What happened to the Romulan Empire after Romulus was destroyed

Discussion in 'General Trek Discussion' started by The Overlord, Nov 6, 2012.

  1. T'Girl

    T'Girl Vice Admiral Admiral

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    My personal theory is that the red matter had a temporal component.

    If all the red matter accomplished was to turn the existing supernova remnant into a black hole, it doesn't stop the shock wave from continuing on it's path of destruction. The shock wave is already gone.

    However, if red matter has a temporal property, then it would basically reverse all the effects of the original supernova. The shock wave would never have been created and the planet Romulas would be "un-destroyed."

    First the star supernovas', which threatens Romulas. Only then does Spock promise to save the planet, after the shockwave is already on it's way, "consuming everything in its path."

    After Romulas is destroyed, Spock shoots the red matter into the supernova remnant. I believe what happen next was one of those Star Trek "reset events." As a end result of Spock's actions, Romulas was fine.

    This next is from oldSpock's mind meld with nuKirk.

     
  2. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Mere land does not ensure the survival of the next generation. It needs to be a veritable paradise for this - and, as per what we're shown, it isn't (most planets uninhabitable, etc).

    If the romulans were breeding like tribbles, then they could reach ~1-10 billions in 2000 years. Taking into account their pioneering history, wars - or more mundane causes: accidents, crimes, some not finding mates, etc - every single family must have at least 5-6 children.

    In which case, the romulan success in ensuring security and reproductive success for the next generation would be impressive; it would be unmatched in the federation, in any case.
     
  3. T'Girl

    T'Girl Vice Admiral Admiral

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    But if you using a 0.02 growth rate, that's 2% annually, not 2% every generation. The mistake you're making is you're actually using a 0.00066 annual growth rate, this is why the number you're getting (38,190 people) after 2,000 "annuals" is so incredible small.

    0.02 divide by 30 give you 0.00066.

    Even if each generation is thirty years, statistically the birth rate for a population group is calculated over the total time period.

    In one of my previous post I said:

    If we started with 10,000 people, and each couple in each generation produced an average of 3 children who in turn reproduced, the population of the Empire could be up to 110 billion people.

    Now, I did stipulate three children surviving to reproduce another surviving three children. Not three children born. This statement takes into account children and adults who don't survive to reproduce the average number. So, at that rate of population growth, you don't get "~1 - 10 billion," you get 110 billion people in the current population after two thousand years. This already takes into account illnesses, accidents, warfare and all other causes of "not reproducing the average number."

    :)
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2012
  4. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    So - every romulan couple has to have 3 children per 30 years:

    If you take into account hazards such as pioneering, catastrophe, lack of resources, deaths, not finding mates, not having children, etc then every romulan couple has to have at least ~4 children per 30 years (a few "spares").

    Which raises the problem: how does a colony manage to feed/educate/etc a population 3 times as numerous as the preceding one, every 30 years?*
    Not by building ships and going somewhere where there's no infrastructure.
    And not by having magic tech (as Kirk's childhood colony - and every other failed colony in trek) proves.

    Oops. Looks like there's no beating that petri-dish.

    In conclusion, 2 conditions are needed:
    Romulans must breed like tribbles;
    Romulans must hand-wave resources in order to support these next generations.

    *In human history, couples could afford 5-6 children only because most didn't make it to adulthoold.

    This alone is a VERY high order.

    What losses due to illnesses, etc? What percentage?
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2012
  5. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    They don't have to be like bacteria to have a massive population. You do know that a sextillion is, say, a million times more than a quadrillion right? They could be the most unfortunate species in the galaxy, suffer all the catastrophies possible, and could easily reach the quadrillion range. In fact, the more they spread out on other planets, the less impact any kind of catastrophy would have on them. And you keep bringing up human history, like the Romulans are going to suffer from bad teeth, influenza, no food, stroke and heart attacks due to obesity, chicken pox, scarlet fever, mumps, malaria, amscesses, and other 20th century diseases that can be prevented in a society that uses science.
    Your estimates of 40k are laughable.
     
