Preconceived notions can often color the way we see the world. It’s easy to assume a thing is one way because it seems natural in our minds, and then we learn the truth and can be quite surprised. The easiest way to shake up your beliefs is to look at the cold, hard numbers. Some statistics are hard to manipulate and when you see them laid out, they can blow your mind.
10. The Same Number of People Have Hiked the Grand Canyon As Have Walked on the Moon
Off the top of your head, do you know how many people have been to the moon? Even if you don’t know the exact number, you can safely assume it’s not any great abundance. The moon is typically out of the way for most of us.
So far, only 12 people have set foot on the moon in the over half-century since we first got there. It’s not a popular destination. But that doesn’t mean it’s the least popular journey a person can make. For instance, the same number of people have visited the moon as have taken the time to hike the entire Grand Canyon.
Even though millions of people visit the Grand Canyon every year, most of them just show up to look at the canyon itself. Hiking the canyon is a nearly impossible task. At about 750 miles the journey is already daunting. Factor in that there are barely any trails and it becomes even worse.
Potential hikers need to climb peaks and rappel down others into the canyon itself. Temperatures can range from over 100° to below freezing depending on where and when you are there. If you hope to make it in one continuous push, you’re going to need to be carrying at least 50 pounds of supplies on your back as well, because there are no towns along the way and no stores at which to supply yourself with more. You have to be committed, and extremely well prepared to get it done.
9. More People Have Died From Yellowstone’s Thermal Pools Than Bears
If you spend a lot of time on social media, you may have noticed a long-standing debate about what’s more dangerous to spend your time with, a bear or just any random man. Bears are among North America’s largest and most dangerous predators, and it’s no surprise that people would have a natural fear of them.
Even though a bear is potentially dangerous, there are things that you can find in the same environment that are going to cause more trouble for you. For instance, the thermal pools in Yellowstone Park have actually claimed more lives than the bears that live there. So if you want to have a good hypothetical debate about the dangers of being in the wild, ask people on Twitter whether they’d rather be alone with a strange man, or a thermal pool.
The hot springs in Yellowstone are a serious danger for obvious and less obvious reasons. Wander off a path and you may think you’re on solid ground and then punch through a brittle layer and find yourself in 250° water.
Since the late 1800s, about 20 people have died due to the thermal pools in Yellowstone. Much of this is due to people disregarding warnings and wandering where they’re not supposed to go. That may not seem like an abundance of death in such a long period, but this is a park, it’s a place that shouldn’t be inherently dangerous at all. In contrast, only eight people have been killed by bears in that same amount of time.
Because the water is so dangerous, there are many signs around the park warning visitors to stay in designated areas. The pools, seen and unseen, are full of water which can be highly acidic and boiling hot. One slip and a person can fall in. Injuries are almost guaranteed and death is a possibility, something that seems to be happening more frequently in the social media age.
8. There Are More Monthly Facebook Users Than There Were Humans Alive in 1950
Social media as a whole has a grip on humanity the world over. There are a lot of different platforms to choose from, but Facebook remains one of the most well-known. Even if all the kids are on TikTok these days, you can’t count out how influential and important Facebook has been as the grandfather of the social media movement.
Just how big is Facebook? In the second quarter of 2023, Facebook clocked three billion monthly active users. That means, even if you think Facebook is old and out of date, it’s still far and away the most popular social media platform on the internet.
Three billion users is a remarkable number. There weren’t even 3 billion people on the planet in 1950. Back then the population of the Earth was about 2.4 billion. The USA accounts for 179 million of those users. With a population of just over 336 million, that means over 53% of Americans are still regularly using Facebook.
7. More People Die Taking Selfies Than From Shark Attacks
If it’s not bears in the woods that people are afraid of, it’s sharks in the ocean. In recent years sharks have had a bit of PR pushback with people online trying to educate the world that sharks are not as bad as Shark Week wants you to think.
Are some sharks dangerous? Of course. Just like some house cats are dangerous. That doesn’t mean all sharks are dangerous all the time, and you need to appreciate that as intimidating as they look, they’re not necessarily out to get you. So what innocuous thing is actually more dangerous than a shark? Selfies.
A 2022 study showed that, in the previous 13 years, there were 90 recorded cases of fatal shark attacks. In most of those cases, the sharks were provoked. In that same period, a staggering 379 people died trying to take selfies.
Selfie-related deaths are so prominent in India that the city of Mumbai had to set up no selfie zones to try to protect people. Selfie lovers have died taking photos of themselves just before they got hit by moving trains, others have been snapping photos while on a sinking boat. Stateside more than one person has fallen into the Grand Canyon while trying to take a selfie. Some folks have even shot themselves taking selfies with guns.
