In the spring of this year, American demographers calculated the growth rate of the earth's population, starting with the first representative of Homo sapiens. The figure turned out to be impressive: 108 billion.

Journalist and director Paul Ratner shot a short video about the study and described its results in a portal "Big Think ".

Many take it for granted that we live in a unique time - at the cutting edge of history. But one has only to think how many people have already lived on the planet, and there is no trace of our arrogance. And the main question is not even how many people lived, but how many died.

As of 2015, demographers from the Population Data Bureau, a Washington-based NGO, estimate the total human population of the earth at 108.2 billion. If we subtract the roughly 7.4 billion who trample the planet today, we get 100.8 billion earthlings who died before us.

So, the dead are almost 14 times more than the living! It would be an impressive army of zombies, ghosts or White Walkers from the Game of Thrones. If you consider yourself an optimist, then you can consider that your contemporaries are about 6.8% of all who have ever lived in the world. For the sake of simplicity (and to account for people born Last year), round the figure up to 7%. We are 7%. Let's not lose face!

How did scientists get this result? There is a demographic report on the Washington Bureau website. It says that the starting point was the fifty-thousandth year before the birth of Christ. It is then that modern Homo sapiens are believed to have appeared. The dating can be disputed: early hominins walked the Earth already millions of years ago. But 50,000 BC is the date the United Nations uses to calculate population trends.

Of course, no one knows exactly how many people have been born since then. The estimate is based on "informed speculation". Experts take into account many factors, such as high mortality in the early stages of the evolution of our species (during the Iron Age, the average life expectancy was 10 years), the lack of medicines and food, climate change, and much more. When all this is taken into account, it is not surprising that the population of the planet has grown so slowly. In our ancestors, infant mortality could reach 500 cases per 1000 births.

The organization's specialists have collected all their data on population growth rates in one table.

Population growth rate from 50,000 BC to 2011; also shows the number of births per thousand people and the total number of births between each two marks

Interestingly, the rate of growth slows down between the beginning of our era and 1650. In the Middle Ages, a plague epidemic raged in Europe - the Black Death. Also noticeable is the population explosion after the industrial revolution. For a century and a half since 1850, the world's population has increased by about 6 times!

Every day the number of inhabitants on our planet is growing. This is due to many factors and varies from one to another. Therefore, it is very difficult to keep track of how many people live in the world. However, approximate data still exist.

The population of the planet

Today, about 7 billion people live in the world, it is difficult to give exact data, since someone is constantly born and someone dies. For the most part, the population of a country depends on several factors, including the level of development of the state and, in particular, medicine, the standard of living and even the temperament of a person.

Many centuries ago, there were much fewer people on Earth, but over time this figure has grown rapidly. Despite world epidemics, diseases and the terrible continue to multiply and populate every piece of the planet. Most of the population lives in the most developed metropolitan areas, where the standard of living is higher than in small cities, the same applies to countries. About half of the people live in the most populated countries.

China

The first place rightfully occupied by this country almost reaches the figure of 1.5 billion, that is, almost 1/5 of how many people there are in the world today. Despite the fact that the government authorities possible ways trying to deal with the regulation of the birth rate, the number of inhabitants of the country is still growing rapidly, increasing by about 8.7 million annually.

India

If we talk about how many people are now in the world, then the second place among the most populated states belongs to India. About 1.17 billion people live here, which is about 17% of the total world population. The annual population growth in this country is about 18 million people, that is, the Indians have every chance to bypass the Chinese in terms of the number.

USA

With a constant influx of immigrants from less developed neighboring countries, the United States is one of the most populous countries in the world. About 307 million people of various nationalities live in this state.

Indonesia

The fourth position in the list is occupied by a state located in Southeast Asia. About 240 million people live on its territory, which is about 3.5% of the total

Brazil

The first five are concluded by this sunny country, which is also the most populated state in South America. Exactly 3% of how many people in the world live in Brazil. The number of inhabitants of this state reaches 198 million inhabitants.

Pakistan

Sixth place belongs to Pakistan, which, according to the latest data, has about 176 million inhabitants, which make up 2.6% of the total population of our planet.

Bangladesh

The country, located in South Asia, is home to 156 million people. That is, the number of Bangladeshis is about 2.3% of the inhabitants of the planet Earth.

Nigeria

This African country is also in the top ten in terms of the number of inhabitants. The number of people living here reaches 149 million, that is, 2.2% of all people on the planet. In addition, Nigeria occupies a leading position in terms of fertility, which may soon help it overtake Bangladesh.

Russia

A significant part of how many people live on the planet falls on Russia. Despite the fact that Russia in terms of population, it is only in 9th place. This is due to the fact that here the death rate greatly exceeds the birth rate. The territory of this state accounts for about 2% of the population of the entire Earth, that is, about 140 million people.

