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Three facts from “Our World in Data” that everyone should know
- WA 8y agoThere is a fantastic video by Hans Rosling about the global population growth and why global population might actually stall around 10 billion people: https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth/up-next https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_... This relates to fact 2 in the article.
- lancebeet 8y agoHis foundation's website also has some really nice data visualizations: https://www.gapminder.org/tools/ https://www.gapminder.org/tools/
- amingilani 8y agoHere's a UN chart: https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/
- ForHackernews 8y agoFor the sake of the environment and every nonhuman species, we'd better hope that population growth doesn't just stall but reverses itself.
- vjerancrnjak 8y agoIt's going to be weird to live in an age when pyramidal schemes (pension systems, academia etc.), that have been foundation of the modern civilization, start falling apart (given that they are based on a healthy population pyramid).
- gbear605 8y agoThat's modern-day Japan.
- ForHackernews 8y agoWe're going to have to adapt. New technology and higher productivity should allow us to keep enjoying higher standards of living with declining populations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steady-state_economy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steady-state_economy
- amingilani 8y agoRelevant Kurzgesagt video on overpopulation: https://youtu.be/QsBT5EQt348 https://youtu.be/QsBT5EQt348 I learnt about the overpopulation myth during my undergrad, but I'm continuously surprised by how many people (including Thanos) didn't know this. Edit: Here's a chart of expected population growths. It's expected to start slowing down[1] [1]: Select WORLD from the menu: https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/
- ItsMe000001 8y agoI don't see why you called it myth. Just because it sort of works short term does not tell you anything about long term consequences. Earth has changed drastically with all the humans on it. You need a lot of optimism about solutions for global warming and pollution. The linked short "feel good" video asks an extreme question "Will this lead to the end of our civilization?" (pretend the other side made a ridiculous claim to make them look foolish and to easily counter what nobody said), takes an incredibly tiny number of data well selected to support the desired conclusion, and of course lots of colorful animations - I'm supposed to take that seriously? I find the myth that the myth is a myth to be too mythical for my taste.
- jpadkins 8y ago> Earth has changed drastically with all the humans on it. do you have earth scale measures for this? what is your threshold for drastic? on most measures I can think of, earth is pretty much the same as it was 100k years ago. maybe you are suggesting humans have a drastic impact on other species on earth?
- ItsMe000001 8y agoGeologically it is the same, a stone is a stone, true that. The creatures on it, both plants as well as animals, changed drastically by human intervention. Example: https://mic.com/articles/84681/this-is-exactly-how-much-weight-humans-take-up-on-earth-compared-to-other-animals https://mic.com/articles/84681/this-is-exactly-how-much-weig... (it's for this xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/) Then there's the pollution, for example plastics (tiny particles) everywhere, example: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/06/plastic-fibres-found-tap-water-around-world-study-reveals https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/06/plastic-... We change(d) the atmosphere, from pollutants to CO2 levels. Land for agriculture: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.AGRI.ZS https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.AGRI.ZS -- much of it is to support livestock https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/08/human-footprint-map-ecological-impact/ https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/08/human-footprint-...
- rubyn00bie 8y agoIf you want more facts like this I’d highly suggest anything but Steven Pinker especially: https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/0143122010/ref=nodl_ https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/...
- alberto_ol 8y agoI am always confused buy the expression "anything but". I assume you want to suggest that people should read the Pinker's book, but I think it could be interpreted also as read everything except that book. https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/8061/what-is-the-difference-between-nothing-but-anything-but-and-everything-bu https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/8061/what-is-the...
