Would it be scientifically possible for a human population of two to reproduce and expand to 6.5 billion in six thousand years?
by 
Tom
ANSWERS: 5
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Only if 1. the two people were one each of male and female; 2. they knew how to grow enough food to feed themselves and their offspring; 3. they knew had the technology and training to handle all medical problems that might afflict their descendants until it reached a critical mass above which the loss of a few would not jeopardise the survival of the community; 4. they and all their offspring avoided conflicts such as wars that tend to decrease the population; 5. they lived in an area free of earthquakes, hurricanes and other things that might eliminate the entire population or a good portion of it; and 6. they were both very fertile and so were all of their offspring.
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Easily you are talking about exponential growth.
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No. Two people isn't enough. The problem is that the gene pool is severely limited. It's like you roll the dice and you always get a six. There are lots of rare genetic disorders that only come up if both parents have the gene. As if both parents rolled a six. But if you only have sixes, you only get sixes. Pretty soon the human race has died out from rare genetic diseases. Human's nearly died out from this when there were only 10,000 of us. If there are only two, we're doomed.
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The present rate of population increase in the world is more than 2% per yr. and the population is now over 6 billion,however the average rate would only have to be one half of 1% per yr to produce the present world population in 4300 yrs., we would have reached a population of over 300 billion if man was reproducing a million or more yrs. ago.
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Dang near has happened. If religion didn't make sex such a taboo, maybe we could be more earth friendly and slow down a bit.
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