Really? More alive today?

 

Flipping radio stations the other day. Blurb came up for a show. Guy in the blurb said something about more people being alive today than the total that have died throughout history. And that kind of made me want more details. Had I heard it wrong? Was it being presented sarcastically as part of some larger discussion and I missed the theme?

But it was a commercial for the show, it ended with no more, and I changed stations.

A few days later, I heard the ad again. And if I missed something the first time, I missed it the second time as well. Because it sure sounded like the person was saying more people are alive right now than have died in all of history to this point.

The thing about my curiosity is based on my having heard this claim before. I kind of remembered it being a really way off claim that wasn’t true. But I just couldn’t recall whether my memory was right.

In general, the idea actually sounds pretty enticing. Advancement in medicine over let’s say just the past two hundred years means that life expectancies today are significantly greater than they were in 1800. In fact, for most of the world, it has just about doubled. Seriously…

Until the range of years reaches 1850 to 1900, most places around the globe had life expectancies of less than 40 years. Today, most locations top 70 years and just about all are solidly above 60.

And if you want to go back further than that, well, five hundred or one thousand or more years ago things weren’t as good as they were in 1800.

Two simple reasons for the improvements? Farming and cleanliness. We’ve improved our efforts with agriculture, while at the same time improving sanitation.

Now, funny thing, around the same time we see these life expectancy numbers improving is also about the time we can look at somewhat accurate records for the total number of people alive at that moment. That’s about when we begin getting a better handle on information for population growth rates and more. In essence, before the past two hundred years, the numbers are guesses.

So, people are living longer, which means more people around to span multiple generations. Plus, better details about exactly what the entire planet looks like. And the great thing is, lately we’ve arrived at a point where the guesses are darn good ones. Most studies and researchers are able to adjust factors for various circumstances and variables, while all seem to be narrowing in on similar results when putting this type of question into perspective.

So… are there more people alive right now then the full total of people that have died?

Interesting question.

The answer isn’t even close.

Most scientists have what they refer to as something of an Adam and Eve moment. In short, no matter what your religious beliefs may be, in order to extend the population we need to have a first couple identified. And for that, the population is set at 2, and roughly has been placed around 52,000 years ago in 50000 BC.

The population climb moves along slowly at first. But the death rates are staggering. Somewhere around 1600… by percentages about 52,000 years into our 52,000 years… estimates place the living population at 500 million. Conservative estimates for the same date say that at that point more than 86 billion people had died.

Give or take a few hundred million, most groups providing such information say that about 7.7 billion people are alive right now. To get here, more than 108 billion have died.

Yeah… that’s right… it sounds amazing to suggest that more people are alive on Earth right now than the entire collected history of those that have died. But the far more likely reality is that even with a population explosion of sorts over the past four hundred years, better medical care and other factors helping us live longer, the current population is about 7% of those that ever lived. And with birth rates declining and a planet that really is never going to be home to more than one hundred billion people at the same time, the idea is never going to be close to true.

It sounds interesting when you hear it. But it provides a good lesson to do a bit of research, since not everything that sounds possible turns out to be true. And occasionally, it’s not even close.

 

If you have any comments or questions, please e-mail me at Bob@inmybackpack.com