[ExI] Lethal future was Watson on NOVA

[Keith Henson]

On Sat, Feb 19, 2011 at 1:27 AM,  BillK <pharos at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Feb 18, 2011 at 7:16 PM, Keith Henson  wrote:
>> Evolution had good reason to build in a strong drive to have sex. ?And
>> in the pre birth control era that resulted in reproduction.
>>
>> It's also fairly clear to me that there is a drive directly for
>> reproduction, especially in women. ?You only need to consider what one
>> member who used to be on this group did to have an example.
>
> No. There isn't.

You know who I am talking about?

> If you look at the groups who have falling birth rates they correlate
> *very* strongly with women's rights and the empowerment of women. As
> soon as women get the power to choose they stop having children. Some
> might have one child, but this is below the rate required to sustain
> the population.

Agree on the points of course.  But if there was *no* direct drive for
reproduction, they would have none.

> You can also correlate falling birth rates with first world countries,
> or 'civilization'.
> Which also correlates with women's rights.
>
> I agree with Eugene's claim that there are sub-groups and third world
> nations that to-date still have high birth rates and growing
> populations. But it is to be expected that these high birth rates will
> only continue while their women remain subjugated under male
> domination. How long that will last is questionable.
>
> That is why I disagree strongly that advanced civilizations will be
> breeding like rabbits. The 'advanced' part means low reproduction by
> definition.
>
> If a civilization is busy breeding furiously and fighting for survival
> with other breeders, they have no spare capacity to get 'advanced'.
> Too many mouths to feed.
>
> BillK

I don't think you are considering the future angles here.  Cloning and
gene editing for example, not to mention outright duplication.

And if we have vastly longer lives, a low reproductive rate is a good idea.

Keith