Enlightenment now: the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress
Succès de librairie (documentaires), Ouvrages documentaires canadiens, Auteurs canadiens (documentaires), Sociologie
Braille avec transcription humaine
Résumé
Is the world really falling apart? Is the ideal of progress obsolete? In this assessment of the human condition, cognitive scientist 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 a gift of the Enlightenment: the conviction that reason and science can enhance human flourishing. Far from being a naïve hope, the Enlightenment 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. Bestseller. 2018.