14 Reasons Why You Are Pretty Small (In The Scheme of Things)
The world’s population is expected to reach eight billion people sometime this year.
You, of course, are only one person.
One person among nearly eight billion others.
Feeling small right now?
Don’t worry; you’re in good company.
After all, even falcons feel in awe at the vastness of the universe and how small a part they truly play in the grand scheme of things.
Don’t quote us on that, though. A certain falcon is quite litigious. And, apparently, connected!
But you, yes you, are indeed miniscule, and here are fourteen reasons why:
1. If Earth’s history were compressed into a single day, humans wouldn’t show up until the last second.
Anatomically modern homo sapiens (that’s us, in case you’re not the brightest bulb) didn’t emerge until around 300,000 years ago.
How old is Earth, you ask?
4.54 billion years old, give or take around 50 million years.
Seriously, is being late to the party a human trait or what?
2. Your heart will have beaten 2.5 billion times by the time you turn 70 years old.
With all due seriousness, how many of those heartbeats of yours have been because of a certain dashing falcon?
A certain dashing falcon named Calvin. Last name O’Falcon.
All of them? Oh my, you must have impeccable taste. 😉
3. We all produce enough saliva in a lifetime to fill two normal-sized swimming pools.
That’s about 25,000 liters in total, if you’re the type who likes to get things exact.
For extra credit, why don’t you go find out what percent of your saliva to date has been drool?
4. Voyager 1 has traveled around 30,000 mph for 45+ years, yet is only 20 light hours away.
Even with all that time and speed, this probe is just a little less than 15 billion miles away from Earth.
For reference, the nearest solar system, Proxima Centauri, is about 4.3 light years away.
Maybe this means you shouldn’t suggest a trip through space for your next family vacation, huh?
5. A person with an average lifespan who sleeps for 8 hours per night will spend about 229,961 hours asleep.
You can’t reach your potential while you’re sleeping.
Bet. ::yawn::
About those other 459,922 hours, use the short amount of time you have wisely.
Bet. ::yawn::
After all, you probably don’t want your epitaph to read: “Did homework, attended school, worked, then died.”
Bet!
6. The average human body contains 59,650 miles of blood vessels.
That’s more miles than the whole of our planet, which has a circumference of 24,902 miles.
Yes, we are telling you that your body’s blood vessels are twice the distance around the globe.
What you do with that information, well, that’s up to you, buddy…
7. If you could acquire one teaspoon of a neutron star, it would weigh a trillion kilograms.
For the imperials among us, that’s about 2.2 trillion pounds.
Hate to break it to you, but no, you’re not going to acquire one teaspoon of a neutron star.
Things like that just aren’t common—not even on the black market. Sorry.
8. If you were driving at 55 mph, it would take approximately 193 years to reach the Sun.
Hold on, hold on! What the heck is wrong with you? A 193-year trip?
Don’t you know that if you drive at 110 mph, pulling off this crazy stunt of yours would only take 96.5 years.
Sometimes your common sense leaves much to be desired.
9. If you were on an airplane that could somehow fly to Pluto, your trip would take around 800 years.
Unless you’re on a super fast Boeing 777 traveling at its maximum velocity of 590 miles per hour.
In that case, you’d reach the dwarf planet in roughly 680 years.
Hey, it’d be worth however long it takes to hear Pluto’s dope ambient sounds, y’know?
10. Americans eat 18 billion hot dogs every year.
As of the 2020 census, there were 331,449,281 Americans.
That’s roughly 54 ⅓ hot dogs per American each year.
And you’re still surprised American men and women have dominated the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest, eh?
11. Over 900 trillion footballs can fit inside the Grand Canyon.
OK, but why would anyone want to fit 900 trillion footballs inside such a majestic location?
Oh yeah, the Internet should have taught us this: Some peeps do love to troll, don’t they?
12. An active person will walk a distance equivalent to traversing the entire planet 4 ½ times in their lifetime.
7500 steps a day from birth to death (at the convenient age of 80) leaves you with 216,262,500 steps before you croak.
If you have a reasonably normal stride, that’s about 110,000 miles, or roughly 4 ½ times around this big ball of a planet.
Do we have to spell it out for you why walking isn’t a sport, or is this fun fact enough for you to get the picture?
13. The average person breathes in approximately 11,000 liters of air each day.
Alright, alright, we could do the math thing again to show you how this all adds up, but we won’t.
We have sky high expectations for you and know you can find this info out on your own.
So do it, or else Calvin will be disappointed in you and never let you live it down. He’s good like that.
14. There are over 6 billion dust mites in a typical bed.
Yes, this is true, so uhh, you’re going to clean your bed, right?
Right?
Why do I hear crickets chirping?
Naturally, you want more fun facts, don’t you?
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And afterwards, maybe, just maybe, one day you can actually hold your own at trivia.
