Factfulness

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Overview

Factfulness, published in 2018 by the Swedish physician and statistician Hans Rosling with Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Ronnlund, argues that most people hold an outdated, overly negative picture of the world, and offers ten habits of thought that explain why. The book is a practical guide to reading data calmly and avoiding dramatic misperceptions. Its value for learners lies less in its conclusions about the world than in its method: it teaches how to check an instinct against evidence before acting on it.

Context

Hans Rosling spent his career in global health, including work in Africa, and became widely known for lively public talks that used animated charts of countries. He died in 2017, and the book was completed with his son and daughter-in-law. It builds on Rosling's long-running surveys showing that educated audiences answer basic questions about world development worse than chance.