Factfulness: Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think 

Answer these 4 questions:

  1. In all low-income countries in the world today, how many girls finish high school?

a.- 20%

b.- 40%

c.- 60%

  1. In the last 20 years, the proportion of the world’s population living in extreme poverty has…

a.- Almost doubled

b.- Remained more or less the same

c.- Almost halved

  1. How many of the world’s one-year-old children have been vaccinated against some disease?

a.- 20%

b.- 50%

c.- 80%

  1. Which geographical regions have the highest incidence of melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer?

a.- Those that have lots of sunlight

b.- Those that have moderate sunlight

c.- Those that have little sunlight

Someone left a copy of Factfulness by Hans Rosling in my office for me. I don’t know who it was, but I’m grateful.

It’s a book about a surprising problem: the enormous amount of ignorance about the answers to some very important questions. As Rosling points out, many of the “facts” that we accept as true and indisputable turn out to be false. And this is not a function of education. College grads prove themselves to be as ignorant as high school dropouts. In fact, monkeys do a better job of getting most of these important answers right. (I’m not kidding. Rosling has convincing evidence.)

I came upon this phenomenon about 15 years ago. Back then, you may remember, people were convinced that sun exposure was the cause of skin cancer and were doing everything they could to keep themselves and their children away from its rays. This didn’t make sense to me. The sun, after all, is the primary source of life. And as many studies have since proven, I was right to be skeptical. We now know that a healthy amount of sunlight each day promotes Vitamin D (more a hormone than a vitamin). And that wards off not only skin cancer but just about every other inflammation-related disease. (And, yes, geographical regions that get lots of sunlight have the lowest incidence of melanoma.)

Answers to the 4 questions, above:

  1. c
  2. c
  3. c
  4. c
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Inculpate (verb) – To inculpate (in-KUHL-pate) is to blame or accuse. As used by Germaine Greer: “Guilt is one side of a nasty triangle; the other two are shame and stigma. This grim coalition combines to inculpate women themselves of the crimes committed against them.”

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The Resistance Banker (Netflix) .- Set in Amsterdam during the German occupation, this film follows the brave work of Wally van Hall in establishing and running a secret underground bank to fund the resistance. Like Schindler’s List and Sophie’s Choice, it conveys the horror of the Nazi movement in a way that feels real. Not as the robotic, one-dimensional evil that’s so easy to reject, but in a subtler and more complicated way that has you asking yourself: “What would I do?” This is a good movie. It was nominated for an unprecedented 11 Golden Calvesat the 2018 Netherlands Film Festival and won four of them, including Best Feature Film and Best Actor.

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“Seattle Is Dying”.- When I was in my 20s, New York City was a shit hole. Except for a few uptown neighborhoods, you couldn’t walk for 10 minutes without stepping over a bum or being accosted by someone demanding money. Alleys smelled like urine. Eventually, the voters got tired of it and elected a mayor that hired a team of people that got tough on misdemeanors. Lots of tenderhearted people objected. You can’t arrest people for being crazy or homeless, they argued. Live and let be. Tough love was administered and the city gradually pulled itself out of its trough. Nowadays, NYC has one of the lowest crime rates per capita of any big city in the USA.

San Francisco used to be a beautiful city. About 15 years ago, things started to change. The last time I went there was about 5 years ago. It was such a dangerous place, I vowed I’d never go back again.

Next to San Francisco, Seattle is the city with the highest crime rate per capita, the filthiest streets, and the most homeless. And like San Francisco, Seattle’s policy of compassion towards the homeless is the principal cause. LINK

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