The register keeps changing after the book is fixed in print. Each entry below was added to this row in the order shown.
Retrieved as an independent check on SRC-055 rather than as a substitute for World Population Prospects. VALUES AS PUBLISHED: 2022 22,462,173; 2023 23,594,623; 2024 24,672,760; 2025 25,620,427. TWO THINGS FOLLOW AND BOTH BEAR ON CHAPTER 1. FIRST, 25,620,427 for 2025 corroborates SRC-055 to five significant figures from a separate compiler, so 'about 25.6 million' is firmly a 2025 quantity. SECOND, THE SERIES STOPS AT 2025. No 2026 value is published. So the book cannot compare a 2026 planning figure with a 2026 projection from either of these sources, and any sentence implying it has done so is wrong. What the evidence supports is that the 2026 planning figure is close to the 2025 projection, which is a weaker and more interesting statement, because it raises the question whether the planning figure was built off the projection rather than corroborating it. THIS BOOK MUST NOT ANSWER THAT QUESTION WITHOUT THE DOCUMENT. It may state what it holds and stop. [THE SENTENCE THAT STOOD HERE IS STRUCK, 18 AUGUST 2026, AND IS QUOTED SO A PARTIAL READING CANNOT REINTRODUCE IT: 'STILL NOT OPENED: World Population Prospects itself.' IT WAS OPENED ON 18 AUGUST 2026 AND IS SRC-256, a public CSV on the Population Division's own site, no login and no paywall. The routes this row recorded as blocked, data.un.org paging returning HTTP 500 and the data-portal API returning HTTP 401, were real and were not the only routes; the row named no others and printed a bar. What follows is the record of the attempt as it stood on 11 August 2026 and is retained for that.] data.un.org carries the WPP 2024 medium-variant series for Syria, 1,460 records over 1950 to 2100 across 18 variants, confirmed present on 11 August 2026; its paging returned HTTP 500 on the page holding 2026 and the Population Division data-portal API returned HTTP 401 without credentials. That is a retrieval attempted and not completed, not an impossibility, and it stays on the queue
AMENDED 18 AUGUST 2026 ON MIN-440, AND THE AMENDMENT REVERSES THIS ROW'S OWN CHARACTERISATION RATHER THAN THE PROSE'S. THIS ROW SAID: '25,620,427 for 2025 corroborates SRC-055 to five significant figures from a separate compiler'. THE WORLD BANK IS NOT A SEPARATE COMPILER FOR THIS INDICATOR AND THE BANK SAYS SO. SRC-260, the Bank's own indicator metadata for SP.POP.TOTL retrieved 18 August 2026, lists its source organisations and names first: 'World Population Prospects, United Nations (UN), uri: https://population.un.org/wpp/, publisher: UN Population Division'. Its sourceNote states 'The values shown are midyear estimates', and WPP's midyear value for the Syrian Arab Republic on 1 July 2025 is 25,620,427 at SRC-256, WHICH IS THIS SERIES' 2025 VALUE TO THE UNIT. SO THE AGREEMENT BETWEEN THIS ROW AND SRC-055 IS NOT TWO COMPILERS AGREEING; both are accounts of one file. WHAT SRC-260 DOES NOT ESTABLISH, AND THE DISTINCTION IS THE WHOLE POINT: the metadata gives four source organisations for the indicator worldwide and does not state, field by field, which supplied the Syria value. What is established is that the Bank names WPP first among them, that the series is midyear by its own account, and that the value matches WPP's midyear figure exactly. That supports 'the file behind them' and does not support a claim that the Bank never touches the number. CONSEQUENCE FOR PROSE: Chapter 1's 'The dashboard and the World Bank series were opened on 11 August 2026 and the file behind them on 18 August' is right, and the finding that put it in doubt was resolved against the register.