The Better Angels of Our Nature Why Violence Has Declined

Steven Pinker

eBook - 2011

“If I could give each of you a graduation present, it would be this—the most inspiring book I've ever read."—Bill Gates (May, 2017)Selected by The New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of the YearThe author of Rationality and Enlightenment Now offers a provocative and surprising history of violence.Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think we live in the most violent age ever seen. Yet as New York Times bestselling author Steven Pinker shows in this startling and engaging new work, just the opposite is true: violence has been diminishing for millenia and we may be living in the most peaceful time in our species's existence. For most of history, war, slavery, i...nfanticide, child abuse, assassinations, programs, gruesom punishments, deadly quarrels, and genocide were ordinary features of life. But today, Pinker shows (with the help of more than a... more