Eh??? It's not a single national population that is doing the damage, it is the worldwide population! Besides, far more people are being born than are emigrating.
In a 2003 interview with the conservative magazine Human Events, McIntyre described the philosophy behind the website as based on "freedom" and "common-sense values"; Bevan said that the website's owners shared the common conservative belief that the mainstream media was biased "against conservatives, religious conservatives, [and] Christian conservatives"
I agree that the lack of reproduction will have long-term consequences.
Though I do not think it is a moral duty per se.
The belief that we have too much of a population & that it is increasing is a huge misconception.
It is misinformation. The truth is that there are a lot less children than there are adults.
This, besides the wars & the current economic collapse, will bring, another, great, economic collapse.
There will be a lot more elderly people who can not contribute, or can, but very little, & a few younger ones, who not only have to take care of themselves,
raise a family, but also produce much more, & take care of the elderly.
Hopefully we will have robotics sorted out by then, otherwise, well, let us just say that,
through human history, the economic & population collapses were never even close to this bad.
That's because they grow into adults. If we say that somebody is a child until puberty (around 13) and the average adult dies at 80 (I don't know the exact figure) then 80-13=67 means that 13 years of their lives they are children and then they become adults for 67 years of their lives. Of course there are less children than adults but unless couples are having one or less children these days, the population is still increasing, more resources are needed to support them and they have children and the next generation is even larger.
I think vegan89 is probably right and has superior and better thought out analytical arguments. But many others just will refuse to think about things like this analytically as it somehow doesn´t feel right to them. As soon as you try to take an analytical approach to concepts like the value of human life, they just get an emotional reaction, become intolerant to your viewpoint, and lose interest.
However I think vegan89 you should frame it as “better to have children” than “moral duty” though. I think I am coming around to that school of thought that having children is better than not simply because more I think life is good. But we shouldn´t frame it as a requirement just because it does good. That is like saying you must give to charity, or even you must give to this charity. You are perhaps obliged to not do bad, but perhaps not required to do good and especially not required to do a very specific good.
I think post 47 by Brian is interesting though. Possibly not quite right since vegans will influence others…but worthy of some thought.
The environmental argument against children is a weak one I think. If 1000 children are born that may be enough emissions to kill 1 or 10 people. Say 10. You have therefore created 1000 lives, and taken away 10. If lives are a good thing, that´s a net good.
The argument that vegan89 is wrong because some parents will rebel against their children and take the opposite approach is a weak one. It´s obvious to me that children of two vegan parents are more likely to be vegan than children of two carnists. As long as that´s true more often than not, the argument holds. Just looking at religious societies. Only a minority children rebel and change ideology.
Vegan89, you seem to be more utilitarian/consequentialist leaning, but I´ve noticed over the years that some people on this forum are more deontological : prefer to judge the action itself rather than the broader consequences. That may be your real disagreement with some: unfortunately even professional philosophers can´t seem to get anywhere with deciding which approach is best.
That's because they grow into adults. If we say that somebody is a child until puberty (around 13) and the average adult dies at 80 (I don't know the exact figure) then 80-13=67 means that 13 years of their lives they are children and then they become adults for 67 years of their lives. Of course there are less children than adults but unless couples are having one or less children these days, the population is still increasing, more resources are needed to support them and they have children and the next generation is even larger.
Elon Musk made some tweets about this with some valid arguments,
but I did not stop to think it through on my own as they just seemed, highly plausible.
I do not think this data is correct, compared to what I have seen over the years.
The lifespan expectancy being 30 was a myth, which was proven by various institutions over time.
I think even Harward made a post about it. But again, this was, years ago, so I do not have any saved citations to offer.
As for the population numbers, it was 9 billion back in, if I remember right, 2016.
Maybe this image is biased, and of course, maybe the data I saw back then was flawed.
Either could be true.
Do you know many people who have more than one or two kids?
People I know or have met, either have no kids at all, just one kid, or rarely two kids.
Seldom they have 3-5.
If indeed the population is increasing & I was wrong in my notion, then, I am happy about that.
The entire world's population could fit in Madagascar, with enough farmland to feed everyone & produce the needed amneties, & have space for further growth. All whilst everyone gets to live in one plane, with ordinary houses, not even skyscrapers or apartment complexes.
Imagine what could be done with skyscrapers. It is all just a matter of strategy & design.
Obviously though, most people are not rational & are stubborn, & would not want to do something like that.
Also, if Elon Musk is wrong about this concept, do you think he is lying about it?
And if so, to what end?
Our World in Data is a reliable source (usually citing other sources rather than own research) and the data looks correct.
I don't think the world population has ever been 9 billion, I think you remembered that wrong or got bad info.
It looks like the world population is between 7.9 and 8.0 billion and could reach 8.0 billion within this year or at the latest early next year, that might spark a few articles about population. I imagine the articles will discuss the question about when the world population will peak and go into decline.
Projections that the world's population would still keep growing through much of the second half of the century look out of date. China and the West looks set to go into decline, with only Africa having fast growth.
