I am dating and the goal is to propose in the end of the year, and have 5 kids along the way.
The more we learn about heritability and environment the stronger genetic determinism (at scale) gets.
If you are smart and relatively well off (as is your partner) have as many kids as you can.
The challenges we face in the coming century require as many of the best and brightest of us as possible.
There is too much people in the world already.. We have all the bright people we need already, we just need to cater and take care for the ones already here..
Until we can get around and have everyone already here feed and sheltered we should stop multiplying like rabbits..
in my opinion 1 kid is enough, 2 kids tops.. that is more then enough to keep us (humanity) around for a long time..
The Flynn effect reversed sometime in the mid 80s. The pattern is currently for less educated people and people in worse financial situations to have more children than those more well off.
That's significantly concerning given we have extensive evidence genes matter more than environment does in humans:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4270739/
It is far more efficient in the long run for that trend to invert, and the average intelligence of the population plays a huge role in facing the challenges of the future successfully.
Pretending this is not a significant and increasingly dire problem does nothing but avoid confrontation with hard truths.
that was the same in the past of the now called developed countries, but as overall economy improved more people had access to better medicine, child mortality decreased and people raised above misery, all that mean that families did not had the need for as many kids as before..
In fact having more kids now can be detrimental in many places because kids can be expensive to raise..
So not only having many kids is no longer a necessity, it can be a financial burden that many families cannot take and lets be realistic that will not change anytime soon..
All in all i do not see why we should not make an effort ensure the people in worst financial situation have their situation improved.. And for the less educated people to be more educated.. And that not only in undeveloped countries but everywhere..
Last, but not least.. Let me tell you something.. People in undeveloped countries are just as smart as people anywhere else if you give then the change to achieve their full potential..
So i maintain my opinion.. we should worry to feed and shelter the people already here before we worry about reproducing like rabbits.. people can do wonders if they do not have to worry about their next meal..
But, again being realistic, i do not see any of this changing anytime soon as well.. but one can dream..
and i will not even comment on the racist implication that people in developed countries have better genes just because they are from developed countries..