World in the widest sense means the universe, the whole system of created things (as distinguished from God). In this sense the world, and facts and problems in regard to it, are discussed at ASTRONOMY and other articles cited there (such as SOLAR SYSTEM, STARS, COMETS, ETHER, &c.), CREATION, COSMOGONY, DARWINIAN SYSTEM, and in many of the articles on philosophical and theological systems, such as PANTHEISM, NEOPLATONISM, &c. In the narrower sense it means the terraqueous globe, discussed in its physiographical relations in the article EARTH, where are described its figure, dimensions, mass, mean density and constitution, its surface, movements, the distribution and work of solar energy. The areas in detail of the great land-divisions of the world will be found under CONTINENTS. As to the population of the earth Wagner and Supan in the Bevölkerung der Erde for 1891 give the following estimates:
| Europe (without Iceland, Atlantic islands, &c.) | 357,379,000 |
| Asia (without the Polar islands) | 825,954,000 |
| Africa (without Madagascar, &c.) | 163,953,000 |
| America (without Polar regions) | 121,713,000 |
| Australia and Tasmania | 3,230,000 |
| Oceanic Islands | 7,420,000 |
| Polar Regions | 80,000 |
| Total | 1,479,729,000 |
The following table shows approximately the numbers professing the chief faiths of the world:
| Buddhists | 500,000,000 |
| Hindus | 160,000,000 |
| Mohammedans | 155,000,000 |
| Confucians | 80,000,000 |
| Adherents of Shintoism (in Japan) | 14,000,000 |
| Jews | 7,000,000 |
| Christians— | |
| Roman Catholics | 152,000,000 |
| Greek Catholics | 75,000,000 |
| Other Christians | 100,000,000 |
| Various Heathens | 237,000,000 |
| 1,480,000,000 |
See also the articles CHRONOLOGY, ETHNOGRAPHY, GEOGRAPHY, GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION, GEOLOGY (for the age of the Earth, see there at p. 154), MAN (for the antiquity of the human race), POPULATION, and books cited at VITAL STATISTICS.
Worm Grass. See SPIGELIA.