http://endofspecies.com Demographic decline: is humanity at the end of its life cycle? A natural life cycle common to all cosmic civilizations? Mon, 02 Oct 2006 12:27:12 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en   If everything has a beginning and an end, can humanity be the exception? If all stars and galaxies emerge and disappear obeying the same laws of physics, does every cosmic people, human and ET alike, follow the same cycle of social evolution?  All civilizations in space face the same reality: the ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=9   In order to fully replace a generation, technically, every female must have two of her newborns survive into adulthood. Throughout history, given the high frequency of death, meeting this target often required from four to eight deliveries per lifetime. Thanks to medical and nutritional advances, two grown-up children demand as ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=8   Reproduction was serious matter in pre-industrial days, as it still is in today's poor South. By helping around the house or working outside for wage, children contributed since an early age to the family. Nobody in the West complained about child labor before the 19th century. More importantly, as many ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=7   Are low-fertility societies sustainable? Can we get away economically with fewer children? Do we still need at least 2.1 for psychological well-being? If a smaller youth population can not feed and care adequately for the masses of oldies that outnumber them, sooner or later the pendulum will swing back.  On the ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=6   Can life be happy without many children? For sure, there will always be children. The issue is not voluntary childlessness; it's whether a world of 1.3 or 1.8 babies per mum such a good deal, psychologically, when we age? Aren't young people trading their future happiness, which means more babies ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=5   ''What is to be done?'' pundits would ask, in good Leninist fashion. If people don't reproduce for themselves and suffer little for that, can they be persuaded to do it for a cause larger than their own private lives? Is humankind important enough to motivate humans where God (not enough ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=4   How could a species of conscious, intelligent individuals run its own course toward extinction? What happened to the much-touted human greatness? And that special destiny in space? Isn't survival the primary purpose of life itself?  You can't help feeling absurd? Such feelings won't go away until you stop to see so ... http://endofspecies.com/?p=3