- TangoTrotFox 8y agoI'm curious about one thing. Like the article alludes to there is currently an extremely strong connection between fertility and low education, low income, and high religiosity. This [1] is a list of nations by net natural population growth. So births - deaths. From the top (according to UN predictions for 2015-2020): Uganda, Angola, Mali, Somalia, Tanzania, etc. From the bottom on nations that are collectively dying: Bulgaria, Latvia, Ukraine, Hungary, Lithuana, Romania, Portugal, Greece, Japan, Germany, Italy, etc. One of the facts is that 137,000 people/day have been escaping 'extreme poverty'. But what happens when the part of society that is living in economically stable and educated households is not even reproducing to the point of replacing itself, while those living in low education and low income households are massively reproducing? The natural response here is that if we can just improve the situation of places such as Africa then this situation ought resolve itself with birth rates starting to become comparable thus preventing a condemnation of the next generation. There are two problems with this view. The first is that this relies exclusively on a correlation which to date has proved less than predictive of African fertility levels. More importantly this effect is not just international but also intranational. Those who earn the most in the US have the fewest children with households earning less than $10,000 having a 50% greater fertility rate than those earning $200,000+. [2] It seems we're creating a society where each new birth is more and more likely to come into this world in some of the least appropriate households. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_increase https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_i... [2a] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-family-income-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/241530/birth-rate-by-fam... [2b] - https://www.census.gov/topics/health/fertility.html https://www.census.gov/topics/health/fertility.html (the link to statista presents this data in a cleaner format - also adding this as just a more reliable source)
- BerislavLopac 8y ago> But what happens when the part of society that is living in economically stable and educated households > is not even reproducing to the point of replacing itself, while those living in low education and low > income households are massively reproducing? Migration is what happens. Followed by integration.
- wslh 8y agoThe world population has almost doubled from 1960 to 2018. I think this makes the #1 fact much stronger.
- nicolas_t 8y agobut the fertility rate has fallen by half which compensates for the doubling of the world population
- jeffreyrogers 8y agoThere are still more kids born now than back then, so the decline in absolute child mortality shows progress.
- andrepd 8y agoI think this is the most important thing to retain from reading this article: >[...] Both are true at the same time: The world is much better than in the past and it is still awful. >To bring this to mind I need to know both statistics: When someone says we can sit back and relax because the world is in a much better place, I point out that 11 children are still dying every minute. We cannot accept the world as it is today. And when I feel hopeless in the face of this tragedy, I remember that we reduced annual child deaths from 20 million to 5.6 million in the last fifty years. Keeping this in mind at all times is a very important thing.
- grasshopperpurp 8y agoI agree with you, and that's succinctly said. It reminded me of this article from a couple days ago. >Trump administration claims only 250,000 Americans live in extreme poverty, despite UN estimates of 18m https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-extreme-poverty-numbers-un-nikki-haley-trump-a8417001.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-extreme...
- skybrian 8y agoThese seem to be two different measurements of "extreme poverty," each of which is different from the world-wide definition used by economists in the original article: "The UN’s numbers come from the official Census definition which has been kept for decades by the US government, defining extreme poverty as having an income lower than half the official poverty rate." "Citing a recent survey of American households, Heritage found only 0.08 per cent of American households (or about to 250,000) are in “deep poverty,” defined by Heritage as living on less than $4 (£3) a day. This statistic does account for government social spending programmes which help the poor – like Medicaid, food stamps, and housing assistance – while the figure cited by the UN does not." I guess if you're going to memorize facts, you should also memorize definitions.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- bungie4 8y agoFirst off, I stand up and applaud the Gates Foundation, and everybody, who work to improve the lives of everybody on the planet. WRT: Extreme Poverty, a few years back, we had a political party who tackled the problem of poverty by redefining the measuring stick of what constitutes poverty. POOF much celebration and self-handshaking when they announced that during their term, their efforts dropped the number of people living in poverty by a very significant amount. This has left a bad taste in my mouth ever since to never trust claims from politicians. So I wonder, in the case of this article, how many of those people no longer living at the adjusted poverty line and now only marginally above it and no longer included. They're still their, but buy grace of a single digit, are now considered much better off.
