b) Three things that I found interesting were how fast the population started to grow and made a huge increase in the past years. Also I found it interesting how the the global literacy rates of the world have been rising and have been increased from  75% to 84% over past 20 years. Lastly I found out how over 3 billion people live in extreme poverty and live on about $2 per day.

c) I think it is possible for Earth to continue at this rate because now, we can see huge a improvement in the fertility rate in countries like Bangladesh, if we provide them with proper contraceptives. Now since there are more expenses to cover Earth will grow at a slower rate, dropping the fertility rates to 2 or less children per women. We should also pay close attention to how much space and money we waste on building architecture, we should take note if the population continues to grow even at a slower rate we will eventually need more farms to provide food for our families.

d) I don’t think Earth is facing any other larger global issues other than the high increase population growth because it is main cause of other leading issues because of overpopulation the sickness and the spread of diseases is much faster, it causes world hunger because most of the space is used for housing and buildings therefore less space for farmland and overpopulation is also the main cause of global warming and pollution.

 After watching the video, I do think that it is possible for the Earth to continue at this rate. As was shown in the video, people all around the world are becoming more educated and are having smaller families. The population growth rate is also expect to slow down by the end of the century.  However, there are still more than 1 billion people around the world that are still in extreme poverty and if the rest of the world doesn’t contribute to help end it then we will never become better. We should also starting using more renewable energy sources such as solar and wind instead of fossil fuels so that we don’t make climate change worse than it already is.

As I briefly mentioned before, climate change (global warming) is a big issue and most people ignore it. If we don’t hold ourselves accountable and make a change in the way we use energy than it might be an end to the world as we know it. Climate change is getting worse and worse every day and if it continues getting worse it will lead to the extinction of many of the animals and plants that are on the earth today as well as places like Florida going underwater because of the melting glaciers.

- Bavneet

b) While watching the video, the first piece of information that stuck out to me was that, government employees go door to door delivering contraceptives and explain why adults should use them instead of just saying another kid won’t hurt. ⅕ kids would die because of the lack of attention, nutrition, and safety. I would have never thought of people going house to house just to give them contraceptives because of their lack of knowledge. The second thing that I found interesting was that, monkeys would guess a percent of something at random and at chance. But still manage to me more correct than university students and adults. When I first heard that monkeys would be right in comparison to humans, my mind was blown because humans have the advantage of schooling and an education. The last piece of information I thought was interesting was that, we can avoid the worst possible in general including population growth as long as rich people share with the poorer and less fortunate. Meaning that blaming people in poverty for things like pollution and such, when in reality it is the rich themselves. 

c) I think that the world can continue at the rate it is going at right now as long as people follow simple rules and be more cautious of the environment the they are right now. For example, littering would be stopped, carpooling would be more encouraged and everything would not be do energy consuming. By continuing with the efforts of stabilizing fertility rates and the use of contraceptives and such, for the world to go on as it is now, will not be as hard as it was in previous years. 

d) One really big issue that we should focus on is the use of fossil fuels in our world. Soon the fossil fuels will run out and could be the cause of wars, deaths, outbreaks, etc. Creating more issues with safety. By using natural sources as fuels for machinery and devices, the use of fossil fuels would go down by an enormous amount creating the issue to go slow down. 
-Sonia Singh  

b) Three things that I found interesting about the video was that in Bangladesh, the woman who had only two children made that into her career. She goes around her village promoting having fewer children because it saves money and so that they can stabilize their country's birth rate. One of her methods were providing women with contraceptives, for example, birth control pills.  Another thing I found interesting about the Hans Gosling video is that even an economically developed and a highly educated country like Britain couldn’t answer a simple survey. It must have been very humiliating because even students who attend Oxford University were beaten by monkeys in the survey. Lastly, I found it interesting that the poor people would find joy in buying a bicycle when we take advantage of the cars we have. The family in Africa was so happy they could finally afford a bicycle after saving up for several years, but even though we have things like motorbikes and cars in our lives, we always want more. 

c) There is only so much space on earth, and maybe there aren't even enough resources to support all of the human population, but that does not necessarily mean that it is impossible for the earth to continue at this rate. The number of people that are on the planet is not the biggest problem, but it is rather how much each person consumes. Since the population is increasing, we need to build more houses/buildings. Buildings don't make the earth any heavier because the materials were already on the earth, to begin with. In my opinion, it is possible for the earth to continue at this rate, all we need to do is make a few changes to the world. We can start off by stabilizing the fertility rate so we don't have overpopulated countries. This will lead to more money being saved so we can focus on those children getting an education so they too can learn ways to make the planet a better place so more humans can thrive. Better education can lead to children having better knowledge about things, for example, safe intercourse so they don’t get things like STD other health-related issues. With this knowledge, the death rate of the world can decrease and everyone will live a long healthy life. With changes like these, it will be possible for the world to continue.

d) A major issue we should all be concerned about is Global Warming. Its effects on the planet are drastic climate/ temperature changes, a rise in sea levels/floods, an increase in natural disasters, and so much worse. More economically developed countries are going to suffer a bit more than developing countries because global warming and natural disasters are more prone to happen in those areas due to a large number of people who contribute to pollution. MEDCs would suffer floods (whether this is because of a tsunami or rising sea levels), hurricanes, tornadoes, extreme winds and more. These problems are all caused by the excessive production of methane, burning fossil fuels like oil and coal, using chemical sprays like Febreze, smoking and the destruction of trees within biomes eg. rainforests. These are all things that are an obstacle for the earth to continue supporting its population; because if we don't take action fast, the earth will soon just melt away

- Ichchha Phenden

Three things I did not know before watching the video were that:

c) Is it possible for the Earth to continue at this rate? 

