And murderous conflict: < Now do the same exercise I did with 6 children - well, no wonder they live in poverty>
The nature of nature is to force viciously genocidal brute genetic warfare and females having lots of off-spring has been a vital strategy for most species forever. Count fungal spores for example, or fish eggs.
People are somewhat different in that the value of our brain is so great and its education so lengthy of necessity to create great value in it so the number of births per woman is at most about 20 and normally more like 10 [in the natural state] with nature inventing menopause so she can help with the next generation which is more important than going on breeding like mad herself for another 20 years.
But the result of having such a burgeoning population is that one way or another, a Malthusian final solution is the result, with 80% of humans having to die without reproducing. Given their propensity to reproduce, that means a lot of conflict and that has been the fact of history since chimpoid times.
I don't recall ever seeing it mentioned, but it's pretty obvious that the most important invention ever to avoid conflict is contraception.
With only one child, or two, possibly three, and unusually four , women and fathers value their children very highly. No longer are there hordes of spare young males of low value with little better to do with them than give them a club, sword, or rifle and helmet and send them off to the front line to get more territory and women, or at least stop the opposition from doing so.
Now, we Qualcomm shareholders are more inclined to hire a horde of Chinese to help in mobile cyberspace development, than hire males to go into hand to hand combat. A billion Indians looks like a huge market, not a threat. They'll either buy from me or work for me. Buying and selling is a LOT better than head-hacking and cannibalism.
It seems that most likely there will be a shortage of people, rather than a surplus, with Peak People predicted for 2037.
It seems likely that the total population will end up at something like a billion or two, though that would mean a LOT of ghost towns.
People do tend to like living in cities and 10 million people can easily form a well-designed city in comfort and convenience with all mod cons. Not that such a thing exists yet.
Mqurice |
