Mountainfilm in Telluride 2012 focused on population, and although the Moving Mountains Symposium is over, we’re not closing the door on the discussion. It’s a many-layered subject and affects most every ecosystem on the planet.

In this video, Joel Cohen, a professor of populations at Rockefeller and Columbia Universities (who couldn’t make it to our symposium), outlines the complexity of the topic while simultaneously simplifying the difficult subject.

Before you begin, a few caveats:

1. The video is 43 minutes.
2. The intended audience is students who might consider demography as a course of study, but the sales pitch on either end is brief.

If the caveats deter you in any way from setting aside 43 minutes to watch, here are a few incentives to counteract them:

1. He’s got a sense of humor, managing to work Woody Allen, a nudist colony and his face on the body of a woman into his message.
2. He offers compelling reasons to care about other countries and humans, even if some are ultimately self-preserving (hint: disease).
3. You’re likely to learn something about the interconnectedness agriculture, technology, contraception, education, violence, inequities, other species, economics, environment, women and subsidies.