From 1 Billion to 8 Billion: A Journey

The world just hit 1 billion people in 1804 and nobody even noticed. While Napoleon was

conquering Europe, humanity quietly crossed the biggest milestone in our species' history.

It took us literally 200,000 years to reach this number. Think about this. From the dawn of

humans until 1804, we crawled our way to 1 billion. Then something absolutely insane happened.

We hit 2 billion just 123 years later. Then 3 billion in only 33 years. The acceleration

is mind-blowing. In 1804, most of those billion people lived in just two places.

China had around 300 million, India had 200 million. Europe was sitting at maybe 180 million

total. The entire Americas? Less than 25 million people. Africa had roughly