The New Encyclopedia of the World by Octopus Books Limited dated 1977, like almost any other timely book over 30 years old, can provide an inspiring flashback of what the world was, and how things have actually changed versus how we might have expected them to at the time.
Below is a photo of Shanghai from the book that I’m sure will amaze anyone familiar with how Shanghai looks today. There are of course many more photos telling similar stories of China’s growth since 1980, and even a whole museum devoted to the history and future of its blinding pace of progress.
Perhaps less interesting than the picture is the more obvious change in population and economic statistics of Asia since 1975 – since the numbers in this encyclopedia (China’s population was 830 million, India’s 619 million), the populations of most of the countries in Asia have roughly doubled. Compare that with the population of the UK, which was 56 million then vs 63 today.