February 9th, 2013
Tyler Cowen has some nice things to say about What to Expect.
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I just saw you on Book TV and learned a lot from your very excellent presentation. One question: regarding human beings’ wish to have children, I didn’t hear you mention the biological, as well as complex psychological, wish to pass on one’s genes. Other mammals have this very strongly if not consciously, and it transcends whether one is religious or “spiritual” per se. It probably is in the book but just wasn’t stressed on TV by you.
Thank you. -
Saw you on CSPAN. I wonder what policy changes could bridge the gap between the fertile young and the financially secure / emotionally mature middle-aged. In particular, I’d like to see the industrialized world allow some of their young, fertile women to finance college educations by renting wombs to rich middle-aged couples who waited “too long”.
By combining forces, women could start having babies at a younger age without running off the rails of the college educated professional middle-class society. On the contrary, they could actually further their professional goals by being fertile… but only if conservative hangups can be overcome
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Another policy that would work is to control the sex-ratio. After times of war, and in polygamyst societies, the fertility rate is high.
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Hey john, i predict in the future, once the rest of the world had adopted the western style liberal democracy that highly values individual rights, that there will be a huge conflict between womens reproductive rights (the right to take birth control) and the survival of the human race. Should we take away womens rights?
Marianne Goldberger, M.D. February 10, 2013 at 1:36 pm
I just saw you on Book TV and learned a lot from your very excellent presentation. One question: regarding human beings’ wish to have children, I didn’t hear you mention the biological, as well as complex psychological, wish to pass on one’s genes. Other mammals have this very strongly if not consciously, and it transcends whether one is religious or “spiritual” per se. It probably is in the book but just wasn’t stressed on TV by you.
Thank you.