I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you. There are more people alive today. Than people that have died since the beginning of our species.
130 years ago. We were ~1.8 billion people. The mortality rate from childbirth hoovered around 1%. Today, it’s 0.0001%
We are, roughly. 8 times as many people today than 130 years ago. As our population increased, childbirth mortality decreased. While armed conflicts have increased.
More Ukrainian soldiers have died since the start of Russias war. Than childbirth deaths in the Europe for the past 20 years combined.
And that’s just Ukrainian losses. Rather. Those are just the Ukrainian losses they officially admitt have died. Other international estimates quadruple those losses.
It does not look very promising for your “full stop” that more ukranian soldiers have died in the past 4 years than european women in childbirth over the past 20.
And by the looks of it. The war doesn’t have an end in sight anyone soon. Not to mention the new ones we’re starting
So 50 billion women roughly, at a mortality rate of 10-20% (how bad would it have been in pre history? Maybe worse?) you’re looking at 5-10 billion women who died from child birth in prehistory alone.
Literally 10-20% of half the world population constantly until the 19th century.
Edit:
Adding my new source for context.
“…it would seem that 73% of all
war-related deaths since 3000 Bc have
occurred in the 20th century AD, pro-rating
the data up to the end of the century.
Another 23% occurred from AD 1500 to
1900, so that the Modern period of history
accounted for 96%) of all war-related deaths.”
But there’s a giant flaw in your calculations here if we assume your 100 billion figure is accurate. Which it seems that it is. So i was wrong about that.
Infant and child mortality was extreamly high in our primitive past. 50 billion girls born. Does not mean 50 billion girls grew up. If you want to estimate the number of girls (and boys) that even made it past age 5. You’ll have to cut that number in half. And then there’s another ~10 years they will have to survive to even have a chance of dying in childbirth. (Not the best phrasing but you know what i mean)
So, your 5-10 billion is starting to look a lot more like 2-4 billion (if we’re being generous). Unfortunately for your argument. The boys that also grew up past puberty were all expected to be soldiers when called upon. You either fought and died or you just died. With some luck you survived. And by luck i mean lucky to have been born on the winning side.
The various empires in our history did not become empires because they were nice to eachother. They did so through blood and conquest.
Genghis Khan’s conquests killed ~40 million people alone. That’s estimated to have been 11% of the worlds entire population at that time.
Again. This isnt a competition. But men have always (unfortunately) been very resourceful when it comes to war and killing their percieved enemies. And there’s been no lack of fighting, ever.
It’s a bit of a trope but various massgraves confirms it. Kill the men. Enslave the women and children. (And then work them to death)
Genghis Khan’s conquests killed ~40 million people alone. That’s estimated to have been 11% of the worlds entire population at that time
Is that military men or does that also include women and children?
I still think the order of magnitude difference is too big between the two groups. 90% of women had children historically, and had kids for basically the entire time they could bear them. Men would be conscripted for war, true, but there were also long periods of peace and war wasn’t constant unlike childbirth.
The male subset is naturally smaller and more sporadic.
The female subset is larger, encompasses 90% of women, and was constant until menopause.
Is that military men or does that also include women and children?
A fair assumption would be that women and children were included in those ~40 million. How many or what percentage I cannot answer due to lack of surveys conducted at that time. But as far as I’m aware, If you opened your gates and laid down your arms, you’d be allowed to live while paying tribute to your new Khan. But if you didn’t, they would operate mostly like everyone else. Kill every man in sight, kill their sons, kill some of the rest for good measure, let a few run away to tell the tale, and enslave the rest.
Every man able to hold a spear. Is going to hold a spear. When enemies are knocking at your gate. Every man is a military man. The concept of “Military” and “Civilians” is a very modern concept. There was no distinction between the two.
What do you consider a “long period of peace”?
War has been pretty damn constant throughout the ages. England and France had a war lasting more than 100 years. Famously called “The hundred year war”. The USA have since their inception had roughly, 20 years of peace. Total. Africa has been a clusterfuck of warlords and infighting since (at least) the end of WW2. (Yes, I know why that’s the case. But that’s another topic for another day). The Middle East have always been good at war long before the brittish started drawing lines. And as for Asia. Well, we covered part of that with Genghis Khan. Not to mention the various Chinese dynasties and their conquests, infighting and rebellions. Japans recorded history is absolutely filled to the brim with wars.
Wars and fighting have been pretty much non stop for the vast majority of our history. The longest time of “peace” in Europe is considered to be either 1815-1914 or 1945 to 2022. But even those have the asterisk of “Peace among major powers in europe”. Since there’s been plenty of armed conflicts in Europe even during those years.
