132 réponses à ce sujet

[1136342t54_]

Actually in ME Trillions have been mentioned a few times as a general ball park for Galactic Civilization. Protheans were stated to possibly have a population within the Trillions also.

[Wulfram]

Or to put in another way, the Alliance is engaging in a cynical land grab at the expense of its citizen's lives.

Modifié par Wulfram, 08 février 2012 - 08:39 .

[Medhia Nox]

@Wulfram: That's how humans have always done things... welcome to the American frontier.

[DuffyMJ]

It's a 20 acres and a mule style colonization in ME universe -- except 20 acres is actually continent-sized parcels of land with the downside that slavers may swoop down and carry you away. Didn't Ahern literally get like a country-sized plot of land for his retirement home? On a military pay/pension?

You'd have to be a total idiot to move to a densely populated place in Mass Effect. I will explain it like this... A friend of mine started a niche business for installing/upgrading fiber optics -- bought very expensive equipment that can put perfect holes through 8 ft. concrete, etc... And ended up doing this work in 2/3 of the buildings in Manhattan for major $$$. For a dude like that with a skill like that, sure, go to the big city and rake in the dollars.

But if you're just an average Joe with regular-people-skills that any fool can get, why would you go to NYC? You wouldn't -- you'd go to Alaska or something where they need bodies.

[IBPROFEN]

Bleachrude wrote...

 I agree and disagree with you.

For the citadel, the numbers are actually reasonable. Remember, what you're looking for is not "just population" but population density.

Ward length = 43.6 km
Ward Width - 330m

Total ward area = 14.388 square liometres

5 wards thus give an area of 71.94 kilometres squared.
Assuming population is equally dispersed, you end up with a population density of 183, 486 per square kilometre

From Wikipedia, Manila currently has the highest population density in our world at 43, 079  per square kilometre.

The Citadel is literally 4 times as dense as Manila and 9 times as dense as Paris.

Similarly, remember that Illium is a world where the asari can only comfrotably build at ground level at the polar latitudes.which is North of 60N and South of 60S. The former is pretty much above finland and norway while 60S doesn't even hit the tip of either S. America or Australia...Yet the asari have fitted over 85 million in that region...(again, assuming that the image from the game is "true", those latitudes don't have that much landmass...)

That said, the population figures have to be off given how quickly humanity is able to become an important player... 

 
 As for Citadel you got one of the arms that a warehousing for the races there.

[Arkitekt]

Wulfram wrote...

I don't think it's really moaning. It's having a fun discussion about demographics.

It starts being something more than "a fun discussion about demographics" when people jump into calling other people, in this case bioware's writers, as "unimaginative" and without any sense of "scale", and other petty insults.

I don't mind fun discussions at all. It's more the mind-blowing arrogance displayed at calling writers names just for the sake of sounding smart.

[Medhia Nox]

@Arkitekt - kinda like the people who call them (the writers) stupid for punishing their pet morality (be it Paragon or Renegade) - or, if a plot doesn't go the way they "know" it should go.

The BSN is full of this behavior - everyone thinks they can write a better story - the vast majority couldn't.

Modifié par Medhia Nox, 08 février 2012 - 11:05 .

[Butcher_of_Torfan]

You need to take into account birthrates as well. Asari have a very long lifespan, and their children take a long time to fully mature, compared to humans. They probably have a very low birthrate, and a different perspective than humans due to their long lives. Any expansion they do is going to be methodical and well planned. Salarians sound like they spawn like frogs, so probably have a very high birthrate, but they only live 40 years or so. Everything in the lore also points to Salarian reproduction being very tightly controlled as well. I dont see trailer park situations where a salarian has way more kids than can supported. Looking at how large and powerful the Turians were when they first made contact with the council, my guess is that they had the closest to a human level of expansion. This also played a role in the vicious colonial wars they had with themselves. That experience, combined with how disciplined and rule of law orientated their society is keeps their expansion in this day and age managed.

The one notable exception would be the Krogan. They breed like rats, live forever, and apparently exercised no form of birth control or family planning whatsoever. Look how that turned out. If humanity continues to breed all willy nilly, and maintains this "i have the right to reproduce however much i want!" mentality, i can see them eventually hitting the point of exponential population growth again, outpacing available colonies, and becoming the next krogan, so to speak

[Butcher_of_Torfan]

Arcian wrote...
Star Wars is:

1) Insanely unrealistic in every possible way.
2) A Type 3 on the Kardashev scale.

Humans in Mass Effect is, for your information, a type 0.9 on the Kardashev scale - just 0.2 points higher than where we are in reality. Contrast the council species who are at best 1.1 on the scale.

Never thought i'd see the kardashev scale mentioned on BSN. 

+10 internets

[Wulfram]

My guess is that the Asari birth rate is low, but that this is cultural and thus it could easily be raised - prior to the advent of advanced medicine I really can't see how a species which usually only has a couple of children and only starts breeding at 350 could survive.

