How to answer your biggest questions—with data (w/ Mona Chalabi)
How to Be a Better Human
TED
4.1 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 28 November 2022
⏱️ 41 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Whenever we have a question – about ourselves or the world around us – it can be helpful to visualize our answer in order to really understand it. But how do you conceptualize something as big as inequality, as complex as grief, or as silly as your probability of correctly guessing today’s Wordle? For data journalist Mona Chalabi, the answer is through data – and drawing. You’ve probably seen Mona’s illustrations on the internet. She’s known for interpreting data in a way that makes you GET it. In today’s episode, she explains how anyone could use analysis to answer their most personal questions – from whether or not to have a breakup to how many friends you should have. For the text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts
For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Ted Audio Collective. |
| 0:02.0 | Audio Collective. |
| 0:04.0 | This is how to be a better human. |
| 0:10.0 | I am your host Chris Duffy, and this podcast has been fact-checked by professionals. |
| 0:15.0 | That's important to note because sometimes as a comedian I can get a little squishy with my facts. |
| 0:20.0 | I care a lot about making sure that anything that I say is a good entertaining funny story, |
| 0:25.7 | and I care maybe a little bit more about that than that it is exactly accurate. |
| 0:30.8 | In fact, at my wedding, my mother-in-law gave this hilarious toast that was a huge hit where |
| 0:35.4 | she just took one of the jokes that I told on stage a story that involved her and she |
| 0:39.7 | broke down all of the ways in which I had exaggerated or compressed things for comedic value. |
| 0:44.7 | As she said, when you hear Chris say something on stage, you got to just remember five little |
| 0:49.3 | words. |
| 0:50.5 | Didn't really happen that way. Perfect toast. She nailed me. Now, |
| 0:57.1 | Mona Chalaby, today's guest, is all about making sure that we look at reality |
| 1:01.9 | accurately. |
| 1:02.8 | She uses her artwork, her data visualizations, |
| 1:05.4 | and her journalism to make sure that we dig into the data, |
| 1:07.9 | we check our sources, and we end up with stories |
| 1:10.2 | where it did happen exactly like that. |
| 1:12.8 | Mona is also a good friend of mine. |
| 1:14.2 | We met when she interviewed me in New York City years ago |
| 1:16.9 | for one of the stories. |
... |
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