Factfulness

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2018

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Introduction-Chapter 1

Chapters 2-3

Chapters 4-5

Chapters 6-7

Chapters 8-9

Chapters 10-11

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Chapters 10-11Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 10 Summary: “The Urgency Instinct”

While working in Mozambique, Rosling came across a disease he couldn’t identify. It may have been food poisoning, but it could have just as easily been a contagious illness with the potential for rapid spread. Out of caution, he advised the mayor to set up a roadblock and stop the buses to the city. Later that day, Rosling discovered that dead mothers and children were being pulled from the sea. When the buses stopped, the people sought alternative transport to the city. They piled into fishing boats that were not equipped to support extra passengers. The boats capsized, and the women and children, unable to swim, drowned, all because of the roadblock.

The urgency instinct “makes us want to take immediate action in the face of a perceived imminent danger” (227). The important part of this definition is “perceived.” The danger may not be real, but this instinct convinces our brains we must take drastic and immediate action to avoid a catastrophe. If you are in the path of an oncoming car, this instinct will save your life. However, in most cases, rushing decisions can lead to unforeseen consequences that are worse than what is being avoided.

Rosling points to deceiving data as a leading cause for activating this instinct. He stresses the importance of choosing the data we view and remembering that “[o]nly relevant and accurate data is useful” (242). Pausing to think before making decisions helps to curb the need to act urgently. By doing so, we realize things are not as dire as we initially believed and that the predictions we hear are only guesses.

Chapter 11 Summary: “Factfulness in Practice”

Rosling begins this chapter by showing factfulness in action. In 1989, he traveled to a remote village in what is now known as the Democratic Republic of Congo to collect blood samples for a vaccine against the konzo virus. The villagers, with their overdramatic worldviews, believed Rosling to be a bumbling European who was trying to trick them into giving him their blood in exchange for nothing. One woman stepped out of the crowd, presented the facts in a clear way, and defused the tension, allowing Rosling to take the samples he needed. This woman, uneducated and likely illiterate, was able to “think critically and express herself with razor-sharp logic and perfect rhetoric at a moment of extreme tension” (247). She practiced factfulness, and if she can do it, Rosling argues anyone can.

Factfulness does not require education, money, rank, or success. It requires releasing the instincts outlined throughout this book to view the world from a place of open-minded calm, rather than a place of anger or fear. To approach the world this way, children should be taught humility so that they are aware of the limitations of their knowledge and so they are willing to change opinions when presented with new information. As well, children should learn to be curious and to actively seeking out new information so that mistakes “trigger curiosity instead of embarrassment” (249).

Rosling ends with a message to readers: he encourages readers to expand their knowledge without fear and to admit where their information has holes. He believes a worldwide mindset of factfulness will take time and that it is possible because factfulness is less stressful to us and much more useful. When humans understand the world, we can see progress and “what we have to do to keep making it better” (255).

Chapters 10-11 Analysis

Rosling points out that the urgency instinct directly causes our overdramatic worldview. When triggered, the instinct makes us believe that circumstances are terrible and that we must do something to avoid catastrophe. Urgency triggers our fear instinct. We make decisions without thinking about the ramifications. For Rosling, a decision he made too quickly and without thoughtful consideration led directly to the deaths of men, women, and children; urgency made him too afraid to not take action. As it turned out, there was no contagious disease, only food poisoning. Rosling’s drastic action ended up being unnecessary, and lives were lost for nothing.

The activists Rosling discusses in Chapter 8 trigger our urgency instinct. According to Rosling, activists often make immediate action the only option that will have an effect; for example, if we don’t donate, volunteer, or otherwise act now, the chance to help is lost. The urgency instinct triggers the single perspective instinct, causing us to fixate on what we believe must be done right this moment. Combined, these instincts make us lose sight of progress. In Chapter 2, Rosling identified progress as a slow-moving phenomenon too small to overcome our negativity instinct. We want to see positive change or believe our actions make a difference. To overcome the negativity instinct, we act with urgency, often negating the positive change we are so eager to see.

The woman in Chapter 11 shows how factfulness can and does work. Rosling’s presence in the village triggered fear in the villagers. Their fear caused them to think negatively, fixate on why they believed (rather than the actual reason) Rosling was there, and prompted them to take urgent action to protect themselves. After listening to Rosling’s logic about konzo and a vaccine and after having seen how konzo affected the children, the woman formed a fact-based view of the situation and communicated it to the other villagers in a way as to dispel drama. As a resident of a Level 1 country, this woman likely had limited access to formal education, showing that advanced education is not required to understand factfulness. Just as the dramatic instincts reside in our brains, so does the ability to think past them and be informed.

Rosling estimates a universal fact-based worldview will take time and be slow progress. As shown in Chapter 2, we have limited patience for change that lacks visible evidence, and so, the gradual progression from drama to fact works against our ability to achieve a fact-based worldview. The negativity instinct makes us believe our efforts are pointless, which then triggers our other instincts. Urgency and fear make us act without thought, further halting our progress. Destiny affirms we cannot change because we have always thought dramatically. We search for something or someone to blame for our lack of progress, not realizing or admitting there’s no one to blame but our own failing mental systems. Factfulness requires ongoing work, and we must approach it from a place of calm logic for it to take effect.