It said in one WT publication(sTUDIES INTHE SCRIPTURES?)that the human population increased from approxiatemly 10 people to 8,000 people in just 190 years.
IS THAT FEASTIBLE?
2370-2180 population increase from10? to 8,000
by badboy 24 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Sirona
Feastible? LOL
I don't know and its too early for maths...sorry bb
Sirona
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City Fan
Badboy,
I suppose it might be if you ignored infant mortality rates, and death from disease, famine, war and natural disasters.
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LittleToe
Well, given that Shem got busy and had Arpaxad two years later, the story indicates they started pretty soon.
How do the figures go, if every woman gives birth once every possible year from twenty through fifty (and assuming the "Boys" took twenty year old wives just before they entered the ark, and that the registered firstborns were legal rather than hereditary)?Lets further argue that 1/2 were female, which we'll round down. Polygamy was already practiced in the pre-flood account. So well go for maximum yield and no death, for arguments sake. Noah's wife likely doesn't count (assuming she was the original model) as her childearing years are likely over (given that Shem is 100).
Given that the "division" is supposed to have taken place in the lifetime of Peleg, who was allegedly around from 101 - 340 years after the flood, and I dont recall where the 190 years came from, we'll go for both ends of the spectrum.
Anyhow:
Year 0 - population 8
Year 101 - population 63058
Year 340 - population 109 trillion
Just a caveat that's worth noting, as a sidebar.
Noah planted a vineyard, got drunk, and got exposed by his grandson Caanan.
Allegedly this was because grape-juice now fermented, but seems to indicate that it was supposed to be pretty soon after they got out of the ark. Something is incredibly dodgy about those details, if it were to be accepted as a completely accurate tale, as Caanan isn't supposed to aroud for a while. -
ezekiel3
This is the WTS fuzzy math:
*** it-1 p. 460 Chronology ***
The date of the attempt at building the Tower of Babel is not stated in the record. Genesis 10:25 indicates that the division resulting from the confusion of the languages there occurred sometime during ?the days of Peleg.? It does not necessarily follow that this event occurred at Peleg?s birth. The expression "in his days" would in fact indicate that the division took place, not at or immediately subsequent to Peleg?s birth, but sometime during his life span, which extended from 2269 to 2030 B.C.E. If each post-Flood male parent at the age of 30 were to begin fathering children at the rate of one child every three years, with an average of one male child every six years, and continued this until the age of 90, then in a period of about 180 years from the end of the Flood (that is, by 2189 B.C.E.) the population could have grown to a total of over 4,000 adult males. This conservative number would be ample to fit the circumstances relating to the tower construction and the dispersal of the peoples.
But wait, there's more! Analyze this (about the growth in population of Isrealites in Eygpt):
*** it-1 p. 779 Exodus ***
In view of the large families then and the desire of the Israelites to have children to fulfill God?s promise, it is not unreasonable in our calculation to count each male family head as bringing forth ten children (about half being boys), on the average, during the period of life between 20 and 40 years of age. For conservativeness, we might view each of the original 50 who became family heads as not beginning to father children until 25 years after their entry into Egypt. And, since death or other circumstances could prevent some male children from ever becoming productive children, or could interrupt their child-producing before their reaching the limit of 40 years we have set, we might also reduce by 20 percent the number of males born who became fathers. Put simply, this means that in a 20-year period only 200 sons, instead of 250, born to the 50 original family heads we have designated would produce families of their own.
A
calculation. Even making all these allowances, the population would still increase in an accelerated manner, and that with God?s blessing. The number of children born during each five-year period from and after 1563 B.C.E. (that is, 50 years before the Exodus) up to 1533 (or 20 years before the Exodus) would be as follows:INCREASE OF MALE POPULATION
B.C.E. Sons Born
from 1563 to 1558 47,350
from 1558 to 1553 62,300
from 1553 to 1548 81,800
from 1548 to 1543 103,750
from 1543 to 1538 133,200
from 1538 to 1533 172,250
Total 600,650*
* Theoretical male population from the age of 20 to 50 years at time of Exodus (1513 B.C.E.)
It may be noted that even a slight adjustment in the method of computation, for example, increasing by one the number of sons born on the average to each male parent, would send this figure up to over a million.
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funkyderek
It's all perfectly feasible if you allow for lifespans and birthrates that have never been observed in recorded history. More likely is that it's just made up.
