# How would the world change if people could only have two children? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 8, 2017, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049 "2017-11-08T13:57:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/21 "2017-11-09T14:40:26Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > We’d soon have an entire planet of little Emperors and Empresses… Yeah, the Chinese problem writ large. > [@Voyager](#): > > Given the hard limit of 2, it will happen - it just might take a little longer. I don’t the the OP’s premise allows you to buy baby rights. Babies, yes, but not the rights. So given that at least some parents won’t have 2, and that some children will die, we are still below replacement rate. Even more so since life extension won’t be 100% effective. Hard to extend one’s life when your plane blows up in the middle of the ocean. Those who choose not to or can’t have a kid naturally can have their genetic material extracted and someone else can have their baby quota. Unless one is trying to design a plan to make the species extinct then it’s how it would go down. No, life extension won’t be 100% (well, as long as we are talking about staying biological), but it would buy us time to basically work things out to ensure that everyone, whether they wanted babies or not was taken into account. I recall reading that if you were somehow able to completely turn off aging (and get rid of all of the effects and diseases of aging), that the progression of the new actuary tables would be something like 50% of the population live to a couple of hundred, 10% to 1000, 3% to 10,000 and down from there. You might get some really old timer that lives to 100,000 or so, just like we get some people today that live into their 120s. Starting with the current population of 7 billion, it would take a long time before we even had to start worrying about the 2 baby issue and eventual species extinction…long enough that I don’t think it would be an issue. Even without radical life extension I’m pretty sure it would be long enough that we could come up with solutions even with the technology we have today. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/22 "2017-11-09T18:39:42Z")
> [@XT](#): > > No, life extension won’t be 100% (well, as long as we are talking about staying biological), but it would buy us time to basically work things out to ensure that everyone, whether they wanted babies or not was taken into account. I recall reading that if you were somehow able to completely turn off aging (and get rid of all of the effects and diseases of aging), that the progression of the new actuary tables would be something like 50% of the population live to a couple of hundred, 10% to 1000, 3% to 10,000 and down from there. You might get some really old timer that lives to 100,000 or so, just like we get some people today that live into their 120s. Starting with the current population of 7 billion, it would take a long time before we even had to start worrying about the 2 baby issue and eventual species extinction…long enough that I don’t think it would be an issue. > > Even without radical life extension I’m pretty sure it would be long enough that we could come up with solutions even with the technology we have today. You are neglecting accidents and crime. You are neglecting deaths before reproduction. The OP specifically said that if your baby dies at 1 day, you don’t get to make a replacement. Even assuming that the OP allows the selling of genetic material, not everyone will do so. In your scenario, some immortals may not feel the need of achieving immortality through children as opposed to not dying. I did say that dying out will take a while. Not as long a while under a less optimistic life extension scenario. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/23 "2017-11-09T19:23:15Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > You are neglecting accidents and crime. You are neglecting deaths before reproduction. The OP specifically said that if your baby dies at 1 day, you don’t get to make a replacement. > Even assuming that the OP allows the selling of genetic material, not everyone will do so. In your scenario, some immortals may not feel the need of achieving immortality through children as opposed to not dying. No, I’m not. Basically, if species survival is on the line I don’t think it will be a choice. My WAG is that in such a scenario everyone’s genetic information will be collected at birth. If someone dies before they can have children it shouldn’t be an issue…either a clone or use that genetic material to mix with another to produce the requisite offspring. > [@](#): > > I did say that dying out will take a while. Not as long a while under a less optimistic life extension scenario. I don’t think that anyone would allow the species to go extinct…at some point even assuming the limitations of the OP steps will be taken to ensure the species survival. But probably not until the population dips below, oh, say a billion. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/24 "2017-11-09T21:44:32Z")
> [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > Just a thought experiment that came to me in the middle of a night: How would the world change if people could never have more than two children each? This is happening. To understand what’s going on and why, the wonderful and recently departed Hans Rosling can get you up to speed in a very few minutes. Skip to the last 4 minutes if you don’t have 10. Strap line: the worlds population should stabilise at around 9 billion: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/fTznEIZRkLg/hqdefault.jpg "Hans Rosling: Global population growth, box by box") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTznEIZRkLg) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/25 "2017-11-09T22:20:59Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > It also fascinates me how places that lean atheistic in beliefs, which I include this board, often discuss limiting the number of children that ‘should’ be born/allowed. I think your imagination has run away with you. Nobody is discussing ‘should’ here. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/26 "2017-11-09T23:07:14Z")
> [@XT](#): > > No, I’m not. Basically, if species survival is on the line I don’t think it will be a choice. My WAG is that in such a scenario everyone’s genetic information will be collected at birth. If someone dies before they can have children it shouldn’t be an issue…either a clone or use that genetic material to mix with another to produce the requisite offspring. Without their permission? That would be an interesting debate. > [@](#): > > I don’t think that anyone would allow the species to go extinct…at some point even assuming the limitations of the OP steps will be taken to ensure the species survival. But probably not until the population dips below, oh, say a billion. I don’t buy the OP’s premise either, but am trying to play along. Good premise for an sf story, though. And an example of something which would be selected against in evolution. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/27 "2017-11-09T23:56:16Z")
[quote=“up\_the\_junction, post:24, topic:801049”] This is happening. To understand what’s going on and why, the wonderful and recently departed Hans Rosling can get you up to speed in a very few minutes. Skip to the last 4 minutes if you don’t have 10. Strap line: the worlds population should stabilise at around 9 billion: [/QUOTE] Interesting lecture, but there’s a great difference between people _choosing_ to have fewer children and what would happen if they were denied the ability to have all the children they wanted. Both might change the world, but people who were frustrated, hungry to have children would react in ways that people who aren’t limited by things outside their own will wouldn’t. ---
**Author:** ![MsBatt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@MsBatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsBatt)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2017, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/28 "2017-11-11T22:20:17Z")
Science fiction has been speculating about limited reproduction for a long time now. Some solutions are elegant, some are horrifying. One of the latter that I recall: Parents (this was in an age when it was just assumed only married people had kids) were only allowed ONE child—but they had until that child was five to decide whether he or she was a keeper. The main character in the story was a woman saying goodbye to her 4-year, 364-day-old child. John Varley has as a background to many of his stories a world in which sex changes are are simple as changing your socks, and most people do so frequently. In this world, each person was allowed, and expected, to have one child. Each person had to give birth to this child. The sperm would come from a sperm bank, and therefore wouldn’t count against the ‘father’s’ allotted child. Other stories are more interested in population reduction. These involve things like lotteries, genetic testing, proven worth (invent something wonderful, etc.), and so on. One of my favorites still allowed people to choose to have children, BUT—you had to get a license, and to do that, you had to spend…oh, I think it was two weeks, caring for an android toddler. The android screamed constantly, broke things, soiled itself every 15 minutes, etc. Lots of folks turned their android back in before the required time… ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2017, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/29 "2017-11-11T22:47:16Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > You beat me to it. > > If the _maximum_ number of children anyone could have would be 2, then the _average_ number of children born per woman would be _less than 2_, which would mean each generation would have fewer people than the previous generation. > > Given that the current world population is in excess of 7 billion, it would take awhile for this to happen, but we’d eventually get there. Only if you extend the “two children maximum” out to very long time scales, but that seems very unrealistic. As populations became smaller and smaller I suspect fertility rates would rise again. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2017, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049/30 "2017-11-11T23:06:22Z")
Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot & Donald Trump would not have been born. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-world-change-if-people-could-only-have-two-children/801049.md?page=1)