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That is a terrible idea because only reasonable people will follow it.

Precisely, to say don't have kids to responsible people is kind of eugenics that ensures that only irresponsible people have kids. (Maybe eugenics is a bit too strong of a word, but you get the idea.)

This! [0]

About 12 years ago I proposed during class in school, that to save the planet we must reduce number of people living on Earth significantly and relatively quickly. Well the teacher thought that I was new Hitler (at least at first).

Just like you said, the point is that either people shouldn't have kids at all or have no more than 1. If whole Earth's population would do this, in 30years we will see a sharp fall in the population count. And in 60years it should be reduced by 30% at least [1].

If we will not do this now - our children, or grand children will not thank us.

[0] this is probably against HN ethos, though I couldn't resist

[1] It's completely out of my head, though if the perfect scenario would work - I guess it's a reasonable number.

We need both, to reduce the total number of people AND to reduce the per capita consumption.

I have seen more than enough people that claim to have no children for the sake of the Environment, only to go and buy pets and treat those like children; retarded children that will never learn to speak, walk in 2 feet, or become productive members of society, demanding constant attention for their natural lifespan, and which will age rapidly and die in their teens, - and have valuable medical resources expended in heroic efforts to futily prolongue their agony for weeks/months. You could claim that the pet dies early and does not produce offspring, but then the pet owner will likely mourn for a few weeks and then go to the pet store and start all over again.

Well, I mean, really, the only ecologically sound thing to do is kill yourself.

We don't need to do anything, the economy is already decreasing population. The dual income family has destroyed big families. It's very difficult financially to have one child and two is about the max families can handle. And dual income is necessary to survive now. Economy is getting harder and harder for everyone. The optimal strategy for families now is to put massive resources into 1 or 2 kids and hope they do ok in this coming automated economy world. Social security is on the path to collapse. It's not a giant savings account like many think. It's designed so current tax income pays for current retired generation. When the millenials retire, the system will collapse due to lower young population. But it's not just social security, the whole economy is designed like this. Population growth was a base assumption that is no longer true.

It's only in the well developed western world.

Third world countries have the 'capacity' to almost double world population (in case of medium growth scenario, hopefully population size will plateau at around 13 billion, I do not think that optimistic rapid decline is possible without rational action of global intervention to reduce population growth [0]), which IMHO sounds catastrophic. Because for next 50-100 years global population will be increasing rapidly and hopefully will stabilise after that, without any prospects of reduction for probably double of that time frame. Even if the population will start to decrease I think it may take at least few ages to reduce population size to what is today.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World-Population-1800-210... , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population_estimates

Europeans are currently doing their best to follow your advice. Their average fertility rate was 1.58 in 2014 with Portugal at 1.2. The world average is around 2.3 which happens to be the rate at which population growth is around zero.

Individual judgement? Do we imagine some couples saying to themselves "We're not up to much genetically-speaking so - we'd better not have any kids"?

> Individual judgement? Do we imagine some couples saying to themselves "We're not up to much genetically-speaking so - we'd better not have any kids"?

I think that global 1 child policy would be harsh [0], though, for the lack of better term, a 'perfect' medium between 'no child at all' policy and "increase human population until it's destruction" scenario.

In perfect case couple would have up to 1 offspring, thus global medium would be something like 0.9 or 0.8, or even less. Which will reduce global population by half in 50 years.

[0] It's harsh, though would be right thing to do so we will not proliferate and consume ourselves to the point of global destruction.

This is wrong, population growth is not a problem anymore. All developed countries have very low fertility rate (even the US when excluding immigration). Japan's demographic crisis is the future for all developed nations.

> All developed countries

And all non developed countries will potentially add 3-5 billion to current population [0]

[0] on moderate forecast, IMHO optimistic sharp decline is not possible without very aggressive global intervention to population growth (either from rational human thinking or from ecological catastrophe). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World-Population-1800-210..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population_estimates

There's also the argument that wanting to reproduce is a natural human urge, and you're asking people to go against a very key biological instinct.

We haven't done all we can to protect the environment. We haven't even tried that hard. It might be easier to reduce our personal impact to 10% than try to reduce the world's population by the same level.

