| > > So in the long run we have to either die or stop having children. There is no other option. > This is a very different statement from your previous assertions that we have to die, period. Actually, it's not. I would have thought it was self-evident that ceasing to have children was not a viable option, but apparently you don't see that, so I will explain: the desire to have children is woven deeply into the human psyche, indeed, into the psyche of every living thing that has a psyche, for a very simple reason: genes that build brains that want children reproduce better than genes that build brains that don't. The only way to achieve immortality without unsustainable exponential growth is to asymptotically reduce the reproduction rate to 0. The more immortals you have, the fewer of them will be able to have children without exhausting the resources of the universe. And if you think this is a small price to pay for immortality you really don't understand human nature, or even life itself. > Populations grow more slowly or not at all when people feel substantially safer. That's true, but you will never reduce the growth rate to zero organically. You will always have some people who want a child. Among mortals this is not a problem. As long as the reproduction rate is <= 1 this is sustainable. But the sustainable reproduction rate in a population of immortals is zero, and you will never achieve that absent draconian enforcement because Darwin. > I'm hoping that the observations above help in that regard. Not at all. All you've done is provide evidence for my initial hypothesis, that you are hopelessly naive. > (This will be my last comment on this thread.) That's fine. Check back in 20-30 years. |