A review by miguelf
The Power of Bad: How the Negativity Effect Rules Us and How We Can Rule It by Roy F. Baumeister, John Tierney

2.0

This book serves as a cross between a synopsis of long held psychological observations and a mix of some techno-optimist reflections pulled from folks like Steven Pinker: that negative, or “bad”, thoughts can be overwhelming and that in actuality the world is a much better place that we think it to be. A good number of examples are given in the first few sections to back up this thesis. Fair enough. It reads for the most part like a book that a corporate manager would hand out to their underlings to read and absorb as there are some tidbits about how being positive can serve one well in business sectors such as the service industry. It’s all pretty innocuous until it goes off the rails at the end and there’s a longish section about how the concern over nicotine addiction has been totally overblown – it’s just that pesky ‘negative’ thinking and that the harms of smoking are all in the tar. Wait, what?!? And then there’s the doubling down on the twisted observation made on GMO’s: while GMO’s might not be as harmful as their fiercest opponents make them out to be, the unthoughtful brushing asides of all concerns comes across as really petty in its expression here. And finally putting Georg Gilder on a pedestal is just wrong: most of his overrated predictions turned out to be bunk. Thankfully it’s not overlong.