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Some thoughts
Okay, so population growth is pretty much exponential when you don't have any limiting factors (things like space, food, etc.). Well, space is pretty darn big, and with futuristic hydroponics and biochemical synthesis, I have a hard time believing that there would be much to limit population growth. As long as resources exist to build new structures to house people, in space or on a planetoid, populations would probably skyrocket throughout known space. Overcrowding? Just set your robots to work at constructing a new orbital station, or send out a ship full of adventurous newlyweds to that recently surveyed planet.
Stations would probably exist more as orbital living modules than outposts. Mining operations would not have much lack of workforce (either biological or mechanical), and resources could be exploited at a very quick rate in very large quantities. Even new colonies would probably not have much difficulty getting started, since their locations would have been selected out of potentially thousands, and the resources available would quickly allow for growth. After all, a sufficiently advanced space-faring society should have plenty of experience on setting up these new colonies. Launch a ring of satellites to scan the surface, drop down modular living pods to ideal locations, set up automated mining and terraforming equipment, and a self-suficient colony is created. In a few decades or so, people can start living outside of the pods. A few decades later, the first orbital habitats might begin to appear, all the while more people are coming from the older worlds.
Probably as a result of political power concerns, there would be plenty of emphasis on reproduction as a means to advance your new colony. I imagine a lot of large families would exist on newly colonized worlds, not because life is particularly difficult or dangerous, but because more births mean greater power. You can go to your interplanetary congress and demand greater representation, you have more workers for producing and consuming goods for a healthy economy, and should it come to it, you have a larger population base to create a militia to defend your planet in times of strife.
Core (established) worlds would essentially exist to consume resources and export people. They probably would have few resources of their own, although serve well as trade and governmental hubs, or serve as bases of operation for resource acquisition within a system. They'd only produce enough food for a relatively stable population, to keep a steady flow of people headed off-world. Overall inner worlds would be boring, fairly crowded, and mostly exist as economic powerhouses. After all, if you've got 50 billion people on a world and several billion more in orbit, that's quite a lot of economic influence on the galaxy. The new colonies have every reason to want to become like the established worlds.
And so... population growth continues at a very fast rate, pretty much without end. Each new colony spurred on through several phases. Initially, raw resources would be the most important in an agrarian society, eventually replaced by tourism as the primary focus (resource gathering is still full-force, however). After that, as less unused land is left, a more industrial economy might take shape, as resources are mined off-world and processed on-world. Technological gadgetry, shipbuilding, and of course orbital construction would take up the later phase. Entertainment might become a secondary focus, as well as anything requiring more human thought and effort, like the pursuits of science and the most important issue; figuring out how to fit more people on one planet, or move them more efficiently to others.
Anybody agree? Disagree? Other thoughts? This is sorta my random ideas topic for the month, so let's get a good discussion going.
The expansion of any species is only curtailed by an increase in predators, lack of food, or overcrowding. Assuming mankind can overcome the space travel problem, overcrowding is not a problem. Assuming hydroponics technology and agriculture keeps pace, food is not a problem. And assuming we don't find some Voinians two systems over, predators aren't a problem either.
If humankind become truly a spacefaring civilization, there will be no barrier to almost infinite expansion and growth.
I feel sorry for whatever developing races we encounter after we finally start colonizing. But hey, at least we'll have some things to test our new weapons on.
There aren't actually very many earth like planets around. The best bet for habitable planets is finding a useful part of a planet on a creepy orbit around a brown dwarf.
Even with space travel, overcrowding is a problem. Space is still rare, and travel even more expensive.
I'm sorry, mrxak, but your thinking appears to be firmly entrenched in the 1970s. Things have moved on since then. Global fertility levels have fallen 40% between now and the 1950s. About 83 countries adding up to 44% of the world's population now have subreplacement fertility level. They include countries like Canada which is most certainly not suffering from space or food limitations.
No single factor can explain this dramatic decline. Economic development doesn't apply. Bangladesh is one of the poorest countries in the world yet its fertility rate was reduced by half over the last 30 years. Culture does not apply. This decline in fertility applies not just to Western Europe but to Brazil, Sri Lanka, Japan, Thailand, and Tunisia as well.
