That, according to a seriously shaky Wolfram|Alpha calculation, is how much land that each person would get were the Earth (minus Antarctica and the Sahara Desert) split 6.67 billion equal ways.¹

Here’s the equation:

For comparison, 4.659 acres is about the size of 2.6 FIFA-sanctioned international match soccer fields.

If you’re thinking, Gee, that actually kind of sounds like a lot, bear this in mind: the actual Earth is not a flat grid of equally habitable cells—inevitably, many millions of people would get stuck with parcels on mountainsides or in toxic waste dumps, swamps, deserts and Siberia. The above figure is clearly on the generous side.²

That said, I’m on the borderline of horror with this one. It either makes the world seem very small or makes mankind seem very stifling.

Either way, this much is certain: the fact that Wolfram|Alpha can help be indulge in such childish things is undeniably cool.

1. A side note: one of mankind’s greatest inventions is the technique of building vertically. But, for the sake of this hypothetical, I’m talking straight-up land ownership.
2. And no, there’s no easy way to further refine the equation, short of making an exhaustive (and totally subjective!) List of All Terrestrial Hellholes Known to Man and plugging each item in one after another.