Hi Pop Worlds
- Thread starter Mithras
- Start date
UK is essentially "High Population Density" especially English urban areas - I don't like it much (I'm a Scot and my original 'home patch' is Elgin - google maps it!) but I think Hell-hole would stretch it and I am familiar with Amsterdam, Paris, etc, none of which rated as hellholes (Paris gets damn cold though; romantic, my arse!).
The population codes are not broken, per se, they do tend to imply (for a human sized race on an earth like world) much higher levels of technology, serious social engineering and probably extraplanetary habitats (certainly at the top end).
Tobias is bang on the money, basically.
The population codes are not broken, per se, they do tend to imply (for a human sized race on an earth like world) much higher levels of technology, serious social engineering and probably extraplanetary habitats (certainly at the top end).
Tobias is bang on the money, basically.
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
Gaidheal said:
which seems, to me at least, reasonable in an SF setting.
GypsyComet
Emperor Mongoose
Using our own real world as an example, I tend to think that a world that works its way up from the Stone Age is less likely to surpass the tens of billions level (Pop A) simply because the path to those levels is littered with necessary urban renewal on a planetwide scale.
A planned community that was planted on a world at TL11 and Pop 6, however, could easily plan its growth to surpass 100 billion. Structural and social engineering together. No medium-density communities (its either an arcology or the scattered agro support folks), proper use of land from Landing Day, and other factors.
I suspect Humaniti cannot stumble into a Pop B by accident. If it isn't being planned for at every step, the sheer random nature of settlement will create the same fluxes we see on Earth and likely cap population at a low A.
A planned community that was planted on a world at TL11 and Pop 6, however, could easily plan its growth to surpass 100 billion. Structural and social engineering together. No medium-density communities (its either an arcology or the scattered agro support folks), proper use of land from Landing Day, and other factors.
I suspect Humaniti cannot stumble into a Pop B by accident. If it isn't being planned for at every step, the sheer random nature of settlement will create the same fluxes we see on Earth and likely cap population at a low A.
Gypsy - I'm not entirely convinced but I suspect your general thrust is correct, to be honest. My personal take on the world generation method is - It's a Guide. I alter the world as needed to move it into the bounds of the possible without removing all 'outlier' results, so, for example, a 'high-g' & 'tiny' world, seems surpassingly unlikely (what's the core? Soild Uranium?) but a 'High Pop' & 'Water World' I can see as being at least possible (maybe they all live in floating cities on the ocean, maybe they are aquatic either by evolution or technical adaption, etc).
Gaidheal said:
Problem is, that's not necessarily true because of the random way that UWPs are generated - you don't necessarily have high TL with high population. This is why I proposed in the playtest that there should be TL mininums for high populations (I think I proposed that min TL for pop 9 should be about 4 or 5, and min TL for pop A should be 9 or 10, and min TL for pop B should be at least 13 or 14) - I don't think those were officially adopted though.
Just to play a mind game with folks, Imagine a Dyson sphere at the Earth's orbit around our sun. Cover it with 50% water and 50% forest.
Insert a TL 0 human hunter-gatherer society and allow it to expand to equilibrium.
The population would be something on the order of Pop G (10^16).
Insert a TL 0 human hunter-gatherer society and allow it to expand to equilibrium.
The population would be something on the order of Pop G (10^16).
Tobias
Banded Mongoose
That would make some sense, although a "realistic" solution would also take world size and physical characteristics into account. I could see Pop A on an Earth-sized planet at TL 8-9, (10 billion+ people will live on this one before we hit TL 9) but not on a much smaller one.EDG said:
Then again, all "Hub Worlds" (Pop A+) would have at least an average interstellar TL (12-13 depending on polity) in a reimagined TU of my making. With rare exceptions such as minor race homeworlds and lost colonies.
EDG - I know, which is why I use it as a guide but I do sympathize with you, I think the system should have been tweaked a little, along your intended lines, in all probability. The counter-argument is that the current system throws out more 'interesting' results which a Referee can 'sanity check' for use in their setting.
