Bina Venkataraman's The Optimist's Telescope says humans can make better decisions

In The Optimist’s Telescope, using examples from ancient Pompeii to modern-day Fukushima, Bina Venkataraman dispels the myth that human nature is impossibly reckless and highlights the practices we can adopt in our lives—and the ones we must fight for as a society. She draws from stories she has reported around the world and new research in biology, psychology, and economics to explain how we can make decisions that benefit us over time.

The book has got wide media coverage from reviews in The New York Times to TV interviews.

An interview with Bina Venkataraman in The Wired:

https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-practice-long-term-thinking-in-a-distracted-world/

Bina Venkataraman Interviewed on MSNBC:

https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/how-to-look-ahead-with-the-optimist-s-telescope-67854405885

Bina Venkataraman’s TED talk gets over a million views

Bina answers a pivotal question of our time: How can we secure our future and do right by future generations? She parses the mistakes we make when imagining the future of our lives, businesses and communities, revealing how we can reclaim our innate foresight. What emerges is a surprising case for hope -- and a path to becoming the "good ancestors" we long to be.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by editors on the home page. The video, in link below, has been viewed over 1.1 million times.

https://www.ted.com/talks/bina_venkataraman_the_power_to_think_ahead_in_a_reckless_age?language=en

About Bina Venkataraman

Bina Venkataraman teaches in the program on science, technology, and society at MIT and serves as the Director of Global Policy Initiatives at the Broad Institute of Harvard & MIT.  She is also a fellow at New America and a former journalist for The New York Times and The Boston Globe. 

Bina previously served as Senior Advisor for Climate Change Innovation in the Obama White House. She also advised the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology in responding to the Ebola epidemic, promoting patient access to cancer therapies, and reforming public school science education. 

Bina is an alumna of Brown University and Harvard’s Kennedy School.  She is the recipient of a Fulbright, a Princeton in Asia fellowship, a Metcalf fellowship, and a James Reston fellowship.

Bina has worked in India, Alaska, Cuba, Mexico, Vietnam, and Guatemala; she grew up in a small town in Ohio. Her endeavors abroad and at home have included translating Spanish and English in emergency rooms, teaching writing to Harlem high school students, working the graveyard shift at a hotel in the Arctic wilderness, lobster fishing in Baja California Sur, and cataloguing films for a cinema critic in Havana.