Well, I constrained the scope, but CO2 emission is not the only problem about the environment. Most resource are scarce and although I believe in Elon Musk as much as the next techie, we can't just take a leap of faith. Water is scarce, energy is scarce (though we are getting better), but we are growing at an unsustainable rate.

Now the main problem is that if you reduce your CO2 emission by 80% and you and all your offsprings have two kids and each consume at your reduced level, in just two generations, it would been better if you didn't have kids. Two generations after that even at the reduced consumption, you (by having kids) contribute to CO2 emission by a factor of 6 if you have just consumed all the meat and didn't have kids.

Geometric progression is a nasty nasty thing.

>"you and all your offsprings have two kids"

Two kids per couple isn't enough to cause population growth.

Two parents having two kids leads to the exact same number of people on the planet after the parents die.

We only see population growth with 3+ kids per couple, and that's becoming increasingly uncommon in developed countries.

It could. If lifespans were so long as to be nearly immortal (which may happen in our lifetimes), then the birth rate that would lead to stable population level would be one per couple. At that rate, a population of N would asymptotically approach 2N.

Absolute immortality isn't a plausible scenario, but it's important to consider that as longevity increases, the reproductive rate that leads to a stable population must go down.

Sure, at the point of signficant life extension we would need to set stricter limits on population size, but we're not quite there yet. Also, whilst there is some overlap, I think it's helpful to think of environmental damage and overpopulation as separate, as we'll have a hard enough time convincing people to change their daily habits without also asking them to give up on the idea on having multiple kids.

Exactly.

Whilst human population can't continue to grow on this planet indefinitely, there's plenty that can be done to push our societies in a direction that works with nature. That should be our focus.

To give one example of how working with nature benefits us all, check out this talk by William McDonough:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoRjz8iTVoo

We already do a lot of things that go against our biological instincts. Which is probably one of the main reasons humans are so successful as a species. We can change ourselves some more, if it will increase the chances of our species' survival.

We sit in font of computers the whole day. The disciplined ones runs when there is no immediate danger or prey. We don't attack or kill people when they make us angry. We don't have sex with everything that has a chance to bear offspring.

But we are doing more and more things going against our biological instincts, especially in the last century; So I don't know if I would qualify the current human a successful species. We are destroying our habitat

I'm going with only replacing myself and my future wife if I end up having children. In other words, have 2 or less children per couple. I believe with ideas such as what Schwarzenegger is suggesting, the current population can be sustained and will thrive without requiring reduction in the future.

Concern for future generations and people sacrificing for said generations will be key to saving the environment.

Many movements express your idea, none of them are popular. E.g.:

  * Voluntary childlessness: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntary_childlessness
  * Human extinction: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntary_Human_Extinction_Movement

Another idea: not having pets.

Somewhat related, a funny sketch by Bill Burr on population control: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wq_edHqpdA

This comment is satire right? I thought so at first, then saw that the comment's children are taking it seriously, or even going along with it. Now I'm not sure anymore.

If followed conscientiously by those who really think this way - this approach really might benefit future generations.

"The only serious question in life is whether to kill yourself or not." ― Albert Camus

So you can take the idea of volunteer depopulation farther. You first?

Well, that is a nasty thing to say, but my whole point was that a single person's reduced consumption doesn't help as much in the grand scheme of things just because of exponential growth.

It's not meant to be nasty at all. For Camus, that was philosophy concentrated down to a single sentence. Why do we keep on living? Especially if one has decided not to breed? What then, is the point of life?

You can ask any number of people who have chosen not to have kids - or any number of gay people, or people who were born sterile, or have otherwise lost the ability to have kids - this question. For many of them, the answer is "to enjoy it, and to be a positive influence in the lives of others".

What's with this point of view when questions/solutions/hypotheses like the parent comment suggest?

When I propose this idea the usual reaction is: "Are you the next Hitler? Do you want to kill everybody? Maybe you should kill yourself first!".

It's proposal not to proliferate ourselves to extinction, no one is proposing any mass genocide. IMHO [0], we are 2-3 generations from catastrophic survival problems (unfathomable problems due to climate change, lack of resources like drinkable water, etc.).

[0] completely pulling this out of my a, though I think it's reasonable scenario with current increasing rate of consuming ourselves to death.