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Ten Global Trends That Every Smart Person Needs to Know: And Many Other Trends You Will Find Interesting
"I would say that learning this material … has lifted some of the existential weight from me. Things aren't as bad as they are trumpeted to be. In fact, they're quite a bit better, and they're getting better, and so we're doing a better job than we thought. There's more to us than we thought. We're adopting our responsibilities as stewards of the planet rapidly. We are moving towards improving everyone's life." ―Jordan B. Peterson, Beyond 12 More Rules for Life
Think the world is getting worse? You're the world is, for the most part, is getting better. But 58 percent of people in 17 countries that were surveyed in 2016 thought the world is either getting worse or staying the same rather than getting better. Americans were even more 65 percent thought the world is getting worse and only 6 percent thought it was getting better. The uncontroversial data on major global trends in this book will persuade you that this dark view of the prospects for humanity and the natural world is, in large part, badly mistaken. World population will peak at 8 to 9 billion before the end of this century as the global fertility rate continues its fall from 6 children per woman in 1960 to the current rate of 2.4. The global absolute poverty rate has fallen from 42 percent in 1981 to 8.6 percent today. Satellite data show that forest area has been expanding since 1982. Natural resources are becoming ever cheaper and more abundant. Since 1900, the average life expectancy has more than doubled, reaching more than 72 years. Of course, major concerns such as climate change, marine plastic pollution, and declining wildlife populations are still with us, but many of these problems are already in the process of being ameliorated as a result of the favorable economic, social, and technological trends that are documented in this book. You can't fix what is wrong in the world if you don't know what's actually happening. Ten Global Trends Every Smart Person Should Know will provide busy people with quick-to-read, easily understandable, and entertaining access to surprising facts that they need to know about how the world is really faring.
Think the world is getting worse? You're the world is, for the most part, is getting better. But 58 percent of people in 17 countries that were surveyed in 2016 thought the world is either getting worse or staying the same rather than getting better. Americans were even more 65 percent thought the world is getting worse and only 6 percent thought it was getting better. The uncontroversial data on major global trends in this book will persuade you that this dark view of the prospects for humanity and the natural world is, in large part, badly mistaken. World population will peak at 8 to 9 billion before the end of this century as the global fertility rate continues its fall from 6 children per woman in 1960 to the current rate of 2.4. The global absolute poverty rate has fallen from 42 percent in 1981 to 8.6 percent today. Satellite data show that forest area has been expanding since 1982. Natural resources are becoming ever cheaper and more abundant. Since 1900, the average life expectancy has more than doubled, reaching more than 72 years. Of course, major concerns such as climate change, marine plastic pollution, and declining wildlife populations are still with us, but many of these problems are already in the process of being ameliorated as a result of the favorable economic, social, and technological trends that are documented in this book. You can't fix what is wrong in the world if you don't know what's actually happening. Ten Global Trends Every Smart Person Should Know will provide busy people with quick-to-read, easily understandable, and entertaining access to surprising facts that they need to know about how the world is really faring.
160 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews
January 5, 2021
If you ask people whether the world is getting better or worse, most people will say worse. This book completely refutes that. Compared to 50 or 60 or 80 years ago (and before) the human race is much better off. We are wealthier, healthier, and eat better. We have fewer wars and live longer. This is true for all kinds of people in all parts of the world. To take one example, the COVID vaccine was perfected in just a few months. It used to take years to develop vaccines. In the middle of the twentieth century, every child caught chicken pox, measles, mumps, whooping cough, and many got polio. In today's world no child should ever catch any of these. Go back a little further and many people caught tuberculosis or small pox. These diseases have been essentially eradicated. In addition, many inventions we take for granted today didn't exist a few years ago, including the internet, cell phones, and Netflix. Who could live today without streaming video? So thank your lucky stars you live in today's world.
September 26, 2020
Pessimists should read!
If you are not an optimist before reading the book, you will be. There is incredibleEvidence that the world is getting better not worse. Even in these trying times.
