Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think by Peter H. Diamandis

Mar 30, 2012 Shirley Freeman rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is an amazing book! The authors define abundance as 'providing all people with a life of possibility.' Imagine a world where 9 billion people have adequate clean water, food, shelter, energy, education and health. The authors not only imagine it, but think it is possible within the next 25 years. Yes, it seems overly optimistic but their argument (with supporting data) and their energy and enthusiasm are contagious. They outline the incredible technological advances that are occurring in ps...more

4 likes · like · see review

Nov 11, 2012 Greg rated it 4 of 5 stars

Still reading so I can only comment on what I've read thus far which is slightly more than half. Many other reviewers have provided a synopsis of the books premise more than adequately so I won't repeat that, but I would like to add one point. I would ask that anyone reading this open your mind to possibilities that exist outside your awareness and they are just that.....possibilities. Of course no one can predict the future (as some reviews suggest this is attempting to do), but I don't get tha...more

4 likes · like · see review

Jul 20, 2012 Todd Martin rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: environment-science

In Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think, author and X Prize founder Peter Diamandis makes his case that the standard of living of the bulk of the world’s population can be raised to a level in which everyone’s basic needs are met within the next twenty-five years. How is this to be done you might ask given the many seemingly intractable problems that are present around the globe today? …. SCIENCE, the private sector and the largesse of billionaires!!

This might seem far-fetched, but yo...more In Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think, author and X Prize founder Peter Diamandis makes his case that the standard of living of the bulk of the world’s population can be raised to a level in which everyone’s basic needs are met within the next twenty-five years. How is this to be done you might ask given the many seemingly intractable problems that are present around the globe today? …. SCIENCE, the private sector and the largesse of billionaires!!

This might seem far-fetched, but you don’t have to look very far into the past for other visionaries whose dreams have come true. In the 1940s and 50s there were crazy prophets who envisioned a future of jet packs, hover cars, transporters, ray guns, robot servants, food pills, 4-hour workweeks, space elevators, cryogenic freezers that would bring us back from the dead, colonies on the moon, mars and in our oceans and an abundance of shiny unisex jumpsuits. In the post WWII years, these individuals were viewed as seers, eccentrics, and dreamers with unrealistic expectations, and yet, look at us now … with … uh … exactly none of that stuff. Ok, it’s a bit odd that they didn’t get any of it right and that they failed to anticipate the negative aspects of technology such as nuclear waste, massive species extinction, global warming, thalidomide, the formation of the ozone hole, toxic waste, fishery die-off and oceanic dead zones.

But that’s all in the past, and now we have a fresh breed of Utopians who portend to usher in a new era of prosperity through chemistry. Could they be right this time? Well … it’s a nice thought, but no one really knows. It’s not possible to predict the future and the road is littered with the failed attempts of those who have tried. Data shows that prosperity is rising in most third world countries and that this rise is driven in large part by new technologies (in particular computers and the internet). Barring some catastrophe (such as the worst case predictions of global climate models) it’s reasonable to assume that this trend will continue in the near term. In the long term, one can’t ignore the fact that rising prosperity also leads to increased consumption, environmental degradation and pollution.

I didn’t feel like the book provided a convincing argument, instead, the bulk of the text simply consists of a survey of some of the technologies that are presently under development and a description of the purportedly benign global benefits that they will bring … that is, assuming that they wind up being technologically viable, scalable, cost effective and adopted into broad public use (a huge assumption, given that most technologies fail to satisfy these requirements).

Unfortunately, there are many claims that Diamandis’ makes that I found to be flawed (here are but a few):
1. Diamandis claims that cell phones reduce consumption because they obviate the need for such thing as TVs , stereos, flashlights, tools, video games, computers and home entertainment systems. How many people own not just all of these items but multiple versions of each? Lots. Cell phones are just another consumer item that people purchase on top of many other consumer items.
2. He repeatedly uses the term “sustainable growth” a phrase which is, at best, meaningless and at worst a disingenuous marketing ploy. The term is most often used as a green veneer to allay the guilt of hyper-active consumers. More to the point though, the U.S. EPA stated in a 2007 report: “While much discussion and effort has gone into sustainability indicators, none of the resulting systems clearly tells us whether our society is sustainable.” In other words … nobody even knows what the term means or how to measure it. The phrase represents little more than empty rhetoric.
3. Diamandis is enamored of the robber barons (which is weird on its face … given the fact that they were, you know … first and foremost “robbers”) and believes their philanthropy will save the planet (Diamandis falls into this category and clearly likes to thinks of himself in heroic terms). Here’s the thing though, robber barons and philanthropists have been around as long as civilization has existed. Ignoring the oppression they engender for the moment, they've had more than enough time to solve the world's problems and have not come close to doing so.
4. Along with the above, he believes the private sector will offer all the solutions, ignoring any role of government. That’s fine, but completely ignores the fact that all of the fundamental research for the programs he discusses had their origin in publically funded programs. The internet, space program and human genome project among others would not have existed but for government funded research. Private companies do not engage in basic research because their motive is profit (as opposed to knowledge).
5. Diamandis spends an entire chapter arguing that those who disagree with him do so because of the inherent psychological underpinnings of the brain, which cause us to be unduly influenced by an innate pessimism and to place increased weight on negative arguments and evidence (and to ignore positive news and events in turn). Evidently, if you disagree with Diamandis’ point of view, it is not because he failed to provide convincing evidence, but because of your unconscious pathologically negative patterns of thought. Interesting idea, but as a rebuttal to criticism it’s intellectually dishonest.

