The Factfulness Framework
In 2018, a Swedish doctor named Hans Rosling published a book that changed how we think about thinking.
The book was called Factfulness, and its central insight was devastating in its simplicity:
Human beings are systematically wrong about the state of the world—and we're wrong in predictable ways.
The Instinct Problem
Rosling identified ten instincts that distort human judgment. Not random errors. Not individual quirks. Universal patterns hardwired into our cognition by millions of years of evolution.
These instincts were useful on the savanna. They helped our ancestors survive predators, find food, and navigate tribal politics.
They are catastrophically maladapted for the information age.
Here's how they work against us:
The Fear Instinct
We pay more attention to frightening things than important things.
A plane crash kills 200 people and dominates headlines for weeks. Car accidents kill 40,000 Americans every year and barely register.
The media knows this. That's why every story is framed as a crisis, a threat, a disaster in waiting. Fear drives clicks. Clicks drive revenue. Your anxiety is someone else's business model.
At Veremet, we separate "frightening" from "dangerous" through evidence. Our dossiers show you what the data actually indicates, not just what makes the most compelling headline.
The Gap Instinct
We divide the world into two groups—us and them, rich and poor, developed and developing—and imagine a vast gap between them.
In reality, most of humanity lives in the middle. The gap is an illusion created by focusing on extremes and ignoring the distribution.
This instinct is exploited constantly. Political narratives depend on making you believe "they" are fundamentally different from "you." Division is profitable because it drives engagement.
At Veremet, we show distributions, not dichotomies. Our Consensus Gauge displays the full spectrum of evidence, not just the loudest voices on either end.
The Negativity Instinct
We notice the bad more than the good.
Every year, the world gets better on almost every measurable dimension: poverty, literacy, child mortality, access to clean water, basic education. And every year, people report feeling more pessimistic.
Why? Because good news isn't news. "Things gradually improved" doesn't generate shares. "Everything is falling apart" does.
Algorithms exploit this ruthlessly. Platforms are optimized for engagement, and nothing engages like outrage, fear, and despair.
At Veremet, we provide context. When you investigate a claim, you see it in the context of trends, historical data, and comparative evidence. Not just the crisis of the moment.
The Single Perspective Instinct
We seek simple explanations for complex problems.
The real world is messy. Effects have multiple causes. Solutions have trade-offs. Reasonable people disagree.
But simple stories are easier to understand and easier to share. So we flatten complexity into narrative. We find villains and heroes. We reduce nuance to soundbites.
This makes us easy to manipulate. Anyone with a simple, emotionally compelling story can capture attention—regardless of whether that story is true.
At Veremet, we synthesize multiple sources. Our Clarity Engine pulls from diverse data streams—academic research, primary documents, credible journalism, official records—and presents the full picture, not a convenient slice of it.
Why This Matters Now
Rosling wrote Factfulness before the current AI revolution. Before deepfakes. Before large language models could generate plausible-sounding misinformation at scale.
The instincts he identified haven't changed. But the information environment has.
Today, anyone with a laptop can:
- Generate synthetic media indistinguishable from reality
- Create fake websites that look like legitimate news sources
- Deploy bots that simulate grassroots movements
- Target messages to exploit specific psychological vulnerabilities
The instincts are the vulnerabilities. Bad actors are the exploits.
Our Response
Veremet is built on Rosling's framework.
Every feature we design asks: Which instinct does this help counter?
Fear Instinct → Evidence-Based Context Our dossiers don't just tell you if something is true or false. They show you the actual risk, the actual data, the actual scale. We separate "this is scary" from "this is dangerous."
Gap Instinct → Spectrum Visualization Our Consensus Gauge shows you where evidence actually falls—not a binary true/false, but a nuanced distribution of supporting and contradicting data points.
Negativity Instinct → Trend Analysis When you investigate a claim, we show you the trajectory. Is this actually new? Is this actually worse? Or is this just the latest iteration of a recurring pattern that isn't as alarming as it sounds?
Single Perspective Instinct → Multi-Source Synthesis Our Clarity Engine doesn't rely on any single source. It aggregates, compares, and synthesizes—then shows you exactly where the information came from so you can evaluate it yourself.
The Goal
We can't rewire your brain. The instincts Rosling identified are part of being human.
But we can build tools that help you recognize when those instincts are being exploited. We can surface evidence that counters instinctive reactions. We can create an environment where clear thinking is easier than confused thinking.
Factfulness isn't about being smarter. It's about being systematic.
It's about building habits and using tools that compensate for the ways human cognition fails.
That's what we're here to help you do.
Further Reading
If you haven't read Factfulness, we recommend it. Hans Rosling died shortly after completing it, but his work continues through the Gapminder Foundation.
At Veremet, we consider ourselves inheritors of that mission—building the infrastructure to make factfulness not just a personal practice, but a collective capability.
Be curious again.