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Dec. 14th, 2005 09:57 amI have spare time today because I am home sick, which is not the most fun thing in the world. Am still trying to figure out what I should do with all these SIGHUPs, SIGQUITs and SIGTTERMs. Am also busy trying to make all this computer crap do what I want it to do. Nevertheless, I shall use this opportunity to taunt you with some math that I did the other day about the world's population problem.
This, by the way, is to me an example of the kind of mathematical computations that the average citizen should be able to do after graduating from secondary education, and that would help prepare them for making informed political decisions. It's not particularily useful, but it is helpful for trying to evaluate certain propositions brought to your attention. You shouldn't even need a calculator (well, except for the metric->standard conversions)
The question came out of a thread on IIDB (which I do not post on, but I read occasionally), concerning the amount of people that the earth can support. Debate over the number continues, but someone brought up the old saw that the entire population of the Earth could probably be crammed into Texas. Another asked if this were true.
This gets into the idea of megacities, science fiction constructions that house huge populations in close association with each other. Traditionally they are utopias for the elite few at the top, and distopias for the working class bums who get thrown into cramped quarters, locked into a world that cannot do more than oppress them, and are controlled by some sort of totalitarian government. Sci-fi in particular uses the motif of the super-advanced, and extremely dense cityscape to map out a future where individualism is lost in the crowd.
Throwing out that interpretation for the moment, I was curious to see if it was possible to design the basic idea for such a city that, while housing the world's population in a fairly small area, did not have to be ridiculously conformal. As to how I succeeded, you can judge for yourself.
( How Big is a Megacity? )
This, by the way, is to me an example of the kind of mathematical computations that the average citizen should be able to do after graduating from secondary education, and that would help prepare them for making informed political decisions. It's not particularily useful, but it is helpful for trying to evaluate certain propositions brought to your attention. You shouldn't even need a calculator (well, except for the metric->standard conversions)
The question came out of a thread on IIDB (which I do not post on, but I read occasionally), concerning the amount of people that the earth can support. Debate over the number continues, but someone brought up the old saw that the entire population of the Earth could probably be crammed into Texas. Another asked if this were true.
This gets into the idea of megacities, science fiction constructions that house huge populations in close association with each other. Traditionally they are utopias for the elite few at the top, and distopias for the working class bums who get thrown into cramped quarters, locked into a world that cannot do more than oppress them, and are controlled by some sort of totalitarian government. Sci-fi in particular uses the motif of the super-advanced, and extremely dense cityscape to map out a future where individualism is lost in the crowd.
Throwing out that interpretation for the moment, I was curious to see if it was possible to design the basic idea for such a city that, while housing the world's population in a fairly small area, did not have to be ridiculously conformal. As to how I succeeded, you can judge for yourself.
( How Big is a Megacity? )