Enlightenment now : the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress

The Resource Enlightenment now : the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress
Label
Enlightenment now : the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress
Title remainder
the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress
Statement of responsibility
Steven Pinker.
Creator
Contributor
Author
Narrator
Subject
Genre
Language
eng
Summary
The follow-up to Pinker's groundbreaking The Better Angels of Our Nature presents the big picture of human progress: people are living longer, healthier, freer, and happier lives, and while our problems are formidable, the solutions lie in the Enlightenment ideal of using reason and science. Is the world really falling apart? Is the ideal of progress obsolete? In this elegant assessment of the human condition in the third millennium, cognitive scientist and public intellectual Steven Pinker urges us to step back from the gory headlines and prophecies of doom, which play to our psychological biases. Instead, follow the data: In seventy-five jaw-dropping graphs, Pinker shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise, not just in the West, but worldwide. This progress is not the result of some cosmic force. It is a gift of the Enlightenment: the conviction that reason and science can enhance human flourishing. Far from being a na & iuml;ve hope, the Enlightenment, we now know, has worked. But more than ever, it needs a vigorous defense. The Enlightenment project swims against currents of human nature--tribalism, authoritarianism, demonization, magical thinking--which demagogues are all too willing to exploit. Many commentators, committed to political, religious, or romantic ideologies, fight a rearguard action against it. The result is a corrosive fatalism and a willingness to wreck the precious institutions of liberal democracy and global cooperation. With intellectual depth and literary flair, Enlightenment Now makes the case for reason, science, and humanism: the ideals we need to confront our problems and continue our progress.*Includes a Bonus PDF with charts and graphs
Accompanying matter
technical information on music
Cataloging source
TEFOD
Dewey number
149/.7
Form of composition
not applicable
Format of music
not applicable
LC call number
B833
LC item number
.P56 2018ab
Literary text for sound recordings
other
Music parts
not applicable
PerformerNote
Read by Arthur Morey
Transposition and arrangement
not applicable
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