> -----Original Message----- > From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On > Behalf Of Kevin B. O'Brien > Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2008 9:00 PM > To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion > Subject: Re: What is wealth? > > > The countries with high fertility rates tend to be poorer. Thus, wealth > is > > anti-correlated with the probability a person's gene marker will be seen > in > > a given member of the Nth generation after one's own (which is a > standard > > measure of sociobiological fitness). > > > I tend to think that is a pretty simple manifestation of the Demographic > Transition. Children are a net asset in poorer countries (they can be > put to work, can support you in old age, etc.). In richer economies, > children are a luxury good that cost you a lot and deliver no economic > return, hence you will tend to have fewer of them.
You know, if you took this and the first statement of yours I responded to as axioms, you could probably put together a system in which both A and ~A are both provable statements. (This was considered a big negative when I took math and logic). :-) So, I think you have to pick one of the two statements you made and reject the other. Or, say that both have some impact, but are not nearly as universal as you've portrayed. Indeed, while I think the latter statement has some truth, the data don't really fit it as a sole explanation. Russia's birth rate fell as its economic conditions fell. There were far fewer births in the Great Depression as there were in the post WWII prosperity. The US has a far higher birth rate among college educated women than Japan does. My suggestion is that sociobiology is a viewpoint to be used, among others, and that it is not a simple explanation. But, unlike others on the list, I do think partial understandings can be helpful. Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
