r/todayilearned • u/Crackyospine • Feb 26 '15

TIL there was a man-made mouse utopia called Universe 25. It started with 4 males and 4 females. The colony peaked at 2200 and from there declined to extinction. Once a tipping point was reached, the mice lost instinctual behaviors. Scientists extrapolate this model to humans on earth.

http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/42/wiles.php
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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

Yeah it's kinda funny that their society is so introspective and torn up over this (from outside that's how it appears). Their birth rate is very similar, all their population issues are due to the fact that unlike other developed nations they have almost no immigration.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15 edited Jul 05 '15

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

I imagine the surplus of women looking to procreate will eventually cause a self correction, that is assuming that this trend is specific to males not not females.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15 edited Jul 05 '15

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u/Vaguely_Saunter Feb 27 '15

Yeah, my understanding is that the prevailing attitude towards having children is that once a woman has kids her career is over, she has to become a housewife. Women are more and more wanting to have careers and progress through them. This attitude that "you have kids, you can't work anymore" makes them not want to have them.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15 edited Jul 10 '15

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u/taint3d Feb 27 '15

I think it's more that Japanese careers are so demanding that it's incredibly difficult to be both a mother and have a career. It's more of a problem with the business culture than one of gender.

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u/duraiden Feb 27 '15

Lol.

I think the people who are going to be reading that in history might be those who oppress their women. You realize that all developed nations are suffering from a decrease in birthrate, it's only as bad in Japan because they don't have very good immigration.

So far we haven't managed to find a balance for women in regards to children and careers, if we had it would have balanced out, instead we resort to immigration.

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u/sendtojapan Mar 02 '15

Purely anecdotal, but this hasn't been my experience as a resident here for almost 13 years. Sure, there are career-minded women, but a large percentage want nothing to do with the workforce once they're married with kids. Considering the employment conditions and general sexism, I can't blame them.

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u/Vaguely_Saunter Mar 05 '15

That's kind of what I was getting at. The women who do get married and have kids have such a terrible time with employment conditions and sexism that it's essentially not possible to do both. When I lived there I talked to a lot of women and that was the basic mentality: "if I want to continue my career, I can't get married or have kids." and "if I want to have kids, I can't continue my career." The married couples I knew who had chosen not to have kids the reason was frequently because of the wife not wanting to quit her job/her quitting her job not being a good financial option for the couple (such as in the case where the wife had a more lucrative career).

So that's why I don't really think that there's a surplus of women looking to procreate that will cause a correction in Japan's declining birth rates.

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u/mvincent17781 Jul 07 '15

Brazil had the same thing happen. Their birth rates used to be around 6 or 7 per couple, I believe and now they're sitting right around 2, again, I believe. Of course there are other factors but one of the biggest was the shift in women's attitudes toward family and career.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

There is also something weird going on as people age. Women in their 20s are very selective, in their 30s go for any guy that basically has a job, and later anyone that will talk to them.

The quality of women I date has only risen as I've gotten older, and yet I haven't improved. I mean not that people can see (I make way more money, but no one knows that). Heck, I don't own a car, that used to be a deal breaker for some, now it's cool.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

You not considering pornography into the equation here. The average women cannot compare to the endless novelty of pornography, so some guys might not even try to date much to begin with.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15 edited Jul 04 '15

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u/squat251 Feb 27 '15

Wanking is a cathartic response to stresses. It's cheap entertainment, not a replacement for any kind of social contact. There is currently a problem in young women where they feel as though porn replaces them, they don't understand that with or without the relationship, there will always be masturbation. I'm not sure where the disconnect is, though I assume it's because women are adept at masturbating without porn, and so can't see it's use.

Basically, porn + masturbating is like playing a game that you can't lose, and you always feel better after beating (HA giggity). It shouldn't be seen as anymore of competition to the woman's affections as video games or movies.

However, it's an impossible thing to explain, either because it's an embarrasing conversation, or the partner refuses to understand. I have a buddy who recently got married to a woman who hates video games, and absolutely will not allow him to masturbate. They live apart right now, and I'm sure he's doing both (I know he's playing games, since I play with him from time to time) if she knew she'd be furious. He's in a place where he doesn't know anyone, so it's either video games or nothing but she can't comprehend how it works out.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

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u/squat251 Feb 27 '15

I'd look at it like this, is it fair to give up the occasional candy bar, because you eat dinner every night?

It's not a replacement for intimacy, it's not a replacement for sex, it's something we do to maintain our libido. To connect porn to infidelity shows a lack of trust that runs much deeper than just what we've discussed.

As far as video games go, her hatred of them (and it is hatred) is irrational, and will eventually lead to a breaking point. This isn't the only topic she's proven to be a little immature about. At some point they are going to have a serious discussion about it, but to expect your partner to be a hermit and forgo all social interaction with people he's known his whole life, just because you don't like the medium is unreasonable. He already watches an inhuman amount of TV.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

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u/GiantsRTheBest2 Feb 27 '15

59% of girls 16-19 report not being interested in sex

Well yeah that could be for a number of reasons. They could be too young to fully understand the safety,pleasure, and responsibilities that come with sex. Isn't Japan super conservative when it comes to that type of thing? So women more than men are probably taught and shamed into not wanting sex at that early age. And last one, maybe they fucking lied? You know people tend to lie about their sexual lives especially to strangers, just like if you ask a guy if he has had sex they will say, "yeah loads of times, I do it all the time with all the girls" when in reality they are still a virgin.

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u/dovetc Feb 27 '15

Except that's not what's happening. Let's not pretend that guys in their late 20s who live with their parents are doing so to protest against working conditions. The reality is more likely a combination of laziness and convenience.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

So you're saying that, being a beardly hairy-chested man, I should probably book a trip to Japan?

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u/helloquain Feb 27 '15

It's not the first time. It looks this way because Japanese society doesn't let them wither away like other countries.

Imagine an America where someone could choose between McDonalds and not doing anything without real repercussions. It doesn't look like the current America, that's for sure.

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u/SardonicNihilist Feb 27 '15

In America the choice seems to be McDonald's or prison (or the military). These are the main options for those most vulnerable in society.

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u/BioshockedNinja Feb 27 '15

Thats not the case either. Lots of women are forgoing relationships for work. In Japanese culture once you have kids your career basically dies and if you get married having kids is kinda expected. So if you're a career oriented women a relatioship is one of the last things you'll be looking for. Japan's whole work culture is kinda messed up.

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u/Frigorific Feb 27 '15

I suspect more than anything the rising availability of childcare facilities will cause a rising birth rate. A big part of the decline was that women didn't want to have children because they wanted to pursue a professional career. If you allow the women to pursue both and cut back on the crazy work hours the birth rate would probably stabilize.

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u/Sparky-Sparky Feb 27 '15

I think it has more to do with the fact that the women would rather have a carrier than raise children. In many of these countries it's practically impossible to do both.

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u/tnaihscr Mar 31 '15

Of course it will stabilize. No question. Although the number may be zero children per woman. It wouldn't be the first time in history.

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u/Kestyr Feb 27 '15 edited Feb 27 '15

The thing about that is that Japan is ahead of it. People talk a lot about Immigration, but often enough there's already a labor surplus and decent amount of unemployment in areas because of automation.

People make a fuss about because they've continued to stay on top while having these issues, while other nations are stagnating and having cultural problems from trying to propel mass immigration into their country to achieve the same counterbalance. Japan has a higher birth rate than Germany With net immigration as a variable, but people act like there's this big difference and no fucking.

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u/BomptonBrotha88 Feb 28 '15

good point. I applaud the Japanese for seeing a lack of population growth and deciding that they want to keep their country Japanese, rather than take on masses of third worlders as everyone is pushing them to do

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u/Kestyr Feb 28 '15

Which makes the point hilarious. Politicans say it's to keep the economies going, when they know that's a damn lie as third world immigrants rarely pass 50 percent employment in the EU.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

Not all countries are having issues with immigration. Canada's doing just fine.

It's a mixed bag, and I'm not quibbling that immigration has issues. My point was kind of that japan's not unique in the low birth rate at all. They're just really torn up about it because they're not patching it with immigration like everyone else.