But the biggest problem with the book is that Diamandis simply does not seem to understand human nature. Just as those who earn $1 per day wish to earn more to meet basic needs , so does the lower class want to become middle class, and the middle class to become millionaires, millionaires strive to become multi-millionaires, and multi-millionaires wish to become billionaires. Simply put, there is no such thing as 'enough' when it comes to human beings and their desires to acquire material wealth and possessions. Increased wealth begets increased consumption and as long as we continue to overlook the role of population, it will become increasingly difficult to ignore the fact that we live on a finite planet with finite resources. A far better solution than the ones Diamandis proposes, would be to put humane programs in place to systematically reduce human birth rates. The world is quite big enough to sustain many millions (as opposed to billions) of people in abundance, with plenty of room left over for other species and vibrant ecosystems. (less)

8 likes · like · see review

May 16, 2012 Jud Barry rated it 3 of 5 stars

The future according to our popular novelists is almost always dystopian. Peter Diamandis encourages us to imagine otherwise, based on the potential of recent developments in science and technology.
Taking a page from Ray Kurzweil (with whom he has established Singularity University), Diamandis's future is very much the present-day reality of artificial technology, nanotechnology, robotics, communications, and biotechnology, where the pace of innovation conferred by computerization has greatly im...more The future according to our popular novelists is almost always dystopian. Peter Diamandis encourages us to imagine otherwise, based on the potential of recent developments in science and technology.
Taking a page from Ray Kurzweil (with whom he has established Singularity University), Diamandis's future is very much the present-day reality of artificial technology, nanotechnology, robotics, communications, and biotechnology, where the pace of innovation conferred by computerization has greatly improved the prospects of the planet to support all of its inhabitants comfortably.

Thus, this is more than another account of gee-whizardy. It's about how technological progress can be translated into a higher degree of creature comfort for earth's creatures (well, at least its people), including those living at the "bottom of the pyramid." Indeed, one of the most encouraging messages of the book is how some parts of the world--Africa in particular--occupy in some respects an advantageous position vis-a-vis some of these new technologies. The advantage, such as it is, comes from the fact that they don't have the developed countries' huge invested interest in the old and expensive technologies of land lines, coal, and gasoline, which puts the under-developed countries in a better position to be early adopters of the new technologies, particularly solar power. Cell phones have already proven themselves to be a potent tool for delivering financial and public health benefits in such countries as Bangladesh and Kenya.

Diamandis places a great deal of faith on the ability of tech philanthropists to deliver the goods that will produce our abundant future. While never providing an overt critique of centralized governments, Diamandis consistently uses such examples as Bill Gates to show how much tech tycoons really care about the world and are the key to its salvation.

Unfortunately, he fails to make a distinction between private actions taken for public benefit--Wikipedia comes to mind--and private actions taken for proprietary benefit, like those of Craig Venter in the race to map the human genome. Diamandis's account of Venter's role is brief, glowing--and self-contradictory: "Building on work that had come before, Venter ... delivered a fully sequenced human genome in less than one year (tying the government's ten-year effort) for just under $100 million (while the government spent $1.5 billion)." Sounds like a wasteful government, doesn't it? What he doesn't say is that "government" (actually scientists using money from public sources) had done 80% of the work by the time Venter got to it--and copied it. That's what "building on work that had come before" means. And then, Venter wanted to declare private ownership of what his company had "discovered," whereas the "government" wanted to make the information available to create future wealth in the form of new knowledge by others "building on work that came before."

Diamandis also places a great deal of stock in prizes as an engine of progress. I have no beef with that, but if he wants to point fingers--even without seeming to do so--I do have to wonder why, five years after the awarding of an X-prize to not one but three winners of a competition to design "the world's first fast, affordable, production-ready car able to achieve over one hundred miles per gallon equivalent," there is still no such car on the market. The reason, I'm sure, has something to do with why American auto-makers were never able to release any fuel-efficient cars in the first place and had to have Japan show them how; it has something to do with the fact that so-called "fuel-efficient" cars are being marketed today that get less than 40 mpg, which is disgraceful. The reason is one that I don't fully understand, but it is a demonstrable phenomenon no less. And it has nothing to do with wasteful governments.

I am hopeful that the future will turn out the way Diamandis describes. But there is one reason why dystopian fiction prevails--it is really more about people than technology. If, as J-P Sartre said, hell is other people, so might we say the same about the future.(less)

6 likes · like · see review

Mar 12, 2013 Andy rated it 1 of 5 stars

Optimism makes things better. Hooray!

