Should we use eugenic reasons forbid the marriage of women over 40 planing on having babies as well?
Yes. We should also encourage the use of sperm donors as resulting in 1/5 the birth defect rate. (On a large scale, this advantage would erode, but that is easily dealt with by encouraging men to donate more and treating them less like crap; we can think of it as 'sperm banking', akin to existing practice of 'egg banking'.)
In the Western world most people are pretty out-bred, one generation of inbreeding does very little damage
Do you know this, or are you guessing? If I were to go looking for any studies in out-bred populations, at how many points of average IQ damage would you concede the point?
Yes. We should also encourage the use of sperm donors as resulting in 1/5 the birth defect rate.
Ok you win eugenics is a good idea. But after designer babies are the norm, this rationale becomes obsolete.
A thought occurred to me today as I skimmed an article in a rationality forum where the subject of gay marriage cropped up; seeing as the issue has been hotly contested in various public fora and especially the courts, what about poly? After all, many if not all the arguments for gay marriage apply to poly marriage as well.
Questions for LWers who are currently in a such a relationship, or have an opinion to share:
Do polies want to marry each other or do such relationships not lend themselves to permanence above a threshold of partners? Should polies campaign for the right for a civil union anyway? what are the up and down sides of this? etc