- coldtea 8y agoThat's a very important thing to keep in mind. "Facts" and figures quoted by governments, or even by various organisations not only can be twisted seven ways till Sunday to present a nice or gloomy picture with statistics, but even the raw numbers themselves can also be very different than the truth on the ground.] >So I wonder, in the case of this article, how many of those people no longer living at the adjusted poverty line and now only marginally above it and no longer included. There are lots of subtleties there as well. A family with very little to no income, but living in a traditional e.g. African or Amazon community where income is not really required (even European rural communities lived perfectly well with making most of their own food and minimal actual "jobs" and money well into the 1950s), could be much better off than a family that now makes $2 a day, but has been driven out of their land and forced to live in piss poor conditions and work their bones off in some slum.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- forapurpose 8y agoExtreme poverty, in this case, is a measure developed by economists and not by politicians, and AFAIK the definition hasn't changed significantly in many years. As the parent says, not being in 'extreme poverty' doesn't tell us much about one individual. They could have $2.50 per day; they could be Bill Gates (of course, it tells us a lot if someone is living on less than $1.90/day; that's a much smaller range). But the aggregate measure is meaningful: The number is decreasing and has been for decades - a miracle relative to world history - bringing hundreds of millions of people of out hopeless poverty; just look at India, China, and Latin America. Yes, some are still very poor, but we can use other measures to examine that such as median income (which also has changed dramatically). Also, 'poverty' in wealthy countries and 'extreme poverty' used in this measure are entirely different things. If you're reading this, $1.90/day probably won't pay for your electricity or water usage for the day, much less food, shelter, health care, education, transportation, etc.
- crazynick4 8y agoI don't think the graph regarding extreme poverty accounts for inflation. I don't know what an international dollar is, assuming its close, but 1.90 USD in 1850 is equivalent to about $55 today (according to Google), or 20,000 USD per year. That's not extreme poverty, I've lived on less than that.
- twoslide 8y agoThere's an interesting link between Facts 1 and 2 that the author misses: > Fact #1: Since 1960, child deaths have plummeted from 20 million a year to 6 million a year. About half of this reduction (from 20 - 10 million) is because: > Fact #2: Since 1960, the fertility rate has fallen by half. Globally, the population of young people has decreased. Child mortality has decreased, too, but not by a factor of 3. [1] https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.0014.TO.ZS https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.0014.TO.ZS World Bank reports 0-14 years, rather than 0-5 used for infant mortality.
- meritt 8y agoYou seem to be forgetting that during this time period the world population grew from 2.5B to 7.5B. That's faster than the fertility rate decreased. > Globally, the population of young people has decreased. The proportion of the population which are young people has decreased but the total population of young people has increased significantly: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.0014.TO https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.0014.TO
- twoslide 8y agoIndeed, I missed "% of total" on that graph, thanks
- crazynick4 8y ago> You seem to be forgetting that during this time period the world population grew from 2.5B to 7.5B. Older people were also staying alive longer - the death rate no longer offset the birth rate to the same extent as before.
- petermcneeley 8y agoLooks good right? but all is not so great. Whats happening is a squeezing of the middle. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1oHJezqBYU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1oHJezqBYU Thats why this is also front page HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17413622 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17413622
- frockington 8y agoWhat is inherently wrong with squeezing the middle? Seems like you'll get increased competition and innovation as people scramble to move to the top. Could be a net positive for mankind
- smacktoward 8y agoLet's do an experiment then. Let's say I come down to your neighborhood and remove a sufficient volume of food so they can only feed 70% of the total number of people in the neighborhood. Sounds good, right? I mean, you will absolutely see increased "competition and innovation" as you and your neighbors scramble to make sure you end up on the right side of that 70%!
- petermcneeley 8y agoBy that logic I think you would want to squeeze the top right? I mean if you remove the middle then people will have to fill the middle before the even attempting at the top (and the top is saturated under current conditions) ;) Beyond such myopic reasoning I think there is a great deal of economic theory around the collective economic benefits of having a strong middle class. You could try to argue against this but I think its at least a popular mainstream theory.
- frockington 8y agoIt is a popular mainstream theory. I'm not optimistic that this can continue. With technological innovations, I am convinced that we will end up in a can and cannot society where some people will be able to keep up and some won't.
- incidentnormal 8y agoThe book which Bill Gates recently gave a copy of to all 2018 college graduates - Factfulness, is a very well written and comprehensive treatment of this and more by Hans Rosling (Gapminder). Highly recommended, it's not long either - you could read it in a couple of evenings or a weekend easily.