[NoMoreNicksLeft]

If you think humanity is a good thing, and you want it to continue indefinitely into the future, then reproduction is essential. If you do not think this, then you want Earth to be a dull rock, with no civilization and no intelligent species. It really is just that binary.

>Without that pressure, would people choose to have fewer children on a scale we've never seen before?

They already made that choice, decades ago, and there's no evidence anyone is rethinking it. Fertility levels are sub-replacement.