Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,rec.arts.sf.science
From: mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman)
Subject: Re: Are the Moties us?
Organization: Oracle Corporation
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 22:30:28 GMT
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In article <1992Aug14.113015.3466@desire.wright.edu> demon@desire.wright.edu (Stupendous Man) writes:
>In article <1992Aug12.201344.6642@oracle.us.oracle.com>, mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman) writes:
>> Has it occurred to anyone else out there that the Moties are really
>> not all that different from us?

>> Consider:

>> Up until quite recently the optimum genetic strategy for a human
>> female was to have a few kids and concentrate on them.  The optimum
>> strategy for a male was to have as many by-blows as possible but to
>> also have a small family that he concentrated his effort on.

>> This is no longer the case in most developed countries.  

>> In the US today, if you have a family of twenty kids you won't have
>> fun but you will probably bring all, or the fast majority of them, to
>> maturity.  That means you will have a larger share of the next
>> generation.  This is true for both men and women.

>	Perhaps, but (at least in the US) the attitude is not one of
>dominating the next generation.

Come on, Brett.  Most of your posts are much more intelligent than
this.  Who said anything about attitudes?  Do dandelions have
attitudes about dominating the next generation when they send out
their seeds?  Heck no, but that doesn't stop advantageous traits from
spreading an becoming predominant in the population.

>> Countervailing pressures for smaller families won't be caused by
>> crowding.  They will be caused by changes in conditions that make it
>> impossible to have all or most of the children in a large family
>> survive.

>	Actually factors for smaller families include increased leisure time
>and a better standard of living.  Images of large families now evoke pictures
>of huddled masses.

Once more, such things are evolutionarily irrelevant.

>> If I am right, we would expect the following effects....

>> 1.  Women having children at a younger age

>	Affluent women have children at an older age.

But in society as a whole we do seem to have a recent trend to births
at very low ages.  

>> 2.  More women having children without husbands - after all, the male
>> is no longer so important and you only have so many child bearing
>> years.

>	Income is a factor here also.  As is history.  Those growing up with
>one parent are far more likely to be a single parent.

So?

>> 3.  More premature births - we can take better care of them now
>> outside the womb and if you pop them out early you can have another
>> kid sooner.

>	!  Premature birth is hardly controllable, and not likely to be an
>evolutionary factor.  For 100ks of years premature babies have died.  Any
>evolutionary pressure would have been that of breeding it out of ourselves.

So then why don't we have 24 month gestation periods like elephants?
Average gestation periods can evolve up or down.

>> 4.  Women having more kids

>> Seems to me like we have effects 1, 2, and 3 already.  I don't know
>> about 4.

>	Not here we don't.  The exceptions are in poorer areas.  With 3) more
>preemies live because of better technology.  But it hasn't been long enough by
>far for this to have had any evolutionary effects.

Just more food makes preemies more likely to live.  Remember - an
eight month baby is also a preemie.  I'm not talking about six
monthers.

As for "poorer areas" how poor are they?  Poor enough that large
families or families without male parents don't survive?  Heck no.  

>> Until something happens to forcibly restrain humn breeding I would
>> expect to see a continuing trend that brings us closer and closer to
>> the Motie model.

>> A race with a doubling period of 100 years that bumped into us even
>> today would see us as a plague that could take over the galaxy while
>> they are still stuck on a few dozen worlds.  They would be right.

>	Except that our population is largely regulated by wealth.  If they
>wanted to pacify us, all they would have to do is make us all rich.
>:)

Why the smiley?  In the short run you are totally correct.  I am
contending, however, that in the long run the negative correlation
between wealth and fertility will disappear.
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