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The Great Stanford Buffy Population Equilibrium Study

Posted by chrisd on from the spike-as-cellular-automata dept.

Suture writes "A PhD candidate in ecology at Stanford University has done an ecological analysis of humans and vampires in Sunnydale, the home of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He took some initial assumptions on rates of population growth, vampire feeding, etc and plugged them into a differential equations model. What he got was an equilibrium human population of 36,346, and an vampire population of around 18, and furthermore the equilibrium is stable. His conclusion was that even though the show's designers are not ecologists, they managed to come up with ideas that actually made ecological sense. Scroll to the bottom of the page to see a pretty cool spiral graph of human population vs vampire population."

5 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. In Sunnydale CA by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    The college students perform quadrature to determine equilibrium human/vampire ecologies.

    In SOVIET RUSSIA, the vampires integrate YOU!!!

    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
  2. Pardon my skepticism by PhysicsGenius · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    While I enjoy pretty graphs (and I enjoy pretty young female actresses even more), I'd like to call attention to the fact that this guy is not a mathematician, he is an ecologist. Look how wrong they were back in the 70's about global cooling and how obviously wrong they are right now about global warming and you will agree that this should be taken with a grain of salt.

  3. Or how about this one... by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    In SOVIET RUSSIA, the vampires are real, and they are integrating YOU!!!

    (They are truely math wizards)

    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
  4. Re:You can get a Ph.D for that?! by ackthpt · · Score: -1, Flamebait
    Well, he could have done a study in something more practical, such as:

    Saturation point of Spammers to Netizens

    Balance point of IP lawsuits costs to anything remotely new or innovative which doesn't cost an arm and a leg.

    How many trees have actually been saved by the "paperless office"

    Explain Hollywood accounting

    Produce a workable model where producers and artists are fairly compensated, and consumers have fair use and easy access to music

    Ok, I know I'm only dreaming... Guess it's time to get back to work.

    --

    A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
  5. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    I watched five minutes of the show onces. It's a stupid piece of shit show and any idiot that would put that much time and effort into it is a stupid piece of shit themselves.