Rosling found that the students scored an average of 1.8 questions correctly out of 5, which is worse than how the average chimpanzee would score by randomly selecting answers. In addition, Rosling found that the Swedish Professors scored an average of 2.4 correctly, which is on par with the chimpanzees. This result is significant in that it shows that there is a great misunderstanding about the socioeconomical situations in different parts of the world.
Preceding economic growth in Asia, Rosling mentions that there was a massive growth in the overall health of the population. He notes the trend of an increase in life expectancy and a decrease in family size from 1964 to the present in Vietnam. In addition, when comparing the rates of development in Brazil and South Korea, he points out how the South Korean population was healthier and therefore developed faster than Brazil. Overall, he shows that development of health is an important foundation for the development of a better economy.
In accordance with Rosling’s TED talk, there is a strong postive linear releationship between Child Survival and GDP per Capita. This further supports his idea that the health of a population is essential before the economy can thrive.
Rosling shows that from 1962 to 2003, the global income distribution becomes less right-skewed than before. Additionally, the mean GDP per capita increased. As Rosling previously explained a trend of global health generally improving, it makes sense that there is also an increase in wealth in accordance with the trend of better health resulting in better economic development.
Rosling using data to describe human development with very high spatial and temporal resolutions presents an easily-understood picture of the patterns of human development over time. This allows for a greater number of people to take advantage of the information we have available and helps reduce common misconceptions among the greater population. This is important because for society to remain just, it is essential that the general population is well-informed.
Rosling’s work with the Gapminder project is significant in my opinion because it helped make data from databases much more accessible to the public. By making data from databases more searchable, Rosling has helped allow for anyone to find the data and be able to examine the relationships that exist among it, which will enable people to pick up new patterns in human development. These many new perspectives and interpretations will give us a greater understanding of the world. I think that Rosling has done wonders for our ability to understand global paradigms.