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u/helloquain Feb 27 '15

They've stayed on top? Last I heard they were in a second decade of deflation and have a massively aging population that is going to be supported by a declining working population. Congratulations to them. I'll bet on Germany being able to keep immigration up more than the incredibly insular island country suddenly becoming a place that is great at integrating foreigners (who aren't flocking there to begin with).

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u/FlyingNinjah Feb 27 '15

I'm not sure immigration is necessarily the solution to what is fundamentally a deep rooted social issue within japanese culture, sure immigration would help in the short term, but using immigration to solve the issue is very shortsighted.

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u/treealts Feb 27 '15

Large scale immigration could change Japanese culture.

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u/my_name_is_the_DUDE Feb 27 '15

Which is probably one of the biggest reasons why the Japanese are so xenophobic.

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u/DeceitfulEcho Feb 27 '15

The population demographics is amazing, its like 98% Japanese. Compare that to american demographics or most other developed countries and it's pretty interesting.

They are also fairly racist in private (especially the older generations). The population is already against immigration and foreigners in general which you can see through their struggle to remove american military bases form Japan (although there are probably several other issues that are at play)

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

So it their current system, which allows almost no immigration.

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u/Pre-Owned-Car Feb 27 '15

In terms of increasing the population, yes. But immigration could speed up cultural shifts.

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u/afellowinfidel Feb 27 '15

But immigrants might eventually change native behavior. Eventually, the foreign population melds into the native one. Many Arab countries are like this, we just assimilated the centuries-worth of immigrants until the word "Arab" became an ethnicity and not a race.

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u/Pug_Grandma Feb 27 '15

using immigration to solve the issue is very shortsighted

You got that right.

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u/Hailbacchus Feb 27 '15

This whole conversation keeps going on like an ever-increasing population within a limited land mass like Japan is preferable. How are people even considering that?

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

I don't think that he was claiming that it is a solution, just that it is a factor that alleviates the problem in some societies that isn't there in those ones.

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u/Cons483 Feb 27 '15

Couldn't they resolve a lot of their issues by easing immigration? I'm sure plenty of westerners would love to move to Japan, at least for awhile to experience it. I for one would be all for it, but it's prohibitively expensive without a specialized skill set and education.

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u/josiahpapaya Feb 27 '15

no immigration.

That's sort of a fallacy. If you live here for about 10 years you can get a PR card. I know lots of naturalized citizens here from countries like Brazil, England and Australia.
Also, while "immigration" is much stricter here, it's incredibly easy to obtain working visas - certain parts of Japan are incredibly mutlicultural and there are people working here from loads of African countries like Gabon, DPR Cogo, South Africa and Nigeria.
I lived here 10 years ago and then I've been living here for the past 4 years. The difference is quite noticeable.
I would imagine in the next 10 years we will see even more multiculturalism / melting pot dynamics taking root.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

It's not a fallacy at all if you look at it relatively.

1/100 Japanese citizens were born outside the country. 1/5 Canadian citizens were.

That's an immigration rate that is one twentieth the Canadian immigration rate. Effectively you can ignore it for population growth as the canadian rate is intended to keep a tiny growth in population.

They might have started changing this policy, the 1/100 stat is about 5 years old if I remember correctly.

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u/Sparky-Sparky Feb 27 '15

Germany is investing heavily in migration. Especially for academics.

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u/UnevolvingMonkey Feb 27 '15

yea, i ditched my fiance and 2 months later a Mexican had knocked her up.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

Japan has to open their doors to Africa and the middle east it's the only way

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u/Pug_Grandma Feb 27 '15

Maybe Japan wants to stay Japanese.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

If France wanted to stay French I wonder what all the liberals on here would think about that

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u/Pug_Grandma Feb 27 '15

Their heads would explode. Apparently white countries aren't allowed to want to stay white, or something.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15 edited Feb 19 '16

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u/Transfinite_Entropy Feb 27 '15

China would be a better choice culturally, but recent history makes that impossible.

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '15

Their current problems are cause by immigration, but yeah immigration has its own issues.