Scientists and engineers exist, and they will make super-duper new gizmos. Yay!

Everything in the whole wide world will soon be radically better because of the business-like innovations of the techno-philanthropists. They are like gods; praise them!

The problem for this goofy book is reality. As documented in Forbes, Fortune and other publications, the Gates Foundation (to use the biggest example of techno-philanthropy) actually has a pretty bad track record. T...more Optimism makes things better. Hooray!

Scientists and engineers exist, and they will make super-duper new gizmos. Yay!

Everything in the whole wide world will soon be radically better because of the business-like innovations of the techno-philanthropists. They are like gods; praise them!

The problem for this goofy book is reality. As documented in Forbes, Fortune and other publications, the Gates Foundation (to use the biggest example of techno-philanthropy) actually has a pretty bad track record. They justify this by saying you have to take risks and fail a lot to succeed sometime. Perhaps, but that's also what losing gamblers say. The life-saving success they hang their hat on is the expansion of polio vaccination. But this is a program that has been going on for decades under the leadership of the Rotary Club and other non-profits and uses an old, simple, cheap, evidence-based intervention. It's wonderful that the Gateses have used their enormous clout to promote this worthy endeavor, but it doesn't prove the point trying to be made in the book. It actually supports the opposite conclusion: we should look at what is known to work now and do more of that, instead of speculating on unproven and often non-existent new gizmos. Some discussion of these kinds of issues should have been prominent in the book if the agenda were really how to best make the future better.

And when one digs into the details of specific issues, it seems the author is just making stuff up. I don't know about the safety of hypothetical next-gen nuclear reactors, but I know about public health history. Diamandis messes up on basic concepts like the difference between lifespan and average life expectancy at birth. He actually talks about 30-something year-old grandparents dying as the natural state of the species, apparently not understanding that life expectancy 150 years ago was 30-something not because people got "old" and died at 35 but because children routinely died before their fifth birthdays. If half the people die at age 70 and half at age 0, then average life expectancy is 35. People who can't do basic math shouldn't write science books. (less)

1 like · like · see review

Oct 10, 2012 Kevin O'Brien rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: future, technology

The global climate is changing and the ice caps are melting. Civil liberties are eroding. Romney is rising in the polls.

There are a lot of reasons to be pessimistic about the state of the world. If you are inclined that way, this book is a useful corrective.

I can't say that a whole lot of this book was new to me, since I follow many of these topics already. He brings in the exponential growth curves that Ray Kurzweil has popularized (think Moore's Law, but applied to a lot more than just transis...more

1 like · like · see review

Dec 01, 2012 Aaron rated it 5 of 5 stars

*A full executive summary of this book is available here: http://newbooksinbrief.com/2012/03/03...

In their new book `Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think', Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler argue that, despite the problems that our technology has recently created (including dwindling resources, global warming, and a population explosion that threatens to confound [and in some cases already does confound] our advances in agricultural production and medicine), we needn't discard our tech...more *A full executive summary of this book is available here: http://newbooksinbrief.com/2012/03/03...

In their new book `Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think', Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler argue that, despite the problems that our technology has recently created (including dwindling resources, global warming, and a population explosion that threatens to confound [and in some cases already does confound] our advances in agricultural production and medicine), we needn't discard our techno-optimism after all. Indeed, according to Diamandis, the world is on the precipice of another explosion in technology that will soon bring refuge from many of our current problems, and abundance to our doorstep. Not content to let the goal or the timeline remain vague, Diamandis is happy to hang a more precise definition on each. When it comes to abundance, Diamandis defines it as "a world of nine billion people with clean water, nutritious food, affordable housing, personalized education, top-tier medical care, and non-polluting, ubiquitous energy" (loc. 317), and, to top it all off, the freedom to pursue their goals and aspirations unhindered by political repression. With regards to the timeline, Diamandis claims that it "should be achievable within twenty-five years, with noticeable change possible within the next decade" (loc. 580).

In an attempt to convince us that this goal is achievable (and convincing he is), Diamandis takes us through the latest technological developments (and those that will soon be coming down the pipe) in numerous fields such as water filtration and sanitation (including advancements in water desalination, nano-filtering, sewage recycling, and the smart-water-grid); food production (including the next generation of genetically modified foods, vertical farming, in-vitro meat, and agroecology); education (including personalized education, the OLPC [One Laptop Per Child program], AI education programs, and advancements in educational games, video-games and computer programs); energy (including solar and wind power, the next generation of nuclear energy and algal biofuel, the smart-energy-grid, and battery-encapsulated energy storage); healthcare (including stem cell therapy and organ creation, robotic medical care-givers and surgeons, genomic medicine [based on your individual genome], and Lab-on-a-Chip technology [a diagnostic tool compatible with your cell phone that can instantly analyze samples of saliva, urine and blood]), and many, many more.