So far this question has mainly been discussed on podcasts outside the mainstream, but I would definitely predict to see more discussion of this in the mainstream in the coming months.
I think vegan89 is probably right and has superior and better thought out analytical arguments. But many others just will refuse to think about things like this analytically as it somehow doesn´t feel right to them. As soon as you try to take an analytical approach to concepts like the value of human life, they just get an emotional reaction, become intolerant to your viewpoint, and lose interest.
However I think vegan89 you should frame it as “better to have children” than “moral duty” though. I think I am coming around to that school of thought that having children is better than not simply because more I think life is good. But we shouldn´t frame it as a requirement just because it does good. That is like saying you must give to charity, or even you must give to this charity. You are perhaps obliged to not do bad, but perhaps not required to do good and especially not required to do a very specific good.
I think post 47 by Brian is interesting though. Possibly not quite right since vegans will influence others…but worthy of some thought.
The environmental argument against children is a weak one I think. If 1000 children are born that may be enough emissions to kill 1 or 10 people. Say 10. You have therefore created 1000 lives, and taken away 10. If lives are a good thing, that´s a net good.
The argument that vegan89 is wrong because some parents will rebel against their children and take the opposite approach is a weak one. It´s obvious to me that children of two vegan parents are more likely to be vegan than children of two carnists. As long as that´s true more often than not, the argument holds. Just looking at religious societies. Only a minority children rebel and change ideology.
Vegan89, you seem to be more utilitarian/consequentialist leaning, but I´ve noticed over the years that some people on this forum are more deontological : prefer to judge the action itself rather than the broader consequences. That may be your real disagreement with some: unfortunately even professional philosophers can´t seem to get anywhere with deciding which approach is best.
@Jamie in Chile, you’ve tackled several important points but not in an order that makes it easy to split up into quotes. Never mind, I’ll do my best to respond.
Firstly, your second paragraph is an excellent summary of one of the things I was trying to get across. I totally agree with you on the point of ”is better than” is much more palatable than “have a moral duty” precisely because it doesn’t alienate those who disagree and leaves the power of choice where it should sit - with the individual.
However, you also mention in that paragraph that you believe more life is good, and you imply (although I may be misinterpreting, in which case my apologies) that disagreement with @vegan89’s analysis is refusal to think analytically about an emotive subject. I believe that quality of life is more important than quantity, and so I would qualify your statement to say more happy life is good. I also believe it is everyone’s right to choose not to have kids since that only affects themselves, but one should only choose to have kids if one can provide for them and put them before yourself. The idea of procreation to meet one’s own agenda strikes me as wrong because the child cannot choose in advance whether or not to enter into the deal.
Of course, I see no problem with vegan parents choosing to have kids because they want kids. Nor do I see a problem with vegan parents choosing to adopt children and raise them as vegans - a life that already exists has been made better as a consequence, there is no question of ”did you give birth to me just for your own ends” and, incidentally, the chances are the newly vegan child was previously one of the 10 omnivorous children @Brian W was talking about. In other words, this isn’t just a binary discussion; there are other alternatives available that don’t have to be so morally controversial.
As for whether @vegan89 is right to suggest vegans having kids will change the balance of lobbying power in a generation or two’s time, I wouldn’t want to predict.
I said "I think I am coming around to that school of thought that having children is better than not" however I haven't really decided. I am leaning one way at the moment, but one of you may convince otherwise, or I may change my mind.
Here are three alternative viewpoints as "more life is good" does seem a bit simplistic.
1. More humans may mean more factory farming, which may be bad lives, as well as less wild animals. So it's not clear that there is overall more good there even if the humans have happy lives.
2. Try this thought experiment: imagine if humanity were considering whether to have add another 100 billion people to Earth immediately. Doing so might make things pretty bad for everyone, cause environmental disasters, and even increase extinction and civilizational collapse risk leading to less humans in the long run, it seems like intuitively like a bad idea, or at least something we'd want to hesitate and think carefully on.
3 Here is another thought experiment, imagine a couple in your street have 50 children (maybe every time she gets pregnant, it's triplets, OK, not very realistic but just stay with me for the purposes of a thought experiment). Now when you go to the park, half the space is taken up by one family, half the doctor's appointment to to one family, half of the school's resources are dealing with one family. Somehow, even if creating 50 children has created more life and happiness and joy, this doesn't feel right. (Assume all the children are happy due to a combination of good parenting support from wider family and state support.) If you agree with me that 50 children doesn't feel right, then does that also mean that 49 doesn't feel right either...probably yes...OK what about having 9 children, does that feel like not the fairest decision for the rest of society. If so, what about 4 vs 2?
After thinking through all these points my tentative conclusion is that it's hard to get to a firm conclusion on the topic of population ethics. The last book I read, What We Owe The Future by William Mackaskill, mentions that population ethics (including the yet to be born) is a real headscratcher even for professional philosophers.
you imply (although I may be misinterpreting, in which case my apologies) that disagreement with @vegan89’s analysis is refusal to think analytically about an emotive subject.
