With both landmass and population concentrated in the Northern hemisphere, a northern-centric view of the world in most things is inevitable.
I was looking for some information on population distribution by latitude and came across this graph on Chris Blattman’s site. However he was not the source of the diagram but had obtained the image from Paul Kedrosky’s page which still exists but no longer has the image. He in turn referred to a Bill Rankin whose page no longer exists. The diagram is said to be from 2000 data but I have not been able to find the source or anything more recent. An excellent diagram.
UPDATE: The original seems to be here: http://www.radicalcartography.net/index.html?histpop
POPULATION HISTOGRAMS
Bill Rankin, 2008More fun with numbers! Roughly 88% of the world’s population lives in the northern hemisphere, and about half the world’s population lives north of 27°N.
Taking the northern and southern hemispheres together, on average the world’s population lives 24 degrees from the equator.
World population by latitude and longitude: source unknown (via chrisblattman)
Trying to trace some of the data on which this diagram is based I came across the fascinating work of Waldo Tobler. Professor Emeritus. Geography Department. University of California. In his presentation from 1999 on Unusual Map Projections I found two diagrams which – I think – must be the source (perhaps updated) for the diagram above. Unusual Map Projections Tobler 1999
The k2p blog 