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  • What if you actually did see dead people?

  • Not in a Sixth Sense kind of way,

  • but in an 'inexplicable mass resurrection' kind of way.

  • Not in a 'Walking Dead' kind of way,

  • but in a "Holy cow Grandma's back!" kind of way.

  • While this might sound like a great opportunity to catch up with lost loved ones,

  • and to meet some of your heroes...

  • it would actually be horrible.

  • This is 'What If,'

  • and here's what would happen if every dead person came back to life.

  • there are still way more dead people.

  • If we go back about 200,000 years ago, when modern humans began to evolve,

  • and counted all the humans who have been born between then and now,

  • well, you'd be looking at a crowd of about 108 billion people.

  • Now imagine all of those people alive right now.

  • Some scientists believe that our planet can support a maximum 10 billion people.

  • And according to UN projections, we'll reach that number by the year 2100.

  • Now, still scary, but at least that gives us some time

  • to come up with solutions for overpopulation on Earth.

  • So suppose you're thinking about it over a cup of coffee one day,

  • and you look up, and you see someone you haven't seen in a long time...

  • because they're dead.

  • But they're not anymore!

  • In fact, everyone who's ever lived on Earth is miraculously brought back to life!

  • Only it's not a miracle, it's a crisis.

  • A food crisis.

  • Space isn't even the main problem, since,

  • throughout all of human history, until about the last few decades,

  • most humans lived in rural areas;

  • and that's probably where most of the resurrected would return to.

  • Ironically, despite having enough land to fit everyone,

  • we wouldn't have enough available farmland to feed everyone!

  • and that was to feed what is now only 7% of the total population.

  • There's simply no way we'd be able to feed 100 billion people.

  • Under these constraints, 90% of the world's population

  • would easily die of starvation within two months.

  • And that's not even including deaths

  • that would arise from the world war ensuing over resources,

  • which, honestly, would be a really unfair fight.

  • Relatively quickly, the world population

  • would stabilize at a reasonable, if not a quite cramped, capacity.

  • And while it would all be settled in a few months,

  • those who survived the shock and awe would still be wondering,

  • "what the heck just happened?"

  • While it's a totally impossible scenario, it does give you something to think about.

  • The UN claims that in recent years,

  • families around the world have been getting smaller,

  • and fertility rates are decreasing.

  • But is it too little, too late?

  • Catch up on other big questions next time on 'What If.'

What if you actually did see dead people?

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