Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!lll-winken!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ames!vsi1!hsv3!mvp
From: mvp@hsv3.UUCP (Mike Van Pelt)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Why bother? (was Re: Terraforming, sun shield)
Message-ID: <7493@hsv3.UUCP>
Date: 2 Mar 91 01:55:09 GMT
References: <21260@crg5.UUCP>
Reply-To: mvp@hsv3.UUCP (Mike Van Pelt)
Organization: Video 7 + G2 = Headland Technology
Lines: 32

In article <21260@crg5.UUCP> szabo@crg5.UUCP (Nick Szabo) writes:
-Before winking too much, think about the fact that since the advent of
-birth control, sex != procreation.  In long-term thinking such as we're 
-discussing here, this has serious consequences.  For example:
-
-* Barring large, regular, and indefinitely lasting immigration 
-  from Earth, a terraformed Venus would never be populated to the limit 
-  of the created ecological niche.
-
-* Space settlements in general will die out without such waves
-  of immigration indefinitely into the future.
-
-* Eventually, human population growth on earth could slow, reverse,
-  and approach extinction.
 ...
-It seems that there is little biological "parenting instinct" to 
-motivate conception independent of sexual desire and keep this trend
-from reaching its ultimate conclusion.

Still, there are people who, while intelligent and educated, choose to
have large families.  To the extent that this personality is inherited,
one might expect the population drop to slow, and then pick up again,
as those who don't want children get better at not having them, and
remove themselves from the gene pool.  (Think of it as evolution in
action...)

The question, of course, is whether there is anything inheritable about
the desire to procreate, as distinct from sexual desire.  
-- 
Mike Van Pelt                                When guns are outlawed,
Headland Technology/Video 7                  only Carl Rowan will have guns.
...ames!vsi1!v7fs1!mvp