Talk Origins? Be serious.
"The Pyramids of Giza were constructed before 2490 B.C.E., even before the proposed Flood date. Even if we assume they were built 100 years after the flood, then the world population for their construction was 13 people. In 1446 B.C.E., when Moses was said to be leading 600,000 men (plus women and children) on the Exodus, this model of population growth gives 726 people in the world. In 481 B.C.E., Xerxes gathered an army of 2,641,000 (according to Herodotus) when the world population, according to the model, was 89,425. Even allowing for exaggerated numbers, the population model makes no sense."
The claim is that an average .5% growth rate will get from 8 people 4,500 years ago to the present population. That is a very low growth rate and includes all of the wars, plagues, etc over that time. The claim is not that the population only grew .5% each year.
T.O. blatantly misrepresents the claim by making it a hard .5% each year and you couldn't figure that out?
What growth rate would have been required to get from 8 people in 4000 BC to however many people would have to be around in 400 BC to have 3,000,000+ in Greece and enough people in Persia to provide 2.6 million for an army? And then what would the growth rate have to be from then to now in order to average .5% for all time? And why did it slow down so drastically?