Steven Pinker Wants Enlightenment Now!

America, observers are fond of saying, is the only country based upon an idea. That idea—that all men and women are created equal and have inalienable rights to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness—is directly informed by the Enlightenment, the movement that dominated ideas and culture in the 18th century.
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But are we still an Enlightenment nation?

"The Enlightenment principle that we can apply reason and sympathy to enhance human flourishing may seem obvious," writes Steven Pinker in his new book Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism and Progress. "I wrote this book because I have come to realize that it's not."

Pinker is a linguist who teaches at Harvard and is the author of The Better Angels of Our Nature, The Blank Slate, and How the Mind Works. He's been named on the top 100 most influential intellectuals by both Time and Foreign Policy.

In this wide-ranging interview with Reason's Nick Gillespie, Pinker explains why he thinks Pope Francis is a problem when it comes to capitalism, nuclear energy is a solution to climate change, and why libertarians need to lighten up when it comes to regulation. He also makes the case for studying the humanities as essential to intellectual honesty and seriousness even as he attacks that "cluster of ideas, which is not the same as the humanities, but just happens to have descended over large sectors of the academic humanities: "the deep hatred of the institutions of modernity, the equation of liberal democracy with fascism, the feeling that society is in an ever-worsening spiral of decline, and the lack of appreciation, I think, that the institutions of liberal democracy have made the humanities possible, made them flourish."

Edited by Todd Krainin. Cameras by Mark McDaniel and Krainin.

[AR]

The divide between Enlightenment values and anti-Enlightenment values has always been a divide over the place of human reason. If you think revelation overrules reason, then reason is subordinated where in practice this means one person's authority rules over another. If you believe that there is no such thing as truth, or that reason is inept at attaining truth, then everything becomes a "power" game. Religious dogma used to be the main enemy of reason, postmodernism is now the new enemy. It's not surprising that enemies of truth and reason in the end are only interested in power. If you're interested in truth, you're interested in dialogue, not domination. If you don't care for truth, you're a despot.

[ArupGuhaideasanctuary]

wow an interviewer who has actually done some research on the topic and doesn't just leaf through the notes handed to him while pretending to listen

[BjornMoren]

Nick is a brilliant interviewer, but I would have enjoyed longer and more detailed replies by Pinker. Maybe they tried to cover too many topics. Overall a great interview though, thanks for sharing this.

[RaceBannonChannel]

This is such a good interview! I immediately bought his new book. Thanks Reason for doing this.

[colinc]

Not yet having watched the whole interview yet I have to say the tone of the introduction alone was very inspiring & motivating. I think Pinker / ReasonTV should expand on the intro video alone as a compassionate plea for the need for Enlightenment reasoning. Too often libertarian / enlightenment arguments cede the empathy / pathos / feelings side of the argument to bleeding heart liberals or "think of the children" conservatives.

[BoxRadishScissors]

From Wikipedia: "In February 2001, Pinker, "whose hair has long been the object of admiration, and envy, and intense study", [112] was nominated by acclamation as the first member of the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfS) organized by the Annals of Improbable Research."

[sbeast]

ENLIGHTENMENT + VEGANISM = 👍
ENLIGHTENMENT - VEGANISM = 👎
SIMPLE MATHS FOLKS

[soren]

The enlightenment is dead, and I have killed it.

[liamshaughnessy]

Listening to this on the Overdrive library app!

[mikefixac]

OK, I just got my doctorate in smartness :). Wow, I enjoyed this.

[SterlingArcherify]

A video published 30 minutes ago, 59 minutes long... as of THIS writing, the haters would have to have arrived from 30 minutes in the future to have watched the whole thing and formulated a reasonable opinion.

Watch the damn video, people.

[davidanderson]

Good interviewer - and Pinker is The Bomb, intellectually. It might take you awhile but if you read his "Better Angels" and "Enlightenment Now" you will be a much better informed person/voter/. D.A., J.D., NYC

[roggie]

We are not we are idiots, fools and cowards. I talk to people every day who know literally nothing of this country it's history or founding principles

[benjaminperez]

When reading Nietzsche, one can't help feeling that he was the first and last brutally honest person (e.g., "The demand to be loved is the greatest kind of arrogance"); when reading Pinker, one can't help feeling that he is the first and last utterly reasonable/rational person. Nietzsche's lessons steel one's soul; Pinker's lessons soothe one's temper and edify one's mind. Nietzsche toughens one up; Pinker straightens one out. It might be best to incorporate the best of each thinker's best: free spirit∞free thinker hybrids might even transcend Enlightenment, after enacting it.

[llamasarus]

People in Ivory towers telling us things are getting quit reading his book after he started supporting carbon taxes and claimed that gang violence has no root causes....

[j]

First of all, I am a huge fan of Steven Pinker. Though I have not read Enlightenment Now, he seems to suggest that general progress and upward mobility of humankind is on such a positive trajectory, we need not be concerned with any potential obstacles in the way of this progress. For instance, does he acknowledge the argument of globalization doing perhaps more harm than good regarding wages and full time employment for "low-skilled" workers? Has globalization helped developing countries at the expense of American workers? I am no fatalist, but I simply want to know if he acknowledges these problems in his new book. I would love to hear from those of you who have read it.

[michaels]

Pinker is definitely correct about religious dogma leading to great carnage. Good point.
Sincerely,
Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot

[nikolademitri]

That last point he makes is critical: we have made progress, but we’re always in danger of losing it. I don’t think people take the time to realize this fact often enough, if at all. I, for one, am increasingly worried about just how likely it appears losing progress is inevitable..

I guess I’m a pessimist, in the sense that I think things will get pretty unbelievably terrible in the future, at least there’s a high probability that such is the case (so perhaps that’s being a realist). The reality is that we’re on a crash course with disaster if we don’t, as a species, change our trajectory in a handful of important ways. I agree with Steve, things have gotten better, and enlightenment values can help ensure that we will continue to improve, but I’m afraid we’re moving away from some of those values in a variety of ways.

I’m also afraid that if we don’t do what we need to do to stabilize a lot of global unrest, and correct the problems that are causing it, that we will, sooner or later, be plunged into a situation where enlightenment values are chucked out the window, because chaos will lead to totalitarian tyranny. We’re already seeing this in various ways, as liberty is consistently being traded for a sense of “safety” (but are we any safer?).

Looking forward to digging into this book. Thanks, Steven, and thank you, Nick. ✌🏼

[roggie]

The answer is thorium nuclear, plenty of fuel almost no waste by products

[snnyburnett]

Would like to see some deeper discussions touched on here. Bit too much preaching to the choir and skimming over topics.
Nick and Pinker have some funny moments in here. Had to pause to laugh about the final terminus on the road to serfdom.