Birthrates are falling in most places around the globe, in nearly all the developed nations (except Israel). And in many places not considered “developed.” Most are below replacement level which is 2.1 children per adult woman.
One wonders. Is this what happens when an intelligent species gets control of its fertility? Separates highly incentivized reproductive behavior from its former biological consequences? Do intelligent species die out? Is it the reason we’ve not been visited (as far as we know) by a star-faring species?
Or is this an intermediate stage in an evolving process which eventually takes reproduction mostly or entirely out of individual hands and turns it over to some technological “fix?” The crèche system of “Brave New World,” for instance? Is perhaps Huxley’s “alcohol in one’s blood surrogate,” a future birth defect risk, the future’s fetal alcohol syndrome?
