Oddbean new post about login | logout Humans seem to build more shit, when they have babies to build for.
I dunno, the Shakers made great furniture that was built to last.
I think is more related to the purpose of life and some sort of notion of immortality through the offspring. But it’s just an impression :)
Maybe so. But there will always be babies to build for. If babies are fuel for the vehicle of society then good ideas are the steering mechanism. Power to go means nothing if the vehicle has driven off the road. While breeding is needed, it is FAR from being the only useful thing in life.
No, I refuse to give in to this point. In West Germany, people warned that the birthrate was dropping, and everyone laughed and said, "No worries! People will always have children!" But people didn't. The children were never had. And now they are missing.
So what is “the point” you refuse to give in to? My point is that “global population decline” is a manufactured fear and that attention to “bettering ones impact on society” will be at least as useful for humans “on aggregate” as making more babies. I don’t think we actually disagree here, or even on the fact that making babies is in general an important activity for humanity to continue with. Maybe we disagree on the effect that regional demographics might have on the global population? … I’m not sure.
On this note, on the p thiel rogan podcast, thiel talked about how when a population goes below replacement birth rates, they never come back O.o
It's closer to 1.1, I think, and immigration/emigration can turn it around, but yeah.
While immigration can solve the literal numbers problem, if there is no successful integration -new citizens share the main values of previous citizens- (and the bigger the immigration needed, the bigger the challenge), then you’d be replacing one set of values for another, not solving for why a specific set of values leads to inevitable lower birth rates
The objective version of that is that you're replacing most of a less-successful culture with most of a more-successful one, but the former has a better chance at partial-extension.
While tend to agree (just like a gene, a natuon that doesn’t reproduce can’t be easily categorised as succcessful), let’s not forget many of the less successful nations have higher birth rates (a steelman arg is higher birth rates are a response *against* a declining nation, but still )
Without babies I don’t see any reason not to build shit. Especially if building shit is fun.