According to Diamandis, the technological innovations mentioned above are being spurred on by 3 forces in particular these days that are likely to bring us to a state of abundance even quicker than we might otherwise expect, and one that extends to all parts of the world. The 3 forces are (in reverse order as to how they are presented), 1) the rise of the bottom billion--which consists in the fact that the world's poorest have recently begun plugging into the world economy in a very substantial way, both as a consumer and as a producer of goods (largely as a result of the communications revolution, and the fact that cell phones are now spreading even to the world's poorest populations); 2) the rising phenomenon of the tech-philanthropists--a new breed of wealthy individuals who are more philanthropic than ever, and who are applying their efforts to global solutions (and particularly in the developing world); and 3) the rising phenomenon of DIY innovation--which includes the ability of small organizations, and even individuals to make contributions even in the most advanced technological domains (such as computing, biotechnology, and even space travel).

With regards to this last force, part of Diamandis' purpose here is to inspire the layperson to enter the fray with their own contributions towards abundance by way of joining one of the numerous open-source innovation projects available on line, or throwing their hand into one of the many incentivized technological prizes in existence, or in some other manner of their own devising. In this regard, the authors are very successful, as the work is both invigorating and inspiring, and I highly recommend it. A full executive summary of the book is available here: http://newbooksinbrief.com/2012/03/03...
A podcast discussion of the book is also available.(less)

1 like · like · see review

Apr 19, 2012 Lena rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

Most human beings have a built-in tendency to focus on the negative, obsessing about all the things that are wrong with the world and how we're all on the fast track to hell in a hand basket. In this book, X PRIZE founder Peter Diamandis tackles that view head on with a compelling argument that humanity is actually in far better shape than the 24/7 news cycle would have you believe.

The core of his argument is that a number of forces have come together to create an opportunity for problem solving...more Most human beings have a built-in tendency to focus on the negative, obsessing about all the things that are wrong with the world and how we're all on the fast track to hell in a hand basket. In this book, X PRIZE founder Peter Diamandis tackles that view head on with a compelling argument that humanity is actually in far better shape than the 24/7 news cycle would have you believe.

The core of his argument is that a number of forces have come together to create an opportunity for problem solving unprecedented in human history. Among those forces are the explosive growth of computing technology, the democratizing power of the Internet, and the rise of billionaire technophilanthropists with a genuine desire to save the world.

Diamandis and co-author Steven Kotler spend good portions of this book looking at the most serious problems facing the world today, including water, food, sanitation, health care, energy and repressive governments. In doing so, they offer tangible examples of new technologies that have or soon will have the potential to eliminate those problems.

Among the most interesting sections for me were those on how cheap mobile diagnostic tools and cloud based medical computers can bring health care to remote regions of the planet; how Generation IV nuclear reactors can power the earth for 1,000 years using existing nuclear waste with zero risk of the dangers of current plants; the discovery that kids in an Indian slum who spoke no English and had no computer experience could teach themselves biotechnology if given a computer; and that a guy in Colombia with a Facebook page succeeded in taking down FARC, a rebel organization that had been terrorizing his country with kidnappings and violence for 40 years.

Examples like these were the most valuable part of this book for me, provided in enough abundance to combat my own natural "yeah, but..." tendencies. The author's attempt to provide a structural framework through which to view these examples - a pyramid of possibility inspired by Maslow - was less successful; it was too abstract and less engaging than the inspiring, real world examples.

In addition, I couldn't help noting that just because many technologies do drop dramatically in price as they increase exponentially in power doesn't mean that the exponential growth he anticipates can solve many of our problems will actually occur. Despite that, I found this book to be authentically hopeful; it pushes back hard enough against the doomsayers that I finished it feeling like we have a much better chance at solving our big problems than I did before I started it.

(less)

9 likes · like · see review

Sep 01, 2012 J. rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: own

A lot of interesting ideas in this book. It caused me to google several topics and added a few books to my reading list. The author is an evolutionist, none-the-less I'm glad I took the time to listen. There's a ton of liberal, hippie crap in the later half though. A ton. So much that the last half of the book desperately needs a bath. Also the author seems to be under the impression that the Arab Spring was a good thing.

If nothing else, the effectiveness of x-prize type competitions surprised m...more

1 like · like · see review

Jan 03, 2013 Ryan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfic-science, nonfic-issues, nonfic-future, nonfic-economics

According to some viewpoints, life on Earth is getting worse, with more and more people competing for fewer and fewer resources. However, Peter Diamandis and Stephen Kotler are here to make the case for optimism, arguing that innovations in technology, communication, information access, energy production, medicine, agriculture, methods of learning, and entrepreneurship are likely to have vast, transformative effects on human society in the near future. Key to understanding this is the authors’ b...more According to some viewpoints, life on Earth is getting worse, with more and more people competing for fewer and fewer resources. However, Peter Diamandis and Stephen Kotler are here to make the case for optimism, arguing that innovations in technology, communication, information access, energy production, medicine, agriculture, methods of learning, and entrepreneurship are likely to have vast, transformative effects on human society in the near future. Key to understanding this is the authors’ belief that technological progress tends to follow an exponential curve, rather than a linear one, with inventions that seem to be of limited use at first quickly evolving to become crucial, productivity-enhancing features of everyday life. We’ve already seen this happen with airplanes, cars, computers, and the Internet, and there’s little reason to believe it won’t happen with solar and nuclear energy, better batteries, smart agriculture, gene therapy, self-driving cars, and artificial intelligence. If you’re familiar with techno-optimists like Ray Kurzweil, then you know the cloth that Abundance is cut from.

