Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress

If it seems to you the world is heading over a cliff, look around. People now live longer, are healthier, freer, and happier than ever before.

In a breathtaking overview of the state of humanity in the third millennium, the psychologist and science popularizer Steven Pinker urges us to turn away from sensational news headlines and catastrophic predictions that so cleverly exploit cognitive distortions inherent to the way our minds work. Instead, he invites us to look at the numbers and—using dozens of striking graphs—shows unprecedented progress not only in the West, but across the entire world in every sphere, from health and well-being to safety, peace, and human rights.

This progress is neither accidental nor the result of outside forces. It is a gift to the modern world from the Enlightenment thinkers, who were the first to realize that knowledge can be used for the prosperity of all humankind. Enlightenment ideas are not naive fantasies. On the contrary, they worked—and that is an indisputable fact. Nevertheless, it is precisely now that these ideas especially need our protection, because they run counter to characteristic shortcomings of human nature—tribalism, authoritarianism, demonization of outsiders, and magical thinking—which modern demagogues love to exploit. Yes, the problems facing humanity are enormous, but all of them can be solved if, continuing the work of the Enlightenment, we use reason, trust science, and follow the ideals of humanism.