Earth is warming. Keep having kids.

When most of us begin to think about having children, we consider one or more of the following questions: Am I responsible enough? Can I afford it? Will my partner and I be loving parents?

We are not thinking, But what if the world were to end?

According to an agonizingly earnest story in Monday’s New York Times, some millennials are, in fact, making family planning decisions based on fears of catastrophic climate change, overpopulation and pollution — in short, based on dystopian science-fiction depictions of end times and the hyperventilating junk science that has come to inform some climate change zealots.

All of this, ultimately, is very, very bad for science.

Before getting to that, let’s start with the Times’ claims about this so-called trend. They’re dubious.

For one, the report surveys a population of “more than a dozen people ages 18 to 43,” while acknowledging “few, if any” studies have determined the role climate change plays in childbearing decisions.

I could probably find more than a dozen people to say they had kids just to ritually sacrifice them on a pagan altar. That wouldn’t make it a trend.

On top of that, the Times attempts to suggest this nontrend might have something to do with our falling birthrate, which is, to put it politely, laughable. There are dozens of explanations for the fact that Americans are having fewer kids, including heightened economic insecurity, increased education among younger populations and a delaying of motherhood.

But let’s set all that aside for a minute and believe that this group of at least 13 people who say they are personally contributing to the declining birthrate because they’re worried about climate change are worth paying attention to. What, exactly, are their fears? In their own words: “I don’t want to give birth to a kid wondering if it’s going to live in some kind of ‘Mad Max’ dystopia,” said one, while admitting, if it weren’t for climate change, she would go off birth control tomorrow.

Another expressed worries that parts of the planet will imminently be too hot for human habitation.

“I’ve seen how Syrian refugees, who are running from a devastating war, are being treated,” she said. “Imagine how my children will be treated if they have to flee their country due to extreme weather, drought, lack of resources, flooding.”

“Animals are disappearing,” said another. “The oceans are full of plastic. The human population is so numerous, the planet may not be able to support it indefinitely.”

In a hilarious twist betraying the very premise of the Times story, this woman had not one but two children — because of these fears.

“Someday, my husband and I will be gone,” she said. “If my daughter has to face the end of the world as we know it, I want her to have her brother there.”

It’s hard to imagine anyone deciding not to have children, fighting millions of years of evolution — and the irresistible adorableness of Baby Gap clothing — because they truly believe the “end of the world as we know it” is less than a generation away.

The fears aren’t predicated on science but on a rash of fiery and fatalistic pseudoscientific rhetoric that’s scared who knows how many into making bad economic decisions, and at least a few people into childlessness.

There are the hysterical climate change nonscientists, like Bill Maher, who routinely blurts out scarysounding nonfacts on his weekly show like, “We could lose Florida” thanks to climate change.

Then there are science “celebrities” like astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, who used Hurricanes Irma and Harvey to warn our favorite vacation spots will soon disappear.

Yet science is not at all settled on the link between climate change and hurricanes. As one climate scientist puts it, “Determining the role of climate change in increasing or decreasing the present and future likelihood of a rainstorm like Harvey presents a challenge.”

This is not science, folks. Neither are movies like “Angels & Demons,” “The Day After Tomorrow,” “Mad Max: Fury Road” or “Geostorm.”

If you believe climate change is real and that we should be having smart conversations about how to best address it — and I do — the hysteria isn’t helping, not a bit.

As for procreating, climate change is no reason not to have kids. But if you truly think it might be, best not to. The real world is far scarier.