I don't buy that argument. I think the consequences of having kids one can't feed can be strong enough even in poor countries, to prevent the conception of those kids. Basic forms of birth control should be free (that's way better than providing free food). The least educated, poorest people can understand their usage.
I'm not saying poverty, hunger, and overpopulation aren't problems that can't be solved, but I do think they're more complicated than you propose.
In India, healthcare workers have had trouble convincing villagers to accept free vaccines for diseases like polio because of rumors (with some loose history behind them) that the government is actually trying to sterilize the poor.
Culturally, discussing sex is a very big taboo.
Even in a "first world country" such as the United States, politicians regularly block the availability of contraception on shaky religious grounds.
In the city Mumbai alone, it's estimated that the number of people living in slums could be as high as several million.
People in slums may see having children as a way to increase their potential income (kids can work too), or intake from begging, or as a way to ensure that someone will take care of them in their old age.
Given these issues, how would you roll out a program to provide condoms to the slum dwellers in Mumbai alone, and how do you convince them that they should not have children?
I'm against giving aid that isn't part of a super holistic temporary (even if decades) solution that could conceivably work. Today's solutions have mostly failed; they've made the problems worse.
The Indian villagers may be justified in being wary of the vaccine, because the Indian gov't is highly corrupt. So the holistic solution should deal with the corruption too. If that's too hard to do it may be better to do nothing. The same is true with the larger cultural issues.
I do believe the problems are intractable in many countries. We don't have enough resources to solve them. (Esp. since the US is perhaps the poorest country when our national debt and unfunded liabilities is considered.) So, rather than make the problems worse with nonviable attempts, I think it's best to do nothing and let Nature sort it out.
The point of humanity is to control our destiny and not be left to the vagaries of nature.
Do note : it was assumed that people were on the same page about certain things and they need not be discussed.
For example: so far this discussion has never considered the reasons which lead to the poverty in the first place.
Since you are in disagreement, with the soundness of humanitarian goals, the scope of the discussion changes, quite dramatically.
Does india get redressal for the food and raw materials stolen during British rule?
Do we get repatriation for people sold into slavery?
Can we launch counter attacks on countries which benefited from this? Do we have a claim on GDP output from the UK/France and Portugal?
Your theory of least misery is under the utilitarian school of jurisprudence. It's limits are the same. It fails for situations where actions are unjust but create beneficial outcomes for the majority.
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What you are inherently arguing for is using your comparative advantages and somehow letting a portion of people die of starvation, Intentionally.
That is heinous. It is not intellectually sound or risqué,
it is "let them eat cake", just couched in other terms.
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You haven't consider the complexities on the ground and have in general hand waved them away. That's being rhetorically empty. Your last comment was that the problems are intractable.
No the problems are hard. Extremely extremely hard.
But thats what entrepreneurship is about - finding the solution to hard problems.
This really isn't true. My dad has spent a big %-age of his life working on family planning in the third world. It's a tremendous challenge getting people to use birth control, even in places without effective food aid.
Everything I've read says it's indeed a tremendous challenge, mainly for religious/cultural reasons. (They don't want to use birth control, and/or they want lots of kids even if they can't support them.) That's why the solution must include consequences for the parents who have children they can't support, like loss of freedom. If the consequences can't be enacted (e.g. it would take war to enact them) it may be best to do nothing and let Nature sort it out. I haven't read of family planning efforts in the third world (as aid from the first world) including such consequences.