It is possible for the Earth to continue at this rate but only if the right decisions are made. If we continue to pollute the earth, keep children away from proper education, and be careless of our present and future, it would just cause more problems that would become difficult to solve. As we become more cautious of our surroundings, the Earth would definitely continue and the human population could live on.  

We could be the reason for our own extinction. Climate change, pollution, fossil fuels and all the mess that we have created are becoming worse which could one day lead to the extinction of humans if we don’t take action.  

-Nitharsana (Nithi)

Before watching the video, I never knew much about how the world stands today and the many factors to it. As Hans Rosling had said, many people judge with preconceived thoughts and I was one of those people as I believed that the world was truly going down and population growth was going to destroy our world. I also did not know about the slowed rate of population growth before the 1800s as the fertility rate was ~5-6 babies per woman, however many of those children did not survive due to their living and health conditions. Continuing with the slowed rate of population growth, I didn’t know how low the population was in the 1800s where the population was only at about 1 billion, and now ~200 years later it has grown by 6 billion people. This really surprised me as I had thought that since the fertility rate was much higher back then, the population would’ve been higher and as the years went on it would’ve decreased, however, it is the other way around.

One thing that I found really interesting about the video was the way Hans Rosling explained his theory/logic and how he had perceived it to his audience. The way he had used the population boxes to show the audience how the number of children in the world would stay the same, even with the death rates and birth rates in our world really was outstanding for me. Another thing that I found dominant was how there are Bangladeshi representatives that go door- to- door to household wives and women to deliver contraceptives. This really stood out for me as I knew that Bangladesh was an undeveloped country and would’ve never expected for there to be a steady government environment where they had representatives delivering medication and remedies to those who couldn’t afford it or didn’t have the time. Lastly, one of the things that I found interesting was the transportation investment cycle that many underprivileged families go through; shoes, bicycle, motorbike, car, and finally planes. This really stood out to me as families like Olivia’s and Andrea’s work so hard every day to make enough money to afford a bicycle so that their family of 8 can transport easily through their village. The way these types of families would work up the cycle really is rather impressive and inspiring.

I think Hans Rosling did a incredible job explaining his theory about how the Earth will not be destroyed as soon as we think as his points are accurate, the fertility rate is decreasing while the death rate is increasing which means a steady population growth. If the fertility rate does continue to stay at 2.5 babies per woman or even lower, then I do think that it is possible for the Earth to continue at this solid rate. Even though there are still countries with high fertility rates such as Niger and Somalia, if these rates continue to make progress just like Bangladesh did then our world isn’t going down anytime soon. 

When it comes to the leading issues of our world, the list is endless. Climate change, pollution, deforestation, excessive landfills etc. are all major issues in our world that can slowly, bit by bit, decrease the span of life on earth. These issues not only environmentally affects our world but physically as well as air pollution is a leading cause of cancer, deforestation gives humans the lack of oxygen and animals the loss of millions of homes etc. Population Growth is a growing issue that can change our world as a whole, however, these environmental issues can change our world even more drastically.

- Aisvarya .S

3. Think it is possible for the earth to continue at this rate because, if the population rate is so many, most of the people are from poorer families but, have more children. The richest families have more educated but, have less children.
4. There is still polution and global warming that is greatly caused by the growing population of the world. This has caused a dangerous impact on some of the most populated countries like India and China. 

 

Is it possible for Earth to continue at this rate?                                              I think Earth can continue at this rate but we need to make positive changes towards our Earth if we don't want bad things happening in the future. For starters we need to get people out of poverty and simple things like education is important. Education can help them build careers or even start a business and take care/provide for their families. We should also make people aware and educate them on using contraceptives as well as the benefits of having smaller but healthy families. We should also help provide these basic things so women are able to be in control of their own fertility because over 100 million women don't have access to the contraceptives they need. Having smaller families can be so much beneficial towards the world but to your money as well. 

Another very large issue is climate change. As humans we produce a lot of air pollution which is leading to global warming (climate change) getting worse as days pass. This problem can create a large amount of other problems one being that climate change is causing rising sea levels meaning that land is slowly getting submerged underwater. We will have less and less land to develop on as the population is developing. This issue can cause extinctions to many animals as well as cause an increase of natural disasters as well as increase the intensity of the natural disasters which can cause a lot of damage if reached on land. Diseases can spread and so on and so forth. In the end we all face human extinction and the end of the world if we didn't start making a change. 

- Kirat S