Steven Pinker Chapter 16: Politics Chapter 17: Violence

Greta Kent-Stoll Brooke Porter

Chapter 16: Politics

 Intellectual conceptions of human nature lead to political ideologies ranging from right to left  How is society conceptualized?

 Social Contract  Individuals agree to sacrifice autonomy in exchange for security.  (The biological equivalent is reciprocal altruism)  Sociological View  People are social by nature, and they function as parts of a superorganism

 The association between political ideology of either right and left AND these two conceptions of society is loose  The clustering of beliefs into either liberal or conservative: what is the underlying reason?

Liberal vs. Conservative

 Liberal  Can be associated with the Utopian Vision  Utopian Vision: Our limitations come from social arrangements  We do not have an inherent nature (Blank Slate)  Conservative  Can be associated with the Tragic Vision  Tragic Vision: humans are limited and selfish  Traditions last because they allow us to work around the flaws that are part of our nature

 Different political beliefs result from two visions  Two examples:  Economy  Violence

The Problem with the Utopian Vision

 Scientific evidence for an inherent human nature  Historical evidence for an inherent human nature

The U.S. Constitution concurs with the Tragic Vision

 Checks and balances in government  Measures to protect the people from corrupt rulers  Protecting the rights of the individual (and his desire to get ahead)  Democracy is not perfect, but it is the best proven government system thus far  Freedom as well as security  Famines rare  Wars against other democratic nations rare

The Tragic Vision can coexist with various political views from right to left  Bowler and Gintis  People are neither “antlike altruists nor self-centered misers” (Pinker, 2002).  Robert Frank  People tend to spend their money like “drunken sailors”  We would benefit from high consumption tax  Chomsky  Inborn language faculty: propensity to communicate  Natural desire for community and the drive for creative expression

 Politics can (and should) change as our conceptions of human nature become increasingly sophisticated

Strengths of Chapter 16

 The separation between political right and left  There is an obvious clustering when it comes to the diverging views of liberals and conservatives  Variations of political association and ideology can exist

Strengths of Chapter 16

 Selfishness and the desire for self preservation are inherent components of our human nature  Evidence exists to suggest that the desire for community and a degree of communication and cooperation is a part of our nature  Our politics are capable of changing as we become more advanced in our conceptions of human nature

Weaknesses of Chapter 16

 Is there a true “clustering” of beliefs on either end of the spectrum?

 Do the political views possess a degree of logical cohesion after all?

 Liberal views on sex and a desire to create economic equality  Is Pinker accurate in explaining the political polarization by an underlying alliance to either the Tragic or Utopian Vision?

Chapter 17: Violence

“The story of the human race is war. Except for brief and precarious interludes there has never been peace in the world; and long before history began murderous strife was universal and unending.” – Winston Churchill

Historic Evidence of Human Violence

 Skeletons with scalping marks, ax-shaped dents, and arrowheads embedded in them  Weapons like tomahawks and maces that are useless for hunting but specialized for homicide  Paintings from several continents showing men firing arrows, spears, and boomerangs at each other  Cannibalism: human bones ground up and used for food, myoglobin found on pot shards and in human excrement

More Historic Evidence

 Not just war: ethnic strife, turf battles, blood feuds, individual homicides  History indicts our species: the crucifixion of Jesus  Words in our vocabulary:

to crucify, to draw and quarter, to flay, to press, to stone, the garrote, the rack, the stake, the thumbscrew.

Theories of Violence: Learned

 Learned, Social  Violence has nothing to do with human nature but is a pathology inflicted by malign elements outside of us  Violence is a behavior taught by culture  Right-thinking people: “violence is learned behavior”  Childhood abuse: people who have been victimized often become victimizers themselves

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Many say American Culture is the cause

• Journalist Alfie Kohn attributed the Oklahoma City bombing to American Individualism: “We have a cultural addiction to competition in this country. We’re taught in classrooms and playing fields that other people are obstacles to our own success” (pp. 309). • • Another explanation of the bombing put the blame on American symbols: national seal, state mottoes.

New Hampshire: “Live Free or Die” Massachusetts: “With the sword, we seek peace, but under liberty”

The American Conception of Maleness

 Boys are forced to separate from their mothers and stifle their emotions  “Violent behavior, emotional distance, and higher rates of drug addiction can’t be explained by hormones…the problem, experts say, is cultural beliefs about masculinity-everything packed into the phrase ‘a real man’”(pp.309).

“Violence is learned behavior”

 Not based on any sound research  Aggressive parents often have aggressive children: These tendencies may not be just learned, but inherent as well  Guns make it easier for people to kill: Maine and North Dakota have the lowest homicide rates, but almost every home has a gun

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Some opposing views on media violence

• Media violence – glorified violence and murder Investigation: 200 studies looked for a connection between media violence and violent behavior, and more than half failed to find one.

• Violent children seek out violent entertainment; children are aroused by action-packed footage • Exposure to media violence has little or no effect on violent behavior in the world • American media and media violence is a major cause of American violent crime • Canadians watch the same television shows as Americans but have a fourth of their homicide rate

Theories of Violence: Biological

 Evidence that we may have evolved mechanisms for discretionary violence  Large size, strength, and upper-body mass of men is a zoological giveaway of an evolutionary history of violent male-male competition  The effects of testosterone on dominance and violence  The emotion of anger  Fight-or-flight response  Disruptions of inhibitory systems of the brain can lead to aggressive attacks  Boys play rough and tumble

Pinker thinks…

 “…we will never understand violence by looking only at the genes or brains of violent people. Violence is a social and political problem, not just a biological and psychological one” (pp. 317).

Two fears people have

 Examining the roots of violence in human nature consists of reducing violence to the bad genes of violent individuals  Ethnic groups with higher rates of violence  If people are endowed with violent motives, they can’t help but being violent, or must be violent all the time

Understanding Violence: The 3 Principle Causes of Quarrel

 Competition  Diffidence  Glory  Hobbes’s analysis shows that violence is not a primitive, irrational urge¸ nor is it a pathology . It is a near-inevitable outcome of the dynamics of self interested, rational social organisms.

Understanding the Hobbesian Trap

 The problem with violence is that the advantage of deploying it or renouncing it depend on what the other side does  Game Theory: the best decision for each player individually is sometimes the worst decision for both collectively

Means of Preventing Violence: Conflict Resolution

 Submitting to the rules of the law  Figuring out a way for both sides to back down without losing face  Acknowledging the possibility of one’s own self-deception  Accepting the equivalence of one’s own interest and other people’s

 Advances in human conflict resolution depend on the ability to be rational, and to realize that the mind is a combinatorial, recursive system: we have thoughts, thought about our thoughts, and thoughts about our thoughts about out thoughts.

 Acknowledgement of this unfortunately may be accepting violence or even approving of it.

Strengths of Chapter 17

 Strong arguments against the “usual suspects”  Guns, discrimination, poverty  Pinker’s agreement with the “radical scientists”  Use of contemporary examples to easier relay his ideas

Weaknesses of Chapter 17

 More strengths than weaknesses in this chapter  Flowery language tends to muddle his message  Slightly unorganized

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We’re finally finished!

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Thanks for your participation!

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THE END!