Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from Curiosity.com.

I'm Cody Goth. And I'm Ashley Hamer.

Today you learn how the concept of nudge has helped governments and corporations around the world change your behavior

with Nobel Prize winning economist Richard Thaler.

You'll also learn about how scientists are building better robots by watching squirrels

do parkour.

Let's satisfy some curiosity.

Back in 2008, behavioral economists Richard Faylor and Cass Sunstein published the book Nudge. It was all about how tiny changes in how people make choices can have big outcomes.

A lot has happened since then. Organizations in the private and public sector have adopted strategies in the book,

and Richard Thaler was awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize in economics.

All while people have faced new and different challenges in their

decision-making. So Richard Faylor and Cass Sunstein decided to publish a new edition of their mega bestseller called Nudge the final edition.

Here's a conversation we had with Richard Thaler about the basics of Nudge Theory and how things have changed since the first edition.

A nudge is some small feature of the environment that attracts our attention and influences our behavior without requiring us to do anything.

So modern cars are full of nutches.

If you're too close to the car in front of you. It beeps. If it's a fancy car it might even break. The GPS device suggests

a route.

But you pick the place you want to go

and you can change your mind

or take a different route. Yesterday I was going somewhere and there was a big traffic jam and so I got off and the GPS doesn't complain.

It's not a backseat driver so the idea of nudge is can we

make the world more like driving with the GPS.

...