AH Challenge: Super-Tasmania

[ColeMercury]

The challenge is to make it so that Tasmania is both a lot more populous than OTL (its population must be approximately 7 million, or more if possible) and more influential than OTL. It's up to you whether Tasmania is an independent nation (i.e. it refuses to participate in Federation, like New Zealand and Fiji did) or whether it is still an Australian state (in which case it's be a super-special-important state like NSW and Victoria in OTL).

There is no limit to how far back the POD is (but try to aim for no earlier than the mid-18th century at most) - the only requirement is that it is indeed the UK who colonises Tasmania (so you can't make Super-Tasmania Dutch or whatever, and it can't be an indigenous society either).

 

[Seldrin]

That's impossible, with all the inbreeding needed to reach 7 million everyone will either be super-retarded or super-dead.
(No offence to any inbred Tasmaniacs)

 

[ColeMercury]

That's impossible, with all the inbreeding needed to reach 7 million everyone will either be super-retarded or super-dead.
(No offence to any inbred Tasmaniacs)

Unless, of course, more colonists come to Tasmania in the 18th and 19th centuries. I'd have thought that was obvious.

 

[Michael B]

Unless, of course, more colonists come to Tasmania in the 18th and 19th centuries. I'd have thought that was obvious.

Could the island support them without going into environmental meltdown? Given the current population of the larger New Zealand is current just over 4 million I think a reality check is required here.

 

[Atom]

Hrrm. This is really hard. maybe if Tasmania was some kind of city Island? Like a really big Singapore, but I just don't see how that would happen. Some kind of major disaster could help, if say, for some reason many Australians had to evacuate to Tasmania for some reason.

 

[TheLoneAmigo]

In terms of land area and climate, Tasmania is fairly similar to Ireland, which has a population of approximately 6 million... after thousands of years of continuous habitation.

 

[Joseph Solis in Australia]

Tasmania could support 7 million people. Tasmania's climate is simillar to Ireland or Scotland. It's a colonists fault of not populating the Tasmania well. Instead, the colonists had populated Sydney or Melbourne instead in Tasmania.

 

[Geekhis Khan]

*Reaches WAY up past the small intestine*

Britain moves its prisoners to Taz rather than Austrailia. Population remains steady thanks to potato agriculture while Aus proper is mostly forgotten until later voluntary colonization efforts. Eventually Taz residents form a seperate government from Aus and NZ, eventually join the commonwealth as an independent nation (Flag: Union Jack, Southern Cross, and a Taz Devil sillouette).

 

[Stephen]

What if some of the early setlers actually realise that mainland Australia is too hot an dry to live on comfortably, while Tazmania is temperate and fertile.

 

[DuQuense]

What if some of the early setlers actually realize that mainland Australia is too hot an dry to live on comfortably, while Tazmania is temperate and fertile.

I alway heard that Tasmania was a Temperate Rain Forest which is why there were only 10~12,000 Natives when the British arrived and hunted all the males to Extinction.

 

[False Dmitri]

The challenge is to make it so that Tasmania is both a lot more populous than OTL (its population must be approximately 7 million, or more if possible) and more influential than OTL.

POD: 1644. Abel Tasman returns from a long voyage, having charted substantial portions of the coast of a vast continent to the south of Asia. A Dutch mapmaker labels the continent Tasmania in his honor.

Today, Tasmania is a large country of more than 20 million people and an important member of the Commonwealth of Nations. The island of Van Diemen's Land, discovered by Tasman on an earlier voyage, is one of its smaller component states.

 

[Michael B]

I alway heard that Tasmania was a Temperate Rain Forest which is why there were only 10~12,000 Natives when the British arrived and hunted all the males to Extinction.

And rain forests tend to have poor soil because all the nutrients are in the plants.

As part of Australia Tasmania is going to suffer from poor soil. Put in large numbers of colonists and you will end up "mining" it and hit the same problems that Australia is now suffering, namely worked out farmland.

 

[Stephen]

That's impossible, with all the inbreeding needed to reach 7 million everyone will either be super-retarded or super-dead.
(No offence to any inbred Tasmaniacs)

The dangers from inbreeding are often overstated many populations had very small founder populations. And if the population is increasing the inbreeding is shrinking not increasing.

 

[Seldrin]

The dangers from inbreeding are often overstated many populations had very small founder populations. And if the population is increasing the inbreeding is shrinking not increasing.

The thing about inbreeding was kind of like an Australian in-joke about Tasmanians.