Given appropriate economic and social factors, people redefine the amount of space they need to 'own'. This is precisely how we come to have 'city living' at all and what is considered 'the minimum' is very much a matter of culture (and that culture is shaped by economics, geography, etc).
In short, no it need not be a 'hellhole' for the inhabitants and yes we really can get a lot more people onto planet Earth (or similar), we* just might not like it much. I'm going to ignore food though... there comes a point where that is the limiting factor.
[edit] * I.E. You and I reading this thread, as I've already pointed out that I prefer small cities and most yanks seem to find UK and Europe to be 'crowded', from what they've said to me.
In short, no it need not be a 'hellhole' for the inhabitants and yes we really can get a lot more people onto planet Earth (or similar), we* just might not like it much. I'm going to ignore food though... there comes a point where that is the limiting factor.
[edit] * I.E. You and I reading this thread, as I've already pointed out that I prefer small cities and most yanks seem to find UK and Europe to be 'crowded', from what they've said to me.
Rikki Tikki Traveller said:
Indeed, and that would be a "special circumstance" ... however, unless they appear on the scene as fully educated adults (IIRC that's the case for Cherryh's "Downbelow Station" ... but its a long time since I read it) then, as in Bujold's "Vorkosigan" series you still don't have large families ... Beta Colony practices, IIRC, population control, wasn't Cordelia an only child? The hint is, IIRC, that that's more or less normal for Beta ... and on Barrayar, well, Miles is an only child, really (Mark is not a voluntary birth chosen by the parents), and so is Ivan (OK, Ivan's father is executed before Ivan is born, yeah) and, apart from the one Count who has all those daughters (and gets into strife over it because of the method), it seems as if most of the noble families have only one child, perhaps two, as the norm.
Even in "In the Mountains of Mourning" and sequel(s) the backswoods types seem to have relatively small families, or are at least heading that way now that "civilizashun" is reaching them.
Of course, Traveller doesn't encourage the level of genetic engineering and related tech that Downbelow Station represents ... seems opposed to it, in fact ... its certainly not canon (not that, IMO, canon should always be the arbiter) and, of course, in DS, there are very specific and localised and limiting reasons why DS goes the route it does which the Imperium would be, on my impression anyway, fairly violently opposed to ... YMMV.
Barrayar tech? Sure. Why not. But since it really only cuts nine months out of the equation, leaving the parents with a minimum of five or six years of considerable economic cost (till the kid starts school), this doesn't actually encourage the women to likely have more ... the reason they don't is because of the impact of child-rearing on their careers ... and artificial wombs don't change that cost.
As for childcare, well, yes, but, at least here in Oz, according to the ABS, women also don't want to put their kids in childcare until they are at least school age, and regard it as the great imposition that effectively reduces the number they are likely to have ... and so there's a limit there, as well.
Phil
Tobias
Banded Mongoose
Oh, sure. What part of the population in Japan is living in a "hellhole" then? In percent, if you please, so I can get what part of the population you consider significant. (And after you did your homework on that one, we can talk causes.)aspqrz said:
Oh, and by the way, about opinions...
http://www.shortpacked.com/comics/20070502opinions.png
alex_greene
Guest
* makes T gesture *
Guys. Let cooler heads prevail, or else this place is going to be swarming with mods.
If this was Shadownessence, there'd be all manner of people writing in red type right about now, but it isn't. Yet still, there are times when you just have to back into your corners.
I'm enjoying the discussion of how to portray worlds with a high population density in a science fictional setting. Consider Larry Niven's Puppetteer rosette. A trillion Pierson's Puppetteers, all living on four out of five worlds on a Kemplerer rosette travelling at near C, heading out towards the SMC to escape the Galaxy blowing up.
To a creature with such a profound herd instinct, living shoulder to shoulder with the rest of the Puppetteer population is the only way for them to live, and hardly a hellhole at all.
