khadaji2002
SOC-12
This is an idea I never considered. Stolen and stored!
the value of life
- Thread starter Xerxeskingofking
- Start date
This is an idea I never considered. Stolen and stored!
Xerxeskingofking
SOC-13
yes, but all of these were motivated by desperation to some extent, and a "anywhere is better than here, even a shallow grave" mindset.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Reading between the lines about life on high TL, high population Imperial worlds there appear to be a lot of desperate people willing to risk it.
No medical insurance for the poor - so they die or are forced into 'voluntary' colonist programs.
No unemployment benefit so they too are forced into 'voluntary' colony low berths.
High law level means you will eventually fall foul of the law and end up in a convict low berth.
You may as well take your chances and set out on your own to win fame and fortune, even if it means the odd pit fight, working passage, low berth, stowaway, thug for hire existence.
No medical insurance for the poor - so they die or are forced into 'voluntary' colonist programs.
No unemployment benefit so they too are forced into 'voluntary' colony low berths.
High law level means you will eventually fall foul of the law and end up in a convict low berth.
You may as well take your chances and set out on your own to win fame and fortune, even if it means the odd pit fight, working passage, low berth, stowaway, thug for hire existence.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
There's voluntary push and pull conditions, but a lot of local authorities .may have a lock on immigration control, leaving them stranded in the starport.
Unfortunately human life seems to follow some of the principles normally associated with commodities: the greater the supply then the lower the unit value. That could certainly apply to High Pop worlds in a setting where there may be a couple with A ratings in a couple of subsectors.
Reality is the opposite: high populations are the result of a higher value placed on life, as reflected in reduced violence and improved medical care.
Populations grow as mortality in children & young adults decreases. More people surviving to have children gives you more children.
I have a whole section on MTU on certification, which includes a variation on the Traveller computers, and all sorts of hazmat hauling.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
I have to mention India and China, neither country places a great value on human life or rights.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
Homogeneity.
Surprisingly recent, or was dormant, in India's case.
Surprisingly recent, or was dormant, in India's case.
http://www.economicsdiscussion.net/articles/10-causes-of-high-birth-rate-in-india-explained/2243
http://www.geography.hunter.cuny.ed...ors.affect.birth.fertility.rates.outline.html
Reality is that high population growth ( on our earth at least ) is most prevalent in areas where life is cheap and where most people cannot afford education, technology or heath care. These people would be on the tail end of a Pareto curve. In developed countries where the population would be on the higher end of that curve, birth rates are lower.
Historically, not quite true.
Byzantium hit an estimated million during Roman Rule, and that's neither a life-cherishing nor terribly medically skilled populace.
Londinium was 30 thousand or more during Roman times...
It's all about food distribution - if you can get food and water, and keep people busy (Presuming Calhoun's findings are in fact valid, keeping them busy is important), you can get rapid population growth — Well beyond the levels of density that are toxic.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
I thought Rome hit a million, though mainly due to serial cereal shipments from Egypt, and the dole.
In classical antiquity, the grain supply to the city of Rome could not be met entirely from the surrounding countryside, which was taken up by the villas and parks of the aristocracy and which produced mainly fruit, vegetables and other perishable goods. The city therefore became increasingly reliant on grain supplies from other parts of Italy, notably from Magna Graecia (Campania and Sicily). The dependency on grain continued to increase, and more grain was imported to Rome from various countries of Roman influence, such as the provinces of Sicily, North Africa and Egypt. These regions were capable of shipping adequate grain for the population of the capital amounting to 60 million modii (540 million litres / 540,000 cubic metres or 135 million gallons / 16.8 million bushels) annually, according to some sources (reference needed). These provinces and the shipping lanes that connected them with Ostia and other important ports thus gained great strategic importance. Whoever controlled the grain supply had an important measure of control over the city of Rome.
In classical antiquity, the grain supply to the city of Rome could not be met entirely from the surrounding countryside, which was taken up by the villas and parks of the aristocracy and which produced mainly fruit, vegetables and other perishable goods. The city therefore became increasingly reliant on grain supplies from other parts of Italy, notably from Magna Graecia (Campania and Sicily). The dependency on grain continued to increase, and more grain was imported to Rome from various countries of Roman influence, such as the provinces of Sicily, North Africa and Egypt. These regions were capable of shipping adequate grain for the population of the capital amounting to 60 million modii (540 million litres / 540,000 cubic metres or 135 million gallons / 16.8 million bushels) annually, according to some sources (reference needed). These provinces and the shipping lanes that connected them with Ostia and other important ports thus gained great strategic importance. Whoever controlled the grain supply had an important measure of control over the city of Rome.
