Freethinker2004

One problem of the bible is that too many people seem to appear too fast. In GENESIS, the eight or so people on the Ark(Roughly four couples) become enough to create the world's first civilizations in under 500 years-and in a similar amount of time, when the Israelites are in Egypt, somehow they go from seventy-five to roughly 6,003,550. How could a population explosion so huge be possible, especially in the ancient world(Although the first one could be because of long ages). Any thoughts?

GakuseiDon

It is certainly possible mathematically to get a large population in 500 years.

If you assume very large healthy families, it becomes easier, but let's assume that the population doubles every 20 years, which (I think) works out to about 4 children per couple who reach adult age.

Using a starting population of 2 and the rule of thumb that 2 to the power of 10 is 1000, then:

* in 200 years you would have 2,000 people
* in 400 years you would have 2,000,000 people
* in 500 years you would have about 50,000,000 people.
* in 600 years you would have 2 billion people

Whether it is likely is another matter - let's just say that it is very unlikely!