If you are not an optimist before reading the book, you will be. There is incredibleEvidence that the world is getting better not worse. Even in these trying times.
January 31, 2021
One of the most aesthetically pleasing and informative books I have ever handled. This information-dense volume is divided into chapters by themes (Top 10, People, Health, Violence, Work, Natural Resource, Tech, and U.S.). Each chapter is a series of two-page spreads with a clear, cited graph on the right-hand side and a textual explanation on the left. The data sources are consistently reputable (e.g. World Bank, European Commission Joint Research Center, UN Food and Agriculture Organization, etc.) and the trends are overwhelmingly positive.
I watched David Attenborough's A Life on This Planet just before reading this book and the contrasting analysis, let alone data, could scarcely be more stark. It is fascinating to me that a selective analysis of data can lead to drastically disparate conclusions. Whereas Attenborough predicts that the end is neigh, Bailey suggests that life is improving in a myriad of ways. The two don't even agree on population. Whereas Attenborough suggests that population will keep rising and destroy the planet, Bailey provides multiple reliable sources that conservatively suggest a peaking of world population around 8.9 billion by 2060 and a decline to about 7.7 billion by 2100. They clarify that Attenborough's numbers are based on a model that does not adequately correct for the strong, consistent decline in fertility as levels of education and prosperity rise, especially among women.
Perhaps most striking is that the majority of the data presented in Ten Global Trends run counter to popular beliefs, which are based not on alarmist news headlines rather than methodical data analysis.
I watched David Attenborough's A Life on This Planet just before reading this book and the contrasting analysis, let alone data, could scarcely be more stark. It is fascinating to me that a selective analysis of data can lead to drastically disparate conclusions. Whereas Attenborough predicts that the end is neigh, Bailey suggests that life is improving in a myriad of ways. The two don't even agree on population. Whereas Attenborough suggests that population will keep rising and destroy the planet, Bailey provides multiple reliable sources that conservatively suggest a peaking of world population around 8.9 billion by 2060 and a decline to about 7.7 billion by 2100. They clarify that Attenborough's numbers are based on a model that does not adequately correct for the strong, consistent decline in fertility as levels of education and prosperity rise, especially among women.
Perhaps most striking is that the majority of the data presented in Ten Global Trends run counter to popular beliefs, which are based not on alarmist news headlines rather than methodical data analysis.
October 15, 2020
Outstanding book. A series of 3-4 page, data-driven summaries of 78 trends. A key lesson is to evaluate an issue over a sufficiently long period of time and using appropriate data measures. Doing so solves two problems. First, a longer time horizon provides context: a short-term downward trend does not become the whole story (nor does a short term positive one). Further, appropriate analysis allows one to more correctly identify causes, effects, and sources of improvement. Excellent data-driven analysis in this book. I was pleasantly surprised to see some of what authors Bailey and Tupy uncovered and presented in their well-written book.
June 13, 2021
If you have one of those ever-pessimistic, capitalism hating, "the end is nigh" type of horrible people around you, hit them with this book, hard.
February 24, 2023
Great presentation of global trends over the past few centuries!
May 6, 2021
Fascinating and surprising. A tiny percentage of Americans actually think things are getting better, but Bailey and Tupy show that on many metrics things are actually improving. The book is an absolute death blow to the frequent calls for revolution, and provides strong support for the hope that incremental change is a better path forward.
October 25, 2020
TEN GLOBAL TENDS: Every Smart Person Should Know & many others you will find interesting | Ronald Bailey & Marian Tupy, Cato Institute, p196.
"Always look on the bright side of life," is both an ironic Monty Python skit and decent life advice. Following this quip, two researchers compiled this book: part coffee table book, part line graph porn, fully data-laden, and very optimistic.
They argue that to fix problems, you need an accurate assessment of reality. The news won’t provide it. Data does. Additionally, most people are psychologically wired to give greater importance to the negative trends than the positive ones (I certainly do). It's a survivor's instinct, as they say.
