Yes dear readers, that's right, some clever clogs (one Brian Thomas*, in fact) has taken the maths and science applied to analysing population sizes and changes and applied it to the vampires of the Buffyverse, ultimately calculating exactly how many there'd have to be in order to have a stable ecology (i.e. not die out and also not have a population explosion).
If you don't want to read the whole paper, there's some neat summaries at these two sites that link to the piece; the latter even throwing in a little dig at Twilight for good measure.
This is far from the first attempt to 'study' vampire populations, I know, but this is a fairly decent - and, hey, Buffy-centric - one.
Quite understandably, the study restricts itself to Sunnydale. No doubt at least partly because there was some much crazier stuff going on with vampire populations over in LA...
...and don't even get me started on the whole "the grandaughter will sire the grandmother" thing.
*I'm such a Buffy geek. I initially read this guy's name as Brian Thompson.
7 comments:
It's actually a bit problematic to limit the study to Sunnydale where the only Slayer in the entire world exists as definitive population control. Add on the fact that the Hellmouth ensures more crazy supernatural turnings and attracting vamps and Sunnydale becomes the exception to the vampire population rule, not the baseline. /geek
Dude, I read it as Brian Thompson too!!!
Interesting, but they did not take into account that humans would pay vampires to bite them, good for the vamps, get blood and don't leave bodies. Not a big fan of the Twilight vamps, the only good looking one they have already killed off, James and I hate the sparkle bit, our vamps (Spike and Angel) don't need to sparkle to be hot and sexy.
If you want a book with a very new take on vampires read The Strain by
Guillermo Del Toro(directed Pan's Labyrinth) and Chuck Hogan(Prince of Thieves). This is a very interesting book, but I like my vamps more in line with Spike, Angel, Mick and Josef. Oh can't forget Henry.
Wish I was a vampire.....
First folks I'd sire would be the entire Buffyfest crew, for providing such a bang up blog.....
wow! uh, thanks?
@Tara: I'm so glad you saw it too. Now I feel slightly less crazy.
I saw it as Brian Thompson as well!
Great article. If I understood the man and whatnot I would have probably enjoyed it more, but nonetheless it is still a badass paper. Thanks for sharing!
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