Do Humankind's Best Days Lie Ahead?: The Munk Debates

Do Humankind's Best Days Lie Ahead?: The Munk Debates

By Steven Pinker, Matt Ridley, Alain De Botton, and Malcolm Gladwell

Progress. It is one of the animating concepts of the modern era. From the Enlightenment onwards, the West has had an enduring belief that through the evolution of institutions, innovations, and ideas, the human condition is improving. This process is supposedly accelerating as new technologies, individual freedoms, and the spread of global norms empower individuals and societies around the world.

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Book Information

Publisher: House of Anansi Press
Publish Date: 06/07/2016
Pages: 128
ISBN-13: 9781487001681
ISBN-10: 1487001681
Language: English

Full Description

Progress. It is one of the animating concepts of the modern era. From the Enlightenment onwards, the West has had an enduring belief that through the evolution of institutions, innovations, and ideas, the human condition is improving. This process is supposedly accelerating as new technologies, individual freedoms, and the spread of global norms empower individuals and societies around the world. But is progress inevitable? Its critics argue that human civilization has become different, not better, over the last two and a half centuries. What is seen as a breakthrough or innovation in one period becomes a setback or limitation in another. In short, progress is an ideology not a fact; a way of thinking about the world as opposed to a description of reality.

In the seventeenth semi-annual Munk Debates, which was held in Toronto on November 6, 2015, pioneering cognitive scientist Steven Pinker and bestselling author Matt Ridley squared off against noted philosopher Alain de Botton and bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell to debate whether humankind's best days lie ahead.

About the Authors

Steven Pinker is the Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He has been listed among Foreign Policy magazine's "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" and Time's "The 100 Most Influential People in the World.

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Matt Ridley 's books--including The Red Queen, Genome, The Rational Optimist, The Evolution of Everything, How Innovation Works, and most recently, Viral: the Search for the Origin of Covid-19 (with Alina Chan)--have sold over a million copies, been translated into 31 languages, and won several awards.

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Alain de Botton is the author of nonfiction works on subjects ranging from love and travel to architecture and philosophy. His best-selling books include How Proust Can Change Your Life, The Art of Travel and The Architecture of Happiness.

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Malcolm Gladwell is the author of five New York Times bestsellers-- The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, What the Dog Saw, and David and Goliath.

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