In 1968, The Population Bomb by the Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich became a bestseller. With its foreboding thesis that humanity’s population growth was outpacing its ability to feed itself, it was a rare book that both caught the attention of the public and became deeply influential in academic circles. But not everyone was a fan. One of the book’s biggest critics was the economist Julian Simon, then a professor at the University of Illinois. Simon thought the thesis of The Population Bomb was little more than poorly drawn speculative fiction, calling Ehrlich a ‘false prophet’. Human ingenuity, Simon argued, would ultimately accommodate the exploding population. As this short animation from TED-Ed details, the ongoing professional feud between the two prominent academics ultimately culminated in a $1,000 bet on the fate of humanity – one which Ehrlich would ultimately pay out, and that shifted the way the world understood population growth.
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Architecture
A 3D rendering of the Colosseum captures its architectural genius and symbolic power
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Human rights and justice
Surreal, dazzling visuals form an Iranian expat’s tribute to defiance back home
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Language and linguistics
Do button-pushing dogs have something new to say about language?
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Art
When East met West in the images of an overlooked, original photographer
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Values and beliefs
Why a single tree, uprooted in a typhoon, means so much to one man in Hanoi
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Meaning and the good life
Why Orwell urged his readers to celebrate the spring, cynics be damned
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Making
On the Norwegian coast, a tree is transformed into a boat the old-fashioned way
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Animals and humans
One man’s quest to save an orphaned squirrel, as narrated by David Attenborough
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Computing and artificial intelligence
A future in which ‘artificial scientists’ make discoveries may not be far away
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