500 Million, But Not A Single One More

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2023Apr 21

This video is an animation of 500 Million, But Not A Single One More, by Jai. You can read the original post here: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/p... Since the video was published Jai made two updates. The rationale for them is explained in this comment full of interesting sources and explanations: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/p... 1. Jai says: The text originally said that Smallpox killed "more than fifty million Native Americans". I cannot find any source I might have originally used for this claim. When attempting to research this more recently, I came across the 2019 paper "Earth system impacts of the European arrival and Great Dying in the Americas after 1492", which estimates 55 million all-cause deaths from European contact across the Americas between 1492 and 1600. "Counting the Dead: Estimating the Loss of Life in the Indigenous Holocaust, 1492-Present" is part of a body of literature exploring the interplay between disease and intentional violence, which further complicates things. Lots of things can make people vulnerable to disease. If a family is forced to relocate, goes hungry, and subsequently are weaker when they fall ill, it seems incorrect to say that the illness alone killed them. All told, disease is widely agreed to be the most significant contributor to the great dying of the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas, and of the diseases Smallpox was probably the most significant killer. Given the complexities and uncertainties here, when I finish writing this comment, I intend to update the text to "over ten million Native Americans" as a lower bound that I feel 80% confident about. I think I could refine this further with more research - this is still extremely ad hoc - but this is as much time as I can afford at the moment. 2. Jai says: "In China, in the 10th century, humanity began to fight back." I believe I originally got this figure from Our World In Data (https://ourworldindata.org/smallpox#h... ), but now believe it to be inaccurate. There are "references" that say the tradition dates back to the tenth century, but the evidence is sparse. Going by Wikipedia's article on Variolation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variola... ), I'm updating this to "the 15th century. On Sopona, the god of Smallpox of the Yoruba people: Sopona inspired our design of the monster in the video. You can find some interesting facts about this god and its cult here: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/p... Jai wrote an epic spinoff of this story here: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/p... ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀PATREON, MEMBERSHIP, KO-FI▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ 🟠 Patreon: / rationalanimations 🟢Merch: https://rational-animations-shop.four... 🔵 Channel membership: / @rationalanimations 🟤 Ko-fi, for one-time and recurring donations: https://ko-fi.com/rationalanimations ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀SOCIAL & DISCORD▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ Twitter: / rationalanimat1 Discord: / discord ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀PATRONS & MEMBERS▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ Many thanks to all the patrons and channel members! This time we have to use a Google Doc, since you don't fit in the description: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1i... ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀CREDITS▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ Animation Director: / evan Animation team: