Ricardo Villarreal

Think, Therefore Think Again

Keep the Enlightenment Going!

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Enlightenment Now Steven Pinker

If your perception of the world is one built around the content of news, you probably have a negative feeling about the current state of affairs. News coverage has indeed become more negative over time. Fortunately, it is also true the world is not falling apart, but quite the contrary.

In his latest book “Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress,” Harvard cognitive scientist Steven Pinker presents a very compelling argument on how humanity today is living in the best time in history.

Following meticulously researched data on different development metrics throughout time, Pinker shows the incredible progress humanity has achieved and makes the case on why we must continue to defend the ideals of reason, science, and humanism, the pillars of the Enlightenment.

Some of the measurements of progress researched are prioritized on values the world agrees on including those in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

When it comes to life span, the world has seen a sharp increase in the average life expectancy. While no developed country in the year 1800 had a life expectancy above 40, today the average life expectancy is 71.5 years globally. For countries in the developed world the average is more than 80 years. That is double the life expectancy in a period of 200 years!

With that, the rates of children and maternal mortality have plunged dramatically. And thanks to advances in farming, sanitation, medicine and science, people are also healthier today than ever before.

In terms of wealth and prosperity, Pinker shows in a very simple but powerful graphic how the Gross World Product today has grown almost 100 times since the Industrial Revolution. All countries have considerably increased their GDP while the percentage of people in extreme poverty has declined from 90% in the year 1800 to 10% today.

And yes, there is inequality. The author’s argument here could sound controversial to some as he mentions that inequality is not a fundamental component of well-being. Instead, he suggests focusing on poverty as a main concern, as “it is not about everyone having the same, but everyone having enough.”

Today, everyone in the US is better off thanks to globalization and technology. The author reveals how today “more than 95% of American households below the poverty line enjoy electricity, running water, flush toilets, a refrigerator, a stove, and a color TV. Affluent families like the Vanderbilts, Rothchilds, and others, had none of these things a century and a half before.”

But Pinker does acknowledge more needs to be done to reduce inequality and improve everyone’s standard of living, particularly the more economically vulnerable. He suggests a solution may be found in a universal basic income.

I appreciate his observations regarding the environment as I have been somewhat pessimistic and concerned about the future of humanity particularly on two topics: overpopulation and the depletion of our natural resources (mainly the water crisis).

As he shows, world population will continue to grow, but only temporary. Its growth rate peaked at 2.1% in 1962 and it has declined ever since, reaching 1.2% growth rate in 2010, and a close to zero projection for the year 2070, when the world population is expected to reach its maximum figure of about 9.4 billion people before it begins to decline.

The environment has seen promising progress as people continue to be more mindful about the importance of protecting our planet. Using clear graphs, Steven Pinker shows how the world has seen a decline in air pollution, deforestation, and oil spills, while the percentage of land and marine protected areas keep expanding.

Progress in technology and the digital revolution has pushed everywhere a rapid process of dematerialization which has allowed us to achieve more with less resources.

Alarming predictions of resource shortages have failed repeatedly, and humanity has always been able to find cheaper, better, and more plentiful substitutes, or recycle and re-engineer products for subsequent use.

When it comes to food production, farmers and scientists have discovered different methods which have allowed food to grow exponentially despite natural disasters and other crises. Our concern today has more to do with food waste rather than supply.

Regarding the topic of water, I wish the author had given the subject more coverage. In a brief remark, however, he believes there is no reason to be alarmed as water assurance will be achieved through desalinating seawater as the world continues to develop more carbon-free energy sources.

Despite the many improvements in environmental quality, the biggest challenge is facing the problem of human-made climate change. The effects of greenhouse gases on our planet’s climate have been increasing the average temperature with every recent year becoming the hottest on record.

The annual emissions of CO2 in the world increased almost every year since 1960. But thanks to strong global actions on decarbonization, CO2 emissions reached its peak in 2014, leveled in 2015, and has declined among the top three emitters (China, United States, and the European Union).

