The University of Edinburgh
Professor Pinker explores ideas drawn from his book entitled The Better Angels of our Nature: Why Violence has Declined.
This lecture discusses the notion that contrary to popular belief that we live in exceptionally violent times, rates of violence have been in decline over the course of history.
Professor Steven Pinker is an award-winning experimental psychologist who works at Harvard University.
He has been named Humanist of the Year by the American Humanist Society and has been listed among Prospect magazine’s top 100 public intellectuals in the world and Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world today.
Recorded on Wednesday 29 May 2013 at The University of Edinburgh’s McEwan Hall.
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What an encouraging reading this book is, and how entertaining! It´s like a christmas cake- filling and stuffed with yum yum^^
fuck you jack off, I was looking for Apocalypse now
I love Pinker's term on page 310: "Crappy governments". He mentions it as a term he overheard at a conference! Hahaha!!! (from you own lips, Dr. Pinker?) I am thoroughly enjoying the book, and I'm nearly halfway through.
And YES- Steven Pinker knows who General Butt Naked is! I learned of the Liberian who was a former cannibal warlord on a VICE video. What a story! Pinker is a digger!!!
41:47 Islam.
His talk is very interesting. But, his constant lip smacking is irritating.
Reality denial. Plain and simple. Such a charlatan. http://www.globalresearch.ca/reality-denial-apologetics-for-western-imperial-violence/32066
here we are on what seems like the brink of another major world war something that could mean the eradication of life on earth
it would be interesting to see a similar book created by a none statist
Great talk and book mr Pinker, gotta love social progress.
On the eve of World War II the world had 2.3 billion people. About 70 million were annihilated in the conflict. That amounts to 3% of world population at the time. Today we have around 7 billion people in the world. Suppose global conflict emerges and 140 million people get killed. That amounts to 2% of world population at the present. Even though this imaginary conflict would kill twice as much as the inconceivably violent World War II, condescending fascists like PInker would still have the arrogance to suggest that humanity should be proud of having grown less violent – because its "better angels" would have reduced mortality from 3% to 2% of the overall population.
I am forever dumbfounded at the fact that such ludicrous line of reasoning can be so easily publicized as 'hard science'. Clearly some people are ready to believe whatever they want to.
Steven Pinker has twice tweeted his 175,000 followers about a documentary I've made that will reduce violence and crime. It – One Punch Homicide – is getting great reviews. You can watch it free at http://www.onepunchhomicide.com.
Could someone in academia answer this question: If I was to walk in to a humanities dept today what percentage of the professors would be in agreement with Pinker's analysis?
I question the approach of rates of violence vs. actual numbers. Each death is a human being, and if we don't consider the actual death count vis a vis the counts per 100,000, are we not missing something critical here?
That is to say, the non-participatory portion of the population is lumped in with the participatory part. For instance, the raw death counts of the World Wars I and II are in the 10s of millions. If you then, say, "norm" that against the global population at the time, you are counting many people from many nations that did not participate or were involved in the violence. Does it make sense to reckon this way?
I am not sure how to answer this question, but it does merit discussion. The reason I raise it is because I would like to see the actual raw numbers reduced to zero. Am I being unrealistic in this assessment? Is the value of a single human life worth less because there is now 7 billion humans on this planet vs. a time where there were only, say, 2 billion? If that is true, then doing percentages will serve as a dis-justice to the individual victims.
Perhaps a more sophisticated model is indicated here.
Why is America investing so much on war if war is on the decline? What if WW3 begins and wipes out half the human race? Wouldn't that mean that modern society is inching closer to one of the most violent time in human history? Most nation on earth are investing and creating more weapons in preparation of war. It's just the calm before the storm!
I haven't watched the video yet…so this is just my 2 cents.
Our benchmark for most peaceful time is against world wars. So I'm sure it is peaceful in comparison to our history of unbelievable levels of violence.Peace itself is an idea I don't think pu can quantify with numbers. Chicago is the most violent it's ever been and the violence continues to rise. I have no evidence but gang and cartel violence seems higher, like in Mexico.
So most peaceful it's ever been isn't that peaceful in my mind now.
Again, haven't watched the video but I want to hear the perspective.
21:00
Edinburgh is one of the 5-eyes "Hearts-of-Empire'. I'm not surprised there wasn't more critique of Steven's data & logic. One eastern lady raised one inconsistency on his school violence data. Empire Proxy-Wars, by which the USA, Canada,, Britain, France & NATO destabilize nations worldwide for the purposes of command, control, cheap-resources & perpetual-war is the ruling-state violence of choice. One must calculate the consequences by which 100 million refugees have fled their once stable homes after war & western multinational destruction of their once vibrant natural biospheres. Pinker represents a submissive privileged trickledown 'class' of agents who just don't have their feet on the ground. From his talk & the vert selective colonial state data he refers to, Pinker like most, know nothing about their 'indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') ancestral roots nor the 1st Nation lands upon which he lives. School, media & religious institution colonial propaganda leaves 'agents' like Pinker tragically repeating & shoring up 'exogenous' (L 'other-generated') dogma, without understanding of the balance in human relations with each other & the biosphere. http://www.indigenecommunity.info provides 77 web-sections with all humanity's once worldwide ancestral indigenous tools to understand peace & prosperity or how to undo 'brainwashing'.
At about 35 minutes his data is out of date. In 2013 Black people were being extrajudicially murdered by police vigilantes or security guards every 28 hours.
Love Planet Earth and be an Eco Hero! ?❤️
Natural theologian? What? Since when?
Whenever I'm feeling pessimistic I put on a Steven Pinker video. Truly uplifting.
Violence is more controlled by modern warfare stayegies. Violence has increased to point where humanist are desensitised.
biased
But in his theory there is one quite big mystery: what is evolution thinking about. What kind of people does evolution really favors? And there's where most so called intellectuals got it wrong. They forget how evolution actually favors strongly religious people and rejects atheists, agnostics and secular folks. Nor was Mr. Pinker focusing looming danger coming from primitive culture enclaves and ideas run by Islamic Fascism. His ideas might be selling well among secular west but not among these more primitive cultural enclaves.
I bet this lull is strong mark that big change is coming and it's not nice to see for Pinker. The demographics are showing: the more advanced society the less births there are. On the other hand most primitive cultures have 3-4 times higher birthrate. Has Pinker and his disciples though what this will mean in period of just 4-5 generations? There are more children born in Nigeria than in whole EU. In 2040 that will be 2:1 for Nigeria, then 4:1.
Idiotic !
I would love if Pinker would update the stats to reflect the Trump effect on hate crimes in America. I'm curious to know the impact of these kinds of leaders on increased aggression.