In what year will the dead again outnumber the living?

Question

In the 20th Century, the human population expanded so rapidly that the number of living humans now is higher than the number of dead humans who have ever lived. Ever. What year do statistical trends indicate that the dead again will take the lead?

Answer 1

The only thing that will cause the dead to outnumber the living will be a dramatic decline in the exponential growth of the human race. If (or more likely when) that will happen is purely a guess by anyone. It would take an ice age or other natural disaster, nuclear war (or other technological disaster), or the depletion of natural resources--my opinion is the latter. While it's probably somewhat simple to extrapolate when we'll run out of resources using current statistical analysis and data, no one's data is going to be the same--Al Gore's source data is going to differ from Exxon's drastically. Keep in mind the source of the data and the outcomes expected by researchers/statisticians when getting "facts" like these.

Answer 2

Considering that we actually have no idea how many populations the earth has contained, it seems that we don't actually know how many people have ever lived. I'm sure they use some type of estimation to try and support the claim, but any attempted calculation isn't necessarily going to be right anyway.

I really hate it when "scientists" make assumptions and try to pass them off as facts. Maybe that's just me being nitpicky, but I gotta say it.