You're a man of the world, eh?

[digitaldiscipline]

Statistical analysis based on some boring curiosity (I wanted to know what the most populous cities in the world today are) reveals some surprising tidbits, courtesy of Infoplease.com.

- Average population density of all nations: 126 people per square mile. In other words, the entire world averages out to be Bhutan.
- Third most populous country? The United States. (It is a really, really distant third.)
- The greater Tokyo metropolitan area would be the 34th most populous country in the world (and probably the most densely-populated)

If anyone wants the spreadsheet I cobbled together... you need a hobby. :-)

["World's 50 Most Populous Countries: 2006." Infoplease.
© 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease.
10 Aug. 2006 <http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/a0004391.html>.]

Comments

[razerwolfe.livejournal.com]

Neat. I love links like that. :-)
And #1 has about 59 times the population of #50.

[mighty-man.livejournal.com]

That doesn't surprise me. But-But-But boy spent a lot of time convincing me that there was more than plenty of space in the world for people -- everyone could have 5,000 sq.ft. of land and there'd be a ton of room left over.

My only real counterpoint to that was that you'd have to grow your own food on that 5,000 sq. ft. plot of land as well as live there.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

At the current population of ~6.5 billion, this averages out to about 221,000 sq ft per person (just under 5.5 acres).