How many people are there in the Universe?

[SitFlyer]

More than one

[KvHagedorn]

do you want the accurate answer or a precise one?

[SitFlyer]

LOL

[Chrono_Wanderer]

Does aliens count as people?

[ZokesPro]

Originally posted by KvHagedorn
do you want the accurate answer or a precise one?

Hehehe.

@Chrono: LOL (I wonder what term they give themselves)

[SitFlyer]

Zokes has got a point. For the purpose of this thread, how do you define 'people' ? The definition of such term could drastically change the results you seek

[Paddy]

Zao PM'd me with the right answer, although Technoid got it over at #murc.

Thanks Zao for the transcript - saved me having to find it!

Beer is in the post!

It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.

[Nowhere]

...me and mine luck...I was thinking of posting something like that (that there is finite number of people, so when rounding this number heavily it's closer to 0 than, previously proposed by me, infinity) but went to sleep instead

[KvHagedorn]

I guess you could say the population of the universe is precisely zero, but that is nowhere near accurate.

[Paddy]

Any other fans of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy here?

[Brian Ellis]

Well, do you mean people or persons?
Caucasians are a people; so are Africans, Amerindians, Asians, Slavs, Polynesians, Micronesians, Oz aborigines, Bushmen, Semites and so on.

I'm trying not to be racist, but what defines a people? Physical appearance is too obvious: it goes deeper than that. I think there may be cultural links, as well (religious structure, historical background over 1,000s of years, language family and so on). I think it may be difficult to sharply define a person or a group of persons as categorically belonging to a given people. However, my guess is that there are about 25-30 major peoples in the world.

[az]

Here, I'm a fan

Brian, wouldn't he have said "peoples" then?

AZ

[Paddy]

he has a name you know

[az]

He has?

AZ

[GuchiGuh]

tell tell!