In the United States, carbon reduction has been accomplished by the growth of wind and solar energy, and by replacing bitumen coal with methane gas. In addition, and as distrusted as it is among the most passionate environmentalists, Pinker stresses we must support nuclear power, a carbon-free energy source and a key solution to further advance decarbonization.

The world is also more peaceful thanks in part to international trade, economic development, international law, and democracy around the world. Democratic Peace theory suggests countries that are more democratic are less likely to engage in a military conflict. Additionally, Pinker reminds us that war also became illegal with the founding of the United Nations in 1945.

On other topics I won’t expand (because I strongly recommend reading this book), the world is living its safest time in history, we are more democratic, more countries have taken big steps on equal rights, and people overall live a better quality of life.

All the above-mentioned criteria take us down to one of the most important indicators of human progress: happiness. People are happier when they are healthier, feel safer, have enough money, when they have the freedom to choose what to do with their lives, and when they spend quality time with friends and family, among other reasons. And data shows every newer generation seem to be happier than the previous one.

But what about the future of progress?

The ideals of the Enlightenment have contributed to improve human flourishing, and it must be an ongoing process. Pinker notes “progress is not utopia” and we must keep striving for human progress and fight counter-Enlightenment ideals that threaten the advancement of humanity.

Reason, science, and humanism are threatened today by the rise of authoritarian backward-looking populism in individuals in power like Trump, who has damaged the institutions of American democracy, attacked freedom of speech, promoted long-debunked conspiracy theories, threatened the environment, antagonized immigrants, and has been hostile to science, just to name a few of his autocratic actions.

More than ever, we need to keep defending reason, science, and humanism.

Pinker warns us that “politicization has become the major enemy of reason,” where people are making their own conclusions of what to believe based on their political bias and not on what is true.

To be clear, this happens with people in both right-wing and left-wing political ideologies. One of the best examples on the right is the denial of human-made climate change. And on the left, we have those denying the safety of vaccines and GMOs. Their positions completely ignore the scientific facts in defense of their (erroneous) beliefs.

To improve the standards of reasoning, we need effective training in critical thinking, cognitive debiasing, better discourse, and debate exercises. But the author also reveals a promising new strategy called adversarial collaboration, where opposite thinkers agree on a method and work together to reach a conclusion.

The accomplishments of science are vast. It has given us evidence-based medicine, it has explained many of the universe’s mysteries, how life evolved and how physical things work, among many other discoveries.

Despite this (or because of this), science has been attacked with hostility by groups that favor ignorance and superstition. The religious are particularly ticked off by science.

I have always found it silly when religious groups get mad at science for ruining their fairy tale stories. Instead of being mad at science for exposing the truth, they should be mad at whoever indoctrinated them with lies in the first place.

Positive for the advancement of reason and science is the fact that more and more people are realizing there is absolutely no good reason to believe in the existence of a God, and today the fastest-growing religion in the world is no religion at all. Amen!

Together with reason and science, Pinker stresses the importance of humanism to achieve progress and maximize human flourishing.

Humanism promotes the enrichment of life, health, happiness, freedom, knowledge, and love through the employment of secular values. Steven Pinker explains not only how the separation of church and state in the US Constitution originated from the necessity to consolidate the former British colonies, but also how diverse cultures have converged peacefully thanks to humanism.

A great example of a successful accomplishment among the world nations is the 1948 humanist manifesto known as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

There are many challenges to face, but many more reasons to be optimistic about the future of our planet. Steven Pinker’s book could not have come at a better time.

“Enlightenment Now” is uplifting and it has improved my perspective of the future of the world. It is also a call to understand, appreciate, and keep protecting the ideals of the Enlightenment that have made our lives better. I strongly recommend everyone to read his book.

 

How Death Makes Us More Alive

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Train TracksWe become thinkers the very precise moment when we acknowledge death and discover our own mortality.

I believe the first time I truly grasped the concept of death and realized I will die one day was when I was 8 years-old. I was at home reading the shocking news about the Mexico City earthquake of 1985 and the number of deaths from the tragedy.

I remember the uneasy feeling in my body and the impossibility of doing something about it as I was holding the newspaper and seeing the word “deaths” in the story.

As I discovered that death was real, thinking about how to deal with this topic started to become serious business as well.