Both Rome and Byzantium. And London swelled to a rather stupendous size, as well, in the first millennium.
For the same reasons: tribute and excellent local food sources combined with plenty of water and a central location with excellent access.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
I was going to say it's the first emergence of globalism, but then I remembered the copper and tin trade of the Bronze Age, and the trade networks they grew.
Meaningless. That's taking a purely cross-sectional view.
Again, you are taking a cross-sectional view. Birth rate will tend to drop as survival improves, but this does not change the basic trend: the more people care about life -- as reflected in improved medicine, laws limiting violence, etc. -- the more populations grow.
Cross-sectional analyses are moronic here, because populations do not occur spontaneuosly; they grow over time. So: has the population of e.g. China grown as Chinese medicine has improved and interpersonal violence has been outlawed? Or, what is the trend in the perceived value of life in Europe vs. Europe's population from the Dark Ages to the present day?
Large global populations will occur where life is more valued, relatively speaking. (And also where technology can support the population
No, it is not all about any single thing. That's reductive.
The question here is how does one single variable -- the value of life -- affect population growth. Are you asserting it has no effect?
Valid point, this is a complex issue that can't be readily reduced to simplistic idea. It can, thought, have a series of relevant principles articulated. Things such as high popn levels are linked to the availability of food, an absence of hostile forces (enemy states, diseases, social practices), medicines and practices that reduce infant mortality, etc.
Maybe the value of life affects population growth at a certain point in a growth curve, but that existence of the point relies on several factors.
Citation needed.
Demographic data contradicts your position.
Globally, population growth is declining, having peaked in the early-mid 60's. It is projected to continue to drop over this century. Do we now consider life to be less valuable than we thought back then? Did we have better medical and better laws than now? The places where population growth remains strongest also happen to be places where the population is poorest.
Overall, the poor will maintain high birth rates, but do not benefit from improved health care and food availability due to cost, so access those don't seem to be the main driver of growth. There is plenty of evidence that laws and law enforcement are skewed against the poor. Yet population growth is highest in poor areas, and is decreasing in rich areas where improved medical care is available.
https://data.worldbank.org/products/wdi-maps
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_and_fertility
There is a strong correlation between population growth and poverty ( and low education and development ).
btw, I'm not sure what you mean by a 'cross-sectional view'.
dmccoy1693
SOC-13
If you have a professional that is well studied (EDU +2), knows medicine well (Medic +2), that takes his/her time (DM+2), is using a computer with Expert Medic (DM+1), and does this on a regular basis (Routine Difficulty 6+), I don't bother making people roll. They all live. I mean, I haven't even factored in a medical bay, the person's END and anything else I can think of to help them.
The only time I think it is important to roll is if you're waking a person up quickly because the ship is under attack. Or if it were Jayne trying to wake Simon up from low berth, and they were trying to be quiet because they broke into a hospital to steal medical supplies, yea, there'd be a roll. And even then, you have to roll snake eyes to kill 'em in my game. Any other failure, and I give the person Bane on all rolls for a day (medical attention negates the Bane).
But that's just my game.
The only time I think it is important to roll is if you're waking a person up quickly because the ship is under attack. Or if it were Jayne trying to wake Simon up from low berth, and they were trying to be quiet because they broke into a hospital to steal medical supplies, yea, there'd be a roll. And even then, you have to roll snake eyes to kill 'em in my game. Any other failure, and I give the person Bane on all rolls for a day (medical attention negates the Bane).
But that's just my game.
Able Baker
SOC-10
While some rather blunt models of population growth have been proposed (and been refuted) here, isn't the OTU implicitly assuming that birthrates can go up dramatically in the future?
I have made calculations several times of how the tens of billions of people might come about on some of the Hi-Pop planets. IIRC, I had to assume birthrates of 4+ per woman in many of the cases to get to the official numbers in the time since official discovery & colonization.
Now I see this as a great springboard for the imagination and see it as a feature. But if you really think that higher TLs (=standard of education & living) lead to lower birthrates all the time, then you will have big troubles explaining the settlement of known space.
I have made calculations several times of how the tens of billions of people might come about on some of the Hi-Pop planets. IIRC, I had to assume birthrates of 4+ per woman in many of the cases to get to the official numbers in the time since official discovery & colonization.
Now I see this as a great springboard for the imagination and see it as a feature. But if you really think that higher TLs (=standard of education & living) lead to lower birthrates all the time, then you will have big troubles explaining the settlement of known space.