  6. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Actually, they DO have to be like bacteria to have a massive population - well fed bacteria, that is.

    And no, they couldn't be the most unfortunate species in the galaxy and reach the quadrillion range.
    All it takes is for the average romulan couple to have 2 children - or less.
    That's it for population increase.

    PS - Easily? Within the confines of the trekverse (as presented) or the real world - well, that's laughable!

    Not these diseases.
    But many others - with similar effects, demographically.
    Many of them mentioned in trek canon.

    EmperorTiberius - in trek, populations suffer from the same "gremlins" human populations suffered throughout history - regardless of 'colonies' or any other hand-waving you would care to use.
    Again, many - most - of them mentioned in trek canon.

    You think it not realistic?
    Well, fantasy science replicators or transporters are not realistic, either.
    You can't pick and choose what you consider 'realistic' and what not (well, you could, but it would make your posts worthless).

    During history, many colonists/lineages/populations suffered from a far worse fate - number of descendants: 0.
     
  7. MacLeod

    MacLeod Admiral Admiral

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    The main one being perhaps the T'Kon Empire, that collapsed when it's central start went nova.

    And it had a population numbering in the trillions.

    As others have said, could conquered/occupied worlds rebel against their oppressors?
     
  8. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    US has had a growth rate between .9 and 2% for the past 100 years. Are you saying people in US grow unrealisticly like bacteria? Are you saying that advanced Vulcan technology in hands of agressive, expansionist Romulans woudn't be able to match this type of growth?
     
  9. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    :guffaw:
    Take a look at demographic increase in developed countries (including USA).
    You'll find it goes backwards, stagnates, or barely advances these days (at most).
    So no, the populations of rich countries definitely do not breed like bacteria.

    Of course, in the trekverse, the conditions - dangerous diseases/wars/lacking food/etc - presented are more like those at the beginning of the 19th century.


    PS - For the USA:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

    One - of many - relevant information: "The total fertility rate in the United States estimated for 2011 is 1.89 children per woman, which is below the replacement fertility rate of approximately 2.1"

    Next time, actually do a google search yourself.
     
  10. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    Wow. I haven't seen someone this stuborn in a long time. You have to look at trends, not particular years which could be an anomaly.
    Look at the freaking link that you provided, it says that the average growth rate in the last 100 years or so was 1.3%, just like I said above. US has 300 million people, it's not a myth. According to you, US should be the size of a small village. Math and history don't lie. Stop being so arrongant and full of yourself and present some evidence.
     
  11. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    I have already shown evidence. You just don't want to look at it; you only look for what you want to believe.

    About USA
    "76 million in 1900 to 281 million in 2000. It reached the 200 million mark in 1967, and the 300 million mark on October 17, 2006"
    Does this look like an exponential curve to you?

    Let's use the malthusian equation:
    0,02 growth "per year"
    112 years since 1900:
    (76000000)*((2,71828182846)^(0,02*112))
    N=713893177

    You fall short by some margin with a mere 300 million.
    And that's counting immigration as legitimate multiplication of the population - which, for the purposes of this discussion, it is NOT.

    BTW, the demographic trend now in developed countries is negative, NOT positive.

    Malthus was wrong - proved decisively by demographic history. Indeed, ANY prediction of continuing exponential curves in the real world was wrong.
    Your imitation is also wrong.
    Deal with it already!
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2012
  12. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    No actually, you got it wrong yet again. With the average growth rate of 1.3, US population would be: 325,946,526
    Pretty damn close for a bad equation.
     
  13. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Actually, the 1,3 number was obtained post factum. Let's take immigration into account - and we'll get a number of, at most, ~0,6-0,8 (average for the last century) - which in in steep decrease (for the last decades or so, the figure is actually below the replacement factor in most developed countries).

