The Daily Onward

“Despite their importance in public discourse, numbers in the range of 1 million to 1 trillion are notoriously difficult to understand.”
-David Landy, a Netflix data scientist and Indiana University adjunct professor of psychological and brain sciences



It’s hard in today’s news cycle to not hear the words millions and billions. Big numbers can be aspirational, political, motivational and, at times, down right pivotal.

No matter how you hear, see and relate to numbers, know that we often don’t grasp what they mean or how they impact our lives. This WSJ.com story showcases it well. Numbers are often just that - numbers.

Why does this matter? Because every day, decisions are made about budgets, philanthropy, and business investment using numbers most of us can’t even picture. And when we can’t see scale, we can’t see trade‑offs or opportunity.