1. Enlightenment Now

Steven Pinker

Found it very difficult to read. And I didn’t finish it. Pinker tries to be very eloquent in every single sentence. Couldn’t finish more than one chapter at the time. There are quite some interesting pleas in there for liberalism, but it didn't stick with me. I think that the way Pinker writes about liberalism is actually the problem with liberalism.

2. Doing Good Better

William Macaskill

I give this book to all my new Kinder collegues. Macaskill is one of the Effective Altruism gang.

'William MacAskill explores the essential questions to ask in order to implement effective altruism and the frameworks for choosing charities, careers, and causes. With these tools, we can increase our impact every time we donate money, volunteer, shop, direct corporate donations, choose a career, or protect the environment. He gives examples but, more importantly, he provides a methodology to determine how we can do the most good in our position with the time and money we have.'

This book will change the way you will look at doing good for sure. This book helped me a lot with structuring the ideas we have with Kinder and Kinder World.

3. Nudge

Richard Thaler & Cass Sunstein

Consumeral behaviourism and psychology can help you understand how people act and choose. Nudging is a way in how you can use these insights to make people take better care of themselves in a non-patronizing way.

4. Sapiens - A brief history of mankind

Yuval Noah Harari

I loved this book. It is thick and starts slow but it is the most gripping book I read this year. It is gives you a great helicopter view of how we as a species ended up where we are.

5. Homo Deus

Yuval Noah Harari

And the sequel picks up where Sapiens left off. It taps into where we are right now going ino the future and how you can understand some of the reasoning behind where we are.

“The single greatest constant of history is that everything changes.” - Homo Deus

"By asking strange questions we connect neurons in the mind."  - Homo Deus

6. 21 lessons for the  21st century

Yuval Noah Harari

More insights into where we are and where we are heading 9or should be heading) :)

The first lab grown hamburger costed 330.000 dollar, in 2013, four years later the price dropped to 11 dollar in a decade it will be cheaper than real meat.

7. Stealing Fire

How Silicon Valley, the Navy Seals and Maverick Scientists are revolutionizing the way we Live and Work

Steven Kotler & Jamie Wheal

How can we become more focussed? These guys think it is all about altered states of mind.
One whole chapter is dedicated to Jason Silva and another chapter is dedicated to Burning Man. #burn #flowstate 

8. The Culture Code

Daniel Coyle

This book is great if you are building a team. It dives into the workings of Navy Seals, successful sports teams and even a gang of Serbian Jewel thieves. I asked Laura (head of HR at Kinder) to read it as well.

9. Machines of Loving Grace

John Markoff

The quest for common ground between humans and robots described from a historical point of view. And then talks about how we can use it. If you want to understand more about robots and Artificial Intelligence and Intelligence Augmentation, this is a good (dry) book to start with. 

10. Factfulness

Hans Rosling

The book which really sticks for 2018 is Factfulness. I suggest everyone to read this.

Factfulness is a timely and essential book about the power of facts in a post-truth world. Here Rosling divides the world into 4 parts that are different stages of development instead of two- developing and developed. Most of us perceive the world to be falling apart. Rosling brilliantly uses statistics and visuals to show how most of us are ignorant about the world, and how things are a lot better than we think and improving even faster. Rosling explains how statistical illiteracy, media bias, and ideological preconceptions makes most people believe in a gloomy world view. He explains by data how positive developments are underreported, while disaster news is vastly over-reported. Factfulnesshas the power to shift your entire perspective. If you want to understand the world, read it!

And check out dollarstreet.com

The following books I am reading at the moment.Yeah, I read multiple books at the same time....

Educated

Tara Westover

Tara grew up as a Mormon but decided to leave home and to get educated. These are her memoirs.

It doesn’t have to be crazy at work

Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson

Really loved Rework, one of the earlier books by Fried and Heinemeier Hansson which I give to all the new entrepreneur I mentor or advise. Rework contains very short very insightful lessons to be learned as and entrepreneur. This is sort of the sequel to that book.

Superintelligence

Nick Bostrom

More on AI. The paths, dangers and strategies.

Brilliant Green

Stefano Mancuso & Alessandra Viola

I read 'The Hidden Life of Trees' two years ago and when I mentioned this to someone they recommended me Brilliant Green. Both books talk about the biggest biomass living on earth and how we should treasure it. Looking forward to reading more in this book.

What should I read next?

Please let me know your suggestions!