There Are A Lot Of People In China

Today's Eric Daniels-type bit of trivia comes from Strange Maps":

China is the world's most populous nation. That much anybody knows. But even if we know a bit more (that the number of Chinese is around 1.32 billion, which is just under 20% of all humans alive today), that figure is still too big to mean much beyond that China is 'number one'.

This map compares the population of China's provinces (plus the 'renegade province' of Taiwan), autonomous regions and municipalities with those of whole countries, and thus helps shed some light on that issue.

China is an interesting country in that it is no longer committed ideologically to Communism, but it is no where close to a free country. Instead, the ideology is a mixture of authoritarianism, nationalism, and some market elements. Hence, I'm glad that there are people interested in translating Ayn Rand's works into Chinese.

If Rand's ideas ever took hold there, China could become a true powerhouse on the world stage. On the other hand, if a different bad ideology became entrenched in place of Communism, we could be looking at a huge menace.

(Via Dave Does The Blog.)