Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark17
If fame is measured just today, maybe. Few people remember Thorpe.
But from 1914 through 1980, nobody knew who Michael Jordan was. That's why I think, of all the people who have lived, Ruth is the obvious answer.
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So I was thinking a bit more about this --- The population of the United States in 1914 was about 99 million people, and there have been five generations (roughly 25 years in length) from 1914 until today, where the US population is around 333 million.
The population of China in 1980 was 1.25 billion, and today it is 1.4 billion. That's two generations of people, but a much larger population base. The same trend would be seen in India.
I'm not a population / demography expert (maybe a Net54 statistician can help), but I wonder whether Jordan beats Ruth on popularity even on aggregate numbers over time because Jordan would have been much, much more popular than Ruth in both China and India, and since 1980, that's a lot of people.