The Guardian, always good for explainer graphics, has this interactive description of how we got from a few hairless apes living in caves to 7 billion people today. The global population is supposed to hit 7 billion sometime this weekend.
Population growth over the last century
Tom Paulson is founder and lead journalist at Humanosphere. Prior to operating this online news site, he reported on science, medicine, health policy, aid and development for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Contact him at tom[at]humanosphere.org or follow him on Twitter @tompaulson.
