Globalisation

[Malthus]

As if nowadays rampant poverty and the inability to support more children adequately stops people from having more children. I refuse to believe  the humans of more than 14 thousand years before us would have a better grasp on procreation and it's effects on their local economic and natural circumstances, than people of today.

The problem of overpopulation in poor countries is like a Prisoner's Dilemma: everyone would be better off if everyone stopped having so many kids. However, individual parents require having as many kids as possible - because without a large family, there is no security. You need to have lots of kids to support you, individually: a big kin system = safety.

This is why, paradoxically, if a country transitions in such a way as to make things more "modern" (like developing some sort of social security net, more reliance on ways of like other than subsistence farming, etc.), the birth rate tends to go *down*. It is in part because folks cease needing lots of kids to survive. Also, as education becomes a priority, each kid costs more (but can deliver more).

There are plenty of other reasons as well - decline in adherence to religious traditions that stress fertility as a virtue, increase in the status of women. But it is hard to deny that there are some self-interested reasons behind this as well.

[CountDeMoney]

Thought it was established that subsistence hunter-gatherer societies had only as many children as could be reasonably carried by mothers when required to shift into Haul Ass Mode. Fake anthropological studies!  So sad!

[Tamas]

Or, you know, they had exactly as many children as they could carry because the rest of the children died.


And so, the reason they had exactly as many children as they could support is that the excess just died.

[The Brain]

lol Hunter

[CountDeMoney]

Or, you know, they had exactly as many children as they could carry because the rest of the children died.


And so, the reason they had exactly as many children as they could support is that the excess just died.

How many beets can you carry, mortality rates aside?

[Crazy_Ivan80]

As if nowadays rampant poverty and the inability to support more children adequately stops people from having more children. I refuse to believe  the humans of more than 14 thousand years before us would have a better grasp on procreation and it's effects on their local economic and natural circumstances, than people of today.

nowadays situation is from the perspective of usually sedentary but Always non-hunter-gatherer societies where it's usually smart to have many children.

[CountDeMoney]

Ed's pastoral theme is "antebellum Mengele chic" featured in the April 2014 issue of Better Cults & Compounds.

[Jacob]

Restriction of sex is not the only way to deliberately limit number of children - there is also abortion and infanticide, which also happened (though to what degree is controversial).

Yeah, I've definitely seen it argued that infanticide was not uncommon but I have no idea whether that was someone's "just so" story or based on solid evidence.

[Malthus]

Restriction of sex is not the only way to deliberately limit number of children - there is also abortion and infanticide, which also happened (though to what degree is controversial).

Yeah, I've definitely seen it argued that infanticide was not uncommon but I have no idea whether that was someone's "just so" story or based on solid evidence.

My guess based on the things I've read off an on is this: researchers know that HGs fertility rate is low. They don't really know for sure why. There are two sets of reasons that get mentioned: one deals with physical causes beyond the control of individual HGs; the other, various reasons within the control of HGs. Unfortunately, hard evidence lacks as to the impact of these various mechanisms, so we can't definitively say HGs *deliberately* control their fertility, or if so, exactly how - though it certainly seems likely, and if they wanted to, there are ways.

All these mechanisms can be shown to exist to some extent, in different degrees with different groups, but their exact impact is hard to measure - particularly given the (very human) tendency of existing HGs to not really wish to discuss intimate details concerning sexual practices, or possibly upsetting details concerning abortion and infanticide, with some foreign researchers who just show up asking questions.

[The Brain]

All these mechanisms can be shown to exist to some extent, in different degrees with different groups, but their exact impact is hard to measure - particularly given the (very human) tendency of existing HGs to not really wish to discuss intimate details concerning sexual practices, or possibly upsetting details concerning abortion and infanticide, with some foreign researchers who just show up asking questions.

Simply solved with hidden cameras. Hell, if the HGs are truly backwards the cameras won't even have to be hidden. Surely we can study subjects who won't answer questions? Otherwise nuclear physics and ichthyology are pretty much screwed.

[Malthus]

All these mechanisms can be shown to exist to some extent, in different degrees with different groups, but their exact impact is hard to measure - particularly given the (very human) tendency of existing HGs to not really wish to discuss intimate details concerning sexual practices, or possibly upsetting details concerning abortion and infanticide, with some foreign researchers who just show up asking questions.

Simply solved with hidden cameras. Hell, if the HGs are truly backwards the cameras won't even have to be hidden. Surely we can study subjects who won't answer questions? Otherwise nuclear physics and ichthyology are pretty much screwed.

Hard to get funding for bugging the Kalahari Desert. 

[Tamas]

Do we know of similar societal birth control mechanism for other mammals, or is this something that was developed than lost exclusively by Homo sapiens?

[Malthus]

Do we know of similar societal birth control mechanism for other mammals, or is this something that was developed than lost exclusively by Homo sapiens?

What do you mean "lost"? We in the West do these sorts of things right now.

What has changed is that the mix of techniques has totally changed.

We have added artificial contraception to the mix, hardly use lactation induced contraception at all, have basically no reliance on sexual taboos, have (probably) increased reliance on abortion, and far, far lower reliance on infanticide (which is now a crime).

No-one (or rather, very few) consciously think "well, if I have more kids, the carrying capacity of North America will be strained". Rather, they think things like "I can't afford to have more kids, it would totally screw up my lifestyle". 

[Eddie Teach]

lol Hunter

Out of curiosity, what is your Christian name?

[The Brain]

lol Hunter

Out of curiosity, what is your Christian name?

I mentioned it once on Old Languish. I thought you kept track of posters?