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I Was A Huge Pinker Fan, Then I Looked Around At The World
VUSOB: Very Unpopular Strong Opinions Blog by Christyl Rivers
We are all angels if we just ignore the obvious
No book helped, or impressed me more, through my graduate studies years than The Better Angels of our Nature by Steven Pinker. He makes a good case, and collects considerable data.
The premise is that society is less violent. We should not believe the headlines, but look into our hearts and minds at our social approval of what is considered “normal” limits of violence.
Okay.
We are expressively less violent in our methods of torture, public execution, gladiatorial displays and animal cruelty. Pinker credits our acceptance of LGBTQ people, women’s emancipation, the change from barbaric tribes to agricultural city states and a few other meaningful social movements over time.
In terms of evolutionary psychology the man has some chops. Seriously.
However, as the last decade has roared forward, people who study systems, and biology — once might say ecopsychology is an excellent example — we realize that although person on person violence has declined, person on biosphere violence has increased. The destruction of life…