In his book, “The Questions of Life”, Spanish philosopher Fernando Savater says that if death is the eternal state of not being, then we have already defeated it: the day we were born.

And even if it is only one time we will defeat death, this one time and opportunity we have of being alive, every day and instant that we continue to live and enjoy life will be triumphantly ours.

With this, not only does one start to think more about life the moment we know we will die, but we also begin to feel more alive than ever.

What do we know about death? Certainly not much. We do know, as Savater explains, that death is very personal and non-transferable. We cannot die for someone else, we can only die our own death.

But death, besides being distinctly personal, is also an accurate concept of true impartiality. Death does not discriminate on race, gender, or socioeconomic class; there is no individual who can escape from it. In the eyes of death we are all equal.

The certainty of death is what gives more importance to our lives. Everything we do, all our work, our hobbies, our social interactions… are all ways of resisting death.

But death is such an incomprehensible thing and so inevitably personal that it also represents the biggest fear for most people.

Some people fear about the unknown that follows death and confront such distress believing in a supernatural after-life world: a mystical place of eternal joy or punishment.

Others, not believing in gods rewarding or punishing humans, fear about the possibility that there is absolutely nothing after death, and that nothing is quite terrifying to them as well.

Perhaps a comforting way to digest this topic comes from Greek philosopher and atomic materialist Epicurus who advises on why we shouldn’t worry nor lose sleep over death: There is nothing to be afraid of because we never coexist with death and we will never feel death, as feeling is an activity (and privilege) of the living.

To feel distressed about the (gazillion) years ahead of us in which we will no longer be alive is just as capricious as to worry about the billions of years before we were born.

If we did not feel any pain being absent for all those billions of years, why should we feel concerned about a future of eternal absence?

Savater also mentions that part of the anguish we feel about death has to do with facing two difficult realities: all the joys of life we will miss when it comes to our own death, and because it will leave us without those we love in the case of others’ deaths.

It’s the conscience of death that makes life a very serious issue to think about. It’s mysterious and marvelous, a type of miracle for which we must fight and constantly reflect.

So death inevitably makes us thinkers. But not thinkers about death itself, but about life. And that should make us feel more alive and grateful.

A popular proverb says, “no one is too young to die, nor too old to live one more day.” It’s up to us to fully take advantage of the time we have and live the best life we can.

 

 

Reading like Nick Hornby

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Nick Hornby“I’m beginning to see that our appetite for books is the same as our appetite for food, that our brain tells us when we need the literary equivalent of salads, chocolate, or meat and potatoes.” – Nick Hornby

“The Polysyllabic Spree” by Nick Hornby is a book about reading that I’m sure you’ll enjoy reading if you love to read. Literally.

With his distinctive witty narrative and open conversational style, the bestselling author of “A Long Way Down” and “Fever Pitch” brilliantly unveils the imperfect and humanizing side of reading we all can relate to.

Let’s face it, reading is quite a challenging task, frequently threatened by all kinds of possible distractions.

And that is the pillar battle in Nick Hornby’s book, as each chapter represents one month of a year-long reading journey, where at the beginning of each episode he enlists those books he bought vs those books he read.

The challenge is quite entertaining as many of the books he reads are not even those he originally purchased. And in the mix of his hilarious explanations, his book commentaries and recommendations are spot on.

As he takes us on this natural and spontaneous reading expedition, he invites us to explore our own reading habits, our unique relationships with books, and even the detours and struggles we face when trying to read.

When it comes to those ever-present obstacles, the author accurately points out that reading is a domestic activity, and is therefore susceptible to any changes in the domestic environment.

Not that this is my case, but let’s say you are comfortably sitting with a book one evening, and your very imaginative and hyper-active four-year-old boy is running around the house while holding a toy spaceship and making sound-blasting special effects.

In such case, you must surrender to the planetary troops that are aggressively pushing you towards an asteroid field, and attempt reading at a later time, perhaps right after the spaceship captain takes an intergalactic bath followed by him going to his zero-gravity sleeping capsule to rest for the night.

Because reading is a very personal activity, we also have our own rules.

