Why it's important to continue aiming for a fact-based worldview | Klara Johansson | TEDxUmeå

You should know by now that child mortality is falling worldwide. I shouldn’t have to remind you (but I will). You should know that it no longer makes sense to divide countries into “developing” and “developed” (if it ever made sense). I will remind you why that is. You should know that family size on average is so small now that population growth is levelling out. It’s a bit complicated, but it’s undisputable.

Hans Rosling dedicated a lot of his time and effort to try to open our minds to this knowledge. Not because he enjoyed the spotlight, but because a fact-based worldview is essential to address the huge global issues still at stake. Hans passed away before his work was finished; we still tend to hold on to old-fashioned views of the world.

Now that he is gone, it falls to all of us who admired him to keep aiming for a fact-based world-view. This lecture is me trying to do my small part; and trying to encourage you to do your part.

I’m a researcher at the Unit of Epidemiology and Global Health at Umeå University, and I have a PhD from Karolinska Institutet. In 2007-2010, I worked halftime at the Gapminder Foundation, with Hans Rosling and other colleagues. My work at Gapminder was mainly to compile and handle health statistics, but I also did some lecturing and development of paedagogic tools. I currently do research on social determinants of adolescent mental health and similar issues, but also run a small freelance consultancy specialized in public health, data analysis and graphic presentations of statistics.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx