For fans of Freakonomics and Thinking, Fast and Slow, here is a book by Hans Rosling, the scientist called “a true inspiration” by Bill Gates, that teaches us how to see the world as it truly is. Factfulness: The stress-reducing habit of only carrying opinions for which you have strong supporting facts. When asked simple questions about global trends-what percentage of the world’s population live in poverty; why the world’s population is increasing; how many girls finish school-we systematically get the answers wrong. So wrong that a chimpanzee choosing answers at random will consistently outguess teachers, journalists, Nobel laureates, and investment bankers. In Factfulness, Professor of International Health and global TED phenomenon Hans Rosling, together with his two long-time collaborators, Anna and Ola, offers a radical new explanation of why this happens. They reveal the ten instincts that distort our perspective-from our tendency to divide the world into two camps (usually some version of us and them) to the way we consume media (where fear rules) to how we perceive progress (believing that most things are getting worse). Our problem is that we don’t know what we don’t know, and even our guesses are informed by unconscious and predictable biases. It turns out that the world, for all its imperfections, is in a much better state than we might think. That doesn’t mean there aren’t real concerns. But when we worry about everything all the time instead of embracing a worldview based on facts, we can lose our ability to focus on the things that threaten us most. Inspiring and revelatory, filled with lively anecdotes and moving stories, Factfulness is an urgent and essential book that will change the way you see the world and empower you to respond to the crises and opportunities of the future.

The moving, playful memoir of Hans Rosling, Swedish statistics mastermind, researcher extraordinaire and author of the global bestseller, Factfulness, with Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Ronnlund

This is a book that contains very few numbers. Instead, it is about meeting people who have opened my eyes.

It was facts that helped him explain how the world works. But it was curiosity and commitment that made the late Hans Rosling, author of the bestselling book Factfulness with Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Ronnlund, the most popular researcher of our time.

How I Learned to Understand the World is Hans Rosling’s own story of how he became a revolutionary thinker, and takes us from the swelter of an emergency clinic in Mozambique, to the World Economic Forum at Davos.

In collaboration with Swedish journalist Fanny Hargestam, Hans Rosling wrote his memoir with the same joy of storytelling that made a whole world listen when he spoke.

A Macmillan Audio production from Flatiron Books

“Filled with his signature warmth and wit, our late friend Hans Rosling’s memoir is an inspirational read about a life that touched so many. Hans’ work focused on data and research, but as this book makes clear, people were at the heart of his story. More than ever, our world needs the lessons Hans shares in these pages: to be guided by evidence and to live with optimism that we can make progress. This book provides a dose of hope in difficult times.” – Bill and Melinda Gates