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Leolaia
badboy....Consider that according to the figures of the Population Reference Bureau, the growth rate for the period was 0.0512 % per year, so in 190 years the population would have grown from 8 to 79 people. The figure is low because of infant mortality (not even counting childhood mortality, adult morbidity, and other factors), which in ancient times claimed an average 1 out of every 2-5 births. In order to squeeze out 8,000 people in the 190 years, the growth rate would have had to have been a whopping 5.263 per year. In comparison, during our twentieth-century population explosion, the rate maxxed out at around 2.0 around 1965 and today it is around 1.4. In other words, the population would have had to grow almost 4 times as fast as it is doing today. And, mind you, our modern growth rate is occurring without much impact from infant mortality. Imagine trying not only to match our current growth rate with ancient levels of infant mortality, but exceeding it fourfold! Since the growth rate of 0.0512 corresponded to an annual birth rate of 80 births per 1,000, to properly account for infant mortality and other factors a growth rate of 5.263 should correspond to an annual 8,223 births per 1,000. That means that an average 500 women would need to give birth to an average 8,200 babies per year. That is, every woman (regardless of age) would need to give birth to a litter of 16.4 babies every year to keep up with infant mortality and a growth rate of 5.263 %.
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Pole
If each post-Flood male parent at the age of 30 were to begin fathering children at the rate of one child every three years, with an average of one male child every six years, and continued this until the age of 90 ,
Is it reasonable to take this male perspective on fathering children? I think this line of reasoning is totally flawed. How could Jehooodaar's light be so dim when they wrote this crap?
The real question is rather:
To how many children each woman may have given birth. And the average woman cannot mother children regularly until her 90s, can she? The span of fertility is much more limited. Not to mention the fact that some women are not fertile. (Incidentally, the same goes for men, but doesn't the Bible always blames women for it? The men would always get another wive/slave and the problem was solved.).
Of course you could assume there was polygamy, but the male/female ratio is about 1:1, isn't it? So how would all of those males have found two or more wives? Even if they'd "swapped" wives (sexist, I know), the poor women wouldn't have typically got pregnant with more than 1 man at the same time (possible, but not typical). And how would that fulfill God's standards of chastity.
Anyway, if we are trying to establish the upper limits of population growth ratio, we should consider women's capabilities not men's.
Edited to add: For instance, theoretically a fertile male (kind of King Solomon-like situation) could have sex every day for a year - each day with a different woman - and thus "father" 365 children within one year. The problem is: how do you get sooo many "wives" for every man?
Another problem results from the terribly limited pool of genes - having just three couples initially would have resulted in serious genetic pathology in the third generation and later. (As TD pointed out on my thread - http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/77620/2.ashx).
Who's wrong? Me or Jehovar's sole channel of communication?
Edited to add: In answering your question: The figures they suggest are possible if you disregard a dozen or so negative factors (natural adult and infant death rates/wars/accidents/infertility/genetic pathology/god's righteous judgements (Sodom, etc), epidemics, etc.). In short: "everything is possible with God". Even if it looks like totally unnatural, nonsensical and unnecessary.
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TheOldHippie
Leolaia - I have pointed out the problems in the demographic points for years, but I'll just comment on the fact that you are too conservative as to the possibility of population growth within specific populations and specific time areas. Kenya experienced a growth from 21.4 millions in 1991 to 30.3 millions in 2000, that is 41,5 % in 9 years or if levelled out 4,6 % annually. And a couple of decades ago, it was even higher. Jordan rose from 4.1 millions in 1994 to 6.3 millions in 2000, that is 53.6 % in 6 years or levelled out 8.9 % annually. These are countires where the birth surplus and not in-migration is the reason for the growth. But the "problem" of course as compared to the Bible, is that you in these countries start with an already rather big population, and not with a handfull of people. Once you've reached the first million, anything can happen - but it takes a huge amount of time to get there.
I never understood, by the way, why polygamy would mean a very rapidly growing population in old days, as one woman still can only give birth to so and so many children, and so what is the use of looking at the guys? There is no surplus of women to get access to.
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Leolaia
TheOldHippie....The growth rate for Jordan at 8.9% for the 1990s seems incredibly high. The sources I just checked online gave the growth rate in the early 1980s as 3.8%, the late 1980s as 2.1%, the early 1990s as 4.6%, and the late 1990s as 3.3%. Nothing as high as 8.9%. The government website distinguished between the present total growth rate of 3.4%, which is influenced by migration (which was what inflated the early 1990s growth rate, due to the Gulf War), and the natural growth rate of about 2.5%. The same source attributes the high natural growth rate to "relatively sudden advances in extending life expectancy and reducing infant mortality, combined with the comparatively slower reduction in high fertility rates". The high growth rate of about 2.5-2.7% is thus due in a large part to modern scientific advances which would not be representative of demographic conditions in the third millenium BC. The Jordanian infant mortality rate is 18/1000 while the ancient rate ranged between six and seventeen times that.
Sources:
http://www.unhabitat.org/habrdd/conditions/westasia/jordan.htm
http://www.kinghussein.gov.jo/resources2.html
http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=jo&v=24
http://www.unfpa.org/focus/jordan/background.htm