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 6-7Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 6 Summary: “The Generalization Instinct”

After Rosling spent a day spent asking villagers in the remotest part of Africa about nutrition, the villagers cooked Rosling and his associate a grand dinner consisting of rat. For dessert, Rosling was served lightly fried larvae that appeared to be moving. Rosling’s associate, who was from Denmark, ate them without complaint. Unable to stomach the thought of eating the larvae, Rosling lied on the spot about how people from Denmark ate larvae but people from Sweden did not because it was against their culture. To prove his point, he showed on a map how the countries were divided by water, and the villagers happily ate the larvae for him. Rosling placed himself in one category (Swedish—unable to eat larvae) and his associate in another (Danish—able to eat larvae).

The human brain naturally categorizes and generalizes everything. This universal trait allowed Rosling to convince the villagers of a false difference between people from Denmark and Sweden. Categories “give structure to our thoughts” (146). Without categories, we would lack frameworks for ideas as well as ways to compare ideas. Generalization becomes a problem when it makes us group dissimilar things together or assume that every person/thing in a certain group is identical. Doing so leads us to conclude untruths about a group based on one sample, whether that sample is accurate or not.

Rosling offers several methods to control this instinct. Of greatest importance, he explains the factor that determines how people live is “not their religion, their culture, or the country they live in, but their income” (155). We cannot remove our brain’s need to categorize, but we can find more accurate categories, such as the 4-level income system. Rosling stresses the importance of avoiding stereotypes and sweeping generalizations. Our “normal” is not the “normal” everywhere and doing things differently does not make people stupid. Keeping these notions in mind helps combat the urge to overgeneralize and do more harm than good: “Sweeping generalizations can easily hide behind good intentions” (164).

Chapter 7 Summary: “The Destiny Instinct”

Rosling opens this chapter with a story from a lecture he gave on how Asia and Africa’s economies are thriving. He presented statistics on the factors that allow countries to improve (education, healthcare, etc.) and showed how these improvements were already happening in Asia and Africa. When he finished, a man from the audience who had served in Nigeria years ago approached Rosling to tell him that Africa would never make it because “their” culture “will not allow them to create a modern society” (167).

The destiny instinct is the idea that things “have always been this way and will never change” (167). This instinct keeps humans from seeing or accepting that the world can (and has) changed. Evolutionarily, this instinct makes sense. Humans once survived by learning how something worked and not forgetting that crucial knowledge. Again, the world has changed, but our brains have not.

The greatest weapon against the destiny instinct is to realize slow movement is still movement. Change sometimes occurs too slowly to see, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening: “Societies and cultures are in constant movement” (179). Studying a culture’s history allows us to see the slow change over a long period of time. We can carry that knowledge forward and remain open-minded. Updating our worldview requires being able and willing to do so.

Chapters 6-7 Analysis

Chapter 6 shows us that, like fear, generalizing and categorizing can be a useful tool, and not just for avoiding a plate of larvae. While we need categories to understand the world, the danger comes when we overcategorize. Placing everyone from a certain race, religion, or culture in a box causes us to believe everyone from a given place is the same. When combined with extremes, this idea leads to stereotypes; though stereotypes are often true, they are incomplete in their depictions of people. Based on a percentage of a population, we believe all Swedes can’t eat larvae or all white people are racist or any other number of harmful untruths. What’s true in a given situation with special circumstances may not be true in the same situation without that very specific condition. Rosling could not eat the larvae, but his resistance had nothing to do with being Swedish. Any other Swede might have eaten the larvae without complaint. If taken to an extreme, Rosling’s lie has the potential to start a widespread belief that all Swedes cannot eat larvae because of their culture.

The destiny instinct stifled the man at Rosling’s presentation who saw Nigeria at one point in its history and believed the country and the entire continent in which it is located could never change. Despite fact-based evidence to the contrary, this man’s image of Africa remained fixed. His inability and unwillingness to change show how the destiny instinct stalls progress. When we believe something cannot change, we give up on it because we see no point in wasting resources on a lost cause. The man’s attitude also illustrates the danger of single data points. He had only one point of reference in regard to a single country but assumed the future of an entire continent.

The destiny instinct causes the outdated worldview to run unchecked. We want to believe we understand the world because to think otherwise frightens us. So we cling to what we “know” as “fact,” even when our facts have not been true for decades. Updated information challenges our tentative hold on understanding. When circumstances change, we must either accept or reject the new information. Choosing to believe things cannot change allows us to feel safe. If we think Africa can’t change, we convince ourselves life won’t change where we are, and we can continue living our lives without fear of the unknown.