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b>"Vaclav Smil is my favorite author… Numbers Don''t Lie takes everything that makes his writing great and boils it down into an easy-to-read format. I unabashedly recommend this book to anyone who loves learning."--Bill Gates, GatesNotesbr>br>An essential guide to understanding how numbers reveal the true state of our world--exploring a wide range of topics including energy, the environment, technology, transportation, and food production./b>br>br>Vaclav Smil''s mission is to make facts matter. An environmental scientist, policy analyst, and a hugely prolific author, he is Bill Gates'' go-to guy for making sense of our world. In Numbers Don''t Lie, Smil answers questions such as: What''s worse for the environment--your car or your phone? How much do the world''s cows weigh (and what does it matter)? And what makes people happy? br>br>From data about our societies and populations, through measures of the fuels and foods that energize them, to the impact of transportation and inventions of our modern world--and how all of this affects the planet itself--in Numbers Don''t Lie, Vaclav Smil takes us on a fact-finding adventure, using surprising statistics and illuminating graphs to challenge conventional thinking. Packed with fascinating information and memorable examples, Numbers Don''t Lie reveals how the US is leading a rising worldwide trend in chicken consumption, that vaccination yields the best return on investment, and why electric cars aren''t as great as we think (yet). Urgent and essential, with a mix of science, history, and wit--all in bite-sized chapters on a broad range of topics--Numbers Don''t Lie inspires readers to interrogate what they take to be true.
