Re: Re: Tweaking the Age Distribution Tables

From: John Hughes <nysalor_at_8DZPcfU6e8-dtCLZiHWHrP81HRoNBopybwA9hbsilJlU5oKAfA7Dvdr76eRBVTiouqDB>
Date: Tue, 9 Apr 2002 22:08:41 +1000


I've asked Greg about the 50% children figure - hopefully his reply will help put the puzzle into proper perspective. Personally, I'd be happy with Nick's original 33% figure.

I've also dragged down an old Human Sciences textbook and come up with some additional guiding figures.

Remember our problem with one birth per year per woman of childbearing age? Here's a quote from J.Z. Young's 'An Introduction to the Study of Man, p320:

"The average expected births per year is 0.433, and there is much evidence that this is near the actual figure achieved by unrestrained human reproduction. The Hutterites are a religious sect in America who believe it is a religious duty to have as many children as possible: they average 0.4 a year. There are other data from various parts of the world showing that this figure is near the maximum."

Later on (p. 325) it talks about birth rates across the world, giving average figures of between 311 and 536 per hundred women. Our '50% children' model is currently running at over 1500 children per hundred women! 15 children each!

Finally, on p 340, it notes that average population growth in the ancient world was around 0.04 per annum. The world population took from around 2000 BP to 350 BP to double. Obviously, there can be tremendous variation, but upper end growth is around 4% per annum, and this has only occurred for short periods of time in modern, developed societies. I haven't worked out the population growth projected by the '50% children' model, but suspect most stead will have to start building hi-rise apartments in a generation or two . :)

John

> John wrote:
>
> > Nick's Age Distribution Table is a powerful and very effective
> > tool that's made our job much easier
>
> Thanks, John! But I completely agree with you that:
>
> > The present version, in adapting the age pyramid to TR's statement
> > that a clan is 50% children, produces some odd effects.
>
> For the record, I first developed the table for populations that were
> 33% children (cf. the Balazarings in "Griffin Mountain"), which is in
> line with real-world populations, then had to flex it *heavily* when
> the population stats in "Thunder Rebels" came out.
>
> I'm extremely grateful to John for identifying flaws in the current
> figures (which I had not previously noticed), and hope we can hammer
> out something more reasonable over the next few days.
>
> > While constant pregnancy not be a particularly far-fetched
> > assumption for the Heortlings, I found it a sobering thought
>
> I would *strongly* resist it. It makes Glorantha too darn weird. In
> general, I aim to make Glorantha match our reasonable expectations,
> so we can focus on the stuff that's *meant* to be weird. I'm sure
> we'd have heard before now if all Heortling women of child-bearing
> age were constantly pregnant.
>
> > Nick notes that the figure for Rome in Empire was only 31.7%.
>
> My source for this is a fairly approachable site, as demography goes:
> http://www.utexas.edu/depts/classics/documents/Life.html
>
> Have a look if you enjoy this kind of thing.
>
> > Another promising option is to differentiate the male and female
> > birth mortality rates so there are a few more women of child-
> > bearing age at the expense of those live-hard, die-young,
> > adventuring males.
>
> I think you'd be hard pushed to make enough of a difference through
> this, without skewing the culture (as John notes). It might be worth
> doing, but then you'd have to use distinct gender separations for
> different cultures (depending on how "adventurous," "live-hard"
> and/or "die-young" the male and female populations appear to be). For
> these reasons, I'm against major tweaks based on gender.
>
> > A third option, less appealing for me, would be to reduce the age
> > of senescence to artificially inflate the children percentage, but
> > this means less elders.
>
> Doesn't work for me -- same reason as "all pregnant, all the time,"
> it'd be too darn weird for gamers' reasonable expectations.
>
> > Thoughts?
>
> Can we pin down where the "50% children" figure came from? (Same
> source as all those detached family homes in the other Read Me First
> pages?). Is there any good reason to stick with it, and not (say) go
> with 33% children / 33% women / 33% men, which is more natural and
> intuitive.
>
> Cheers, Nick
>
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