I agree. Everything is not fine. We should still be very concerned. As long as there are plane crashes, preventable child deaths, endangered species, climate change deniers, male chauvinists, crazy dictators, toxic waste, journalists in prison, and girls not getting an education because of their gender, as long as any such terrible things exist, we cannot relax.
But it is just as ridiculous, and just as stressful, to look away from the progress that has been made. People often call me an optimist, because I show them the enormous progress they didn’t know about. That makes me angry. I’m not an optimist. That makes me sound naïve. I’m a very serious “possibilist.” That’s something I made up. It means someone who neither hopes without reason, nor fears without reason, someone who constantly resists the overdramatic worldview. As a possibilist, I see all this progress, and it fills me with conviction and hope that further progress is possible. This is not optimistic. It is having a clear and reasonable idea about how things are. It is having a worldview that is constructive and useful.
When people wrongly believe that nothing is improving, they may conclude that nothing we have tried so far is working and lose confidence in measures that actually work. I meet many such people, who tell me they have lost all hope for humanity. Or, they may become radicals, supporting drastic measures that are counter-productive when, in fact, the methods we are already using to improve our world are working just fine.
“Factfulness” by Hans Rosling (2018)
I recently stumbled upon an interesting quotation, shown above, by Hans Rosling. I noticed I had already bought the book, but haven’t read it.
Well, it went up a few steps on reading list. And yeah, it’s an interesting perspective. And after having started reading the book, well worth reading. Not only due to the quotation above. But also due to his test and how many humans score worse than Chimps (well, they score less than expected on average). So, yeah, well worth reading.
Oh, and here is the test:
1. In all low-income countries across the world today, how many girls finish primary school?
□ A: 20 percent
□ B: 40 percent
□ C: 60 percent2. Where does the majority of the world population live?
□ A: Low-income countries
□ B: Middle-income countries
□ C: High-income countries3. In the last 20 years, the proportion of the world population living in extreme poverty has …
□ A: almost doubled
□ B: remained more or less the same
□ C: almost halved4. What is the life expectancy of the world today?
□ A: 50 years
□ B: 60 years
□ C: 70 years5. There are 2 billion children in the world today, aged 0 to 15 years old. How many children will there be in the year 2100, according to the United Nations?
□ A: 4 billion
□ B: 3 billion
□ C: 2 billion6. The UN predicts that by 2100 the world population will have increased by another 4 billion people. What is the main reason?
□ A: There will be more children (age below 15) □ B: There will be more adults (age 15 to 74)
□ C: There will be more very old people (age 75 and older)7. How did the number of deaths per year from natural disasters change over the last hundred years?
□ A: More than doubled
□ B: Remained about the same
□ C: Decreased to less than half8. There are roughly 7 billion people in the world today. Which map shows best where they live? (Each figure represents 1 billion people.)
9. How many of the world’s 1-year-old children today have been vaccinated against some disease?
□ A: 20 percent
□ B: 50 percent
□ C: 80 percent10. Worldwide, 30-year-old men have spent 10 years in school, on average. How many years have women of the same age spent in school?
□ A: 9 years
□ B: 6 years
□ C: 3 years11. In 1996, tigers, giant pandas, and black rhinos were all listed as endangered. How many of these three species are more critically endangered today?
□ A: Two of them
□ B: One of them
□ C: None of them12. How many people in the world have some access to electricity?
□ A: 20 percent
□ B: 50 percent
□ C: 80 percent13. Global climate experts believe that, over the next 100 years, the average temperature will …
□ A: get warmer
□ B: remain the same
□ C: get colder
Solutions are:
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1: C, 2: B, 3: C, 4: C, 5: C, 6: B, 7: C, 8: A, 9: C, 10: A, 11: C, 12: C, 13: A
(Score one for each correct answer, and write your total score on your piece of paper.)
Yeah, are you better than random? Do you score higher than 4/12? No? Well, you are not alone. We are primed to look at the world worse than it is. It’s not just that we’re off, we are systematically off for the worse.
Yep, a really interesting book by the late Hand Rosling.
