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Talk:Mystery:What Percentage Go To Hell? (view source)
Revision as of 21:45, September 21, 2011
, 21:45, September 21, 2011→A mathematical approach
Hello,<br />
Hello,<br />
I'm trying to approach this as a mathematician (they same way I approach everything), and I have a question. One estimate I've heard on the Earth's total cumulative population is around 100 billion, which seems a fairly reasonable assumption to me. However, perhaps 30-40% of these lives resulted in deaths before the age of one. Add to that, when you count abortions and miscarriages in the total population, it jumps up to around 200 billion (I can't seem to find that statistic right now ~ it could be off, but I'll go with it.) Figuring out how many Christians have ever lived is tricky, but an estimate can be made, so I have my numerator (maybe 20 billion, with a back-of-the-envelope calculation). However, what denominator should I use? I'm interested in hearing various theological opinions; should I use 100 billion, the amount that were born alive? Or 200 billion, the amount conceived? Or 60-70 billion, the amount that lived passed age one?<br />I'm just ball-parking on my numbers and assumptions, so don't believe them <i>too</i> much, but I think in principle, my question remains. Thank you for your input, and God bless! [[User:EricAlstrom|EricAlstrom]] 16:29, 21 September 2011 (EDT)
I'm trying to approach this as a mathematician (they same way I approach everything), and I have a question. One estimate I've heard on the Earth's total cumulative population is around 100 billion, which seems a fairly reasonable assumption to me. However, perhaps 30-40% of these lives resulted in deaths before the age of one. Add to that, when you count abortions and miscarriages in the total population, it jumps up to around 200 billion (I can't seem to find that statistic right now ~ it could be off, but I'll go with it.) Figuring out how many Christians have ever lived is tricky, but an estimate can be made, so I have my numerator (maybe 20 billion, with a back-of-the-envelope calculation). However, what denominator should I use? I'm interested in hearing various theological opinions; should I use 100 billion, the amount that were born alive? Or 200 billion, the amount conceived? Or 60-70 billion, the amount that lived passed age one?<br />I'm just ball-parking on my numbers and assumptions, so don't believe them <i>too</i> much, but I think in principle, my question remains. Thank you for your input, and God bless! [[User:EricAlstrom|EricAlstrom]] 16:29, 21 September 2011 (EDT)
::: The 100 billion figure is the secular one - relying on counting back 50,000 years and not taking account of the [[Great Flood]]. To make such a calculation, we'd need to consider the date of the flood. If we assume this to be around 4000BC (Taken from [http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2003/deluge.html this website]) then the numbers start to look very different. 8 people went on the arc, so we need to look at the sum of a geometic series.
::: The current number of people is approaching 7 billion, which we'll use for simplicity. Therefore r^n=7 billion. The Sum of Geometric series is given by a(1-r^n)/(1-r) So the total number ever = -56bn/(1-r) where r is the ratio of increase from generation to generation. This method isn't perfect as it views generations as discrete, whereas 1 lineage might have 9 generations in the same time another has 7. Looking at some different values of r.. if we assume population doubles per generation, then we see 56bn have lived ever. If we assume they triple, 28bn have lived. If we assume they increase by 1.5, then 112bn have lived. Looking at tables of population for the documented period of the last couple of thousand years might allow us to decide a good value of r to work with. [[User:AlycaZ|AlycaZ]] 17:45, 21 September 2011 (EDT)