A different way of looking at the world

The above is from Worldmapper, an experiment in using maps to get a different perspective on the world. This map shows the world's population as related to geography. In the words of the Worldmapper people

In Spring 2000 world population estimates reached 6 billion; that is 6 thousand million. The distribution of the earth's population is shown in this map.

India, China and Japan appear large on the map because they have large populations. Panama, Namibia and Guinea-Bissau have small populations so are barely visible on the map.

Population is very weakly related to land area. However, Sudan which is geographically the largest country in Africa, has a smaller population than Nigeria, Egypt, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa and Tanzania.

There are a host of intriguing world views at the site.