Observed arrival · 2026-09-11
The Human Lottery
Draw one life from the estimated 117 billion people ever born and see where your improbable ticket lands.
Field notes
The experience frames demographic history as a weighted lottery rather than a static statistic. Its model first weights eras by estimated births and then weights regions within each era, with historical uncertainty increasing further back in time. The page cites the Population Reference Bureau for total birth estimates and Our World in Data for living-condition context. It also explicitly separates the share of humans alive today from the probability of landing in the present era.
Observed signals
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Editorial observations of this landing page, not a rating.
One card from the complete issue