From Place to Place

Just as the previous paragraph avoided the aspect of limited human influence upon the physical environment other than in world changing natural habitat degrees, Demography of more than one will be used to describe the categories of groupings of humans by numeric parameters on a continuum from rural to megolapolitan and not as an exposition of intricate sociological intrigue other than as to predominant economic activity.

A brief chart of the major divisions of population are as follows:

CTGRY Rural<=Hse=Vill=Twn=Cty=Metro=>Megalo
TYPE
Scn/hunt/gthr Ag Dstr/Serv Mnfctr
[______I________I_______I_______=>
0-1====<5=====~200====>2000======>
POP/sqmi./Csqmi

The types listed in the chart above are proposed as characterizations of the primary economic activity. While they are generally exclusionary in the diminishing size direction, they are not generally exclusionary in total but rather usually additive and inclusive in the increasing size direction with anomalies as per specialized conditions from dense population centers toward rural population centers.

We can see by the numbers that the least populated community is one of a maximum of 100 people or less living in a 10mi x 10mi area. The greatest size being somewhat vague as to specific size, and generally as population centers grow together or expand beyond the base size of the sample area used they become considered one unit. The term Megalopolis is one coined to describe specifically that area between Chicago and New York and other areas in Europe, Africa and Asia where population centers of expansive area and hpgh density have emerged with cultural and social characteristics unique to communities of that size. So here we have an initial look at the strata of human community as nodal entities involving varying numbers of individuals.
Pathway(s) indicate to us the existence of communication. Pathways also help us to analyze the direction, type and amount of communication flows within communities and from one community to another. The term Pathways is used because it would have been an early form of other early forms of commutation used largely by individuals and sometimes by groups, that is still viable today, whereas, smoke signals and drumming are not, save in very isolated and infrequent situations. From microwave and satellite to radio, telephone and facsimile, and computer based internet information communications to the more traditional modes of conveying bodies and packages along roadways and rail and in ships, maritime as well as air, and today even rocket travel becomes more and more approachable, yet footpaths are making a comeback largely as intra-community pathways for recreational and health purposes for individuals so inclined, but also have some revival as inter-community modes of conveyance in areas such as Appalachia and Europe, and have remained in use as significant but diminishing modes in developing regions of the world. Pathways indicate to us the existence of communication by their evidence of movement of individuals between individuals and nodes of population which are limited and delimited in part by the physical environs upon and within which they exist.