During the 7 "expansion waves" mentioned in Ilium's description Asari birth rates were probably high, but for the last 5 centuries their population has probably been stable.

[Butcher_of_Torfan]

Wulfram wrote...

My guess is that the Asari birth rate is low, but that this is cultural and thus it could easily be raised - prior to the advent of advanced medicine I really can't see how a species which usually only has a couple of children and only starts breeding at 350 could survive.

During the 7 "expansion waves" mentioned in Ilium's description Asari birth rates were probably high, but for the last 5 centuries their population has probably been stable.

Good point.   Having too many children could have a social stigma attatched to it similiar to pureblood births.   I've also been wondering if their long lifespan in natural to the species, or it its been artificially extended through genetic modification.  Miranda will live 50% longer than most humans due to hers.  A common theme in transhumanism is overcoming the ageing process.  Is there anything in lore regarding this possibility with the asari?

[AlanC9]

Butcher_of_Torfan wrote...
 I've also been wondering if their long lifespan in natural to the species, or it its been artificially extended through genetic modification.

I've always figured that the whole damn species is a result of Prothean genetic modification. Probably from human stock given how similar the appearances are.

[Butcher_of_Torfan]

AlanC9 wrote...

Butcher_of_Torfan wrote...
 I've also been wondering if their long lifespan in natural to the species, or it its been artificially extended through genetic modification.

I've always figured that the whole damn species is a result of Prothean genetic modification. Probably from human stock given how similar the appearances are.

That would explain how the Asari are able to randomize their genetic code by "mating" with any species.  Such a trait would be highly unlikely to develop through natural evolution. 

[Malanek]

iOnlySignIn wrote...

Bleachrude wrote...

For the citadel, the numbers are actually reasonable. Remember, what you're looking for is not "just population" but population density.

Ward length = 43.6 km
Ward Width - 330m

Total ward area = 14.388 square liometres

5 wards thus give an area of 71.94 kilometres squared.
Assuming population is equally dispersed, you end up with a population density of 183, 486 per square kilometre

From Wikipedia, Manila currently has the highest population density in our world at 43, 079  per square kilometre.

The Citadel is literally 4 times as dense as Manila and 9 times as dense as Paris.

Look! Someone able to do math is on the Internet!

Except it lacks a dimension. But yeah, good to see some logic at least.

Modifié par Malanek999, 09 février 2012 - 02:02 .

[Bleachrude]

Malanek999 wrote...

iOnlySignIn wrote...

Bleachrude wrote...

For the citadel, the numbers are actually reasonable. Remember, what you're looking for is not "just population" but population density.

Ward length = 43.6 km
Ward Width - 330m

Total ward area = 14.388 square liometres

5 wards thus give an area of 71.94 kilometres squared.
Assuming population is equally dispersed, you end up with a population density of 183, 486 per square kilometre

From Wikipedia, Manila currently has the highest population density in our world at 43, 079  per square kilometre.

The Citadel is literally 4 times as dense as Manila and 9 times as dense as Paris.

Look! Someone able to do math is on the Internet!

Except it lacks a dimension. But yeah, good to see some logic at least.

True, as someone earler mentioned, the Citadel wards are probably more vertical than anything we have in compareable Earth cities so there's a good chance that even though "on paper" it looks like the Citadel is denser than manila, the fact that there's no hard and fast rule with regard to height of buildings means the citadel could have even more open spaces than Manila.

re: Birthrate
The birthrate in many 1st world countries is actually BELOW replacement level..immigration is the only reason why may 1st world countries actually have  postivie replacement rate  Japan for example, thanks to a highly restrictive immigration policy has long had a birth rate lower than its death rate and this actually is expected to get worse...

I would be shocked to see any Alliance colony ever hit the billion mark given human nature...we only have had a high birth rate because we a) we're farmers/rural for a long time and high pre teen mortality rate. Once those two factors are gone, human population figures will plateau out IMO.

[muse108]

Think the earth numbers are low, expected that to be closer to 20 to be honest. Even with colonization and population controls well pass the 15 by 2050 or something I read.

Colonies are small, despite what Gringritch thinks (american politics is funny from the outside) getting a moon colony up to a few thousand would be a huge effort, have a huge cost and the concept of sustaining it...

Number may sound small for Citadael, its basically 4 giant crowded cities according to the codecies.

[tetrisblock4x1]

Arcian wrote...

ReveurIngenu wrote...

Where
are the overpopulated mega-planets with billions upon billions of
people, possibly surrounded by artificial rings that contain millions if
not billions of people?  Planets turned into one huge city like in Star
Wars or whatever?

Star Wars is:

1) Insanely unrealistic in every possible way.
2) A Type 3 on the Kardashev scale.

Humans
in Mass Effect is, for your information, a type 0.9 on the Kardashev
scale - just 0.2 points higher than where we are in reality. Contrast
the council species who are at best 1.1 on the scale.