And what would be a high population world to some? For the caste-driven Droyne, they might be able to sustain numbers in a single world that would stagger the human mind, and yet they would call their world only sparsely populated compared with some worlds they used to live on.
And what about the herd-loving K'Kree? Or the Aslan, for whom land is of paramount importance? For an Aslan of high Territory, perhaps a population 7 world would be considered crowded by their standards.
So let's keep it to Traveller. Okay?
Guys. Let cooler heads prevail, or else this place is going to be swarming with mods.
If this was Shadownessence, there'd be all manner of people writing in red type right about now, but it isn't. Yet still, there are times when you just have to back into your corners.
I'm enjoying the discussion of how to portray worlds with a high population density in a science fictional setting. Consider Larry Niven's Puppetteer rosette. A trillion Pierson's Puppetteers, all living on four out of five worlds on a Kemplerer rosette travelling at near C, heading out towards the SMC to escape the Galaxy blowing up.
To a creature with such a profound herd instinct, living shoulder to shoulder with the rest of the Puppetteer population is the only way for them to live, and hardly a hellhole at all.
And what would be a high population world to some? For the caste-driven Droyne, they might be able to sustain numbers in a single world that would stagger the human mind, and yet they would call their world only sparsely populated compared with some worlds they used to live on.
And what about the herd-loving K'Kree? Or the Aslan, for whom land is of paramount importance? For an Aslan of high Territory, perhaps a population 7 world would be considered crowded by their standards.
So let's keep it to Traveller. Okay?
Tobias
Banded Mongoose
Humans are part of Traveller. At least for the Imperium, they are the largest part. So, unless you suggest that all Humans in the TU are fundamentally different from early 21st century humans*, there is a valid comparison here. And that comparison says (fact): If 30-40 billion people on a Terra-sized world automatically mean "hellhole for a significant part of the population", then South Korea, Germany, the UK, Israel, Italy, Taiwan and the Netherlands, to name a few, are "hellholes for a significant part of the population". I think people will accomodate to living in that kind of hellhole.
*Which might make some sense, but not in Traveller.
*Which might make some sense, but not in Traveller.
alex_greene
Guest
And some humans may well come to thrive in such environments.
Recall that at high tech levels in Traveller, flying cities become feasible. Most of the population will have begun living out of something propelled by a grav drive by about TL 12, by TL 13 the buildings can reach kilometres in height and probably incorporate public spaces like parks and other facilities.
At the highest expressions of technology, above TL 15, Ringworlds and even Dyson Spheres could appear; and at TL 15, I'm sure that smaller scale "Ringworlds" could come about when all the orbital stations already extant kind of join together with corridors to form one world-girdling orbital habitat with space for several cities' worth of human population.
It's low tech worlds that have it bad, when some germ comes along and suddenly there aren't enough undertakers to bury all the corpses. And then there are no more undertakers, either.
High Pop worlds become feasible only at high tech levels. Below about TL 5, and you've got a population that can cap at around 7 or 8. Any more than that, and one passing rat or well filled with cholera and the population situation solves itself again.
Recall that at high tech levels in Traveller, flying cities become feasible. Most of the population will have begun living out of something propelled by a grav drive by about TL 12, by TL 13 the buildings can reach kilometres in height and probably incorporate public spaces like parks and other facilities.
At the highest expressions of technology, above TL 15, Ringworlds and even Dyson Spheres could appear; and at TL 15, I'm sure that smaller scale "Ringworlds" could come about when all the orbital stations already extant kind of join together with corridors to form one world-girdling orbital habitat with space for several cities' worth of human population.
It's low tech worlds that have it bad, when some germ comes along and suddenly there aren't enough undertakers to bury all the corpses. And then there are no more undertakers, either.
High Pop worlds become feasible only at high tech levels. Below about TL 5, and you've got a population that can cap at around 7 or 8. Any more than that, and one passing rat or well filled with cholera and the population situation solves itself again.
