Humanity in numbers: how many people have lived on this planet?

In the year 2022, the world population reached a historical figure, never seen before: 8 billion people.

In the age of technology, it is relatively easy to take a global census and calculate how many people live on the planet. Now, what if we extrapolate that question to all of history? How many people have lived on Earth since the dawn of humanity?

The website 'Our World in Data' prepared a study, with an illustrative graph that, hand in hand with an hourglass, shows an approximate answer to that question.

Photo: Our World in Data - Max Roser

This study indicates that there have been 117 billion people who have inhabited the planet since human life arose on Earth.

When did that happen? When demographers began to study this phenomenon, they began counting with the appearance of modern Homo Sapiens around 160,000 years ago.

However, that date has been extended much further, until 200,000 BC thanks to more recent and detailed studies, which would imply many more years and many more people.

Photo: Unsplash - Rob Curran

Thus, the 117 billion people would mean that the current 8 billion is around just 7% of the total population that has existed throughout history.

Obviously, the rate of births has not been the same throughout history and, above all, life expectancy has increased, especially in the last two centuries.

Photo: Unsplash - Mauro Mora

In fact, estimates by Dudley Poston Jr., a demographer at Texas A&M University, suggest that by 2050 another 4 billion people will have to be added to the account, putting the number of people who have lived on the planet in all of time at 121 billion.

Photo: Unsplash - Jacek Dylag

A story that, according to demographers Toshiko Kaneda and Carl Haub, would have started in the year 190,000 BC with a global population of 30,000 people.

Photo: Unsplash - Justice Amoh

Obviously, this figure is approximate, since these demographers recognize that around 99% of human existence lacks real data to reach a reliable conclusion.

Photo: Unsplash - Samantha Gades

Finding the date of the first human who existed on the planet is an almost impossible mission, as confirmed by experts.

Photo: Unsplash - Gyan Shahane

Thus, with the estimate made by 'Our World in Data', it is calculated that for every person who is alive today, there have been 14 people throughout history who have already died.

Photo: Unsplash - Owen Cannon

In proportion, that means  7% alive of all humanity that has lived throughout history is currently alive, a surprising figure that gives a measure of how society and medicine have advanced.

To give another surprising figure provided by Max Roser, the analyst of 'Our World in Data', it is worth pointing out that around 60 million people die every year, but 140 million people are born in that period of time.

Photo: Unsplash - Alex Alvarez

It is estimated that around half of the people who have lived throughout history have done so in the last 2,000 years. In addition, it ensures that half of the people who have died throughout history were children, since half of the boys and girls who were born before the Modern Era died before reaching adulthood.

Photo: Unsplash - Joydeep Sensarma