If Good News had a patron saint, it would be the Swedish professor of global health Hans Rosling.Rosling, who died in 2017, was a wizard at using data and storytelling to challenge misconceptions around global development and progress. With statistics in hand, Rosling could convince the most determined pessimist that the world was, on balance, getting better. And there’s no better example of the Rosling touch than a TED talk he gave in 2010 called “The Magic Washing Machine.” “Laundry day” used to actually mean an entire day of soaking clothes, heating water, hauling, scrubbing, rinsing, wringing, and hanging. But...