Optimism is what runs the world, and cynicism only serves as an excuse for the lazy. Evil is not inherent to our nature. We have achieved so much because we are friendly and decent. The radical thinker Rutger Bregman paints a new, more beautiful portrait of humanity.

Try standing in front of the mirror and remember the worst things ever done – by you personally, and by Homo sapiens as a whole. And smile, because history shows that we are doing much better than you think. This subversive idea belongs to a Dutch historian, writer and TED lecturer. In his new book, Humankind: A Hopeful History, he finds out whether the conviction that humans are selfish, hostile and destructive by nature is actually true. And if we turn out to be intrinsically good after all, what would it change?

Rutger Bregman already shook up the minds of politicians, businesspeople and the general public several years ago in his book Utopia for Realists And How We Can Get There, in which he argued that a better world could be built straight away. Bregman’s critics consider him a naïve fantast, but