what ever his achievements in other fields, this Pinker dude's views on War and Civilization are either paid propaganda efforts, or simple and clear drooling idiocy.
the almost 100% bullshit content is apparent from the stink of the title of his new book alone, but Pinker seems to be taken seriously by many in the general public and even some in academic circles. i've heard citing of his TED lecture in pubs... certainly the idea that humans need the State to curb our "violent nature" is a very popular fallacy spread by, surprise surprise, the State. (and oh look they seem to love Steven Pinker in Israel).
even if it were true, which it most certainly isn't (Vietnam, Serbia, Congo, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.), saying that "war has stopped since WW2" is like saying "I quit smoking. 3 minutes ago."
even if one takes the period of 70 years since WW2 as ANY kind of indication that our world is going one way or another, as John Gray points out in this excellent article) the fact that the super powers have exported their conflicts to poorer countries can not, and MUST not be ignored. 5.8 MILLION have died because of the ongoing violence in the Congo in the past decade alone, and that is only 1 example of wars which are directly connected with global capitalism and the "first world".
about the history of violence one thing is clear and indisputable: war and its possibility arises with every more complex social ties, and its practice and scale drastically increases with the size of society. so from Band level to Tribe level societies the frequency and size of conflicts increase. and in our period of Nation States, where nationalism plays a big role of pitching entire populations against each other, the frequency and size of conflicts have reached a level never before experienced by human kind. (especially since the 20th century, with the added factor of advanced war technologies)
and that is exactly the nature of the primary practical mistake made by Pinker in all those impressive looking graphs -- and those before that have influenced him -- the one of scale: the percentages and graphs do not proportionally represent accurately mortality rates caused by war IN PROPORTION to the size of the socieities that they are comparing.
Pinker claims that "Enlightenment Humanism", by extension Lib-Dem-Prog ideology, and the Media have increased the level of empathy in the world. While to me this is just pure fucking ludicrous: empathy is systematically eroded in modern times, with the media playing a central role of desensitization, misinformation, and propaganda for the war-mongering states.
the almost 100% bullshit content is apparent from the stink of the title of his new book alone, but Pinker seems to be taken seriously by many in the general public and even some in academic circles. i've heard citing of his TED lecture in pubs... certainly the idea that humans need the State to curb our "violent nature" is a very popular fallacy spread by, surprise surprise, the State. (and oh look they seem to love Steven Pinker in Israel).
even if it were true, which it most certainly isn't (Vietnam, Serbia, Congo, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.), saying that "war has stopped since WW2" is like saying "I quit smoking. 3 minutes ago."
even if one takes the period of 70 years since WW2 as ANY kind of indication that our world is going one way or another, as John Gray points out in this excellent article) the fact that the super powers have exported their conflicts to poorer countries can not, and MUST not be ignored. 5.8 MILLION have died because of the ongoing violence in the Congo in the past decade alone, and that is only 1 example of wars which are directly connected with global capitalism and the "first world".
about the history of violence one thing is clear and indisputable: war and its possibility arises with every more complex social ties, and its practice and scale drastically increases with the size of society. so from Band level to Tribe level societies the frequency and size of conflicts increase. and in our period of Nation States, where nationalism plays a big role of pitching entire populations against each other, the frequency and size of conflicts have reached a level never before experienced by human kind. (especially since the 20th century, with the added factor of advanced war technologies)
and that is exactly the nature of the primary practical mistake made by Pinker in all those impressive looking graphs -- and those before that have influenced him -- the one of scale: the percentages and graphs do not proportionally represent accurately mortality rates caused by war IN PROPORTION to the size of the socieities that they are comparing.
Pinker claims that "Enlightenment Humanism", by extension Lib-Dem-Prog ideology, and the Media have increased the level of empathy in the world. While to me this is just pure fucking ludicrous: empathy is systematically eroded in modern times, with the media playing a central role of desensitization, misinformation, and propaganda for the war-mongering states.