That being said it’s still not a convincing argument that more men die from war than women die from child birth. The Mongols also administered a massive empire with a massive chunk of the Eurasian population. It was said you could walk from one end of the Mongol Empire to the other with a gold plate on your head and never fear for your life or belongings. That period lasted for decades…
I think for your position to have any merit you’ll need to refute my point that (let’s use the numbers you gave of 2-4 billion female deaths from childbirth) over the total span of humanity more people have died from childbirth than war
It was said you could walk from one end of the Mongol Empire to the other with a gold plate on your head and never fear for your life or belongings.
I’m gonna go ahead and stop you at the “it was said”. People say a lot of things. Do you have anything to back that up with other than “someone once said that”?
It was said 9/11 was an inside attack. It was said that children playing on the fields would anger the underworldly entities. It was said that flies and maggots spontaniously appear out of thin air. It was said the earth is at the center of the universe. I could go on.
What do you mean i have to refute your point, that’s exactly what I’ve been doing at every step of the way. From your bogous claims that every single girl born grew up past puberty, to your fantasy of there being long periods of peace in the world.
I can to some degree work with archeological excavations of humans remains and recordings of battles to actually back up my claims of people dying related to battle.
You’re the one making the claim that “more women hace died from childbirth than men in battle, full stop” how about you provide anything of substance at all, to even remotely try to back that up? You’ve offered nothing at all beyond “i have a gut feeling”
over the total span of humanity more people have died from childbirth than war
I thought you wanted to restrict this to men/teens fighting in wars. But if we’re just gonna count all deaths from war, it’s not even close.
It comes from a Persian historian Ata-Malik Juvaini (13th century), who wrote that fear of the khans made the roads so safe “a woman with a golden vessel on her head might walk alone [across it] without fear or dread.” This quote comes from Tarikh-i Jahangushay (“History of the World Conqueror”), written ~1260.
Muslim chronicler named Ghazi (1270), holds that “a man might have journeyed from the land of the sunrise to the land of sunset with a golden platter upon his head without suffering the least violence from anyone”
“…it would seem that 73% of all
war-related deaths since 3000 Bc have
occurred in the 20th century AD, pro-rating
the data up to the end of the century.
Another 23% occurred from AD 1500 to
1900, so that the Modern period of history
accounted for 96%) of all war-related deaths.”
Cool. Some persian historian wrote a woman MIGHT walk with a golden vessel. Any records of that actually taking place or are we taking an unproven hypothosis ss fact now?
I suggest you actually read the “paper” you cited as 200 million deaths in battle since 3000BCE.
The author says himself, it’s to be considered a very preliminary estimation, with estimates that may increase significantly, primarily to provide incentive for future studies.
If you can’t even be bothered to read the papers you link. Why should anyone take anything you say seriously?
I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you. There are more people alive today. Than people that have died since the beginning of our species.
130 years ago. We were ~1.8 billion people. The mortality rate from childbirth hoovered around 1%. Today, it’s 0.0001%
We are, roughly. 8 times as many people today than 130 years ago. As our population increased, childbirth mortality decreased. While armed conflicts have increased.
More Ukrainian soldiers have died since the start of Russias war. Than childbirth deaths in the Europe for the past 20 years combined.
And that’s just Ukrainian losses. Rather. Those are just the Ukrainian losses they officially admitt have died. Other international estimates quadruple those losses.
It does not look very promising for your “full stop” that more ukranian soldiers have died in the past 4 years than european women in childbirth over the past 20.
And by the looks of it. The war doesn’t have an end in sight anyone soon. Not to mention the new ones we’re starting
I am sure since even conservative estimates for the total number of humans that have ever lived is 100 billion+
Total human lives
So 50 billion women roughly, at a mortality rate of 10-20% (how bad would it have been in pre history? Maybe worse?) you’re looking at 5-10 billion women who died from child birth in prehistory alone.
Literally 10-20% of half the world population constantly until the 19th century.
Edit:
Adding my new source for context.
Total war death since 3000 BCE are around 200 million
Your link does not work.
But there’s a giant flaw in your calculations here if we assume your 100 billion figure is accurate. Which it seems that it is. So i was wrong about that.
Infant and child mortality was extreamly high in our primitive past. 50 billion girls born. Does not mean 50 billion girls grew up. If you want to estimate the number of girls (and boys) that even made it past age 5. You’ll have to cut that number in half. And then there’s another ~10 years they will have to survive to even have a chance of dying in childbirth. (Not the best phrasing but you know what i mean)
So, your 5-10 billion is starting to look a lot more like 2-4 billion (if we’re being generous). Unfortunately for your argument. The boys that also grew up past puberty were all expected to be soldiers when called upon. You either fought and died or you just died. With some luck you survived. And by luck i mean lucky to have been born on the winning side.