These data nerds categorize reality by people, health, violence, work, natural resource, US, farm, and tech trends. They find, in most ways, things are improving. They start with a top 10 trend list:
1. The Great Enrichment: World GDP and wealth is booming.
2. The End of Poverty: Two hundred years ago, 84% of the world lived in poverty; today, 8.6%.
3. Resource abundance: Access to nonrenewable resources has increased.
4. We're close to peak population (maxing out @ 10 billion, circa 2070.
5. The End of Famine: Worldwide food supply is at about 2,962 calories per person per day.
6. More Land for Nature: Since 1982, the world has added 865,000 square miles of forest; forest gains are net greater than losses.
7. Planet City: Cities tend to be hubs of innovation, and the population is concentrating in the urban landscape.
8. Democracy on the March: Countries qualifying as full-fledged democracies rose by 49% while autocracies declined 39%.
9. The Long Peace: Intrastate wars on declining.
10. A Safer World: Deaths from natural disasters has plummeted.
They have 78 trends in total. Yes, some are worth quibbling in how they splice the data or choose a measuring stick. But all in all, it's a robust set of concrete proofs. Sadly, good news isn't good, clickbait.
"Always look on the bright side of life," is both an ironic Monty Python skit and decent life advice. Following this quip, two researchers compiled this book: part coffee table book, part line graph porn, fully data-laden, and very optimistic.
They argue that to fix problems, you need an accurate assessment of reality. The news won’t provide it. Data does. Additionally, most people are psychologically wired to give greater importance to the negative trends than the positive ones (I certainly do). It's a survivor's instinct, as they say.
These data nerds categorize reality by people, health, violence, work, natural resource, US, farm, and tech trends. They find, in most ways, things are improving. They start with a top 10 trend list:
1. The Great Enrichment: World GDP and wealth is booming.
2. The End of Poverty: Two hundred years ago, 84% of the world lived in poverty; today, 8.6%.
3. Resource abundance: Access to nonrenewable resources has increased.
4. We're close to peak population (maxing out @ 10 billion, circa 2070.
5. The End of Famine: Worldwide food supply is at about 2,962 calories per person per day.
6. More Land for Nature: Since 1982, the world has added 865,000 square miles of forest; forest gains are net greater than losses.
7. Planet City: Cities tend to be hubs of innovation, and the population is concentrating in the urban landscape.
8. Democracy on the March: Countries qualifying as full-fledged democracies rose by 49% while autocracies declined 39%.
9. The Long Peace: Intrastate wars on declining.
10. A Safer World: Deaths from natural disasters has plummeted.
They have 78 trends in total. Yes, some are worth quibbling in how they splice the data or choose a measuring stick. But all in all, it's a robust set of concrete proofs. Sadly, good news isn't good, clickbait.
December 14, 2020
This should be required reading.
October 27, 2020
Ten Global Trends EVERYONE should know.
A very well written and documented presentation regarding key elements of our world today. None of the fatalism so often presented by the mainstream media.
A very well written and documented presentation regarding key elements of our world today. None of the fatalism so often presented by the mainstream media.
November 21, 2020
In a time when so many things seem dire, it’s refreshing to see just how many important trends are improving, in the US and across the world. This book by Cato Institute is factual, supported by research and, most notably, gorgeous. A coffee-table book from a think tank - that too is refreshing.
October 9, 2021
Too much of a coffee table book with data for chosen topics proving that the world as a whole is doing well and making progress. In my mind, statistics can be chosen to prove anything, it depends on how you present them.
February 22, 2023
The book covers many (100-ish) global trends that clearly show how much better life on earth is, it is similar to Factfulness but lacks a bit of explanation of the trends and their wider implications.
The book felt like a list of facts and graphs and that's it. It could be better.
The book felt like a list of facts and graphs and that's it. It could be better.
November 24, 2020
Very interesting data a perspective on the world! The state of the world may not be a bad as we often tend to think it is...