Your faith on the effects of government encouragement of reproduction is also misplaced. I'm aware of many such programs which have yielded no results. As far as I know, the only place where government encouragement of reproduction actually worked very well was in Iran, a relatively closed society ruled by a theocracy. I don't think it is possible for a closed society to become a major presence in space.
The idea that population growth is dictated by factors like food, space, and predators is most suitable for non-sentient life or primitive human life. If we are talking about races capable of space travel, such an idea doesn't apply.
Let's not even talk about the fact that your scenario is predicated on the assumption of a unified planet. That may not be the case. An alternative scenario might be a planet divided into numerous factions and only a few of those factions go to space. It may also be the case that those few factions happen to be the ones with the lowest fertility rates. Therefore, they are unlikely to have a large number of highly populated settlements.
Okay, so let's assume that fertility problems can be cured in the future. Yay, almost your entire post vanished into irrelevance.
As for "government encouragement" you misinterpreted what I am saying. I'm saying people will want to grow their political and economic power by reproducing more, not saying that governments will tell people to make lots of babies.
Remeber that the fertility 'problems' in the first world are, IIRC, more related to women's changing role in the workplace and family and other factors such as contraception and sex education than to some mystery bug that's keeping people from getting laid. These kinds of women aren't going to want to go off to Tau Cati V and start poppin' out the rugrats= they're going to want to go explore and do stuff as much as the men would.
Personally I think that it will take a uninted world 'every creed and every kind' for us to truly leave the planet and begin intrastellar commerce. For as much as the first several thousand years as a space-based infrastructure builds up commerce and trade will be dominated by government and megacorporation, untill prices of technology come down and parts surplusses build up. Most space craft parts nowadays are custom-engineered, and that makes them prohibitably expensive. Once a certain point is reached, however, it will probably be as common as in Star Wars. Seems bloody everyone at least has a floating motorcycle there.
Have you read "The Mote in God's Eye"? It has an interesting take on a civilization that has to breed to survive.
I think what would happen is humanity would expand outwards for maybe 200-500 systems. then slow down. "Fringe worlds", or worlds near the edge of known space wouldn't have population restrictions, so harsh conditions and low population levels would have to be replaced by a substantial birth rate. Inner colonies would of course have to keep population control, either by birth or deportation, given the fact that most people wouldn't be happy with being told "You're being sent to a desert planet on the outer rim!", I would say that inner colonies would use a method of birth control.
I don't think expansion would be infinite. We could expand outwards to every star in the milky way, but then what? Traveling to Andromeda would be as big/bigger a leap then solar -> galactic.
The big question would be, would birth rates soar again once the planetary restriction has been lifted?
This post has been edited by Skyfox : 30 November 2005 - 02:37 PM
mrxak, on Nov 30 2005, 08:18 AM, said:
Okay, so let's assume that fertility problems can be cured in the future. Yay, almost your entire post vanished into irrelevance. View Post
On the other hand, what would a space-faring civilization look like under the condition of low fertility rates? Or, maybe just a situation where overpopulation was not the dominant factor in expansion.
Seed Example: A civilization with the technical ability to get to other star systems, but facing the possibility of "The Next Big War" at home. You might have people trying to earn their way onto an outbound ship before fighting broke out.
Maybe this example has some problems, but that's just off the top of my head.
mrxak, on Nov 30 2005, 01:18 AM, said:
I would urge you to be a bit more open-minded and think of the possibilities.
Perhaps a certain race is incapable of reproducing beyond replacement level. So they may resort to cloning or using robots to expore and colonize space. As a result, only that race's home world actually has people. Though that race may control a huge empire, every "inhabited" planet sans their home world is actually populated by robots or clones. Perhaps that race also has highly advanced medical technology so that the "real" people themselves can live up to 500 years. Perhaps they have a strict hierarchy where the "real" people are at the top of the pyramid, clones come second, robots come third,...etc.
