Every living thing is a sort of imperialist, seeking to transform as much as possible of its environment into itself...  When we compare the (present) human population of the globe with ... that of former times, we see that "chemical imperialism" has been ... the main end to which human intelligence has been devoted.

- Bertrand Russell
 

The main problem with democracy: the majority is never right.  Never, I tell you!  That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against.  Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population the intelligent ones or the fools?  I think we can agree it's the fools, no matter where you go in this world, it's the fools that form the overwhelming majority.

- Henrik Ibsen
 

Where People Live on Planet Earth
Credit: NRCS, USDA

Where do people live on Planet Earth?  Although people inhabit every continent, the highest population densities occur in Asia.  Sparsely inhabited regions occur on virtually every continent, however, including the Sahara Desert in Africa, the Great White North of North America, the outback of Australia, the Amazon of South America, and the Himalayan Mountains of Asia.  The above colour-coded map was produced from populations estimates made for 1994, when the world population was about 5.5 billion.  Current estimates place the world population at about 6.3 billion as of March 2003.

Source: antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov

In Some Places, There Is Standing Room Only...

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