The authors also focus some attention on the so-called “bottom billion”. As they point out, even small improvements that reach the very poor have a marked effect on their quality of life. Simple access to clean water, basic medicine, cell phone communication, a little electricity, and other small conveniences liberates people from their harshest struggles, enabling them to reach for better lives, including more education. This also reduces the rampant population growth and environmental strain associated with poverty, as people find that they no longer need to be subsistence farmers or have as many children as possible to ensure a comfortable future for themselves.

As a guy who works in technology, I think the book’s optimism in that department is well justified. Never underestimate what can happen when millions of very smart individuals, who can share knowledge easily, attack interconnected problems. The middle chapters contain a short who's-who catalog of inventors, thinkers, and entrepreneurs whose work is pushing the envelope in different areas. In fact, I took the artificial intelligence course taught by one of the researchers mentioned in the AI section, and offered for free online by Stanford University. How’s that for abundance? As Diamandis points out, even the President of the United States didn’t have so much expertise at his fingertips twenty-five years ago. Now a kid in India with a cheap laptop does.

On the social front, there seems to be a little more wishful thinking. The authors are hopeful that improved resource efficiency and slowing population growth will bring humanity’s rapacious levels of consumption and environmental impact down to sustainable levels, and I’m sure they’re right to some degree, but will they be right *enough*? Also, while I admire what certain billionaire philanthropists are doing with their money to solve real problems, the authors seem to discount the other side of concentrated wealth and power, the one that hasn’t always cared about humanity’s best interests. And I still have my concerns about the fate of people who no longer have skills that are useful in a technology-based economy -- what will they get paid to do?

But, even if Abundance doesn’t fully address all those questions, it’s still a hopeful, positive book, directing attention towards all the ways that human beings are applying their ingenuity for real good.(less)

like · see review

Nov 16, 2012 Alon Gutman rated it 5 of 5 stars

Its like the entire good part of Ted talks squeeze into one book.

Its inspirational, educational, and eye opening.
(and contain many good references. and stories that are worth knowing about.)

If you want an overview of the past, present and future of technology and changes in the world,
This is an amazing book for that.( and its up to date, came out in 2012!)

The autor beside been engineer and physician
is famous for founding the X-prize! (So he know how to inspire)
and Singularity University! (So he...more

like · see review

Nov 07, 2012 Cynthia L rated it 4 of 5 stars

Written by two remarkable individuals. Kotler is a Journalist and author who for years has been covering science and technology. Diamanis, who seems to be nothing short of genius earned his MD from Harvard and later went on to receive his master's degree in aeronautics and astronautics from MIT. He is probably best known for starting the X Prize Foundation, a nonprofit that runs incentive-based competitions to bring about “radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity.” Past winners have inv...more

like · see review

Nov 05, 2012 Kater Cheek rated it 3 of 5 stars

The cover of this book, which you can't really see from the snapshot, has been done to look like it's wrapped in aluminum foil. Aluminum was once the most precious metal on earth, and now technology has made it so cheap it's ubiquitous.

That's basically the premise of the book; technology brings about abundance. Diamandis has oodles of examples, and he backs them up with a thick selection of charts and graphs in the back. For every doom-and-gloom prophecy that journalists have brought up to frig...more

like · see review

Aug 27, 2012 Mal Warwick rated it 5 of 5 stars

A Technology Maven's Vision of Humanity's Bright Future

Peter Diamandis envisions a world in which humanity triumphs against all its challenges, from climate change, overpopulation, and poverty to the planetary deficits in energy and water.

This is not science fiction. It’s an eye-opening survey of what one celebrated technology visionary perceives as a feasible future for our species.

As Diamandis writes, “Abundance is a tale of good news. At its core, this book examines the hard facts, the scienc...more A Technology Maven's Vision of Humanity's Bright Future

Peter Diamandis envisions a world in which humanity triumphs against all its challenges, from climate change, overpopulation, and poverty to the planetary deficits in energy and water.

This is not science fiction. It’s an eye-opening survey of what one celebrated technology visionary perceives as a feasible future for our species.

As Diamandis writes, “Abundance is a tale of good news. At its core, this book examines the hard facts, the science and engineering, the social trends and economic forces that are rapidly transforming our world. . . The point is this: When seen through the lens of technology, few resources are truly scarce; they’re mainly inaccessible. Yet the threat of scarcity still dominates our worldview.”

