Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Population Growth in the Book of Mormon


The Book of Mormon population growth rate would have to have been more than double that of the Roman Empire and other peers.


Nephite/Lamanite Populations with the most conservative estimates possible:
  • Population Start (Ps) = 100 
    • Number includes both Lehi's family and the Mulekites who colonized during the same period.
  • Lamanite army size estimate using the same number of as the Nephite Army
    • Even though Mormon 6:8 indicates that the Nephites were "filled with terror because of the greatness of their numbers"
  • Warrior to Population ratios used is 1:4
    • Even though anthropologists say 1:5 is the usual ratio.  And they sometimes go as high as 1:6 depending on the type of battles.
References:

[2]  "An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon", John L. Sorenson, BYU Anthropologist
[3]  Pop. Start = 100, Pop. Finish = 1.8 Million = 1.02% Annual Growth Rate See Note [5]
[4]  "Roman Empire Population", Chris Heaton, unrv.com
[5]  "Calculating Growth Rates", University of Oregon, Bob Parker

Other Resources:

[A]  "Multiply Exceedingly", John C. Kunich, Signature Books
[B]  "Population Growth", Wikipedia, 17th-19th Century Growth Rates


From John C. Kunich's "Multiply Exceedingly"
Table 2 - Growth Rates
DATE
U.N.
Smith; Ehrlich
Hauser
Bogue
1650-1750
0.4
0.3
0.3
0.34
1750-1800
0.4
0.5
-
0.5
1800-50
0.5
0.5
0.6
0.43
1850-1900
0.5
0.8
-
0.68
1900-10
0.8
0.8
-
0.65
1910-20
0.8
0.8
-
0.65
1920-30
0.8
0.8
-
1.07
1930-40
0.8
0.8
1
1.11
1940-50
0.8
0.8
-
1.1
1950-60
1.8
1.8
-
1.83
1960-
2
1.8
2
-


Equation to calculate the Growth of a Population:

Where:
Pf   = Population Final
Ps   = Population Start; Ps = 100
r      = Annual Growth Rate
n     = Years of Growth; n = 984



Apologist Response:
http://www.fairlds.org/authors/danderson-steven/adding-up-the-book-of-mormon-peoples

7 comments:

  1. Very good basic (in a good way) analysis. One suggestion: reformat the math portion of your argument (not in the graphic, but in the supporting text below it).

    Explanations that rely on mathematical expressions run the risk of looking amateurish when those expressions are formatted as if they're formulas in a spreadsheet program. Even without relying on MathML or similar technologies, many mathematical expressions (including those used in your "Equation to calculate the Growth of a Population") can be formatted quite satisfactorily with basic HTML tags.

    In this case, you can use <sub>…</sub> for subscripts (f and s), <sup>…</sub> for superscripts (n), and put symbolic names (r, n, P, f, and s) in italics (parentheses, arithmetic operators, and literal numeric values should not be italicized). Also, leave out the asterisk for the multiplication; two terms immediately adjacent to each other are assumed to be multiplied if no other operator is placed between them.

    As a step up from there, the online LaTeX editor at http://www.codecogs.com/latex/eqneditor.php is a great option for producing well formatted mathematical statements in a browser independent fashion.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for that codecogs.com website. I made that change.

      Delete
  2. This is truly an amateurish and purposely contrived interpretation of Nephite and Lamanite populations. The Book of Mormon never says these were the only people living in the Western Hemisphere. You know very well they were not the only ones. Why the fabrication? Who are you trying to fool? Over the one thousand years covered by this scripture, the offspring of Lehi obviously mixed with other people, particularly the Lamanites. Thus, they could easily have greatly expanded their numbers over the millennium. No one seems to be whining about the family of Jacob going to Egypt for a few centuries and returning to Israel by the hundreds of thousands (their massive population growth apparently accomplished in the same way). Why the beef with Lehi's family? Blood typing has proven that several native American populations have blood types that are very common in Europe and the Middle-east, while others have types that are relatively rare in those regions. Different people mixed together!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The BoM makes it clear that the Americas were preserved as a land of promise. Which is clearly not the case just one more evidence that the Book of Mormon is a work of Fiction.

      Delete
    2. It was preserved as a land of promise and is still a land of promise. Just as the land of Jerusalem is a land of promise but those promises are not yet fulfilled.

      The land of promise here in the Americas would only be kept from other nations if the people were righteous. That wasn't the case and even in the beginning of the Book of Mormon we see a prophecy that the people would grow wicked and the land would indeed be overrun by the Gentiles (which is was) which the Lord would bring here to occupy. Your argument is unfortunately flawed and indicates you are unfamiliar with the text of the Book of Mormon.

      Delete
  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

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