January 3, 2023
This is a fantastic and realistic look at the world as it is. The authors find that things aren’t as bad as a lot of people think they are and that a lot of the fears that people had about the world and the future 50 years ago, like overpopulation, famines, resource depletion, etc., simply have not come to pass and why that is. They provide the data and the references to support their findings. The book is a helpful antidote to the castrophism and hand-wringing that accompanies so much economic and environmental policy debate.
The authors describe 10 overarching trends, but they actually go on to address 78 global trends in various categories ranging from people, violence, natural resources, and technology to health, work, and farming. Here are the 10 overall trends that give the book its name:
1. The great enrichment. The world’s economy has grown more than 100-fold in the past 200 years while the population has grown less than 8 times in that period. More people have more money, and that trend is projected to continue as the world economy grows further. By 2100, the world economy will be around $1.1 quadrillion.
2. The end of poverty. With the current economic trend, poverty will be eliminated. Two hundred years ago, almost 80% of the world’s population lived in poverty. In 2018, the world poverty rate had declined to 8.6% and continues to further decline as the world economy grows.
3. Are we running out of resources? In an analysis of the supply and demand for commodities, the authors measured the prices of 50 basic commodities ranging from metals and materials to food and energy. They found that over the last 200 years, the prices of 43 of those commodities, adjusted for inflation, had declined by 36.3% due to greater abundance and availability of those commodities. Two commodities were roughly the same price and only five commodities had increased in price due to greater demand or less availability.
4. Peak population. The world’s population is currently projected to peak in 2080 at 9.8 billion people and then fall to 9.5 billion people by 2100 as economic growth, technology, and rising education rates lowers overall global fertility rates.
5. The end of famine. Due to substantially increased agricultural productivity over the last 50 years, the global average caloric intake has increased to 2962 calories per day. People need an average of 2200 to 2800 calories per day. Today, most famines have disappeared outside of war zones.
6. More land for nature. Global tree cover has substantially increased by 2.2 million square kilometers since 1982 due to less demand for agricultural land. Tree cover is currently expanding around the world except in Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay.
7. Planet city. The authors state that urbanization is a driver of innovation, economic growth, and the richest segments of the population. Two hundred years ago, approximately 80-90% of the world’s population lived in rural areas and worked in agriculture. Currently, about 55% of the world’s population lives in an urban area and, by 2100, this is expected to rise to around 85%.
8. Democracy on the march. As measured by an index created by the Center for Systemic Peace, the number of countries that qualified as a liberal democracy has risen from 31% in 1989 to 49% today. Autocracies have declined from 39% to 11%. Countries with both democratic and autocratic characteristics rose from 30% to 39%.
9. The long peace. Over the past half century, wars between countries have become rarer, and those that do occur kill fewer people.
10. A safer world. People are much more likely to survive a natural disaster, such as an earthquake or a hurricane, due to increased wealth and technological progress.
The authors offer lots of interesting and insightful data and commentary. It provides a hopeful look to the future of mankind and completely upends a lot of what I was taught in my 9th grade geography class back in 1979, which was full of doom and gloom for the future.
Nonetheless, while I have learned never to take counsel from my fears, human behavior is notoriously difficult to predict, and we should never underestimate our capacity to mess things up. For instance, the current Russia-Ukraine conflict now has the possibility of upending several of the authors’ assumptions of continued trend lines should that conflict become nuclear. Hopefully, it does not, and wiser heads prevail.
The authors describe 10 overarching trends, but they actually go on to address 78 global trends in various categories ranging from people, violence, natural resources, and technology to health, work, and farming. Here are the 10 overall trends that give the book its name:
1. The great enrichment. The world’s economy has grown more than 100-fold in the past 200 years while the population has grown less than 8 times in that period. More people have more money, and that trend is projected to continue as the world economy grows further. By 2100, the world economy will be around $1.1 quadrillion.
2. The end of poverty. With the current economic trend, poverty will be eliminated. Two hundred years ago, almost 80% of the world’s population lived in poverty. In 2018, the world poverty rate had declined to 8.6% and continues to further decline as the world economy grows.