Fleets are
not that large, ships do not exist in abundance and exploration is
limited by the Mass Relays. People who are born on a planet are very
often rooted to that planet for generations. Likewise, because
colonisation is a gamble with what planetary quirks, pirates and hostile
native fauna considered, not many choose to risk it. And thanks to the
relatively low enery output, development of colonies that DO get
founded is relatively slow.

The reason why humanity has expanded
so fast in ME3 is, in theory, that they are much bigger risk-takers than
the other species. Other species are slow to expand, but nurture their
existing colonies to grow and prosper while culling natural dangers and
protecting them against pirates - this gives them a nice and even, if
slow, GNP growth. The Alliance instead focuses on aggressive expansion.
The end result is better access to rich resources, which vastly
increases the Alliance's GNP at the cost of exposure to pirates and
planetary dangers. With these resources, they bloat their fleet and
stimulate the native market to increase competition with foreign
markets, giving them an economical and consequentially political edge.

The
end result is that the Alliance's short-term growth is very large -
 theoretically this predatory resource mongering will leave them with an
unstable infrastructure when they amass too many colonies to supervise
and defend. However, this is a moot point since we'll likely never know
how their growth would develop thanks to those f***ing Reapers.

Good job. That's a very good analysis, but I wouldn't try thinking that far into anything when all of the fictional alien races are written with the typical science fictional hive mind mentality. I swear that in every sci-fi setting I know of that humanity are the only species with more cultural diversity and depth than a puddle. It demotivates me to think that an entire species are the way that they are because it was meant to be. That's one of the reasons why I like to keep Wrex alive: he may be a Krogan but just because he's the same species doesn't meant that he can't be different.

Modifié par tetrisblock4x1, 09 février 2012 - 09:49 .

[Chuvvy]

XDMMX wrote...

Isn't Earth supposed to be an overpopulated acid washed slum compared to the alien home worlds.

If bioware thinks 12 billion is over populated, they can't into statistics, or didn't do research. The US could produce enough food for 12 billion nearly on its own (farmers get paid extra by the government not to grow food), and we could fit 12 billion in and around texas, (assuming we built up, like new york). Overpopulation is overhyped, ironically enough. If you look at UN statistics and take into account agricultural technology growth, we won't be overpopulated for a very long time. I don't feel like getting into it at 3:54 am. Or anytime for that matter, I haven't slept in four days, insomnia's a ****.

[Lotion Soronarr]

ReveurIngenu wrote...
Where are the overpopulated mega-planets with billions upon billions of people, possibly surrounded by artificial rings that contain millions if not billions of people?  Planets turned into one huge city like in Star Wars or whatever?  I just feel like the writer's were limited by a lack of imagination and couldn't imagine a bigger, more impressive galaxy.  I guess it's not all that surprising since they made the humans the biggest and bestest race of the universe.  If you can't imagine other races or other worlds being more impressive than you, that pretty much shows lack of a good imagination.

Why even have overpopulated "planets"?

Overpopulation is not attractive. There seems to be plenty of planets capable of supporting life, so why not spread around?


Also, planets turned into one huge city are total bollocks.






www.irregularwebcomic.net/comic.php

www.irregularwebcomic.net/comic.php

[Wulfram]

Anoleis calls Earth an slum because of the pollution and poverty, not the over population.

edit: and he's steadily becoming more out of date as Earth modernises

Modifié par Wulfram, 09 février 2012 - 10:52 .

[Poison_Berrie]

Bleachrude wrote...

True, as someone earler mentioned, the Citadel wards are probably more vertical than anything we have in compareable Earth cities so there's a good chance that even though "on paper" it looks like the Citadel is denser than manila, the fact that there's no hard and fast rule with regard to height of buildings means the citadel could have even more open spaces than Manila.

Keep in mind that as being a space station, there would be need for space to be put towards keeping the place liveable. Enviromental systems and life support, storage for the masses of good that would probably be imported, agriculture (I doubt you want to keep the place fully dependant on importing food).

muse108 wrote...

Think the earth numbers are low, expected that to be closer to 20 to be honest. Even with colonization and population controls well pass the 15 by 2050 or something I read. 

I do think our growth rate is tempering slightly, because of first world birth rates and China's birth restrictions. Depending on policies adopted by governments and medical advances and availabilty and keeping in mind colonization of other planets would mostly be encouraged on Earth and see greater interest on an large population, I don't think it's an unreasonable number.

Slidell505 wrote...

If bioware thinks 12 billion is over populated, they can't into statistics, or didn't do research. The US could produce enough food for 12 billion nearly on its own (farmers get paid extra by the government not to grow food), and we could fit 12 billion in and around texas, (assuming we built up, like new york). Overpopulation is overhyped, ironically enough. If you look at UN statistics and take into account agricultural technology growth, we won't be overpopulated for a very long time.

Overpopulation is of course not so much a question of do we have the resources/space, but more of can we/will we distribute those resources and what are the effects of accomadating for the bigger population on the enviroment and society.

Modifié par Poison_Berrie, 09 février 2012 - 12:49 .