There's no need to assume that everything have to be done by people. Science fiction is filled with stories speculating about how sentient robots will interact with people or how clones will adjust to the reality of their existence, especially if they are regarded as a source of useful body parts. I can imagine good EV plug-ins featuring such a society. What if the player starts out as a clone who, by the age of 30 is scheduled to have his heart torn out to be given to his master?
As for "government encouragement" you misinterpreted what I am saying. I'm saying people will want to grow their political and economic power by reproducing more, not saying that governments will tell people to make lots of babies. View Post
Theoretically? Sure. In reality, I have never heard of an entire population that dramatically increases its reproduction through a conscious decision to increase their political or economic power.
rmx256, on Nov 30 2005, 05:46 AM, said:
First of all, I don't think there has been a drastic revolution of "women's changing role in the workplace and family" in Bangladesh. Yet they had a drastic decline in fertility level.
Second, what makes you think exploration is incompatible with procreation? Consider the colonization of the New World. Back then, women had lots of children in response to the harsh environment which caused high child mortality rates.
Personally I think that it will take a uninted world 'every creed and every kind' for us to truly leave the planet and begin intrastellar commerce. For as much as the first several thousand years as a space-based infrastructure builds up commerce and trade will be dominated by government and megacorporation, untill prices of technology come down and parts surplusses build up. Most space craft parts nowadays are custom-engineered, and that makes them prohibitably expensive. Once a certain point is reached, however, it will probably be as common as in Star Wars. Seems bloody everyone at least has a floating motorcycle there. View Post
I'm not so sure. US got to the moon when it was in competition with the Soviet Union. One might argue that competition is what breeds progress.
Meh, I don't buy it. Sure, corporations and such will greatly reduce the cost of going into space over time. Still, it will still be pretty expensive when compared to terrestrial living. I think when we think of space habitation we have the tendency to revert to colonial modes of thinking: people will be driven off world by overpopulation, or to "get away from it all." Unfortunately, it doesn't look like those reasons will be viable the way things are looking now. Compared to the effort required to terrform a planet and shuttle significant numbers to that new Earth, a national birth control program looks like child's play. So overpopulation isn't a problem: if a society is advanced enough to conquer space, they are more than advanced enough to deal with population by hook or by crook once it becomes a serious problem. Environmental destabilization also appears to be a non-issue by this reasoning: even a polluted ball of dirt is easier to live in for long periods of time than hard vacuum, and it's easier to fix the damage than to "start from scratch" by terraforming a new world. As to the voluntary exile mode of thought, there is the problem that it will be mostly the upper and middle classes that will have the means to actually live in space: cost of living will always be much higher in places where, say, air isn't free, or you have to pay a tax to keep the nitrogen-fixing microbe population stable. And the upper and middle classes aren't normally the ones that pack up everything and leave for over the horizon.
So it appears that space, when or if it is populated, will be populated by the wealthy eccentrics, the dedicated explorers, and the puppets of big powers. So I think the whole "infinite growth" card is a tad bit overplayed. Oh well, maybe if we meet an ET or two we'll change our tune and stop keeping all our eggs in one basket.
I think exponential growth will be the rule in a space-faring society. Of course, all rules have exceptions. But when a somewhat colonisable planet will be found, and opened for colonisation, then people of various origins, both social and cultural, and of course coming from various planets will come (I imagine that's just a new planet on top of the ones already colonised). I'll be damned if all these people will be like today's westerners when it comes to fertility and growth rate. We may not realise it, but still available space (and in fact more the space we imagine is available than the actual available space) plays an important role in limiting growth, not really because people that are in surplus compared to what the land can support (in terms of food of course, but that's not everything) die from this, as Malthus thought, but in fact because people feel there is space for their childrens to grow up and install in and everything. I don't think it's haphazard if there are more people of Irish origin in New York than in Dublin. And the 275,000,000 (please tell me if figures have evolved since last time I checked) inhabitants of a certain country certainly wouldn't have existed in their countries of origin.
This post has been edited by Zacha Pedro : 06 December 2005 - 02:03 PM