For example, I read in both English and Spanish, so I have this rule: I like to read the book of the author in their native tongue primarily.

However, if the author’s language is neither English nor Spanish, then I will proceed to read it in the closest language. Let’s say, if the author is German or Swedish, I would read it in English; if the author is Portuguese or Italian, I would read it in Spanish.

But then I can’t explain why I chose to read Japanese author Haruki Murakami in Spanish, or Greek philosophers in English. Of course, it also depends on availability.

Back to the book, Nick Hornby has a few confessions he shares that I felt very identified with, but also a little bit guilty of such conducts.

For instance, he spends a lot of money on books, many of which he knows he will never read. Anybody else guilty of this?

But let’s say you did start reading a book, and at one point you realize it’s not your type or you simply can’t finish it. Well, it is OK to abandon it. There is no reason to persist with a book that is not working for you.

And while some books are badly written, Hornby reminds us that sometimes they are badly read as well. Not enjoying a book could be our fault too if we don’t provide the commitment and concentration that a book requires.

Now, when it comes to how we organize our reading list, there are (almost inevitably) events that alter the order of your pile of books-to-read.

One of those common events for me comes from book recommendations from a close friend or relative who has a proven track record of recommending great books.

When that happens to me, I feel I must stop whatever I’m reading or update my book cue accordingly in order to give VIP preference to that book recommendation.

Other altering events are realizing an author I like has released a new book or discovering a totally interesting book by accident (like it happened to me with this one).

But altering your book order and putting books aside for later can also be a pain in the Rumpelstiltskin. Especially when you realize there are several books you have put aside which have remained unread for years.

And I’m talking about real physical books in your home! I’m not even going to mention those books I have on my Amazon shopping cart “saved for later”.

One thing is very true: there will never be enough time to read all the books you want.

In fact, Nick Hornby reveals a depressing fact from Gabriel Zaid’s book “So Many Books”, which estimates that it would takes us 15 years simply to read a list of all the books ever published (author and title to be precise)!

The lesson here is to stop wasting time reading books you hate and the more reason to prioritize and focus on enriching, enjoyable, and substantial books.

What books to read? If you are open to new ideas, Nick Hornby has some great recommendations throughout the book covering many genres and authors.

As soon as you immerse yourself in this book, you’ll realize he is not only a tremendous book critic, but his love of books is so contagious you might want to start your own reading list challenge.

At the end of the day, the ultimate goal we readers have is to secure a temporary peacefulness that will allow us to achieve the maximum enjoyment of reading. But can we?

 

Is a Jobless Future Inevitable?

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Rise of the Robots MatrixOne of the biggest threats humanity faces today is the high probability of a jobless future, where robots and automation systems will take over all our jobs.

Think about it. Contrary to humans, robots never get tired, they do not need to take lunch or bathroom breaks, they don’t take vacation or sick days off, they don’t complain about working extra hours, they do not need health insurance & benefits, and, among other things, they do not make… well, human errors.

This apocalyptic scenario (for humans) is a real challenge, currently in progress, and brilliantly covered in the book “Rise of the Robots” by Martin Ford.

And if you think the main victims of automation will be low-skilled workers, be prepared. Machines are in a clear path to take over the good paying jobs as well.

College-educated workers will soon realize their jobs are also at risk as the advancement of Artificial Intelligence is producing cutting-edge machines that can think, create, and train other machines to solve complex problems.

What is the scariest thing about all this? That you could be doing everything right as far as pursuing higher education and skills to obtain a job, and you will still fail. There are too many people and not enough job vacancies for everyone.

How did we get here and how will industries be impacted?

It is true that manufacturing jobs were the first ones to be impacted by automation. As the author reveals in his book, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics shows a dramatic fall in the number of American workers employed in manufacturing since the 1950’s.

We hear today many politicians blaming trade for the loss of manufacturing jobs, but clearly this trend originated decades before NAFTA or the rise of China. And as technology keeps advancing and producing more tangible goods with less workers, jobs in the manufacturing sector will continue to be eliminated.

Another big impact from automation will happen in retail. Per the National Retail Federation, retail trade (including food services) employs about 30 million people in the United States.

