In this video, I’ll ask you three questions from Hans Rosling’s ignorance test to see
if you are smarter than a chimpanzee.
The Swedish academic, Hans Rosling was not only an accomplished physician and statistician
but a fine public speaker as well.
His presentation on “The best stats you’ve ever seen” is my favourite TED Talk of all-time
and shows him at his gifted best, mixing humour with visual animations to produce something
both educational and entertaining.
Using facts rather than opinion, he bought statistics to life and left you feeling more
positive and optimistic with his debunking of myths and proof of the human race improving
over time.
Rosling said that the idea you can split the world into two types of countries, developed
and developing, is outdated and wrong.
“Are the UK, Germany and the USA not still developing?” he said.
Is your world view correct?
How much do you know about the world?
You can check by taking Hans Rosling’s ignorance test.
Question 1.
What percentage of the world's one-year old children is vaccinated against measles?
a) Approximately 20% b) Approximately 50%
c) Approximately 80% Questions 2.
In 1950 there were fewer than one billion children (aged 0-14) in the world.
By 2000 there were almost two billion.
How many do UN experts think there will be in 2100?
a) 4 billion b) 3 billion
c) 2 billion Question 3.
In the last 20 years the proportion of the world population living in extreme poverty
has… a) Doubled
b) Stayed the same c) Halved
The answer to each of these three questions is c).
These questions were asked in various countries around the world and the results were not
good.
For almost every question in every country, the correct answer was chosen by the least
amount of people.
In fact, in many cases the amount of correct answers was lower than it would have been
if a chimpanzee had answered the question, picking an answer at random because they have
no knowledge.
So do you lack knowledge if you got the answers to the ignorance test wrong?
No, not necessarily.
When you score worse than random, i.e. in this case 33% or less, it means you have preconceived
ideas.
The problem is not a lack of knowledge in the subject, it’s these ideas.
A preconceived idea is an opinion formed beforehand without adequate evidence.
For example, many people generalise Africa, treating the entire continent the same way,
rather than judging each country on its own merits.
When it comes to Asia, you wouldn’t say, “I’m not going on holiday to Thailand
because there’s a war in Afghanistan”.
Not all the countries in Africa are progressing at the same rate.
In some growth is up and child mortality is going down, something truly worth noting.
Kenya’s economic growth is over 5%, by comparison the UK’s is only 2%.
So why do you have these preconceived ideas?
Firstly, slow, steady changes are not deemed news-worthy and are therefore not as well
reported as other more shocking stories.
The average number of children born per woman across the world is now 2.4.
Back in 1963, it was five.
As a result, the number of children in the world has stopped increasing.
This is one of the biggest events in the history of mankind and it has been pretty much completely
missed by the media.
Secondly, in a fast-changing world, many of the things you were taught at school may now
be outdated.
Finally, many people generalise their personal experiences, which can be very biased.
A fact-based worldview, fights ignorance.
We need to start acting based on facts to help us understand the world and better benefit
from it.