Diamandis is unusually well qualified to write this book. He is a Harvard-trained physician and an aeronautical engineer with a master’s degree from MIT. Ever since the age of 8, he has been preoccupied with space exploration. He has founded or co-founded a half-dozen businesses and organizations involved in that field and is widely credited with being the seminal figure in jump-starting the private space exploration business with the $10 million Ansari X Prize that led to the flight of SpaceShipOne.

In Abundance, co-written with Steven Kotler and published February 2012, Diamandis veers far from the course he set in space, settling down to earth to explore how humankind can leverage emerging technologies to confront its most pressing problems. Though Diamandis’ focus is squarely on the exponential growth in speed, capability, and spread of information processing technologies, he is not a gadget freak. He recognizes the social and political context in which technology is brought to light, although he may downplay the ferocity of humanity’s innate resistance to change. He writes about “game-changing” technologies, such as the “Lab-on-a-Chip . . . a portable, cell-phone-sized device [that] will allow doctors, nurses, and even patients themselves to take a sample of bodily fluid (such as urine, sputum, or a single drop of blood) and run dozens, if not hundreds, of diagnostics on the spot and in a manner of minutes.” He cites other potential breakthrough technologies now being developed by such luminaries as inventor Dean Kamen and biogeneticist Craig Venter.

For anyone but a Luddite, Abundance is exciting to read. Diamandis clearly believes that the technological advances he writes about hold promise of a much brighter future for humanity despite the anticipated growth in the world’s population to nine billion by 2050. (He even points to growing “in vitro” meat as one solution to the fast-rising demand for protein by ever more prosperous people.) For a science fiction fan such as myself, it’s difficult not to get starry-eyed.

However, the principal flaw in his line of reasoning is that, no matter how promising these new devices and processes might be, it’s not practical to assume that they’ll be quickly adopted around the world. That Lab-on-a-Chip sound wonderful? Great! But how many years will it take to put one billion copies of that device into the hands of the nurses running rural health clinics in Western Kenya and Uttar Pradesh and everywhere else in our wide, wide world? And how much will that cost? And will the spread of the device be rapid enough to prevent what other futurists see as the inevitable pandemics of new communicable diseases? Similar questions arise about nearly every one of the marvelous inventions cited in Abundance.

Peter Diamandis, founder and chairman of the X Prize Foundation and cofounder of Singularity University, laid out his vision of abundance in earth’s future in a brilliant TED2012 talk. The themes he introduced onstage at TED are explored in depth in this book.

To give some sense of the exalted circles in which Diamandis travels, here are some of the trustees of the X Prize Foundation: Larry Page, Elon Musk, James Cameron, Dean Kamen, Ratan Tata, Ray Kurzweil, Arianna Huffington, and Craig Venter, every one of whom would figure in anyone’s list of the brightest and most innovative thinkers and doers in the world.

(From www.malwarwickonbooks.com)(less)

1 like · like · see review

Jun 20, 2012 David rated it 4 of 5 stars

If you liked The Rational Optimist, you'll love this - and I think that this is another salvo in the great half-empty/half-full zeitgeist. Diamandis uses an abundance of sources and demonstrable trends to thoroughly debunk many of the doom-around-the-corner arguments.

There are two basic premises at work here: the necessity of re-evaluation of historical trends, and the actual exponential nature of human achievement.

To demonstrate the first premise, Diamandis spends a significant amount of time s...more

like · see review

Jun 02, 2012 Glenn Capuano rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Anyone with an interest in cutting-edge technology

Recommended to Glenn by: Neil Creek

This book was recommended by a friend, and I certainly enjoyed reading it. The main premise is that the doom & gloom which dominates the media is ill-placed and we are in fact much better off and will soon have the means at our disposal to beat the challenges facing humanity today. Much of this makes sense to me - certainly there is a tendency to focus on the negative, and it's good to see a book which catalogues some of the good inventions which do have the potential to change our lives in...more This book was recommended by a friend, and I certainly enjoyed reading it. The main premise is that the doom & gloom which dominates the media is ill-placed and we are in fact much better off and will soon have the means at our disposal to beat the challenges facing humanity today. Much of this makes sense to me - certainly there is a tendency to focus on the negative, and it's good to see a book which catalogues some of the good inventions which do have the potential to change our lives in the foreseeable future.

As far as how believable some of their predictions are - well I think they vary. I found the section on water quite interesting, and some of the technologies discussed around the provision of clean water are very exciting. Also the education section is worth a read, as I think the authors are onto something with the profound way the internet has penetrated our lives and made so much information accessible, and the availability of mobile apps replacing many devices.

I'm a little more skeptical about their claims on energy generation and health care - claiming that there are trends for both of these becoming much cheaper and affordable which seems to be exactly the opposite of what we're seeing in the real world at the moment (both electricity and health care costs increasing rapidly).

