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The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined Hardcover – October 4, 2011

by Steven Pinker (Author)

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Selected by The New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of the Year

The author of The New York Times bestseller The Stuff of Thought offers a controversial history of violence.

Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think we live in the most violent age ever seen. Yet as New York Times bestselling author Steven Pinker shows in this startling and engaging new work, just the opposite is true: violence has been diminishing for millennia and we may be living in the most peaceful time in our species's existence. For most of history, war, slavery, infanticide, child abuse, assassinations, pogroms, gruesome punishments, deadly quarrels, and genocide were ordinary features of life. But today, Pinker shows (with the help of more than a hundred graphs and maps) all these forms of violence have dwindled and are widely condemned. How has this happened?

This groundbreaking book continues Pinker's exploration of the essence of human nature, mixing psychology and history to provide a remarkable picture of an increasingly nonviolent world. The key, he explains, is to understand our intrinsic motives- the inner demons that incline us toward violence and the better angels that steer us away-and how changing circumstances have allowed our better angels to prevail. Exploding fatalist myths about humankind's inherent violence and the curse of modernity, this ambitious and provocative book is sure to be hotly debated in living rooms and the Pentagon alike, and will challenge and change the way we think about our society.

The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"For anyone interested in human nature, the material is engrossing, and when the going gets heavy, Pinker knows how to lighten it with ironic comments and a touch of humor ... a supremely important book. To have command of so much research, spread across so many different fields, is a masterly achievement." — The New York Times Book Review

"...an extraordinary range of research ... a masterly effort." — The Wall Street Journal

" ...Better Angels is a monumental achievement. His book should make it much harder for pessimists to cling to their gloomy vision of the future. Whether war is an ancient adaptation or a pernicious cultural infection, we are learning how to overcome it." — Slate.com

About the Author

Steven Pinker is the Harvard College Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. A two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and the winner of many awards for his research, teaching, and books, he has been named one of Time's 100 Most Influential People in the World Today and Foreign Policy's 100 Global Thinkers.

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Product details

Hardcover: 832 pages
Publisher: Viking; First Edition edition (October 4, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0670022950
ISBN-13: 978-0670022953
Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
Average Customer Review: 664 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #241,527 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #506 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Violence in Society
- #673 in Books > History > World > Civilization & Culture
- #770 in Books > Medical Books > Psychology > Social Psychology & Interactions

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Top customer reviews

For Better or Worse, The Story of Violence

ByT. L. CooperVINE VOICEon August 4, 2016

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

I've struggled a bit to write this review because I have mixed feelings about The Better Angels of our Nature by Steven Pinker.

I started reading The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined with the attitude that Pinker needed to first convince me violence had declined before getting into explaining why. To be perfectly honest, given the world we currently live in, it's hard to imagine that violence has declined.

While I finished the book convinced that violence has declined, I felt like the explanations for why seemed more hypothetical than proven. Pinker explored violence quite thoroughly beginning his book at the beginning of human existence and moving to modern times in the almost 700 pages of The Better Angels of Our Nature. He explored historical myths as well as historical documents to arrive at his conclusions. He used archaeological finds to disprove mythical battles. He described how the development of etiquette and the creation of government helped quell violence and change our norms about violence. He used a combination of statistics, anecdotal evidence, and archaeological studies to present his case.

Yet, the more I read, the more my college corrections statistics professor's words haunted me. He always warned our class to be careful when writing papers not to allow our biases and our desires to prove our points to affect the weight we gave the studies we used as evidence.

Pinker seems less objective in some areas of The Better Angels of Our Nature than in other sections. He seemed to excuse violence against some people while unequivocally condemning it against others. This bias felt incredibly out of place in a book on why violence has declined.

For example, when talking about things like the FBI's crime report and other such studies on crime, Pinker never mentions the effect of police discretion and biased court results on crime rates or how the statistics for individual areas are sometimes skewed by reporting or not reporting data. My assumption is he believes the numbers wouldn't be enough to skew the overall results, and a simple paragraph could have addressed that issue. Maybe even just a few sentences; however, if those sentences existed I couldn't find them.

His inconsistent handling of anecdotal evidence and research surveys deemed certain groups of people more credible than others without giving a clear reason why.

As I read The Better Angels of Our Nature, I found myself wanting it to be better than it was yet I still think it's a book worth reading. Pinker obviously studied violence in great depth. He explains the statistics in an easy to understand, straightforward method, and he tells the story of violence quite well. He makes violence the main character, for better or worse, in a story that is ongoing and relevant and important. In fact, Pinker tells the story so well and brings up such important points, facts, and conclusions, that I am tempted to dismiss the things that bothered me about the book. Yet, I can't do that in good conscience. Pinker drives home the fact that violence is much less acceptable than it used to be for a variety of reasons and that unacceptability has come about as humans have developed civilization and sought out ways to live together more peacefully. The Better Angels of Our Nature left me hopeful that we can continue to rise above violence and find nonviolent solutions in spite of my skepticism about certain sections of the book.

11 comment 330 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you?YesNo

Violence in Decline: Film at 11

ByMichael GriswoldVINE VOICEon August 21, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Steven Pinker in The Better Angels of Our Nature argues that contrary to the first ten minutes of your nightly newscast dotted with shootings, stabbings, domestic violence, robberies and other violent acts that violence has declined due to a very extensively laid out change in human history from biblical times to present that has led humans largely away from large scale violence.

It is a big book at almost seven hundred pages, but it’s also a big book in terms of ideas. In order to accept Pinker’s thesis, one has to assume that the news media is wrong. That is not that hard a leap due to their nature to sensationalize and dramatize things. The bigger leap and harder ask at least in my case is asking people to look beyond their front door/window. If you as a person question your safety in your own neighborhood, then why care that you are not being crucified or stoned to death as in biblical times?

Pinker is ultimately convincing that the violence is in decline because the norms of civilization have changed, but I really got lost in the last hundred pages or so when he got into the stuff on the human brain. That could be just a personal thing I hold a degree in political science not brain psychology, but I thought he may have reached too far from the basic idea of violence decline, but not assuring that this decline is permanent by telling what could change.

It’s a big idea book that loses something in the last hundred pages or so.

0CommentWas this review helpful to you?YesNo

This is an answer to the cute and all too easy answers of the Gladwell and Freakonomics types

ByBiruta P Kellyon August 22, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

It's hard to imagine a more fundamentally important question than whether or not things are moving in the right direction. This is what popular science writing should be. This is an answer to the cute and all too easy answers of the Gladwell and Freakonomics types.

Pinker does a marvelous job at being accessible without compromising rigor. He appears to be honest when arguments and data are stronger than others, leaving room for disagreement. In areas where I have a background, I can confirm he seems very knowledgable. There are places where I was less convinced, but that seems inevitable for a book that tackles so much.

Best of all, the writing style and sense of values shows a great concern for the human condition and an almost religious zeal for reason's ability to help it. You will never read the news the same way again.