In The Moment ... March 21, 2018 Show 301 Hour 1
If you're weary of bad news and political dramas, you might want to consider just how good we have it in the 21st Century. Steven Pinker's new book is called "Enlightenment Now," and it paints a slightly rosier picture of life as we know it than you might see, for example, on the evening news.
But this isn't a Pollyana utopian fantasy. It's a data-driven look at how humans and human-led institutions are making progress on the most complex problems facing humanity . . . and the areas where we are falling short.
Steven Pinker is an experimental cognitive scientist and one of the world's foremost writers on language, mind, and human nature. He's perhaps best known for his books "The Language Instinct" and "The Better Angels of Our Nature."
He was listed as one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World Today.