3. Are we running out of resources? In an analysis of the supply and demand for commodities, the authors measured the prices of 50 basic commodities ranging from metals and materials to food and energy. They found that over the last 200 years, the prices of 43 of those commodities, adjusted for inflation, had declined by 36.3% due to greater abundance and availability of those commodities. Two commodities were roughly the same price and only five commodities had increased in price due to greater demand or less availability.
4. Peak population. The world’s population is currently projected to peak in 2080 at 9.8 billion people and then fall to 9.5 billion people by 2100 as economic growth, technology, and rising education rates lowers overall global fertility rates.
5. The end of famine. Due to substantially increased agricultural productivity over the last 50 years, the global average caloric intake has increased to 2962 calories per day. People need an average of 2200 to 2800 calories per day. Today, most famines have disappeared outside of war zones.
6. More land for nature. Global tree cover has substantially increased by 2.2 million square kilometers since 1982 due to less demand for agricultural land. Tree cover is currently expanding around the world except in Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay.
7. Planet city. The authors state that urbanization is a driver of innovation, economic growth, and the richest segments of the population. Two hundred years ago, approximately 80-90% of the world’s population lived in rural areas and worked in agriculture. Currently, about 55% of the world’s population lives in an urban area and, by 2100, this is expected to rise to around 85%.
8. Democracy on the march. As measured by an index created by the Center for Systemic Peace, the number of countries that qualified as a liberal democracy has risen from 31% in 1989 to 49% today. Autocracies have declined from 39% to 11%. Countries with both democratic and autocratic characteristics rose from 30% to 39%.
9. The long peace. Over the past half century, wars between countries have become rarer, and those that do occur kill fewer people.
10. A safer world. People are much more likely to survive a natural disaster, such as an earthquake or a hurricane, due to increased wealth and technological progress.
The authors offer lots of interesting and insightful data and commentary. It provides a hopeful look to the future of mankind and completely upends a lot of what I was taught in my 9th grade geography class back in 1979, which was full of doom and gloom for the future.
Nonetheless, while I have learned never to take counsel from my fears, human behavior is notoriously difficult to predict, and we should never underestimate our capacity to mess things up. For instance, the current Russia-Ukraine conflict now has the possibility of upending several of the authors’ assumptions of continued trend lines should that conflict become nuclear. Hopefully, it does not, and wiser heads prevail.
December 14, 2021
This is an important book discussion important ideas. What's more, they're attractively presented. This is the kind of book you could proudly leave on your coffee table to spark conversation with your family or houseguests. And unlike many books of statistics, nothing here is dry or needlessly complicated. Rather, everything is simply and elegantly presented. Simply flipping through the pages, you'll find numerous graphs (each filling one page) opposite text offering some further commentary or explanation of the graph. However, the data visualizations really tell the story as much as (or even more than) the text itself.
And the story is an important one: in general, things are getting better. Not everything, not at a steady pace, but on the average, there's a lot of good news. Of course, some of the individual trends identified by the authors as good news might not be universally praised as such. For example, two of the trends identify increased urbanization around the world and decreased capital punishment. The data are clear and well documented--these are genuine trends. Whether one finds city life appealing or whether one favors capital punishment may be more controversial.
However, even with that caveat in mind, the vast majority of the trends identified in the book ought to be universally acknowledged as good things--decreased cancer deaths, increased nutrition, decreased infant mortality, increased literacy, and so on.
If one were to nitpick, of course one could say that some of the trends are far more complicated than the book allows. This is absolutely true. While some of the trends are fairly straightforward, there are those with nuances not captured by the book's brief presentation. Even still, the authors did a good job of documenting their sources, so those interested in the trends could easily follow up. And we need to remember that this isn't meant to be a work of detailed scholarship. That kind of book has its place, but such technical works will often fail to reach the wider audience targeted by this book. Instead, this is meant to demonstrate trends in broad strokes and to spark conversations, and I think it will absolutely succeed in that endeavor.
