“You’ve got to hand it to the pessimists. They don’t give up. When a prediction fails, their modus operandi calls for the confident launch of another buzzkiller. As next-generation challenges and innovations make the news, a new generation of downers carry on the time-tested tradition of trying to puncture any hope of progress.”

The human nature has a negative bias towards changes, and future optimists are often dismissed as naïve with their wishful thinking.

But the world keeps getting better in many ways. Could it be that the pessimists are naïve – not the optimists?

In this book, Swedish journalist Ulrika Gerth introduces us to some of history’s biggest pessimists and doomsday prophets.