The various empires in our history did not become empires because they were nice to eachother. They did so through blood and conquest.
Genghis Khan’s conquests killed ~40 million people alone. That’s estimated to have been 11% of the worlds entire population at that time.
Again. This isnt a competition. But men have always (unfortunately) been very resourceful when it comes to war and killing their percieved enemies. And there’s been no lack of fighting, ever.
It’s a bit of a trope but various massgraves confirms it. Kill the men. Enslave the women and children. (And then work them to death)
Is that military men or does that also include women and children?
I still think the order of magnitude difference is too big between the two groups. 90% of women had children historically, and had kids for basically the entire time they could bear them. Men would be conscripted for war, true, but there were also long periods of peace and war wasn’t constant unlike childbirth.
The male subset is naturally smaller and more sporadic.
The female subset is larger, encompasses 90% of women, and was constant until menopause.
Every man able to hold a spear. Is going to hold a spear. When enemies are knocking at your gate. Every man is a military man. The concept of “Military” and “Civilians” is a very modern concept. There was no distinction between the two.
What do you consider a “long period of peace”?
War has been pretty damn constant throughout the ages. England and France had a war lasting more than 100 years. Famously called “The hundred year war”. The USA have since their inception had roughly, 20 years of peace. Total. Africa has been a clusterfuck of warlords and infighting since (at least) the end of WW2. (Yes, I know why that’s the case. But that’s another topic for another day). The Middle East have always been good at war long before the brittish started drawing lines. And as for Asia. Well, we covered part of that with Genghis Khan. Not to mention the various Chinese dynasties and their conquests, infighting and rebellions. Japans recorded history is absolutely filled to the brim with wars.
Wars and fighting have been pretty much non stop for the vast majority of our history. The longest time of “peace” in Europe is considered to be either 1815-1914 or 1945 to 2022. But even those have the asterisk of “Peace among major powers in europe”. Since there’s been plenty of armed conflicts in Europe even during those years.
That being said it’s still not a convincing argument that more men die from war than women die from child birth. The Mongols also administered a massive empire with a massive chunk of the Eurasian population. It was said you could walk from one end of the Mongol Empire to the other with a gold plate on your head and never fear for your life or belongings. That period lasted for decades…
I think for your position to have any merit you’ll need to refute my point that (let’s use the numbers you gave of 2-4 billion female deaths from childbirth) over the total span of humanity more people have died from childbirth than war
I’m gonna go ahead and stop you at the “it was said”. People say a lot of things. Do you have anything to back that up with other than “someone once said that”?
It was said 9/11 was an inside attack. It was said that children playing on the fields would anger the underworldly entities. It was said that flies and maggots spontaniously appear out of thin air. It was said the earth is at the center of the universe. I could go on.
What do you mean i have to refute your point, that’s exactly what I’ve been doing at every step of the way. From your bogous claims that every single girl born grew up past puberty, to your fantasy of there being long periods of peace in the world.
I can to some degree work with archeological excavations of humans remains and recordings of battles to actually back up my claims of people dying related to battle.
You’re the one making the claim that “more women hace died from childbirth than men in battle, full stop” how about you provide anything of substance at all, to even remotely try to back that up? You’ve offered nothing at all beyond “i have a gut feeling”
I thought you wanted to restrict this to men/teens fighting in wars. But if we’re just gonna count all deaths from war, it’s not even close.
It comes from a Persian historian Ata-Malik Juvaini (13th century), who wrote that fear of the khans made the roads so safe “a woman with a golden vessel on her head might walk alone [across it] without fear or dread.” This quote comes from Tarikh-i Jahangushay (“History of the World Conqueror”), written ~1260.
Muslim chronicler named Ghazi (1270), holds that “a man might have journeyed from the land of the sunrise to the land of sunset with a golden platter upon his head without suffering the least violence from anyone”
Total war death since 3000 BCE are around 200 million
Here’s an article on pax Mongolia
From 1500-1800 the chance of death from childbirth was 5.6%, and this was with the Renaissance and enlightenment raising living standards somewhat. In antiquity and prehistory the rates would be either roughly the same or higher.
What a stupid hill to die on anyways
Cool. Some persian historian wrote a woman MIGHT walk with a golden vessel. Any records of that actually taking place or are we taking an unproven hypothosis ss fact now?
I suggest you actually read the “paper” you cited as 200 million deaths in battle since 3000BCE.
The author says himself, it’s to be considered a very preliminary estimation, with estimates that may increase significantly, primarily to provide incentive for future studies.
If you can’t even be bothered to read the papers you link. Why should anyone take anything you say seriously?