As a physical artifact, the book is a thing of beauty. Printed in full color on high-quality paper, the book feels good in the hands and the graphs really stand out. As "coffee table books" go, it's a little on the small side, and the tradeoff there is that the written portion of the book (interesting and important, though arguably less so than the graphs) is a bit small and might be a bit of a strain for some people to read.
Ultimately, I feel like the book could have benefitted from being a little larger, a little longer, and a little more detailed with regard to the nuances of a few of its topics. But these are very minor complaints. I wholeheartedly recommend the book and consider it near-required reading for anyone interested in the state of the world.
And the story is an important one: in general, things are getting better. Not everything, not at a steady pace, but on the average, there's a lot of good news. Of course, some of the individual trends identified by the authors as good news might not be universally praised as such. For example, two of the trends identify increased urbanization around the world and decreased capital punishment. The data are clear and well documented--these are genuine trends. Whether one finds city life appealing or whether one favors capital punishment may be more controversial.
However, even with that caveat in mind, the vast majority of the trends identified in the book ought to be universally acknowledged as good things--decreased cancer deaths, increased nutrition, decreased infant mortality, increased literacy, and so on.
If one were to nitpick, of course one could say that some of the trends are far more complicated than the book allows. This is absolutely true. While some of the trends are fairly straightforward, there are those with nuances not captured by the book's brief presentation. Even still, the authors did a good job of documenting their sources, so those interested in the trends could easily follow up. And we need to remember that this isn't meant to be a work of detailed scholarship. That kind of book has its place, but such technical works will often fail to reach the wider audience targeted by this book. Instead, this is meant to demonstrate trends in broad strokes and to spark conversations, and I think it will absolutely succeed in that endeavor.
As a physical artifact, the book is a thing of beauty. Printed in full color on high-quality paper, the book feels good in the hands and the graphs really stand out. As "coffee table books" go, it's a little on the small side, and the tradeoff there is that the written portion of the book (interesting and important, though arguably less so than the graphs) is a bit small and might be a bit of a strain for some people to read.
Ultimately, I feel like the book could have benefitted from being a little larger, a little longer, and a little more detailed with regard to the nuances of a few of its topics. But these are very minor complaints. I wholeheartedly recommend the book and consider it near-required reading for anyone interested in the state of the world.
July 23, 2021
Some time ago, I had come across several TedTalks (one by Steven Pinker and one by Jonathan Haidt) whose premise is the same as this book: Despite the fact that most people believe the world is getting worse, the world has actually gotten exponentially better (in many but not all respects) in the past 200 years. I was not only interested but also deeply convinced by the validity of this premise, as I personally witnessed people close to me who are entirely clueless about how the world used to be just a few hundred years ago, and how rapidly things have improved (at least by standards of modern liberal ideology) in such a short period of time. Sometime later, I was given this book as a gift by a person who knew perfectly well how interested I was in this premise, and I am happy to say that it is a great book that I highly recommend everyone to read. The great thing about this book is that each trend has its respective graph, which makes it easier to visualize statistics as well as flip to a given page depending on what trend you are looking for. It is also a great book to have displayed around the house in case you have guests!
December 28, 2022
A lot of people live in a constant state of anxiety and depression because of the negative, false and often dramatic image they have of the world. They will tell you the world is in decline, war and death is everywhere, cancer is winning, we are killing ourselves at work, and climate change will eradicate the human race. Everything is way worse than before.
But when you read this book and collect a few facts you'll soon realize that 100 years ago, half your family would already be dead, including your children, we have never had so much holidays, and we get better every day at curing cancer and many other diseases, etc.
Obviously, some chart are designed to show the data in a positive fashion. Even though they always write a disclaimer, some graphs could have been made more clear so that the fine prints don't have to be read to figure out the truth. Some statistics are adjusted by GDP which is not always the best metric for adjustment.
But when you read this book and collect a few facts you'll soon realize that 100 years ago, half your family would already be dead, including your children, we have never had so much holidays, and we get better every day at curing cancer and many other diseases, etc.
