What I read: Factfulness

Described by Bill Gates as one of the most important books of our time, over the weekend I completed the fantastic book, Factfulness.   While the name may not sound like a page turner, I was thoroughly enthralled.   The premise of the book is that the world is getting better - Level 1 poverty is likely to be eradicated, global disasters are decreasing and more women are being educated than ever before.   Using graphs, charts and other illustrative measures, the book clearly shows the data to back up the conclusions and more importantly, explores 10 human instincts/biases which rationalize why we often think things are worse than they are. 

I could have highlighted the whole book, as it was filled with stories and facts that I'd like to remember.  It's a book to purchase in hardcover to reference periodically when our assumptions may be getting the better of us. 

“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 naive. 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.” - Hans Rosling, Factfulness