From the author: I often encounter people’s fear that the development of technology will lead to overpopulation of the planet. Indeed, if we are guided by direct logic, then, while maintaining the current birth rate, any field of science, when introducing its promising research, will lead to an increase in the quality of life. We take anything from the directions that promise a breakthrough in scientific and technological progress and change people’s lives. For example, my favorite and most controversial for most is Artificial Intelligence. Thanks to it, it will be possible to cognize thousands of professions of a rational order, and with the proper level of robotics, all other work of a physical nature. I have long debunked the fact that this will not take away jobs (here), but will it improve the quality of life? And how. Firstly, a person will only have artificial work (from the word art), irrational, which is much better and closer to self-realization, without taking away the right to engage in rational or physical work (if you want, then please, handmade things will always be valued and close to art ). Secondly, the line of industrial development: division of labor - conveyor - automation. Each step reduced the cost of the product, which is beneficial for consumers. So, robotization and cognification, the introduction of AI, will make it possible to produce almost everything even without human participation. Full autonomy. Goodbye hunger and shortage of goods and materials. With proper development of energy, be it renewable sources or cold fusion, we will be closer to utopia than ever before (but we will never achieve it, of course). Here are just a couple of directions. And if we talk about genetic engineering, which will make people healthier than ever, products cleaner and healthier than ever, and the environment more natural than ever, then add more points to the imagined standard of living. 3D printing is already making its contribution contribution to progress, reducing the cost, simplifying and speeding up the process of creating many things - from engines to houses. Goodbye housing issue. Quadcopters are already being used for delivery, also making services cheaper and faster. Over the years, with an increase in battery life, mobility and power, they will be able to perform more and more types of work where the introduction of robots is impossible (although they are essentially the same robots, but as a direction they are separated). Nanotechnology, mining and energy in space, quantum computers, incredible amounts of available memory (the same quantum or bio-information carriers) and incredibly fast and powerful Internet, organ augmentation and much more, the mass of which will appear later and which we cannot even guess about now. The direct logic is as follows. Quality of life equals increased life expectancy. Duration equals population increase. An increase in population equals an increase in density. An increase in density equals... a crisis? Now look. As many of you probably know, most European countries are aging countries. This phenomenon is called demographic aging - an increase in the proportion of older people in the total population. Those. the average age of the population is increasing, which, on the one hand, indicates an increase in the standard of living due to an increase in life expectancy, but, on the other hand, this is due to a DECREASE in the birth rate. Usually here I give Smith’s analogy from the first “Matrix”, who compared humanity with a virus, but which just doesn’t work and Europe confirms this. A person is precisely that not an unconscious virus that acts like a program, but is fully aware of the situation in the world and the consequences of its actions. And the higher the education and cultural background, the clearer it is. Europe is the most developed in all respects, therefore progress and an increase in the standard of living allows us to shift the egocentric interest of the type “I want many, many children!” to “The world’s population is growing, resources are not endless, and now it takes so much money to provide for one child.” In Africa and South Asia, the more children you have, the easier it is to run a household. At the same time, the quality of life, unfortunately, is low, and it affects such areas as preschool, school,