Size of antediluvian population..?

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Originally posted by Odin, Vilje&Ve:
In a discussion in another forum on the net, the question came up on the number of people killed by the will of the god of the Old Testament.There are however a number of unknown factors in this kind of calculations, and undoubtedly the number of people killed in the Flood would have great importance on the final number. However, when looking on the net, what I find is from: http://www.ldolphin.org/morris.html
Antediluvian Populations

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According to the genealogical records of Genesis 5, there were 1,656 years from Adam to the Flood. However, the population constants were significantly different then from what-they now are. Men lived to great ages and evidently had large families. Excepting Enoch, who was taken into heaven without dying at age 365 (Gen. 5:23-24), the average of the recorded ages of the nine antediluvian patriarchs was 912 years. Recorded ages at the births of their children ranged from 65 years (Mahalaleel, Gen. 5:15; Enoch, Gen. 5:2 1) to 500 years (Noah, Gen. 5:32). Every one of them is said to have had "sons and daughters," so that each family had at least 4 children, and probably many more.

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As an ultraconservative assumption, let c = 3, x = 5, and n = 16.56. These constants correspond to an average family of 6 children, an average generation of 100 years and an average life-span of 500 years. On this basis the world population at the time of the Flood would have been 235 million people. This probably represents a gross underestimate of the numbers who actually perished in the Flood.

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Multiplication was probably more rapid than assumed in this calculation, especially in the earliest centuries of the antediluvian epoch. For example, if the average family size were 8, instead of 6, and the length of a generation 93 years, instead of 100, the population at the time of Adam's death, 930 years after his creation, would already have been 2,800,000. At these rates, the population at the time of the Deluge would have been 137 billion! Even if we use rates appropriate in the present world (x = I and c = 1.5), over 3 billion people could easily have been on the earth at the time of Noah
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Now, a number given as somewhere between 235 million and 137 billion is a less than helpful estimate.("It is in the price range between a dime and a million dollars..") Undoubtedly there are members of this board who is more familiar with creationist literature then me. If we leave aside the question of whether the flood took place or not, and assume as basis for our calculations that it did take place, what estimates are given by creationists as to the presumed size of the antediluvian population?

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A little off subject, but reading this has made me wonder ::How do we know that Noah etc. refers to an individual and not
a FAMILY tree ?In farming communities in the UK, the farmer is usually known bythe name of his farm, and this name is carried forward to all offspring
who inherit the farm.Does the bible SPECIFICALLY state that it is referring to an
individual when referring to Adam etc. Begat could equally
refer to a dynasty as an individual.