I recently finished reading a great book called Factfulness: Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About the World–and Why Things Are Better Than You Think written by the late Hans Rosling. I knew it would be good when Bill Gates called it one of his favorite books of 2018 and “one of the most important” he has ever read. It is all about our perceptions of the world, how wrong they are and why our instincts are so off. The book is also strangely uplifting.
Turns out most of us have very outdated ways of thinking and Rosling goes through ten compelling reasons why they are wrong. It is definitely mind opening. Even very smart subsets of people couldn’t correctly answer fairly basic questions about the current state of the world.
Rosling frequently jokes that a higher percentage of chimpanzees could do better at answering the questions right than the percentage of us humans who do. Amusingly, he also has country breakdowns so you can see how well, say, the US did in their responses versus other nations.
It was sad to read the book knowing that Rosling died from cancer while he was writing it. But what a nice last gift to the world from this highly accomplished man.
The book is accessible, engaging and thought provoking. I strongly recommend it if you have an interest in world affairs, business, economics, marketing and/or psychology.
