More fodder

[james_davis_nicoll]

Nicked from the UN report, via a post of mine:

Three Earths in 2100:

                Growth Scenario

Region          Low     Medium  High

Africa          27.5%   24.9%   23.1%
Asia            52.1    55.4    57.5
Latin America
and Caribbean    7.4     8.1     8.4
North America    5.8     5.2     5.0
Europe           6.6     5.9     5.6
Oceana           0.6     0.5     0.5

Population       5.5B    9.1B   14.0B   
      

While I freely admit that migration in the past has seen small groups provide disproportionate fractions of migrants and that population models are often incorrect, this seems to me to indicate that all other considerations being equal, the pasty white with the occasional visible minority in the background model used in a lot of SF set in near future interstellar settings is likely to be wildly incorrect.

Comments

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Africa:             13.1%
Asia:               60.6
Latin America &
the Caribbean:       8.6
North America:       5.2
Europe:             12.0
Oceana:              0.5 

If I recall correctly, India all by itself is about 17% of the total, while China is about 20%, both higher than the current fraction of humanity to be found in Africa. Because of differential birth rates, India is slated to pass China by in the 21st, while Africa may well double its share of humanity.

In "North America" (which seems to really be Anglo-dominated NorAm or possibly Nearctica), the US makes up most of the total.

[boywhocantsayno.livejournal.com]

So no matter how you slice it, the percentage of Caucasians in the world is going to decrease by a little over a third (using North America + Europe as a guide to estimation), if these stats bear out. Yes, that does make one wonder about the representation of minorities in SF, though schizmatic's point is about as good an explanation as we're going to find.

I know I've read SF in which people had all become the same shade of tan through interbreeding, but I suspect that until we solve the problem of poverty so that worldwide travel is accessible to all, there will still be a variety of skin tones in the world as most people will still be isolated from each other.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

"I know I've read SF in which people had all become the same shade of tan through interbreeding, [...]"

Traits don't blend that way, or at least these don't. You'll still get lots of variation in appearance. Lots and lots. It may become less useful for guessing where people are from or how closely they are related to you but it's pretty useless now.

[boywhocantsayno.livejournal.com]

Give it a few million years... ;)

[alexx-kay.livejournal.com]

people had all become the same shade of tan

Ursula K. LeGuin's _The Lathe of Heaven_ has an interesting variant on this. It was particularly well handled in the PBS adaptation from (IIRC) the early 80's.