Obviously, some chart are designed to show the data in a positive fashion. Even though they always write a disclaimer, some graphs could have been made more clear so that the fine prints don't have to be read to figure out the truth. Some statistics are adjusted by GDP which is not always the best metric for adjustment.
May 22, 2022
This book’s title is click bait. After watching the video about this topic and being advertised this book, I assumed there would be more detail in it. However each of the top 10 trends only had a 2 page spread about it. The same was true for each of the following 68 trends. For a book titled at the 10 global trends, you’d think that’d make up the majority. I’m not sure this book is really geared to smart people. While it would make an interesting coffee table book, smart people may have more targeted questions about the data, analysis, and larger scope of the trends outlined. I will continue to follow real time updates for the Human Progress. Meant well by the intent but poor execution in a book.
June 4, 2023
Absolutely fantastic. This small coffee table-style book is composed of 87 charts illustrating a different global trend, with a page of text for each that explains it. You would be forgiven for thinking that the world is getting demonstrably worse in a variety of metrics, but this book will leave you glowing with encouragement. Here are just a few to consider:
Global poverty has dropped significantly
Nutrition and global food supplies are up
Natural resources are increasing
CO2 is down drastically
Tree coverage around the world is growing, not shrinking
Natural disaster deaths are at record lows
Energy costs are at record lows
Global literacy and education are at record highs
And many more.
Keep this in your back pocket for any discussion of the state of the world.
Global poverty has dropped significantly
Nutrition and global food supplies are up
Natural resources are increasing
CO2 is down drastically
Tree coverage around the world is growing, not shrinking
Natural disaster deaths are at record lows
Energy costs are at record lows
Global literacy and education are at record highs
And many more.
Keep this in your back pocket for any discussion of the state of the world.
August 22, 2021
3.5/5
A refreshing read amidst a storm of negative news. Poverty and world hunger are in a sharp decline, life expectancy is on the rise, and so much more to cheer for. More technically, I appreciated that the authors provided citations to high-level scientific studies. However, as is often the case, I felt that the authors did not escape their ideological bias as free marketeers. In particular, on a couple of occasions, data were normalized in a somewhat debatable fashion. For instance, instead of plotting the rise in carbon dioxide, the authors only plotted the decline in carbon dioxide normalized by GDP. Why not simply plot both?
Anyways, let science show us the way!
A refreshing read amidst a storm of negative news. Poverty and world hunger are in a sharp decline, life expectancy is on the rise, and so much more to cheer for. More technically, I appreciated that the authors provided citations to high-level scientific studies. However, as is often the case, I felt that the authors did not escape their ideological bias as free marketeers. In particular, on a couple of occasions, data were normalized in a somewhat debatable fashion. For instance, instead of plotting the rise in carbon dioxide, the authors only plotted the decline in carbon dioxide normalized by GDP. Why not simply plot both?
Anyways, let science show us the way!
Currently reading
March 10, 2023Applying for new jobs and flattering myself that I'm a smart person, so had to know what are the 10 trends I need to know?
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Instead of having many children in the hope that a few might survive, more parents around the world now aim at providing those few whom they do have with the skills and social capital that will enable them to flourish in a modern economy.
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TREND 1 THE GREAT ENRICHMENT
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TREND 2 THE END OF POVERTY
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TREND 3 ARE WE RUNNING OUT OF RESOURCES?
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TREND 4 PEAK
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TREND 5 THE END OF FAMINE
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Instead of having many children in the hope that a few might survive, more parents around the world now aim at providing those few whom they do have with the skills and social capital that will enable them to flourish in a modern economy.
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TREND 1 THE GREAT ENRICHMENT
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TREND 2 THE END OF POVERTY
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TREND 3 ARE WE RUNNING OUT OF RESOURCES?
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TREND 4 PEAK
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TREND 5 THE END OF FAMINE
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May 24, 2021
3.5 stars
This is quite a well-researched book and a nice little book to read. There are some funny trends I wouldn't necessarily class as positive in there and also I feel like at times it's trying to make political points instead of sticking to what its main goal was. The title is a bit odd too but that's a minor thing.
