Does no one realize that having 1 or 2 children does nothing to contribute to overpopulation?
Two people giving way to one child puts it in a step toward depopulation. Two people having two children does not variate one way or the other.
Indeed, China has a one-child policy for this very reason. Their population is decreasing.
As for people who think of children as 'clones' or 'burdens', need only look to most of your parents. Look at the amount of love and effort they put into you.
Having a child to love must be one of the best feelings in the world.
Sounds like you just want to live vicariously through some influential clone.
The human race lives on? If you want to argue that that isn't important, there's nothing I can really respond with. I find it important to keep the human race alive and well, though, and think my genes are a positive contribution to that end.
Do your parents think you as some influential clone?
How come nearly everyone here is misanthropic?
Do you think that was some non-directed general statement?
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Powers are for the weak. I have no powers. I mean - unless you count the power to blow minds with my weapons-grade philosophical insights. I'm a thought-o-coaster, I'm the conundrummer in a band called Life Puzzler.
I want to have children. But not because I want to increase the population of the world. It's because I want to raise, care for, teach, and love my child.
I don't think there is any danger of the human race dying out at this point though.
No. The benefit for anyone having kids is the species living on. The benefit I see from myself having kids is passing down what I perceive as good genes. It just looked like he was saying that having kids in general is no benefit, so I was providing a reason for general reproduction being beneficial.
In my opinion a lot of people put too much stock in evolution and genetics. The argument that passing on your genes rather than adopt is a poor one. Humanity has evolved past the point of merely relying on physical attributes to survive so why should it matter if we pass on our genes or not? By teaching a child your knowledge, beliefs, and culture you do far more than what can be done with mere genetics.
I don't really see my reproduction tied very closely to world overpopulation. I see it as a cultural, political, and technological issue rather than a personal one.
There's are about 300 million people living in the United States (the same number of people who live on the Ganges River alone) and population increase is actually quite slow. So, if anywhere is overpopulated, it's not where I live. The problem with overpopulation comes, primarily, from countries with certain conditions (such as poor education or inequality of women).
The argument that one shouldn't have kids because of overpopulation is a poor argument, as I see it. Let's take the problem of sending food to Africa as an example. We, in America (and other "first world countries") feel a sense of guilt for our comforts and freedoms. A good way to ease this burden is to send aid to places we see as being worse than us. So, when we see staving African children on TV, we are tempted to donate money to send them food. The inherent problem with this is that these populations always rise to levels just above the current food supply. We are literally, though our good intentions, increasing the population of starving children by feeding into that system without addressing the more fundamental issues at work (which are social and political). The same argument for not having children because of overpopulation can be used to justify stopping all aid to places like Africa. After all, that's where the overpopulation is happening.
Of course, that's a messy debate. That's why I like to separate the two issues. They really are quite distinct even if the line of reasoning is so similar. That being said, I look forward to being a father. I would hate to miss out on such an experience because of my "first world guilt".
You make a lot of good points but you don't (at least in this post) seem to take immigration into consideration. Clearly a lot of people in third world countries are unable to immigrate elsewhere (for various reasons). But I don't think it is a stretch to say that countries without population control problems (like the USA) experience increased immigration in proportion with the influx of population elsewhere.
I don't have statistical data to reference right now so feel free to slap me with a big [citation needed] but I know there are people here in America that want to grow the population by having large families. Generally speaking it is a religious argument but there are groups (cults really) that encourage believers to have as many children as possible in order to swell the ranks of their faith. Mormons are the clearest example of this. Here in the "first world" we also live longer due to our technology so our death rate is going to be low in comparison to the third world. The fact that we don't currently see a population problem at home doesn't mean we're not going to have this problem in the relatively near future.
I'd also like to note that I'm not trying to convince anyone that having children is bad. My only goal here was to provide Off Topic with something to talk about. I think I succeeded.
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Retired StaffTwo people giving way to one child puts it in a step toward depopulation. Two people having two children does not variate one way or the other.
Indeed, China has a one-child policy for this very reason. Their population is decreasing.
As for people who think of children as 'clones' or 'burdens', need only look to most of your parents. Look at the amount of love and effort they put into you.
Having a child to love must be one of the best feelings in the world.
The human race lives on? If you want to argue that that isn't important, there's nothing I can really respond with. I find it important to keep the human race alive and well, though, and think my genes are a positive contribution to that end.
Do you think that was some non-directed general statement?
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Retired StaffIf everyone followed the creed of "having children is stupid" it would, within a dozen decades.
No. The benefit for anyone having kids is the species living on. The benefit I see from myself having kids is passing down what I perceive as good genes. It just looked like he was saying that having kids in general is no benefit, so I was providing a reason for general reproduction being beneficial.
"From any kind of logical perspective having children is just stupid" is the statement I disagree with, mostly because it's wrong.
You make a lot of good points but you don't (at least in this post) seem to take immigration into consideration. Clearly a lot of people in third world countries are unable to immigrate elsewhere (for various reasons). But I don't think it is a stretch to say that countries without population control problems (like the USA) experience increased immigration in proportion with the influx of population elsewhere.
I don't have statistical data to reference right now so feel free to slap me with a big [citation needed] but I know there are people here in America that want to grow the population by having large families. Generally speaking it is a religious argument but there are groups (cults really) that encourage believers to have as many children as possible in order to swell the ranks of their faith. Mormons are the clearest example of this. Here in the "first world" we also live longer due to our technology so our death rate is going to be low in comparison to the third world. The fact that we don't currently see a population problem at home doesn't mean we're not going to have this problem in the relatively near future.
I'd also like to note that I'm not trying to convince anyone that having children is bad. My only goal here was to provide Off Topic with something to talk about. I think I succeeded.