World Population

Matthew West started at least as early as the 1720’s in spreading information that he had acquired in other universes about health and sanitation. He also started the spread of better agricultural technologies and methods. It was not unusual at the time for families to have significantly more children than we do today. A factor in that was the 75% child mortality rate. You want three kids to survive to adulthood and support you in your old age? Then you had better have a dozen. It took generations for people to adopt a different consciousness about having children as public health and mortality improved. So, in the West reality by 1760, the population of the British Isles was significantly higher than it would have otherwise been. The ideas were also starting to spread to other countries. During the Seven Years’ War when the opportunity presented itself to resettle most of the Irish and other dissident populations to outside the British Isles and moving the growing poor classes of London into the vacated areas, West ran with it. Still, by the time of the French Revolution, the British Isles were at least as populous as they otherwise would have been.

France was also more populous, which was why it had become a powder keg. In our reality, France had about twenty-eight million people when the revolution started. But there were factors contributing to those people’s starving. One factor was the recent volcanic eruptions from Iceland, causing cloud cover, cooler temperatures, and bad crops in Europe. In the West reality, one of his descendents prevented the damage from the volcanic eruptions. However, having half again as many people because of West’s health and sanitation techniques that had been spreading meant that the French were starving anyway. Between the deaths from the war and the introduction of agricultural reforms, they were able to once again feed their people and grow after the war.

A third factor beyond health and agricultural knowledge introduced by Matthew West were his genes. As part of the Sticky Genes was a set of dominant genes that made people healthier and able to live longer. In fact, an adult with the West genes might have their true age expressed by True Age = (Chronological Age – 20)/2 + 20. So, a West descendent at 100, would be like a normal person at 60. At 150, they would be like an 85 year old. Older men tend to be wealthier. If they have children, the wealth means those children are more likely to survive. If a man can be having children for more than 130 years, and those children survive, the population is going to go up. The same is true for women, although more limited. The West women often would have a later menopause. On the other hand, most women never lived to get to menopause in the first place before the knowledge of health and sanitation. Still, this factor also increased the population and the spread of the West genes.

A fourth factor in rapid growth of the human population was prosperity. Because of Angels and their inventions, the Industrial Revolution bloomed much faster than it would have. Transportation technologies were ahead of their time, allowing the ability to ship faster and further. Free trade agreements brought greater trade, which meant local goods didn’t have to be sold locally. People could afford larger families.

After the opening of the way to space and other planets, there was so much unseated land that there was not only no reason not to have plenty of children, but governments were encouraging it and settlement on new planets to try to spread out the human race to a point where no astronomical collision could do us much damage. Additional planets meant even more prosperity, too.

Given these five factors and the synergies between them, it accelerated the growth of the human population considerably. The following table demonstrates acceleration by 139 years to reach a population of six billion.

Year Achieved (Our Reality)	1804	1927	1960	1974	1987	1999
Population (in billions)	1	2	3	4	5	6
Year Achieved (West Reality)	1780	1842	1847	1852	1856	1860

Part of the reason that it was accelerating so quickly was that there were approximately four hundred million young couples actively having children with one or more spouses descended from Matthew West starting in 1840. This does not count older couples, second marriages, or couples where neither spouse is related to Matthew West. Needless to say, the numbers add up quickly.