[HN Gopher] The Saga of a Celebrated Scientist - and His Rodent ...
___________________________________________________________________
The Saga of a Celebrated Scientist - and His Rodent Dystopia
Author : Petiver
Score : 28 points
Date : 2024-11-04 02:41 UTC (20 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.chronicle.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.chronicle.com)
| pvg wrote:
| https://archive.is/u1BQo
| FrustratedMonky wrote:
| Would love to see this repeated. This is divisive, and so many
| arguments spawned.
|
| It would be good to replicate it, just to put down some of the
| naysayers that quibble over a point or two saying it was staged
| or influenced.
|
| And, to gain more knowledge about the causes and effects. We have
| more information today, and more data gathering. Would be good to
| do this study again in a modern lab.
|
| Though not sure this type of experiment would be allowed today.
| Thus the problem. Some of the more well known studies that had a
| big impact on our way of thinking, aren't even allowed to be done
| today.
| nemo wrote:
| >It would be good to replicate it, just to put down some of the
| naysayers that quibble over a point or two saying it was staged
| or influenced.
|
| No, that is _not_ why it would be good to attempt to replicate.
| Shutting people down isn 't the helpful part, but rather
| shedding light on the truth with evidence is the positive.
|
| There's many strong reasons to consider the study was flawed
| (mentioned in the article and readily discoverable online), for
| the record, and the author of the paper's got all the classic
| signs of a crank, so skepticism would be healthy in this case,
| and shutting down skeptics would be very foolish.
| FrustratedMonky wrote:
| "And, to gain more knowledge about the causes and effects. We
| have more information today, and more data gathering. Would
| be good to do this study again in a modern lab."
|
| Yes, I did mention 'shedding light with evidence' as a
| positive thing.
|
| And yes, read article and many others. I don't think the
| flaws were as 'strong' as you are implying, hence, yes, would
| be good to replicate to prevent the arguments for dismissing
| it because there were 'some' flaws.
|
| Treat it like other studies. It was a first attempt, there
| were some interesting results, but also some 'flaws', hence,
| lets replicate and iron out the problems and see if we get
| some additional interesting results.
| gojomo wrote:
| Gwern's deep dive into Calhoun's scholarship suggests taking his
| "results", & popular/stylized glosses thereof, with some pretty
| big grains of salt - in line with the fall from academic
| prominence described in later parts of this article. Gwern's
| abstract:
|
| _> Did John Calhoun's 1960s Mouse Utopia really show that animal
| (and human) populations will expand to arbitrary densities,
| creating socially-driven pathology and collapse? Reasons for
| doubt._
|
| https://gwern.net/mouse-utopia
| swayvil wrote:
| There is a taboo against constraining reproduction. Legally,
| medically or whatever.
|
| Which is unreasonable of course, given that reproduction is
| arguably more destructive than bombs.
|
| If you wanted to dial-down our incessant breeding without getting
| lynched, how would you do it?
| moomin wrote:
| Women's education and women's rights. I don't personally think
| we have an overpopulation problem, but the above are proven to
| reduce birth rates in an entirely non-coercive manner, as well
| as being a good thing in their own right.
| swayvil wrote:
| I was thinking something a little more sure-fire and scifi,
| but yes, that's a kind way to do it.
| Brybry wrote:
| And possibly most importantly: women's wage employment.[1]
|
| [1] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8295801/
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Our what?
| fwip wrote:
| I think you'll find that many people find it both reasonable
| and desirable to preserve reproductive rights, despite your
| casual "of course."
| NoMoreNicksLeft wrote:
| > If you wanted to dial-down our incessant breeding without
| getting lynched, how would you do it?
|
| Dialing it down is easy. Dialing it back up is impossible. The
| Chinese successfully dialed fertility down to 1.0 (officially,
| unofficially far lower), but try as they might they cannot make
| it move back up above that. China is doomed, even if that doom
| lies centuries off.
|
| Other places didn't even have to try. Breeding has been dialed
| down far below the replacement rate, and many other nations are
| on the road to extinction. India has likely sunk below
| replacement fertility, or will in the next year or two. Only a
| few nations in central Africa have above-replacement fertility.
|
| > There is a taboo against constraining reproduction. Legally,
| medically or whatever.
|
| I've never personally seen evidence of such a taboo in the
| western hemisphere. Even in the United States. Instead, a few
| years ago, we had media talking head saying how the law should
| do something about the Octomom, that it "wasn't right". We live
| in the "shout your abortion" era. We're seeing the rise of the
| r/childfree culture. Constraining reproduction isn't taboo,
| it's celebrated. We live in a dying civilization hellbent on
| committing collective suicide.
| GuB-42 wrote:
| Somewhat surprisingly, the answer seems to be "nothing".
|
| In a primitive society, population self-regulates through early
| deaths, caused by diseases, physical injury, famines, etc...
| Then there is a transition to modern society (demographic
| transition) where though improvement in medicine, agriculture,
| and the general idea of not letting people die, population
| grows exponentially, but it doesn't last as people simply stop
| making children.
|
| It has already happened in the first world, most countries
| would have a negative growth rate if it wasn't for immigration.
| Asia are just at the end of their transition and Africa is in
| the middle of it. Assuming the trend still holds, it will be
| the end for Africa and therefore, the entire world in a few
| decades. It is actually reason for concern, as it will result
| in an aging population, and unlike today in first world
| countries, there will be no immigration to compound the
| problem.
|
| But changing the question and asking "How was it done?"
| instead, then I would say "birth control", the voluntary kind,
| the pill in particular. Safe abortion too. As someone
| mentioned, women in the workforce also contributed, but I would
| go further and say that for many women, having a job is not a
| right, it is an obligation! Many couples simply can't live
| decently on a single pay, especially with a child. Also, with
| laws regarding child labor, long studies, and changes in
| mentality, children are more of a burden than they once were,
| as most can't support themselves before their 20s. It used that
| at that age and even way before that, they supported their
| parents instead, especially boys (that's the idea behind
| dories).
|
| Besides the inability to live on a single pay, these are
| generally good things, but the result is less children, which
| is a good thing for ending a potentially catastrophic
| exponential growth, but it may turn out to be a problem later.
| Not an unsolvable one though.
| moomin wrote:
| Yeah, at some point we're going to have to solve the opposite
| problem. Luckily that's also pretty easy to solve as well:
| mandatory maternity/paternity leave, free childcare, &c
| iamleppert wrote:
| A rat is an intelligent creature but also lives in filth.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-11-04 23:02 UTC)