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The Great Plateau
What happens when the human population stops growing?
One of the most famous TED presenters was the late Hans Rosling. He was the master of statistical presentation and a deadly wielder of the long pointy stick. Hans had a talent for boiling down complex numbers into something that was not only entertaining to watch, but helped people to wrap their heads around what they really meant. What made his talks really special for me was the actual story itself that was the most captivating.
Hans was an optimist. He looked at global metrics of poverty and wealth like markers for how tall a kid has grown each year. They were markers of vast improvements humanity has made in terms of reducing heavy costs like disease and child mortality, and boosting basic needs like wages and living standards. It is an intricate dance of numbers that show how far we’ve gotten and where we are headed.
One of his famous talks is about the population curve. He uses these square blocks to represent billions of people each, and demonstrates very clearly how generational growth is slowing down as there are less and less kids being born each year. This is closely correlated with those life metrics mentioned above. Better health, better living standards, means a shift in focus on getting a few kids healthy and educated rather than having large families that…