At times it seems to be a little too self-promoting, with many passages little more than ads for the authors' companies (eg. the X-prize and Singularity University). There is also a lot of faith placed on continued exponential growth, almost to the point of it being a religion - eg. Moore's Law will continue to apply indefinitely - not considering things like quantum limits where it starts to break down. Just because something has grown exponentially in the past doesn't mean it will continue to do so in the future.

In the end, the book is a good read (and quite easy to read) if you want to know about some of the more exciting technologies which are being developed and appearing on the horizon, and how they might affect our lives. I certainly found it engrossing and wanted to read more.

In terms of providing an overarching view of argument in the title that "the future is better than you think" I think it falls a little short, and didn't leave me convinced of the broader view but predicting the future is a difficult game and I'm looking forward to a follow-up in a few years where the same authors evaluate their own predictions against reality.

(less)

2 likes · like · see review

Dec 29, 2012 Nico rated it 4 of 5 stars

Very engaging book for general interest readers who want to learn about scientific advances and experimental technology in a range of fields related to human well-being (health, education, environment, etc.). It's an entertaining and insightful and succinct tour of some of the most exciting ideas in those areas.

For better or worse, the book isn't exhaustive. In each of the fields, the author discusses experimental technologies that leap over current technology and would produce radical change....more

like · see review

Sep 18, 2012 Lori rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: what-i-ve-read

Best book i've read all year (and i've read hundreds). very hopeful about the future. i've read so many books about what's wrong and whose fault it is that it was a nice change to read about what's working and how much better the future could be. loved the story about the man who embedded a computer in a wall in India and let the poor kids figure out for themselves how to use it. Using X Prizes as incentives to cure illnesses is a great idea. some of this stuff has been written about in many oth...more

1 like · like · see review

Jun 19, 2012 baggyparagraphs rated it 5 of 5 stars

Abundant clean water, plenty of inexpensive food without using up the land, energy to spare, no pollution, good health for everyone, improved education, world peace, and relief from difficult or boring tasks. This is the message Diamandis and co-author Steven Kotler share in this insightful and hopeful book that is the antithesis to the shrinking-planet message promulgated by E.F. Schumacher and his acolytes. This is well worth your attention as a way of reforming your thinking about the future....more

like · see review

Mar 28, 2012 Shon rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 0-reviewed

I grew fond of Abundance because it takes all of the subjects that I've been concerned about for creating absolute independence for the individual and shows the reader in one book what mankind is doing to make that possible. Brought to you in part by the founder of the X-Prize Foundation, this book argues that technological progress will not be hindered barring some existential catastrophe, and that all of these goals will be met someday. It shows that despite hunger and the lack of fresh water...more

like · see review

May 13, 2013 Carye Bye rated it 3 of 5 stars

disclaimer I did not finish this book.

I found early on that this book fundamentally disagreed with my beliefs and I really couldn't stomach the rest. I'm not able to write a witty review thus far but will say I can't back ideas involve partnerships with coca-cola or creating test tube meat. I guess I'm not ready for this version of the future. I'm kind of interested in more organic, nature, cooperation, and use of technology as a means for communication, not for creating new chemicals and produc...more

like · see review

Jan 09, 2013 David Pennington rated it 5 of 5 stars

Evening news got you down? Feeling like things keep getting worse? Here's the antidote. In Abundance, Diamandis and Kotler provide plenty of evidence to support the book's subtitle: the future is better than you think.

As somewhat of a pessimist by nature, but an optimist in aspiration, this book is so much more than a book to me. It's hope; it's inspiration; it's an awakening. It's a real, evidence-based examination of human history, education, evolution, and much more--all pointing to an unden...more

like · see review

Jul 25, 2012 Rosa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: economics, non-fiction, historical-fiction, sustainability

This book delivers as the title promises: If you are sick and tired of all the negativity in the news, turn off those mainstream media channels and read this instead. "The news" is about ratings, and does not cover the information that will truly empower you, and expand your thinking.

I'm sure cynics will find ways to discount the advances the authors share in their optimism about the future - even though they are very forthright about the pros and cons, including questions of morality - but I'm...more

1 like · like · see review

May 12, 2013 Jessica rated it 4 of 5 stars

I started off an optimist, but somewhere, somehow lost my faith. Perhaps because of climate change, misogyny, the exploitation of animals and children, mass murder, genocide... oh when will it end? This book restored a little piece of it. The premise is that advances in technology, particularly in food, energy, water, health, and education, especially fueled DIY innovators and incentive competitions, may save us after all.

