The Optimist's Telescope: Thinking Ahead

In a world where immediate satisfaction is the norm, it's easy to avoid thinking ahead. Whether it's decisions about our health (our chronic overuse of antibiotics has triggered a shocking rise in superbugs that are resistant to them), our finances (many in the UK save nothing for retirement), or our jobs, we lack the tools we need to choose what's best for the future. Today more than ever, we need to know how to make better long-term decisions. Bina Venkataraman understands this. As a former journalist and senior advisor in the Obama administration, she forged partnerships between government and business to combat climate change, and she learned first-hand why people dont think ahead. Drawing from her own experience, the stories she has reported from around the world, and new research in biology, psychology, archaeology, economics, and beyond, she identifies the best ways to make decisions that benefit us over time. She dispels the myth that human nature is impossibly reckless, and explains the role that culture and environment play in our behaviour. She highlights the surprising and successful practices that each of us can adopt to make smarter, more thoughtful choices.