Getting Better, III: Cherish the Forces of Civilization and Enlightenment

In his 2011 book, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined, Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker insists that the conventional “romantic nostalgia [that] longs to turn back the clock”—to a time when things were great—is profoundly misplaced. He admits that we can be reminded of the misery inherent in the daily lives

Tolerating Diversity

There is a balance to be struck between gaining insight from historical awareness and reflection, on one hand, and making the present and future slaves to the past, on the other. In his book American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America, Colin Woodard goes too far toward the latter