Factfulness by Hans Rosling
Hans Rosling spent much of his life fighting ignorance by spreading a fact-based worldview. He was best known for his TED talks.
He wanted to write “an enjoyable text that will help a global audience to understand the world” (p.258). He spent the last year of his life writing up the book when he was diagnosed with incurable cancer.
This is a powerful book. It lifts the veil of harmful ignorance. It shows that so many things that so many people believe about the world are false. Most people are not just a little wrong, but they are really wide of the mark.
A lot of people think the world their parents or grandparents lived in was better than it is today. They are really wrong. By every key measure, today is the very best time ever to be alive, wherever you are in the world.
Take this Quiz and see if you can beat a chimp
And, when most people take the quiz, they do really badly.
A chimp would get things right more often than most people when they take this test
Most people – 80% to 90% – in Europe and the USA have little to no idea about a lot of useful and important things.
Ignorance seems to get the worse the smarter people are. It’s particularly high for bankers and the global elite who hang at Davos. They are systematically wrong.
Why are adults so wrong?
As Rosling asks “ Why was this ignorance about the world so widespread and persistent …People had a world-view dates to the time when their teachers had left school’ (p.10-11)
The truth is the world is improving, step by step, year by year.
A lot of people have irrational fears. Rosling helps show a fact-based view and how to address the causes of the irrationality.
If you follow his suggestions, you may beat the chimps.
Adults need special help. They get facts spectacularly wrong. What adults learned at school is outdated within 10 to 20 years of graduating. Unless they are constantly updating their knowledge through free (or low cost) upgrades, is redundant really quickly. The test results show how out of touch with reality most – over 80%- 90% in many countries – they are.
Our human instincts mess up our ability to get things right. Instead, they lead us to get things very wrong.
Things are getting a lot better
Over 259 pages he highlights how better things are getting. You can go on https://www.gapminder.org to see how much better things are.
The world is likely going to get a lot better. It will get a lot better quicker if people read this book and use the tools to dispel ignorance.
These two pages give you an idea how much better things are today.
In eleven chapters he dispels myths and explains why some basic instincts lead people to get the facts wrong.
At the end of each chapter, he has provided a helpful summary.
I have photographed each summary. I recommend you buy the book.
Chapter One: The Gap Instinct
Chapter Two: The Negativity Instinct
Chapter Three: The Straight Line Instinct
Chapter Four: The Fear Instinct
Chapter Five: The Size Instinct
Chapter Six: The Generalisation Instinct
Chapter Seven: The Destiny Instinct
Chapter Eight: The Single Perspective Instinct
Chapter Nine: The Blame Instinct
Chapter Ten: The Urgency Instinct
Chapter Eleven: Factfulness in practice
