Is enforcing rules on certain things for the greater good ever acceptable?

Western societies like ours do find themselves faced with a dilemma where large but poor families are concerned. We all feel that children should be given a good start in life and they should not have their lives blighted because they were born into the wrong family, but at the same time we feel that parents should be responsible in limiting the size of their family if they cannot afford to give all their children a decent upbringing. The result tends to be a muddle which leaves many children in the UK living in families with incomes below the poverty line. However without a large pool of ordinary citizens the economy would be entirely reliant on migrants to do the tasks not done by the Middle Class elite. We would have a helot society.

Resources are under strain, but we could organise them more efficiently. If we concentrated all the UK population in one zone from London to Manchester with the same densities as in central London, then the zone need only be 20 miles wide.That would leave the rest of the country available for agriculture, cut transport costs, leave everyone within easy reach of facilities such as good hospitals, and probably raise productivity due to the networking effect of urbanisation.

Almost half the food produced in the Third World is lost due to poor storage. Water resources are squandered due to failures in irrigation. Even California has not learned to conserve water because it has had subsidised supplies for so long.

Simply spreading wealth around does not work unless you want to put the entire world on rationing, which would certainly end hunger. Some people will always make better use of their talents than others and inequalities will soon re-establish themselves.

Eugenicists have been pointing out since Darwin that humans are the only domesticated animal that is not selectively bred to produce a better specimen. Unfortunately it does sometimes seem that the best specimens in terms of ability to contribute to society are the ones least likely to breed at even a replacement level, while those who contribute least (often over several generations), are those who are the most prolific breeders.

I don't believe you have all the facts or are overlooking them... resources are wasted, in many cases. We use for fun, comfort and convenience, not always out of necessity.

Food is not running out and people could really help themselves more by growing some of their own food.. but many are too busy having the perfect grassy yard.

Meat is not needed in the amounts many people eat it.

Living spaces... since when did a person need so much space and houses with multiple bathrooms and mansions? Really... so many people have so much more than they'll ever need.

Schools... have you seen the nice swim pools, the new climbing walls, the houses torn down to expand a school's area for tracks and whatnot?

There are abandoned, repossessed and empty houses all over the place...some, just rotting away while people wait for the right amount of money to let them go... and some people don't want anyone to have a house they have sitting empty.

Food... have you seen how much is wasted daily from fast food places, private homes, businesses... and look at all the "junk" people buy. There is no shortage of food... just a shortage of interest or care to share and feed others.

This world isn't run on helping others and making sure everyone has their needs met and not matter what limits you give others and how many laws are passed... this world won't be run on helping all and making sure everyone has their needs met.

I could say a whole lot more, but that's it... for now..

One needs to view these things through the scope of history. For instance the Christian Right points a narrowed finger of horror at the Chinese one child law. Resultantly all they report is the BAD outcomes. If one steps back and looks at the bigger picture you will see the changes this policy brought on were many including the incidental empowerment of women who only century ago had almost no say about their future. Now you find Chinese women running the family businesses, getting the college educations that allow them to be doctors, lawyers and college professors. The power brokers of this new China are not old men, but women in their forties and fifties.

Yes, the one child Chinese law resulted in some questionable outcomes, but it also brought on some very interesting changes.

One last thought - in practice the one child law was not a one child law. Rural Chinese areas were allowed several children and the rich frequently just paid a fine to keep trying for a male offspring.

I love your line of thinking, however I think we could ask a better question before asking that one.

What things could be done to discourage having children while still preserving our freedom of choice?

A two thousand dollar tax rebate could be given to those who go get fixed. This will cost the tax payers money initially but will avoid much more $ in the future because they wont be paying for the welfare subsides for those would be children. The operation is reversible just in case the individual changes their minds about having children in the future but the cost and trouble would likely discourage most less than quality people from ever doing that.

This will mostly attract those short term, immediate gratification, lower income type of people which is exactly the type of people who need to be discouraged from having children. (My opinion)

Only the people who are really wanting a child will decide to pass on the tax rebate which are the type of people who should have children, and lets face it. They get a few thousand tax rebate for each child every year once having one anyway so, it's not like its too unfair or anything.

There are a plethora of ideas like this one: ways to influence choice while still preserving freedom of choice in the book Nudge. A lot of ways mentioned in the book have been proven to work very well.

Some other ideas -

Being an organ donor. In our country we have less than 10% participation because we represent the choice with the default option being NO. In other countries they have a 90% participation rate because their default option is YES.

Default options for contributing in a 401 K, & similar things have been proven to work well too. Once could simply elect to opt out but most people do the default option.

We don't need to take away freedoms to influence our suggested best choice to others.

America alone owns four times more food than the world needs to feed itself. Limited resources aren't actually a problem, the planet is more bountiful than corporations and government would let you believe. It means more money to them!

The problem really is offsetting carbon emissions. In order to halt global warming it is projected that we need to cut our carbon emissions to 1.2 tonnes each by 2050. The problem is that just as a natural cycle human beings produce 3 tonnes each every year and so we would need to reduce the world's population to 3 billion or less, and rely only on carbon neutral technology. I suppose we need to replant all the forest we have destroyed in our history, and I suppose also find "green" alternatives to wood, although I admit it seems unfeasible.

Did you ever sit down and have a heart to heart conversation with a virus about his out of control population explosion when he infests a host? Try it. You'll get as much done as you just did. Man is the most selfish creature ever to exist on Earth. If he wants children, and he usually does, he is going to have them. Everybody knows about this problem and no one does anything about it. That will continue until someday in the future when the wealthy wake up and realize that the billions of people that populate the Earth are impacting their survival. Then, the people in charge will get off their dead arses and concoct a pandemic or nuclear accident or biological incident that will severely reduce the poor population. After this, the poor will be hunted down and eventually eliminated. For the good of the few. The chosen ones. Only a few hundred million will be left. Then your problem will be solved. I suggest you start thinking about what you have to do in order to be one of those people that survive, unless of course you have several million pounds laying around. in which case I'm preaching to the choir..

The requirement to have kids should be set at a certain income and level of education of the parents. It is a known fact that stupidity/intelligence spreads through parental/societal guidance. If the parents and also society in general isnt capable of producing healthy, intelligent, and productive individuals, we need to first fix that problem and then think about bringing more individuals into this world.

As for now, we have one of the most horrifically violent and apathetic human culture in known history. Not only in terms of direct physical violence through crime and wars, but in terms of psychological warfare through poverty and discrimination.

If everyone had even a relative thought, we wouldn't be in this shithole now. So the next time think about having a kid or ******* without contraception, don't. Instead, spend that time thinking about how you can help the people that exist right now.

Yes, if we are talking about underdeveloped nations, that receive significant aid from "developed" countries but do nothing except reproducing. No development, no desire to work, live better etc. What's the point of feeding them?

2 countries I personally reside in have a population decline issue and we do need more kids.

White population in general is declining all over the world.

https://sge.lclark.edu/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/...

So NO for this kind of countries.

It will become necessary actually. I would much rather a child not be born than have it abused, killed, or neglected..or die of disease or starvation.

In the U.S. I think we should consider birthing limits, and the cost relationship from public assistance paying to raise a child versus the cost of having people fixed.

There's a difference between enforcing rules and offering incentives. A big difference. In China, parents are only allowed to have one child. If they have a second child, that child is killed. If parents have more than 2 children, 3 or more, the overall population will increase, so your plan of allowing 4 children per couple in China would not reduce the population.