My new favorite book of all time • Hacker News Board

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#61

Post by _greim_ » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:27 PM UTC

"Better Angels"—and presumably this book—cuts against the grain of popular discourse, since claiming the world is in decline and a state of moral depredation has always been an effective way to agitate for change. Which is understandable on one level, because so much in the world is still obviously suboptimal. The reaction tends to be: "How can you claim the world is getting better when [insert bad current event stuff here]?!?"

The problem is that so much of this lessening of horribleness came about via imperfect systems. We become focused in our opposition to the system's flaws, and (in some circles) that opposition morphs into opposition to the system as a whole, which is a dangerous kind of thinking if it becomes mainstream.

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#62

Post by X6S1x6Okd1st » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:28 PM UTC

julian55 wrote: post #37

gourou wrote: post #6

"Sapiens" is another great recommendation by him https://www.gatesnotes.com/Books/Sapiens-A-Brief-History-of-...

Yes, that's a great book. I'm now reading "Homo Deus" by the same author which follows up on some of the ideas in "Sapiens".

How do you feel like Homo Deus compares to Sapiens w.r.t. being hand wavy and having a solid grasp on what the potential futures are that we are facing?

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#63

Post by jzymbaluk » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:28 PM UTC

I feel like people in this thread would also enjoy the excellent podcast How it Began, which is an optimistic take on the history of technologies by Dr. Brad Harris

> The overall theme? Celebration! We are privileged to be descended from men and women who dared to dream big and even die for the cause of progress. Their work is unfinished, and some parts of modernity are even worse than before. But most are better, much better. And we have more tools than ever to fix what’s still broken. How It Began celebrates that progress, and presents a history of the modern world to help inspire its long lasting continuation.

Link: https://howitbegan.com/

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#64

Post by jnordwick » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:28 PM UTC

cs702 wrote: post #11

I read Pinker's previous book, "The Better Angels of Our Nature," and found it eye-opening; it changed the way I perceived the world. Highly recommended. (Here's a review: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/09/books/review/the-better-an... ) This book, his latest one, is now an automatic buy for me.

So torn. I'm generally a Pinker fan, but almost detest Peter Singer's thought to the core. Singer recommending that book makes me really second guess the recommendation. But I respect Bill Gates immensely too.

Maybe the idea that Pinker could write a book so loved by both Gates and Singer is a testament to how good it is?

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#65

Post by greeneggs » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:29 PM UTC

topleveldomain wrote: post #17

" War is illegal. This idea seems obvious. But before the creation of the United Nations in 1945, no institution had the power to stop countries from going to war with each other. Although there have been some exceptions, the threat of international sanctions and intervention has proven to be an effective deterrent to wars between nations." I would argue that something else that happened in 1945 has been a much bigge…

"The Internationalists" makes the case that the 1928 Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact to outlaw war was what started the paradigm shift against war [1]. (Of course the thesis is controversial, as you say.) You might enjoy the book; here's an Op-Ed the authors wrote in summary [2], and a podcast interview with the authors [3].

[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30753784-the-internation...

[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/opinion/sunday/outlawing-...

[3] https://www.lawfareblog.com/lawfare-podcast-oona-hathaway-an...

> From 1816 until the Kellogg-Briand Pact was first signed in 1928, there was, on average, approximately one territorial conquest every 10 months. Put another way, the average state during this period had a 1.33 percent chance of being the victim of conquest in any given year... The average amount of territory seized between 1816 and 1928 was 114,088 square miles per year...

> Since World War II, conquest has almost come to a full stop. The average number of conquests per year fell drastically — to 0.26 per year, or one every four years. The average size of the territory taken declined to a mere 5,772 square miles per year. And the likelihood that any individual state would suffer a conquest in an average year plummeted — from 1.33 percent to 0.17 percent, or once or twice a millennium.

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#66

Post by Santosh83 » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:29 PM UTC

Not a comment on the book obviously, but just seizing on the five points enumerated in the review, 1 is pure fluff, 2 is not a very strong point, 2 and 3 are both more first-world applicable, 4 is again more first-world centric I'd imagine, and 5 is entirely irrelevant given that most countries still manage to go to war (unjustified) with total impunity, especially the biggest of them all. What is the use of declaring war illegal? The only thing world nations are afraid of is nuclear war, but never-ending conventional war can still retard humanity's progress significantly. It is not something we can just dismiss.

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#67

Post by EdwardCoffin » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:29 PM UTC

thisisit wrote: post #5

Strange. Ublock is blocking the whole blog content. TL;dr - Steven Pinker’s Enlightenment Now

Similarly with Ghostery

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#68

Post by kiliantics » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:30 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #55

eloisant wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Including by the countries supposed to enforce the rule (UN security council: Russia who annexed Crimea, China building illegal islands in the Pacific, US who started wars based on lies for oil..)

Which wars did the US start on a lie for oil ?

You could easily argue that most of the conflict the US is currently involved in - and there are many! with boots on the ground or otherwise[0] - have some motive involving petrodollar or other resources.

[0] https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-16/us-now-involved-134-w...

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#69

Post by bloak » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:30 PM UTC

topleveldomain wrote: post #17

" War is illegal. This idea seems obvious. But before the creation of the United Nations in 1945, no institution had the power to stop countries from going to war with each other. Although there have been some exceptions, the threat of international sanctions and intervention has proven to be an effective deterrent to wars between nations." I would argue that something else that happened in 1945 has been a much bigge…

War is perhaps illegal, except in self-defence, but certain people interpret "self-defence" to mean "defence of (national) interests", but also, belt-and-braces, they don't actually declare war any more and claim that what they're doing, killing and maiming people, bombing hospitals, television studios, water purification plants, isn't a "war". Also, Geneva Convention does not apply because the victims are "unlawful combatants" or some such bullshit.

Re: My new favorite book of all time

#70

Post by kevmo » Mon, Jan 29, 2018, 5:32 PM UTC

The thing that I don't like about books and articles like this is that they promote complacency. They obscure shitty living conditions that billions of people are still living under by pointing to statistical averages and fun concepts like "war is illegal" (which is highly arguable in and of itself).

I am all for recognizing that humanity is maturing, but I think books like this actually slow the pace at which it does so.