Imagine that humanity suddenly decided to put aside all interethnic and interreligious conflicts, settling in only one city. Given the fact that today the human population is 7.5 billion people, putting everyone in one place would be quite a challenge. How much space would such a multinational city take and can such an ambitious idea be translated into reality?
Can humanity settle in only one city?
As you know, each nation has its own history, traditions and moral principles. The difference in the perception of the surrounding world between various nationalities can be so great that sooner or later a serious conflict begins to mature in a multinational environment. A striking example of this can be the events that took place at the beginning of the 21st century, for example, during the Abkhaz war or the civil war in Tajikistan, when the difference of interests within the communities turned out to be the cause of the death of a large number of people. If for a moment we imagine that we somehow decided to forget, at least for a while, about the differences in mentality within representatives of different races, placing most of humanity in a densely populated environment, then we can come to the conclusion that, in fact, humanity needs absolutely little place to stay.
As you know, the denser to populate this or that area, the less space we need for life. So, if we resettle all of humanity with the density of one of the most sparsely populated states in the world - Mauritania, then we can come to the conclusion that to accommodate 7.5 billion people we need a territory the size of Russia. In order to slightly reduce this scale, we could try to increase the average population density to more comfortable values of about 1000 people per 1 square kilometer. With these parameters, the “world” city would occupy the territory of Australia.
At the same time, the figure of 1000 people per 1 sq. kilometer is not the maximum. Thus, a large number of Chinese cities are famous for their incredible population density: one of the areas of Hong Kong - Kowloon - is officially recognized as the most densely populated area in the world in the history of mankind. And although this quarter officially ceased to exist long ago due to the flourishing drug trade and prostitution there, statistics show that in the Chinese walled city the average population density exceeded two million people per square kilometer. With such parameters, all of humanity could easily settle in the territory of Palestine, which corresponds to approximately 6,000 square kilometers.
Daria Eletskaya
Promotional video: