no children at all. You can still see this idea of children as a blessing present in some com…

it was a blessing because you had more help. Children could work the farm, help hunt, household chores, etc. When you're a subsistence farmer, getting more help is critical to feeding the family. Now, children can't be brought to the worksite or office, so the blessing is less helpful.

Re: Why are there so many humans?

#77

Post by chadcmulligan »

eindiran wrote: post #60
chadcmulligan wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's always disputes, but no ones dying or being thrown out of their homes, people are being looked after. I have been amazed at the compassion being shown by the political class on both sides. iirc there was a lot of extra care taken in the NT for indigenous people because they seem extra susceptible to covid 19 just as a counter example. I didn't know that about boundary st - assumed it was just a boundary, seem…

> There's always disputes, but no ones dying or being thrown out of their homes, people are being looked after. This is an underrated point; I think your larger message, that cooperation isn't dying, is likely true. I think I have the tendency to focus on the problems that are growing (or continue to exist) without noticing areas where there is progress and my comment was a reflection of that. And I agree that it is…

They are indeed significant points. I feel a lot of government success comes from trust, as in all interactions, if you can't trust your government then things go bad, then they just become people trying to take stuff from you.

Maybe there is some limit where there's too many people for that to occur. I feel one of the necessary conditions is the population needs a cohesive belief system (at least in certain areas). For example, if you have a large population that doesn't believe in science but in the invisible hand of god, and a large population that is scientific humanist then I don't think any system will cope with that - there is very little common ground. If everyone is educated and believes in a rational universe then it makes things a lot easier.

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