Regardless, it's nice to have a catalogue of positive trends across multiple fields to act as a counterbalance to the (still of vital importance) ways in which conditions are not as we would like them to be.
This is quite a well-researched book and a nice little book to read. There are some funny trends I wouldn't necessarily class as positive in there and also I feel like at times it's trying to make political points instead of sticking to what its main goal was. The title is a bit odd too but that's a minor thing.
Regardless, it's nice to have a catalogue of positive trends across multiple fields to act as a counterbalance to the (still of vital importance) ways in which conditions are not as we would like them to be.
January 24, 2023
The author presents a fascinating argument that despite many Americans believing that the world is getting worse, in almost every respect such as crime, poverty and life expectancy, this is not true. It is refreshing to see an optimistic fact-based perspective on the future in contrast to the overwhelmingly negative media view. A key thing to note is that these trends are a little cherry-picked, there are no doubt some aspects of our lives that are getting worse, but by and large, the world is becoming a much more livable place for everyone.
January 3, 2021
Does what is promised
The book does what is stated in the title and then some more. If you want to cut through the sensationalism and shallowness of news networks and get to deeper historical patterns and trends, you will enjoy this short book. The only reason I gave it four stars is that there are a few grammatical errors, which do not detract from the meaning of the book but make the reading less pleasant nonetheless.
The book does what is stated in the title and then some more. If you want to cut through the sensationalism and shallowness of news networks and get to deeper historical patterns and trends, you will enjoy this short book. The only reason I gave it four stars is that there are a few grammatical errors, which do not detract from the meaning of the book but make the reading less pleasant nonetheless.
May 7, 2021
You might think that the world is getting worse and worse each year. This book totally disproves that. It is so easy for media to cherry pick certain dramatic events and portray them to the public and mislead them by making believe that the world is in worse shape than it actually is. In actual fact, the world is getting better and better in many things.
Read this book if you want to feel a bit more optimistic about humanity.
Read this book if you want to feel a bit more optimistic about humanity.
June 14, 2021
Ok I admit I was a bit overwhelmed with facts by the end of it. But I am also saddened watching all the negative news and rage, and this book was a definitive u-turn from that! The bright side of so many things which we are blinded towards.
I am grateful to Robert Bailey to write this during the hardest time the world is facing - the covid pandemic in long time. I am a bit optimistic now *fingers crossed*
I am grateful to Robert Bailey to write this during the hardest time the world is facing - the covid pandemic in long time. I am a bit optimistic now *fingers crossed*
June 28, 2021
Not much useful information here
This was a pretty disappointing read. I guess I was expecting too much. This kind of book will never be able to compete with the barrage of negative news and books we see every day. We are being inundated with reports of global climate crises, growing inequality, increased racism, lgbtq prejudice, increased crime, global pandemics etc. this little book isn’t much help against that.
This was a pretty disappointing read. I guess I was expecting too much. This kind of book will never be able to compete with the barrage of negative news and books we see every day. We are being inundated with reports of global climate crises, growing inequality, increased racism, lgbtq prejudice, increased crime, global pandemics etc. this little book isn’t much help against that.
May 21, 2021
We are hungry to believe in the worst.
Positive can make you happy but negative might kill you, and we focus more on negative.
World is in a much better shape than most believe. This book changed some of my beliefs and gave me hope that we are doing better as a civilisation.
Yet there are many international issues we need to solve but we are not fucked.
Positive can make you happy but negative might kill you, and we focus more on negative.
World is in a much better shape than most believe. This book changed some of my beliefs and gave me hope that we are doing better as a civilisation.
Yet there are many international issues we need to solve but we are not fucked.
July 1, 2021
Really good book. Paradigm shifting. As a catastrophist, I needed this burst of positivity. While "Western society" has some looming significant problems, Asia and Africa are experiencing exponential growth in quality of life, freedom, economic prosperity, nutrition, education and numerous other aspects of life. The future is bright for the Earth, if we can hold it together just a little longer!
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