Steven Pinker’s Work Continues to Dazzle Bill Gates
Billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates may be APS William James Fellow Steven A. Pinker’s best publicist.
The Microsoft founder last year called out Pinker’s 2010 book The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined as “the most inspiring book I’ve ever read.” That shot the title to the top spot on Amazon, a boost of more than 600,000%.
By World Economic Forum – Flickr, CC BY 2.0, Link
Now, Gates is touting his love for Pinker’s newest release, Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress, as his new favorite book.
In Enlightenment Now, Pinker – a cognitive scientist at Harvard University – points to data showing that health, prosperity, safety, knowledge, and well-being are all on the rise, but are overshadowed by tragic news stories and doomsday prophesies.
Hailed as one of the world’s most influential people by Time magazine, Pinker has written on vast stretches of the human mind, including language, emotion, vision, and reasoning.
APS regularly opens certain online articles for discussion on our website. Effective February 2021, you must be a logged-in APS member to post comments. By posting a comment, you agree to our Community Guidelines and the display of your profile information, including your name and affiliation. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations present in article comments are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect the views of APS or the article’s author. For more information, please see our Community Guidelines.
Please login with your APS account to comment.