Letters to the Editor, September 2026
Published: September 8, 2026
There is increasing alarm worldwide about low birthrates and population decline as fertility falls way below 2.1 children per woman, the replacement rate. But over time, human evolution will take care of this problem. In a low-birthrate society, the couples who have children are a little different in some ways from those who don’t. For example, they have more of a desire for children, are more religious, tend to have difficulty using contraception, are more opposed to abortion, and live in a culture that values having many children. These and other associated factors are to some degree heritable genetically or culturally. Identical twin studies have shown that a surprising number of personality characteristics are influenced by genetics; desire for children is probably one of these. After a few generations characteristics associated with having children will become dominant in the population, and birthrates will recover. Populations will fall but never come close to disappearing. On the contrary, I envision a time in a thousand or so years when population growth will again be threatening the planet.
Stanley Henshaw, PhD
Really appreciated the Ehrlich articles and editorial. I loved the selected quotations from him, especially the one on Musk. Thanks for this magazine.
Sharon Bresler
The feature article in the June issue, “The Case for Gradual Population Decline,” was comprehensively informative. I hope acting on its points will help my grandchildren.
I was drawn to the June issue by the photo of Paul Ehrlich on the cover. It is the same image I retained of him when he gave a lecture here at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, almost 50 years ago. I remember being impressed by his study of the butterfly/moth population on a large natural tract of land adjoining the Stanford campus.
Good luck to you and the organization.
Charles H. Hargis
I was very saddened to learn about Paul Ehrlich’s death.
In 1996, a small group of population activists from the ZPG Monterey Bay Chapter had dinner with him before his talk at a local bookshop in Capitola, CA, about his (and his wife, Anne’s) newly published book, Betrayal of Science and Reason.
It was wall-to-wall people in the bookshop. It seemed in that small microcosm of humankind that there was an understanding, and agreement with Ehrlich, that the environment was in a state of decline and that we must take dramatic steps to avert disaster for all life.
Well, here we are 30 years later, with 2.5 billion more people on the planet. I’m convinced we have not averted the disaster, only prolonged it with more technofixes. Some good things have happened over those years, but the human impacts have not helped other species. It is only worse.
Paul signed his book for me, “With warm regards, Fight on!” Yes, we must fight on!
Linda Brodman
I read with great interest the June issue of Population Connection. As a premed/biology major at Stanford, I took Paul Ehrlich’s course devoted primarily to world population and related implications. That would have been 1962 when he was 29 or 30 years old.
Of the many faculty I interacted with at Stanford, Prof. Ehrlich is the only one I specifically remember. The rest of my fellow students and I were very impressed with his scientific rigor and with his passion for teaching and for his research.
Dr. Ehrlich greatly influenced my thinking and career path. Perhaps more than anyone else at that time, he challenged me to undertake a career in science. I similarly focused on population and health, although in a somewhat different field — under- and over-nutrition (obesity).
Bruce Wolfe, MD
Professor Emeritus, Surgery
Oregon Health & Science University
Regarding the photo caption on page 22 of the June issue, I would like to point out that one does not paddle rowboats, one rows them (go figure) using oars, one on each side. (Paddles are used in canoes and kayaks, and water is moved on only one side at a time.)
Jim Thomson
Paul Ehrlich was a wonderful man. I met him at the Rio Earth Summit. So sorry for his passing. He had a very useful life.
Elizabeth Csicsery-Ronay
I was Paul Ehrlich’s PhD student from 1963–1965. Although I eventually did my degree under a different professor, I have always been thankful for his mentoring, which taught me much about science and how to guide students to success. His firm guidance and confidence in me gave an overwhelmed young women in a (then) man’s field the confidence to be a success. I am very grateful. He was an amazing person who did so much for the world and still always remembered me when I happened to visit Stanford.
Alice Schroeder
Send letters to the editor to Marian Starkey: marian@popconnect.org