We have already seen big companies going through major layoffs or totally shutting down because of online retailers like Amazon, who have disrupted this industry completely.

But even if we shop offline at a physical store, many retailers now offer self-service checkout aisles, information kiosks, and devices to scan products. You can go in, shop, and leave the store without ever being in contact with a person.

Information technology is by far the biggest disrupter. Our lives have become highly dependent on IT, and we have integrated computers and mobile devices everywhere.

And as computers get better and make our lives easier, our dependency on them increases. But this also means computers are becoming smarter and can very likely outperform humans in specialized areas.

Take, for instance, IBM Watson cognitive computer system. Watson first rose to fame after winning a live game of Jeopardy! against two of the best game participants. This was a big shock that completely changed the way we thought of computers and their capabilities.

To be clear, IBM Watson was not a project created to win Jeopardy! but to use advanced technology to solve complex problems that are of benefit to humanity.

Some areas where a cognitive system like IBM Watson could be useful are medicine, customer service, technical support, and the financial industry, where it can be very attractive to wealth managers seeking better financial advice and stock market information.

Even in the world of arts, where feelings and emotions inspire creative works, cognitive computer systems are also breaking grounds. Martin Ford mentions a few examples in his book, including one where the London Symphony Orchestra played music composed entirely by a computer!

On the other hand, the author talks about how education and healthcare remain as the two major industries that have not been greatly impacted (yet) from accelerating digital technology. However, they are already witnessing disruptive effects.

In education, more and more universities are offering online courses and degrees which are attracting big enrollments, and will continue to do so dramatically. As a result, many jobs will disappear as educators are not needed on many of these platforms and grading is automated.

In healthcare, artificial intelligence is showing very promising signs and will be a key factor in the successful diagnosis and treatment for patients. And as far as pharmacists in retail settings, their routine and repetitive jobs filling our prescriptions will be replaced by more efficient automated systems.

Going into the future, the author also talks about two accelerating technologies that will highly impact construction and transportation, two industries that generate millions of jobs.

For quite some time now, the construction of suburban homes in the United States has highly consisted of cookie-cutter neighborhoods and apartment homes where prefabricated materials and economies of scale have brought the costs down for developers.

Add the advancement of 3D printing technology to the equation, and you’ll clearly see how the repetitive construction model of tract housing could someday be the job of 3D construction printers. If so, millions of construction workers will be left unemployed.

As far as the auto industry goes, self-driving cars have already proven their incredible benefits and its future impact on the elimination of jobs is imminent. Those who drive for a living, like taxi and delivery drivers, will be the first to feel the effects.

But not only there, if less people own cars, and more people use self-driving cars in the future for their transportation needs, thousands of businesses that rely on maintenance, fueling, insurance, parking, and so on will evaporate, and so will many jobs. Robotic cars will be centralized, maintained, and operated from their company facility.

What about consumers?

With the massive elimination of jobs, there is one very big economic concern. If millions of people are out of jobs, who will consume all the goods produced by technology?

What good is it to make tons of products that no one will be able to buy? We can’t forget that workers are also consumers, while machines are not.

So how do we ensure the prosperity in a mass-market economy so that the workers who are being replaced by machines continue to consume and participate in the economy?

Certainly, stopping technological progress is not a realistic solution.

The author points out that the most effective solution to protect the economy from a jobless future, will be through the distribution of purchasing power among consumers in the form of a guaranteed basic income.

Embraced by cross-party economists and intellectuals, this guaranteed income (also referred to as a “citizen’s dividend”) will provide a safety net while allowing everyone to participate in the market. It will also help alleviate poverty and reduce income inequality.

But to secure an optimistic scenario from these economic challenges, lawmakers today should be negotiating mechanisms to guarantee such prosperity into the future.

In such divisive times, will this imperative subject be the one that finally gets politicians working together?

The reality is clear and alarming, there is a continuous declining labor participation. A reverse shift from this disruption is highly unlikely, and more jobs will be dissolved than those being created.

Those who are more entrepreneurial and innovative will have greater chances to thrive.

 

“Rise of the Robots” by Martin Ford is available on Amazon.