How to make the world add up by Tim Harford @INSIGHTSPublicLecturesNCL

Uploaded November 2021 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago

Tim Harford, economist, broadcaster and journalist
Hosted by Professor Sally Shortall

The Financial Times’ Undercover Economist, Tim Harford, is on a mission to help us think more clearly about the world. That not only means thinking more clearly about numbers, but thinking more clearly about our own preconceptions and biases. In this talk he explores a dramatic incident in art history, and what it teaches us about the obstacles that lie in wait, even for the expert among us, when we desperately want to believe.

Biography
Tim is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of “How To Make the World Add Up”, “The Data Detective”, “Messy”, and the million-selling “The Undercover Economist”. Tim is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of BBC Radio’s “More or Less”, “How To Vaccinate The World”, and “Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy”, as well as the podcast “Cautionary Tales”. Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House. He is an associate member of Nuffield College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Tim was made an OBE for services to improving economic understanding in the New Year honours of 2019.

Tim Harford’s latest book "How to Make the World Add Up" is available to buy now from our university bookseller Blackwell's: blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/How-to-Make-the-World-Add-Up-by-Tim-Harford/9780349143866

Live Q&A:
The lecture will be followed by a live Q&A with the speakers. You can submit a question during the event using YouTube Live Chat, via Twitter @InsightsNCL or by sending an email to public.lectures@ncl.ac.uk.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you for watching.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/c/INSIGHTSPublicLecturesNCL
Follow INSIGHTS Public Lectures on Twitter: twitter.com/InsightsNCL
Visit the INSIGHTS Public Lectures Website: ncl.ac.uk/events/public-lectures

How to make the world add up by Tim Harford

Holmes Lectures for 10- to 14-year-olds: Keeping healthy with sport and food: Run for your life

Guardians of health: how oral hygiene supports our immune system (Lecture 2)

Last line of defence? Excavating the Roman frontier at Magna fort by Rachel Frame

Stuck: How vaccine rumours start and why they don’t go away by Professor Heidi J Larson

$‘Now we have your attention’: pandemics, protest, and politics from below by Jack Shenker Jack Shenker, Journalist and Author Hosted by Professor Sally Shortall, with introduction from Dr Martin Farr Coronavirus has forced many ongoing social crises into the light, while simultaneously expanding the horizons of political possibility. But who are the communities that are fighting for a different kind of Britain, and how will new forms of grassroots organising transform the country’s already fractious political landscape? Award-winning journalist and author Jack Shenker – who writes about how power functions and how it is contested – explores the struggles playing out far beyond Westminster. Jack Shenkers book, Now We Have Your Attention: The New Politics of the People, is available to buy now from our university bookseller Blackwells: https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Now-We-Have-Your-Attention-by-Jack-Shenker-author/9781784708870 Biography: Jack Shenker is a journalist and author based in London and Cairo. His stories have won several international awards, and been translated into many languages. Formerly Egypt correspondent for the Guardian newspaper, his work has also covered Gaza, Africa, Central Asia, the US and the UK, and been published in a wide range of newspapers and magazines around the world including Granta, the London Review of Books and the New York Times, as well as being adapted into films by the BBC. In 2016 his first book, ‘The Egyptians: A Radical Story’, was published by Allen Lane and Penguin to critical acclaim. In 2018, Jack was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for political journalism. His new book - Now We Have Your Attention - a journey into Britains ongoing political chaos from below - was published by The Bodley Head and Vintage Books in late 2019. Live Q&A: The lecture will be followed by a live Q&A with the speaker. You can submit a question during the event using YouTube Live Chat, via Twitter @InsightsNCL or by sending an email to public.lectures@ncl.ac.uk. Resources: Article on the Death of Emanuel Gomes: https://www.uvwunion.org.uk/en/news/2020/04/two-workers-at-the-ministry-of-justice-die-from-suspected-covid-19/ Thank you for watching. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/INSIGHTSPublicLecturesNCL Follow INSIGHTS Public Lectures on Twitter: https://twitter.com/InsightsNCL Visit the INSIGHTS Public Lectures Website: https://www.ncl.ac.uk/events/public-lectures/$

Three tales from the frontier of medical sciences by James Allison, Doyin Alao and Laura Booth

Did the 2020 scramble for Black writers make a difference? by Patrice Lawrence

Justice for the 97: Fractured Lives, Truth Recovery, and the Hillsborough Law by Prof Phil Scraton

Holmes Lectures for 10- to 14-year-olds: Keeping healthy with sport and food: An apple a day

Newcastle Debates: The future of transport in the North East

Inaugural Barbara Strang Lecture: Accent prejudice: #us an’ all? by Professor Joan Beal