Japan

The Land of the Rising Sun closes the top ten, which, however, is the most developed of all those presented above. Approximately 127 million people live here, that is, 1.9% of the earth's population. What is important, since the country is in a somewhat mothballed state, almost all of its population are native Japanese.

Conclusion

The World Health Organization regulates the population of states and controls how many people there are in the world. In order to somehow reduce the birth rate in very poor African countries, missionaries are regularly sent there to give lectures to the local population and provide them with the necessary contraception. Other states are taking other measures. For example, in China, the authorities are fighting too high a birth rate by imposing taxes on families who want to have more than one child. But such measures are urgently needed, because the resources of our planet are limited, and they are greatly influenced by how many people there are in the world. Therefore, it is simply necessary to avoid in order to prevent an environmental catastrophe in the future and a serious depletion of all natural resources our planet Earth.

At the beginning of 2016, headlines on the Internet greeted users with the message that the world population on January 1, 2016 would be more than 7.3 billion people. So, as of the end of March 2016, there were 7.32 (7.39) billion people on earth. English-language sources, in contrast to Russian-language sources, calculate a smaller number.

The population of planet Earth for 2016

The most populous countries in the country

1. China - 1.3 billion people;
2. India - 1.2 billion hours;
3. United States - 323.9 million hours;
4. Indonesia - 258.3 million hours;
5. Brazil - 205.8 million hours;
6. Pakistan - 201.9 million hours;
7. Nigeria - 186 million hours;
8. Bangladesh - 171.6 million hours;
9. Russia - 142.3 million hours;
10. Japan - 126.7 million hours

According to statistics, there are approximately equal numbers of male and female people on the planet:

• 3.7 billion men (50.4%);
• 3.6 billion women (49.6%).

It was found that in 2014 the number of elderly people exceeded the number of children under the age of 5 years. This is due to the fact that the number of children in families has decreased, in some families there has been a complete rejection of children, and in others, such a factor as infertility, which is increasingly progressing at the present time, played a role. The average age of a mother at the birth of a child has increased by several years since the early 1990s.

At the same time, in 2015, the number of born children was 139.3 million, and the number of deaths was 55.8 million people.

How many people live on the planet are monitored by bodies such as the UN Department of Statistics, in Russian Federation – federal Service state statistics. There are statistical bodies in every state, sometimes in every subject, region, state.

Growth of people on the planet

The growth of people on earth is determined by such a value as the natural increase (NP) of the population. This indicator is based on birth and death data and represents the difference between them. Natural growth can be both positive and negative. It is measured per 1000 inhabitants and corresponds to one tenth of a percent.

• In 2000 with a population of 6,099,442.5 thousand, the SP was equal to 1.28%;
• In 2005 at 6,488,139.8 thousand hours - 1.22%;
• In 2010 6,881,527.8 thousand hours - 1.18%;
• In 2012 7,046,317.8 thousand hours - 1.11%. This is the lowest figure in the last 40 years.

The highest rate natural increase was in 1969. and amounted to 2.11% with the number of people 3.5 billion people. According to preliminary estimates, the growth in 2016 will be 1.15%.

The value of the SP of the population is affected by:

1. - wars and terrorist attacks
2. - hunger and disease
3. - standard of living - material conditions, health care
4. - Lifestyle
5. - employment in hazardous industries.

Video: World in numbers. world population.

The counting of earthlings is not carried out out of simple curiosity. For a normal life, each of us needs a certain amount of water, air, food. In turn, each of the inhabitants of the Earth affects environment. Therefore, it is very important to know how many people live on our planet.

How do earthlings think?

In order to find out how many people live on Earth, you need to identify their number in individual countries and regions of the planet. In most countries, the population is determined using a general population census. They are held regularly once every 5 or 10 years. But in some countries and regions of the world, censuses either did not take place at all, or were taken a very long time ago. Therefore, the total number is determined using special calculations.

How many people are there now?

Just under 7.4 billion people currently live on Earth. For many millennia, the number of people on Earth was small and did not increase very quickly. But since the 19th century began a rapid population growth that continues to this day.

What influences population growth?

The growth of the human population depends on many reasons. This is the level of development of the country, and the well-being of people, and national traditions. Until now, hunger, disease and war, as well as natural disasters, remain the reasons for the change in the number of inhabitants of the planet.

The change in population is determined by the ratio and mortality. There are currently 21 births and 18 deaths every second in the world. As a result, daily increases by 250 thousand people. But in different periods of human history and in different regions of the Earth, the value is not the same.

From the state of fertility and mortality in different countries depends on the average age of the inhabitants of these countries. Countries with high population growth have many children and young people. Countries with low growth have a high proportion of older people.