Last reviewed:
Hans Rosling
1948–2017
Swedish doctor and statistician, co-founder of Gapminder.
What they got right
He showed that most people's picture of the world is out of date and too gloomy, and taught simple habits for checking it against the data.
Skill it shows
Numbers and chance
Practise this skillAlso: Cognitive biases
The world cannot be understood without numbers. And it cannot be understood with numbers alone.
Worth knowing
Some critics say the book's optimism can understate risks such as climate change.
Try it yourself
Guess the share of the world's 1-year-olds vaccinated against measles. Then look it up. Were you too gloomy?