Book Report

Jason Horowitz

5/1/20

Professor Berg

Factfulness Book report

Factfulness

Factfulness really showed me that the way we view things and the way they actually are in the world are two totally different things. Factfulness goes into detail about ten 

misconceptions instincts we use that make us view the world the way we do. Each chapter gives a detailed example into how we use these instincts to view certain situations in the world. 

One of my favorite chapters of Factfulness was chapter 2 describing The Negativity Instinct. This misconception describes how everyone views that the world is getting worse each day. People usually notice the bad deed before they notice the good deed. Even though it might sound odd now since the coronavirus the world is the best it has ever been. In 1800, the life expectancy of an individual was 30 years. Today the life expectancy of  an individual is 72 years. This statistic shows the advances the world has made in medicine over the years. Technology is booming like never before basically having all the information in the world at the palm of your fingers at all times. The world is becoming better and better each year. The negativity effect just brings peoples thoughts about the world down only seeing the bad in everything. 

Another chapter that really caught my eye was chapter 5 The Size Instinct. This chapter goes into detail about some statistical numbers that seem astronomical but in the grand scheme of things with how many people there are in the world the number really isn’t that crazy. A prime example of this misconception is how the entire world has shut down for the coronavirus when so far it has only affected 3 millions people. 3 million people is a lot of people and the coronavirus is terrible and very contagious. There are 7 billion people in the world. The people affected by the coronavirus is only a slight fraction from how many people live on this earth. 

Chapter 6 describes how many people generalize groups of people or things to all be the same. Rosling describes in this chapter how people are tunnel visioned and make assumptions about people and things that they don’t know much about because put it in a category that might be a tad similar. Rosling says the best way to get out of the generalization instinct is to travel and meet people from other cultures. By doing this it will show how everyone is different in their own way you cannot clump a group together just because of one thing. 

After reading Factfulness it has given me the opportunity to look at the world differently. The book helps everyone who reads it fight our biases and look at the world through a different way. Factfulness also showed me how much the news just reports the bad things that are happening in the world. They do this because people are more drawn to the bad in the world than the good. Factfulness tries to show how the world can be good.