Violence Vanquished (or we live in the most peaceful time in human history)

[AngryAmish]

"On the day this article appears, you will read about a shocking act of violence. Somewhere in the world there will be a terrorist bombing, a senseless murder, a bloody insurrection. It's impossible to learn about these catastrophes without thinking, "What is the world coming to?" With all its wars, murder and genocide, history might suggest that the taste for blood is human nature. Not so, argues Harvard Prof. Steven Pinker. He talks to WSJ's Gary Rosen about the decline in violence in recent decades and his new book, "The Better Angels of Our Nature."

But a better question may be, "How bad was the world in the past?"

Believe it or not, the world of the past was much worse. Violence has been in decline for thousands of years, and today we may be living in the most peaceable era in the existence of our species.

The decline, to be sure, has not been smooth. It has not brought violence down to zero, and it is not guaranteed to continue. But it is a persistent historical development, visible on scales from millennia to years, from the waging of wars to the spanking of children."


Read the whole thing and be happy. Things are getting better.

[sinkingfeeling]

1. Link?

[Exultant Democracy]

2. Rapid self domestication. Lower density bones, smaller brains, lower fertility, all the signs.

Of course many people are uncomfortable with the thought of being a domesticated animal.

[malthaussen]

3. Thanks, Prof, but I Already Read Candide

I'm sure the good professor's book is loaded with facts and figures and lovely arguments. Indeed, I'll even go so far as to accept the conclusion that we live in the "least violent of times" without even bothering to read his argument. And then I will ask the question: So What?

-- Mal