    You see? It's easy to do - doctoring the data to get what you want and be in rough conformity with the facts.
    If you use such numbers, you can obtain a curve blunt enough to match almost anything you want. And it's getting blunter.
    Needless to say, you can never predict anything with such methods.

    And 325946526 is pretty far from your 'conservative' 0,02 per year which gave 713893177.

    And yet, you go ahead with malthus this, malthus that.
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2012
  14. R. Star

    R. Star Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    The correct answer will invariably be "whatever the plot requires."

    If they want a weakened Romulan empire, they can manufacture the supporting facts easy enough about how epidemics, industrial failings and manpower shortages cause it's downfall.

    If they want a resurgent Romulan empire all they have to do is say okay Romulus is gone, but the other few dozen colonial worlds are doing just fine and the Empire keeps going with a change in the location of it's capital.

    A pity ST09 had to screw up the main universe while introducing their physics altering alternate one.
     
  15. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I'd say the flop of Nemesis and cancellation of Enterprise did a lot more to screw up the Prime universe than blowing up Romulus!
     
  16. T'Girl

    T'Girl Vice Admiral Admiral

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    My scenario was a generation of fifty years (being Vulcanoids), and a average of three surviving children.

    My great'grandmother Izabel had ten, of which seven lived to begin parenting children, plus there was 1 adopted child. She had 14 son/daughter-in- laws (there were some re-marriages), 33 grandchildren, and 115 great'grandchildren (one of whom is me).

    Yes, I agree. The birth rate would be higher than the survives to reproduce rate.

    By producing lots of farmers, teachers, craftsmen, storekeepers, technicians. In other words, children.

    Remember, they arrived on Romulas a technological people.

    Don't forget to into account that in addition to the 4 million people born in America in 2011, there were an additional 690,000 who were naturalized as citizens last year. About 11.8 percent of Americans were born outside of the country. But they are still Americans, regardless of their birthplace. And they are part of our ongoing population increase.

    Not all Romulans would be born on Romulas, but they would be part of the total population of Romulans.

    :)
     
  17. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    :rolleyes: Big wop. Even if you take 700 million figure, the equation is off by a factor of 2 over 100 years. Not bad. On previous page I wrote that even if it was off by a factor of 1 million, there would still be quadrillions. It's a far cry from your estimate of 40 thousand which no one in their mind would take seriously.
     
  18. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Big wop indeed.
    A factor of 2 is disastrous for any prediction.
    Not that what you posted is a prediction; more like you took arbitrary numbers - 0,013 or 0,02 - to ad-hoc "support" whatever you needed supported.

    BTW - if you take the fertility rates from the last decade, from the developed world, you would be very lucky to get positive population growth - ANY population growth. Even with massive doctoring, you have trouble "fitting" this into Malthus' mathematical abstractions.

    Speaking of which - do look up analysis of Malthus' work (easy to find with google) - for example http://mises.org/daily/5501 - and see just how well has his work stood the test of time before proclaiming it did by using post factum numbers.
     
  19. Edit_XYZ

    Edit_XYZ Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    What about your parents? How many children did they have?
    I'm betting - FAR less than 10.

    Except - you have to educate/grow them up first.
    And they can't help you with this by being farmers, etc.

    And when they grow up, they'll have the same problem you have.

    So were the people in Kirk's colony. Didn't stop them from suffering from lack of supplies.

    Except these people aren't biologically romulans; they're subject species.
     
  20. EmperorTiberius

    EmperorTiberius Captain Captain

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    Are you trolling?
    The equation does a good job of doing rough predictions, so you can get some kind of picture. 1.3% is not arbitrary number, it's a fact. Many countries have much higher rates. 1.3% works well predicting US population as well as others, hence I used it. An equation that's used by World Bank and other organizations is fine for me.
    Would Romulans have a population of trillions and quadrillions or would they have a population that could fit into a small football stadium? What do you think?
    Math, history, and common sense say former. You're claiming the latter because of a current general trend in developed countries. Wow how old are you btw? You're either trolling or you have some serious work to do.