6. More People in South Africa Rely on Loans to Pay Bills Than Have Jobs
Have you ever taken out a loan? Most of us do at one time or another, especially when it comes to something like a mortgage or a line of credit. In South Africa, however, loans are a way of life. In 2014, 86% of South Africans had taken out a loan in the previous years. More people in South Africa have loans than jobs.
While many of the loans are from friends and family and thus have informal terms, 25 million out of the country’s 37 million population owed that money to banks or other financial institutions. People use these loans for their everyday expenses like groceries.
Fewer than 10 million people in the country are formally employed. That means they don’t have registered jobs, though the true number is likely significantly higher with people working rural and farm jobs as well as under-the-table ones. But the disparity between employed and using loans is still remarkable.
5. In Some Years More People Die on Cape Town’s Table Mountain Than on Everest
Mount Everest is one of the most famous natural wonders of the world. It’s also one of the most daunting peaks in the world that only expert climbers have ever conquered. Many people have tried and failed, and their bodies are still on the mountain to this day.
As many as 300 people have died on Mt Everest and about two-thirds of them are still there. And while you can’t downplay the danger, it’s surprising to learn that there are deadlier peaks out there. Deadlier, smaller, and flatter. Like South Africa’s Table Mountain.
Overlooking Cape Town, Table Mountain is 1085 meters tall, or 3,563 feet. Significantly smaller than Everest’s 29,000 feet. But because it’s smaller and flatter, it attracts many more tourists. People underestimate the size of the mountain and they also lack caution. Some years 10 to 20 people will die from a range of causes. Some die taking selfies, and others get lost and die of dehydration, or slip and falls.
4. San Francisco Has More Dogs than Children
Americans love dogs and that’s a fact. There are as many as 88 million dogs in the US right now. That’s more than double the human population of Canada. And while dogs have proven to be man’s best friend in a big way, they’ve also usurped humans in some places. For instance, there are more dogs than children in San Francisco.
Exact numbers of dogs can be hard to pin down because not everyone registers their dogs, strays keep breeding, and people outside city limits don’t need to buy tags usually. So there’s a good range for how many could be around but it’s estimated San Francisco is home to between 120,000 and 500,000 with around 232,000 fitting the city based on the national average. As of 2018, there were just over 118,000 children in the city.
3. More Americans Immigrate to Australia than the Reverse
Talking about immigration opens a whole can of worms for some people. The US has a long history of enticing people from all over the world. That’s where the saying American Dream comes from. Everyone wants to come to America and pursue that dream. Everyone except Australians.
Australia is the only country in the world with a net positive immigration from the US. That means more Americans go to Australia than the reverse. So really, we should all be talking about the Australian Dream because that seems to be the big one.
In 2023, data showed that Australia had enticed 110,000 US-born citizens while the US had only seduced 97,800 Aussies.
2. There Are More Slaves Today Than Any Period in History
Slavery is always a touchy subject and a shameful one for most when we reflect on our history. Something worth considering however is that you don’t need to look at history. Right now there are more slaves in the world than there have ever been in the past.
In 2022, the International Labor Organization determined that 50 million people were subject to modern-day slavery. America enslaved 12.5 million Africans during the Slave Trade.
According to the ILO’s numbers, 28 million people today are being forced into labor and another 22 million are trapped in forced marriages which the organization considers to be the same thing. Sexual exploitation only accounts for 23% of those numbers.
The group concluded that there was no region of the world immune from these acts. Some countries obviously have more instances than others but none are free. Forced labor, while different from our preconceptions of pre-Civil War slavery, still involves forcing people to work. The workers often cannot quit, have money withheld, are in debt to employers, or are threatened with deportation if they do not endure poor conditions.
1. More People Have Phones than Toilets
In the Western world, it would be hard to argue that many of us are not addicted to technology. For most of us that takes the form of a phone. You can’t go anywhere in public without seeing people texting, talking, or watching videos. Or making videos. Whatever we’re doing, we’re doing it with our phones.
Now imagine if you were asked to choose between your phone or your toilet. Which one do you think you could live without? For some people in the world, that’s no question at all because more people have phones than toilets.
According to a UN report about 4.5 billion people in the world had a toilet back in the year 2013. However, at the same time, six billion people had a phone. Given that was over 10 years ago there’s a good chance the number of phones has increased since there are another billion people in the world, but the number of toilets probably hasn’t changed that much.
If you’re morbidly curious, of the 2.5 billion people who didn’t have toilets, over one billion of them didn’t have anything and they just went to the bathroom outside somewhere.