Jared Diamond on 12 dimensions of sustainability

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jared Diamond is a world-renowned expert on ancient societies. His now famous book, Collapse, is a study of the choices societies have made throughout history in the face of change -- climate change, as well as others -- and the consequences of such choices.

He is also the author of the bestseller "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed."

This video ends on a positive note and makes many good points along the way. 

We have the "unique opportunity" and capacity to "learn from remote places and to learn from places remote in time," Diamond says. "And among all the things that might incline me towards pessimism, that is the biggest thing that in the end inclines me towards optimism."