Just two days ago, the world's population reached a new milestone, 8 billion.
At the same time as becoming one in 8 billion, I remembered that childhood wish, if one person in the world gave me a dollar...
In fact, my memory of the number of people is still stuck at 6 billion, and the previous 7 billion was in 2011, that is, in just 11 years, the human race increased by another 1 billion people.
This makes one sigh as if the population is growing a bit fast. But in fact, on the contrary, the annual population growth rate is still declining. The current population growth is mainly due to the increase in human life, which has greatly reduced the mortality rate of children and pregnant women. In other words, the progress in health and medical treatment is good news.
However, this also surprised many netizens.
Still others have strange concerns.
In addition, based on this data, we can also see some interesting things.
For example, two countries in Asia account for at least 2.8 billion of the population of 8 billion people. Among them, India is likely to surpass the mainland in 2023 and become the world's most populous country.
Others wonder who is having the baby.
According to a United Nations article, by 2050, half of the global population growth will be concentrated in eight countries: Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Tanzania.
The main force of proper baby-birth.
Also, along the way, the growth interval in units of 1 billion is also quite interesting.
For example, the first human population reached 1 billion after 1800, and then it took more than 120 years to reach 2 billion, when humans first invented the television.
However, it took only 33 years to reach 3 billion, 14 years to reach 4 billion, and 13 years to reach 5 billion, and then the time came to 1987.
From 1987 to 1999, the human population reached 6 billion. It is currently estimated that by 2037, the population will rise to 9 billion.
Therefore, the question that many people are concerned about is, how many more people can the earth hold, is it about to burst?
After all, 8 billion people, standing hand in hand, can enclose the earth and the moon inside.
If the connection is in a straight line, the length is longer than hundreds of earths combined.
But in fact, if you look at space, these 8 billion people on the earth will not occupy much space.
If you let people stand together, everyone has 1 square meter of space, and you can find a 90 km x 90 km "square" on the map to drop everyone:
And this square is also an inconspicuous dot on Earth.
But this does not mean that the population can expand indefinitely, after all, we live on the earth obviously not to occupy pits, we want to consume resources, our behavior will change the environment, and resources are also limited. So ultimately how many people the Earth can carry depends on how humans produce and consume resources. If the people of the earth were consumed according to the standard of living of Americans, the earth may be able to support more than a billion people at present.
It sounds like Snowpiercer, Thanos snapping his fingers.
Of course, the population figures will continue to grow for now. The United Nations had previously predicted that it would approach 10 billion by mid-century, and that the population could remain at 10.4 billion between 2080 and 2100. And what will the world look like at that time?
Many people think that eventually the number will remain at this number, or even fall, after all, the population growth rate is also getting lower every year, and the growth rate slows to balance. Others feel that life will be more difficult, such as accelerating the greenhouse effect, a more extreme climate, a more scarce resource, and a more uneven regional distribution.
And I'm not too worried, after all, maybe the technological leap directly unlocks the population ceiling. Of course, the main reason is,
I feel like I'm almost cold at that time, so I'd better worry about what is in front of me.
(The picture material in the article is from the Internet)
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Source: Madomaru Research Institute
Edited by Quantum Bard