I was skeptical. Would this be neocon climate denial and drivel about per...more

like · see review

May 06, 2013 Loraine rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I love tomorrow and its potential. I have no nostalgia for the past. So this is a perfect book for me. I want to hear the message that this book presents and I got what I was looking for. Lots of it. No wasted words here and never over my head.
Some examples: "We used to think that healthy and wealthy meant you had to be fat. We don't think that anymore. Today, we think that to be healthy and wealthy we need a ton of things, but maybe that too will become old thinking. Technology can replace much...more

1 like · like · see review

Aug 16, 2012 Jesús rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Este es un libro sobre el optimismo. O mejor dicho: contra los pesimistas. Y un libro que cree que en el progreso. Su tesis es que si la humanidad sigue creciendo al mismo ritmo exponencial que lo ha hecho durante el siglo XX, el futuro que nos espera es el de la abundancia. Para que podamos dirigir correctamente esta abundancia (alimentación, sanidad, educación y libertad para todos) entre todos, apuesta por una revolución conjunta gracias a la tecnología en campos como la robótica o la biogené...more

like · see review

Mar 27, 2013 Radix Hidayat rated it 5 of 5 stars

A vivid and thoughtful writing by Diamandis & Kotler how a bright and abundance future is still a possibility, even with bleak news repeatedly come to us on daily basis. Abundance is possible, with people, technology, and capital as its enabler and there are amazing people from around the world that are working on it. There are people who tirelessly working to solve various problems and shortages that are preying on us: food, water, energy, education, information, etc.

My favorite chapters ar...more

1 like · like · see review

Mar 18, 2012 Paul rated it 4 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I liked this book mainly because it presents a positive outlook on the future, which is nice in the media-induced doom and gloom environment that we live in.

That said, this book is a high level survey of all of the technological advances going on right now that are going to change the way the world works in the next few decades. Diamandis first starts out tackling the doom and gloom that most people focus on, specifically from the angle of why doom and gloom is the norm. He goes into the Cogniti...more I liked this book mainly because it presents a positive outlook on the future, which is nice in the media-induced doom and gloom environment that we live in.

That said, this book is a high level survey of all of the technological advances going on right now that are going to change the way the world works in the next few decades. Diamandis first starts out tackling the doom and gloom that most people focus on, specifically from the angle of why doom and gloom is the norm. He goes into the Cognitive Biases that Kahnemen defined in 1974 (see "Judgement Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases" paper) as well as neuroscience to help explain why it is hard for us to focus on the long-term positive versus the current-negative. Kind of boils down to the "sex and violence sells" mantra, but provides a little bit of scientific rigor to it and explains that in most cases our pessimistic views are not normally based in fact.

After the book tackles the question of why it is hard for us to see the forest for the trees, it then goes on the present the high-level problems facing the world and then uses this context to focus on the exponential technologies that will allow us to solve these problems. The survey of technologies and companies the book covers is expansive and is worth reading just for that; he talks about things ranging from 3D printing, to space travel, to biomed and nanotech, to water purification and advancements in nuclear power, as well as many other domains. Even though it is at a high level it presents enough of a map to see where things fit together and decide where to go next (either for reading or for actually doing). In other words, the book is a gold mine for start-up ideas, especially those targeted at the "rising billion" (i.e., the world's poorest people, which he claims are turning into an abundant new market).

One of the key messages of the book is the promotion of the DIY community, and the fact that basically anyone can take on global challenges. He cites examples like how a community of DIY drone builders were able to build an unmanned drone with 90% of the capabilities of a military drone for 1% of the cost. Diamandis focusses heavily on how we can be using incentive prizes to drive the DIY innovation in markets that have stagnated (i.e., space travel, Diamandis is the guy behind the X-Prize foundation).

The only negative thing I will say is that he is almost exclusively positive about all new technologies. The only point he talks about the potential downside is in a short appendix, and this is fairly watered down. He does provide a lot of data to support all of his claims, but one would have to spend a lot of time to verify everything.

(less)

like · see review

May 08, 2013 Jason Cross rated it 5 of 5 stars

We want to believe the worst about everything. The facts although hidden under a wealth of sensationalized media that needs viewership, show that the world has actually become a better place. We need to continue to be forward thinking and problem solve our future. People that dislike this book are probably pessimistic and convinced that we are all going to die from global warming, over population or some other trial. They do not believe that man has the ability to overcome these obstacles. I per...more

like · see review

Nov 15, 2012 Steven Bragg rated it 3 of 5 stars

Abundance is written by the founder of the X Prize, who knows a thing or two about technological advances, and does a good job of presenting an overwhelmingly optimistic view of the future. He brings up a number of advances that, if they can be commercialized, could bring about radical improvements throughout the world. Unfortunately, it does strain my credibility that ALL of these changes will come to pass. In particular, as we keep adding population and more systems are required to sustain the...more

like · see review

title link	preview: Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think
avg rating	preview: Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think Goodreads rating: 4.03 (1105 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13187824-abundance?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1344396582l/13187824.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13187824-abundance?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think by Peter H. Diamandis[/url]

Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think

Friend Reviews

Lists with This Book

Community Reviews

new topic
Discuss This Book

combine
Other Editions (8)

Genres

Readers also enjoyed similar books

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website

Trivia About Abundance: The Fu...

Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think

Friend Reviews

Lists with This Book

Community Reviews

new topicDiscuss This Book

combineOther Editions (8)

Genres

Readers also enjoyed similar books

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website

Trivia About Abundance: The Fu...

new topic
Discuss This Book

combine
Other Editions (8)