“There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” That quote, attributed to any number of voluble Brits, says much about contemporary public discourse.

I thought about that recently while deep in the Virginia mountains (where smartphones don’t work) when a news item came crackling through the antique radio of an antediluvian jalopy passing for a pickup truck. It said the world’s population had just passed 8 billion. Not true, I thought. That was last year’s big demography thing. Or was I in a time warp? 

On my return to base camp in the Shenandoah Valley, I checked it out. Sure enough, the empire’s official people counter, the US Bureau of the Census, had just reported “World Population Estimated at 8 Billion”:

Using data from the International Database, the U.S. Census Bureau estimates the world population hit 8 billion on September 26. [2023]

[Note the] Emphasis on the word estimates.

There are many sources of uncertainty in estimating the global population, and it’s unlikely this population milestone was reached on that exact date.

For example, the United Nations (U.N.) Population Division estimates the world population reached 8 billion on November 15, 2022. 

‘Twas not a time warp after all. But no worries, Mercator readers got the low-down last year. The UN, the lion’s share of demographers, and even yours truly believe that we passed 8 billion in 2022.

So what?

But that doesn’t matter. There’s an irascibly cantankerous contingent, a veritable Greek Chorus of educrats, journalists and self-ordained “environmentalists” who tell us, as gospel, that there are just too many people about, and overpopulation will cause us to moulder away in a maelstrom of climate change. Don’t confuse ‘em with the facts. That would be attacking PC gospel, the secular religion that enables management by guilt.

We’ve been so unkind to the environment. We must atone and save the world by not having kids! Is that what we call circular reasoning? If you don’t have kids, you’re not saving us. But I digress.  

Elon the apostate

As an amateur futurist, I love population projections. With furrowed brow, I was in a state of deep cogitation about this when Fox News popped up with the latest from population apostate Elon Musk. (Stay tuned for the projections):

"Having children should be incentivized, not be a financial penalty like it is in most countries!" Musk wrote on his social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

"We must create the next generation of humans or spiral into oblivion."

The statement came in response to Katalin Novak, the President of Hungary, who announced several pro-natalist policies. These include tax exemptions for women with more than four children, loan forgiveness for couples after having three or more children and access to government-operated fertility clinics.

Spot on! Two years ago, Elon said, "If the alarming collapse in birth rate continues, civilization will indeed die with a whimper in adult diapers.” According to Bloomberg, Musk calls population decline a "much bigger issue" than climate change. What a numbskull he must be!

Notice the hit pieces on Elon popping up here and there? Coincidence, I’m sure. As the world’s wealthiest of the unwoke, he’s an easy target. How ‘bout those hateful Hungarians? Incentivising families? C’mon man!

Projections

If you can believe the Internet, it was either Yogi Berra or Niels Bohr who first said, "It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future." Projections are predictions based on research, so you can credibly hedge your bets.