How Many People Does It Take To Colonize Another Star System? 392
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes: "The nearest star systems — such as our nearest neighbor, Proxima Centauri, which is 4.2 light-years from home — are so far away, reaching them would require a generational starship. Entire generations of people would be born, live, and die before the ship reached its destination. This brings up the question of how many people you need to send on a hypothetical interstellar mission to sustain sufficient genetic diversity. Anthropologist Cameron Smith has calculated how many people would be required to maintain genetic diversity and secure the success of the endeavor. William Gardner-O'Kearney helped Smith build the MATLAB simulations to calculate how many different scenarios would play out during interstellar travel and ran some simulations specially to show why the success of an interstellar mission depends crucially on the starting population size. Gardner-O'Kearny calculated each population's possible trajectory over 300 years, or 30 generations. Because there are a lot of random variables to consider, he calculated the trajectory of each population 10 times, then averaged the results.
A population of 150 people, proposed by John Moore in 2002, is not nearly high enough to maintain genetic variation. Over many generations, inbreeding leads to the loss of more than 80 percent of the original diversity found within the hypothetical gene. A population of 500 people would not be sufficient either, Smith says. "Five hundred people picked at random today from the human population would not probably represent all of human genetic diversity . . . If you're going to seed a planet for its entire future, you want to have as much genetic diversity as possible, because that diversity is your insurance policy for adaptation to new conditions." A starting population of 40,000 people maintains 100 percent of its variation, while the 10,000-person scenario stays relatively stable too. So, Smith concludes that a number between 10,000 and 40,000 is a pretty safe bet when it comes to preserving genetic variation. Luckily, tens of thousands of pioneers wouldn't have to be housed all in one starship. Spreading people out among multiple ships also spreads out the risk. Modular ships could dock together for trade and social gatherings, but travel separately so that disaster for one wouldn't spell disaster for all. 'With 10,000,' Smith says, 'you can set off with good amount of human genetic diversity, survive even a bad disease sweep, and arrive in numbers, perhaps, and diversity sufficient to make a good go at Humanity 2.0.'"
A population of 150 people, proposed by John Moore in 2002, is not nearly high enough to maintain genetic variation. Over many generations, inbreeding leads to the loss of more than 80 percent of the original diversity found within the hypothetical gene. A population of 500 people would not be sufficient either, Smith says. "Five hundred people picked at random today from the human population would not probably represent all of human genetic diversity . . . If you're going to seed a planet for its entire future, you want to have as much genetic diversity as possible, because that diversity is your insurance policy for adaptation to new conditions." A starting population of 40,000 people maintains 100 percent of its variation, while the 10,000-person scenario stays relatively stable too. So, Smith concludes that a number between 10,000 and 40,000 is a pretty safe bet when it comes to preserving genetic variation. Luckily, tens of thousands of pioneers wouldn't have to be housed all in one starship. Spreading people out among multiple ships also spreads out the risk. Modular ships could dock together for trade and social gatherings, but travel separately so that disaster for one wouldn't spell disaster for all. 'With 10,000,' Smith says, 'you can set off with good amount of human genetic diversity, survive even a bad disease sweep, and arrive in numbers, perhaps, and diversity sufficient to make a good go at Humanity 2.0.'"
Re:Why send people? (Score:0, Funny)
How fascinating. Do you often read words that aren't actually there, or is this an isolated occurrence?
Re:Got it all wrong, way too high... (Score:1, Funny)
Re:So. Let us imagine. (Score:1, Funny)
I am a man. I am a volunteer to go on such a mission, as part of the first generation. I will necessarily have to breed, in order to do my part for overall mission success. Does this mean I may have to fuck a woman I find ugly, dumb, boring, vulgar or otherwise unattractive ?
No. We'd never ask you to fuck your own mother.
Re:How many Earthworms? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Sure, but... (Score:5, Funny)
Or pack eggs and sperm, mix as needed.
Just make sure you label everything in the fridge very carefully.
Re:Why send people? (Score:4, Funny)
And we shall call this world Planet of the MILFs...
Re:Starship Diversity? (Score:5, Funny)
On a vaguely related note: Assume you send N ships on this voyage. Do you send N copies of the same ship, and hope the design has no fatal flaw (while acknowledging the advantages of parts redundancy) . Or do you send N different designs in the hope that diversity of design is overall more reliable?
You send N ships and let them breed of course. It may cause an occasional bumpy ride, and sure some of the younger ships will keep asking "Are we there YET?!?!". Then there will be the rebellious phase where the ships pierce their deflector dishes, get decals plastered over their aft thrusters, and deviate to the Orion Nebula because "that's what all the cool ships are doing". But in the end, you'll end up with enough mature and responsible ships to keep things going.
Re:Sure, but... (Score:5, Funny)
Having too many people on earth has historically proven solutions.
Generally, you hand out sharp and pointy objects, two or more colors of clothing, and let nature take its course....
Sure pal, you get to be the red shirt this time.