BACKWARDS

Anyone who wants to travel backwards needs to be prepared. 
It’s not enough to just look in the rearview mirror, even though everything back there looks familiar. 
What lies behind you – in terms of time – you’ve already lived through.
Which is why some enlightened souls ask: “Why the heck would I want to go back?”

Does this strange backwards tendency have something to do with that old dusty saying: “Things were better back then!” 
Even my parents reached for that phrase whenever the news got a bit too much.

Well, that sentence is easy to unravel and reduce to absurdity. 
Because what happened before is called history – it’s taught in schools, it’s available in libraries and online archives. 
Whether the information derived from it actually reaches the public is another matter entirely.

Nine years ago, Swedish physician Hans Rosling died. 
This man didn’t just treat patients – he fed his curiosity with statistics and then presented those statistics to the world in a way that was plausible, pointed, and genuinely fun. 
Hans Rosling explained events and forecasts with flair, wit, and a rare gift for seeing things from multiple angles.

“Factfulness” describes the practice of grounding yourself in facts to develop a clear and accurate picture of the world. 
In other words: actually looking at how people used to live. Once you do, the phrase “Things were better back then” turns to dust pretty quickly. 
Up in smoke!

Our human instincts have taken up an intense hobby. 
They regularly distort our perspectives in ways that have little in common with reality. The so-called “Gap Instinct” – along with nine others – splits the world and its population into opposing, irreconcilable camps.
Oh, damn.

Hans Rosling developed a way of thinking about how to overcome these distorting, dividing instincts – and how a fact-based view of the world makes us, if anything, wiser.

The Gap Instinct: The tendency to divide everything into two extreme categories. 
“Either/or. As if the world only had two colours.”
The Negativity Instinct: The focus on negative news, which distorts our perception of reality. 
"News is the exception to ordinary life."
The Straight Line Instinct: The assumption that a process follows a linear course without any major changes. 
“If you only look straight ahead, you’ll miss the curve.”
The Fear Instinct: An excessive focus on fears triggered by immediate physical and emotional stimuli. 
“When you’re afraid, you don’t think – you run.”
The Size Instinct: Misjudging the significance of a single event or fact without considering its scale within the wider context. 
“When the mouse gets inflated into an elephant.”
The Generalization Instinct: The tendency to generalise from a single element to the whole. 
“See? That’s how it always goes.”
The Destiny Instinct: The belief that certain cultures or countries possess unchanging characteristics. 
"Peoples grow. Clichés don’t."
The Single Perspective Instinct: The restriction to a single perspective and the neglect of other possible viewpoints. 
“If you only have one mirror, you only know one face.”
The Blame Instinct: The search for simple explanations or someone to blame for complex problems. 
"Fingerpointing is not cool.”
The Urgency Instinct: The feeling that it is necessary to act immediately, and perhaps hastily. 
“Think? There’s always time for that later.”

Dividing the world into classes is classic, but it is not right. 
Rosling argued that the categories of first, second, and third world are no longer relevant. 
Many countries once classified as “Third World” have made significant progress in economic development. 
And enormous improvements in education and healthcare across so-called developing nations have led to higher life expectancy and better quality of life.

Things were better back then?

Another common misconception: that women in developing countries are generally poorly educated. 
Rosling’s data showed the opposite. 
Women’s education levels are rising globally – with profoundly positive effects on their societies.

Things were better back then?

Rosling also dismantled the assumption that healthcare in poorer countries is universally poor. 
He showed that many countries have made substantial gains in medical care, even if they still lag behind wealthier nations.

Things were better back then?

Yes, it takes effort to want to be better and more accurately informed. 
But it’s time well spent. 
After all, who wants to spend years living with misinformation, clichés, and plain old wrong ideas?
No thanks.

With Gapminder you can fact-check many of those firmly held beliefs. 
The section “You are probably wrong about…” routinely delivers results that are genuinely surprising. 
And yes – based on facts.

Life was NOT better back then. Mostly.
Sorry.