For the Hogwarts population thing:

The viewpoint of the books is 3rd person limited. and even then, we only see what is deemed important. We are only really exposed to what Harry himself sees and is important enough to be included. Even then, Harry only really has important constant interaction with a small group of 25% of the total population and he seems kind of anti-social outside of his small groups so he's not really the best person to use as a judge for population sizes.


Isn't it then possible to assume that there are a good chunk of students never mentioned from Gryffindor, much less the entire population? And teachers too, if there are others?

I don't remember where exactly this was (I think Pottermore), but some professors were called the "head" of their departments, ie McGonagall for Transfiguration department. It's possible that there are other professors that aren't given seats on the head table because they aren't the head of their respective departments.

Also, Harry does a lot off-screen. He learns spells that we aren't told about until he uses them, meets and interacts with a few people, and generally develops outside of the glimpses we get into his school life. I mean, Harry didn't seem particularly surprised or anything to be introduced to McLaggen even though we only met him in HBP.

So, possible that there are a large amount of people that just aren't involved or important enough to be mentioned in the books? Pretty likely, to me.

 

T'was a thread; this one, I think.

 

There is a potential stumbling block I can see with those numbers; the Weasleys were out in a rural area, so the population density for that particular area might not be typical. The demographics of Wizarding Britain are never really explained, but it's likely that wizarding population density goes up quite a bit in urban areas.

Also, on the point how viable population numbers for the Wizarding world, it does bear mentioning that between muggleborns and wizards marrying muggles, there's a decent amount of fresh DNA being added to the genepool.

 

Translation: Don't try to justify this stuff with math and logic.

:-/

However, the silly part in that whole conversation between Amos Diggory and Arthur Weasley is: Why in the world would Amos and Cedric have *walked* to the Portkey? It's not as if they did it for the enjoyable walk or the exercise, since it's plain they had to get up long before they'd have preferred.

I mean, I could almost understand not Apparating straight to the World Cup site if they didn't know where it was (which, btw, is hard to believe given that Bill and Charlie and, I think, Percy did exactly that to avoid having to get up early enough to take the Portkey), but at the very least, why not Apparate to the Portkey location??

Cedric was probably already seventeen and could Apparate, and if not, surely Amos could Side-Along Apparate the two of them, right? Hell, /Harry/ Side-Along's Dumbledore from an unknown oceanside cliff face and back to Hogsmeade. You'd think that Amos Diggory could make with the teleportation for what might be 20 km or, in real people terms, 12.4 miles

Of course there are others. It's not as if every student in Harry's *year* is introduced, let alone every other year.

Example:

To be fair, though, McLaggen was an unrepentant douche, so it's no surprise that Harry hadn't had much to do with him prior to HBP.

I agree.

 

@ Sesc: Nothing wrong with your numbers at all, I was just taking the piss.

 

I was thinking something random that coincided with all of this and that was - why does the school hire an unpleasant cunt like Filch? Why don't they go with Mary Poppins witch that is a master of household charms to do all that type of work.

Because they have to hire their squibs and keep them busy enough to stay loyal to the wizarding world.

Squibs are said to be relatively rare but it was also said that Muggle-born witches resulted from descending from Wizards/Witches and those genes resurfacing after some generations. So there is a genetic component and for squibs to be rare that perhaps means that anything but pure-blooded marriages were rare up to modern times.

In a ton of different cultures, witches have been hunted down until relative recently. The drive to secrecy is instinctual survival.

But what happens when crossbreeding happens to such an extent you can't hire all the squibs? And that's the second part, almost no wizarding parent wants a squib. They may love a muggle, but not even Molly Weasley wants to talk about their squib relatives. And she's on their side. The magical world treats squibs like shit otherwise. But the more crossbreeding occurs, the more chance even 2 magical parents have a squib even if the gene is recessive.

So over the generations, the magical world will start getting a ton of squibs and no way to hire them or anything. Dissatisfied with their lot in life (even Filch started taking a kwikspell course), how quickly before they numbers ensure that they rat out a hostile muggle world? Hell, even if they can't do it themselves, they just need to ally with one wizard or trick one to get all the notice-me-not charms off an artifact and all that as proof. And then the shit would hit the fan.

So if the population count is at all accurate, what you're seeing is a small sect of society in a life or death situation. Get any smaller and there would be no real civilization to talk about, and the only fast way to getting bigger could annihilate their way of life. It would be something like the situation the Hasidics or Amish were in years ago.

It would drag the Purebloods like Malfoy outside of pure racial supremacy eugenics territory and make them seem like even reasonable defenders of their society when the alternative in the past was either witch burnings or having the Governments swoop in and start doing autopsies wholesale on the witch population for military benefits and what not.

 

Oh look, another topic that's been discussed ad nauseum in this and a million other forums. Tell me you're at least trying the search function before posting these... Please?

 

Cedric and Amos seem like the type of guys that would relish a nice long hike. Gets the blood up, good chap. Hearty characters.

 

@Portus

from GOF:
-Cedric starts his sixth year at Hogwarts at September 1st, 1994.
-Cedric is of-age (17) by October 31st, 1994.
=His birthday is between Sept 1st and Oct 31st.
=As of the 1994 Quidditch World Cup, he isn't old enough to Apparate.

from HBP:
-students learn to Apparate in their sixth year.
-Lessons don't begin until February.
=Cedric couldn't have learned Apparation as of the 1994 QWC.

tl;dr
Cedric can't Apparate. The end.

 

Well, there's that and the fact that I totally whiffed on the next sentence, which of course Sesc was kind enough to point out and make me look like the dumbass I most assuredly am.


Or something.

 

Oh, discussion on the size of the magical world, and/or enrollment numbers at Hogwarts.

We've never had this thread before.

On a more serious note, it doesn't make sense, it doesn't add up, JKR fucked up. If you do your own story, just do it however the fuck you want, because canon doesn't make sense in terms of population.

 

Does your math support Muggleborns? That might contribute to the population, though I guess not by much.

 

It's been a while since I've read the books so bear with me, but I think muggleborns would contribute quite heavily. Doesn't Hagrid imply that there's more muggle blood than pure in the wizarding population, nowadays?

Sesc's numbers make a sort of sense rurally when it comes to magical families, but I think there would be more wizarding abodes in cities. Snape's in York, from what I recall, the Blacks are in London, etc. Purebloods don't seem averse to living around muggles. Why is anyone's guess. It wouldn't be a leap of logic to assume some mixed couples move into towns and cities, as they cannot have entirely magical homes.

So yeah - add a little bit of higher population density in built-up areas and all-magical areas, dot muggleborns in all over the country, and you've got the makings of a population. *shrugs* The more pressing question in my mind is still what they all do for a living.

 

Okay, so what job's do we know exist in canon? All the shops and businesses from Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade, Ministry of Magic related jobs. I can't think of anything else of the top of my head though. Rich families might not need jobs at all so you might be able to remove them from the equation, Muggleborns might be able to get jobs in the real world though that's iffy.

 

Well for jobs you could add things like broom-makers, builders (someone's got to build and repair those family manors), Healers/hospital support staff, potion brewers (not necessarily potion masters), people who grow potion ingredients, floo powder production, sportsmen, people working for the Wizarding Wireless Network, authors/researchers ...

And that's about all I can think of at the moment.