Why The Future Is Better Than You Think

Can a Masai Warrior in Africa today communicate better than Ronald Reagan could? If he's on a cell phone, Peter Diamandis says he can.

Peter Diamandis is the founder and chairman of the X Prize Foundation, which offers big cash prizes "to bring about radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity." Reason's Tim Cavanaugh sat down to talk with Peter about his new book Abundance and why he think we live in an "incredible time", but no one realizes it. Peter thinks that there are some powerful human forces combined with technological advancements that are transforming the world for the better.

"The challenge is that the rate of innovation is so fast…" Peter says, "the government can't keep up with it." If the government tries to play "catch up" with regulations and policy, the technology with just go overseas. Certain inovations in "food, water, housing, health, education is getting better and better." Peter "hopes we are not going to be in a situation where, entrenched interests are preventing the consumer from having better health care."

Filmed by Sharif Matar and Tracy Oppenheimer. Edited by Sharif Matar

About 15 minutes

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