What Makes A City Perfect?

In his recent book about Leonardo Da Vinci, Walter Isaacson listed what, to Benedetto Dei in 1472, made Florence, Italy, perfect. See if you would apply these criteria to judge what cities have to have to be perfect today. What would you add to or subtract from Benedetto's list?

A Perfect City Would Have

1. Complete liberty

2. A large, rich, and elegantly dressed population

3. A river with clear, pure water and mills within its walls

4. Jurisdiction over castles, towns, lands and people

5. A university that teaches both Greek and accounting

6. Masters in every art: architecture, art, weaving, wood carving, literature, philosophy

7. Banks and business agents all over the world

In what order would you list the qualities that Benedetto used? And what order would you use for your list?

Maps Provide a Quick Study of the World

You may have heard about all that it takes to make Nutella. Well, the tenth map in the collection of 40 that the Washington Post published on its website (washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2014/01/13/40-more-maps-that-explain-the-world/) provides a map that brings all the information together. We can easily see that Nutella needs natural resources, such as sugar, cocoa, nuts, from four continents; manufacturing facilities in eight countries;and a global distribution network. That's just a beginning of how much can be learned quickly from the Washington Post's maps.

     Maps also are the subject of the earlier posts, "You Are Here" and "Map Gazing."

Master Math Skills with World Population Problems

Over the summer, students often forget some of their math skills. One way to keep up is to practice by solving the following problems.

     Which continent will add the most people in the next 88 years?______________

     Which continent will have the biggest population decline in the next 88 years?___________

     The world's 10.5 billion population projection in 2100 comes from the United Nations. The World Almanac provides the latest 2012 figure of 7 billion people in the world and includes the Caribbean in Latin America's population.

     By how much will the population increase or decrease between 2012 and 2100 on the following continents?

Asia

      4,710,000,000 (2100)
   -  4,220,000,000 (2012)

Africa

      4,180,000,000 (2100)
   -  1,070,000,000 (2012)

Europe

        740,000,000 (2012)
    -   639,000,000 (2100)

North America

        513,000,000 (2100)
    -   348,000,000 (2012)

South America

        596,000,000 (2012)
    -   467,000,000 (2100)

A challenging game requires players to arrange from highest to lowest populations a mixed up list of countries or major world cities, such as:

Countries                      2012 Populations

Argentina                        (53,511,274)
Bangladesh                     (250,155,274)
Netherlands                    (17,906,594)
Greenland                      (49,356)
Egypt                             (137,872522)

Cities                            2011 Populations

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil    (11,959,700)
Delhi, India                    (22,653,600)
Tokyo, Japan                 (37,217,400)
Beijing, China               (15,594,400)
Mexico City, Mexico    (20,445,800)