It don't think I agree with that since the word "is" replies that the first is definitely because of the latter.
It often is according to my suspicion (which I couldn't defend with evidence), but it doesn't have to be.
Maybe there is a good way to disagree with it analytically.
The non analytical minded people can also have some good points.
seems overly simplistic to be honest
is one amazingly good life better and more valuable than a million lives that are a bit meh but contain overall more pleasure than suffering?
I don't think so
The book I just mentioned above has a long section on this and the other concludes that more lives are probably better as long as the total net pleasure/happiness/joy/contentment is higher
It seems that professional philosophers are beginning to converge on that as a correct position and I agree (as far as we can reasonably conclude anything)
And the author of the book has some strong arguments to defend that position
An interesting question is whether it would make sense to plan to reduce the world's population to say 1 billion and then hold it at that level
Doing so would likely increase the qualify of life of each person - for instance there would be no traffic and everyone would have a big house with a garden and plentiful food and easy access to nature and tourist sites and national parks would be quieter...but to me it seems that 8 times less people wouldn't have an 8 times better life, so it could be worse...most future people wouldn't get to live at all
seems overly simplistic to be honest
is one amazingly good life better and more valuable than a million lives that are a bit meh but contain overall more pleasure than suffering?
I don't think so
No, me neither. Mine was an opinion about one life; that to me it’s more important that that life is happy rather than long. It follows, therefore, that my opinion is also that the free choice to create a life is only right if that new child’s interests and wellbeing are put first. However, I’m not God and so I wouldn’t play with sacrificing the contentment of lives to try to “optimise” overall happiness unless the life was my own.
That said, I am happy to encourage philosophical debate on the subject as long as nothing is acted upon until there is irrefutable consensus on what is right and we have a solid mechanism for regulating its enactment (just as with euthanasia at the other end if the lifetime).
It don't think I agree with that since the word "is" replies that the first is definitely because of the latter.
It often is according to my suspicion (which I couldn't defend with evidence), but it doesn't have to be.
Maybe there is a good way to disagree with it analytically.
The non analytical minded people can also have some good points.
I said "I think I am coming around to that school of thought that having children is better than not" however I haven't really decided. I am leaning one way at the moment, but one of you may convince otherwise, or I may change my mind.
Here are three alternative viewpoints as "more life is good" does seem a bit simplistic.
1. More humans may mean more factory farming, which may be bad lives, as well as less wild animals. So it's not clear that there is overall more good there even if the humans have happy lives.
2. Try this thought experiment: imagine if humanity were considering whether to have add another 100 billion people to Earth immediately. Doing so might make things pretty bad for everyone, cause environmental disasters, and even increase extinction and civilizational collapse risk leading to less humans in the long run, it seems like intuitively like a bad idea, or at least something we'd want to hesitate and think carefully on.
3 Here is another thought experiment, imagine a couple in your street have 50 children (maybe every time she gets pregnant, it's triplets, OK, not very realistic but just stay with me for the purposes of a thought experiment). Now when you go to the park, half the space is taken up by one family, half the doctor's appointment to to one family, half of the school's resources are dealing with one family. Somehow, even if creating 50 children has created more life and happiness and joy, this doesn't feel right. (Assume all the children are happy due to a combination of good parenting support from wider family and state support.) If you agree with me that 50 children doesn't feel right, then does that also mean that 49 doesn't feel right either...probably yes...OK what about having 9 children, does that feel like not the fairest decision for the rest of society. If so, what about 4 vs 2?
After thinking through all these points my tentative conclusion is that it's hard to get to a firm conclusion on the topic of population ethics. The last book I read, What We Owe The Future by William Mackaskill, mentions that population ethics (including the yet to be born) is a real headscratcher even for professional philosophers.
I think it’s well accepted that the planet has limited resources. I would agree it takes more of those resources to feed an omnivore than a vegan, but ultimately we as a species need a way of settling down to a quiescent population level. Unfortunately, the strength of most countries’ economies is predicated on their population not shrinking, so for as long as we rely on money to get things done and it costs money to look after retired people, that will continue to be a difficult problem to fix.
I still have a problem with this one. You have all these countries complaining of too much immigration, so where are all the immigrants coming from - Alpha Centauri maybe? Or maybe they are also losing people to those other countries, meaning that they have the room for immigrants. Which sounds more plausible?
I still have a problem with this one. You have all these countries complaining of too much immigration, so where are all the immigrants coming from - Alpha Centauri maybe? Or maybe they are also losing people to those other countries, meaning that they have the room for immigrants. Which sounds more plausible?
The idea that restricting immigration will solve a population growth problem is shortsighted. It only moves the problem elsewhere. Since the problem is global, there really is no 'elsewhere'. Restricting immigration creates 'haves' and 'have-nots'. The people in places with immigration restrictions get to pretend that they have solved the problem, when they have just made it worse in other places.
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