Bad Idea #1 "No such thing as progress" with Steven Pinker

🔍 Episode Summary:

In the inaugural episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, Mark Lynas is joined by renowned psychologist and best-selling author Steven Pinker to challenge the pervasive myth that the world is in terminal decline.

Steven makes the case for progress as a measurable, empirical reality, highlighting how improvements in health, literacy, poverty, and safety have transformed human life — even if we rarely hear about them. Together, they explore the psychological biases behind pessimism, the rise of reactionary politics, the dangers of nuclear weapons, and the pitfalls of modern progressive movements.

From Enlightenment ideals to eco-modernism, it's a wide-ranging conversation on how to make the world better — rationally.

🧠 Topics Discussed:

• 📈 What progress really means — and how we can measure it

• 📰 Why the media distorts our sense of reality

• ⚙️ The Enlightenment roots of knowledge-driven human improvement

• 🧨 Why nuclear weapons remain an existential threat

• 🧠 How to rebuild a rational, empirical environmental movement

• 🧵 The rise of wokeism and internal collapse of progressive institutions

• 🇺🇸 Trumpism, authoritarianism, and global democratic backsliding

• 🌿 Is eco-modernism the future of environmentalism?
• 👥 How to lead change without tribalism or culture war

👨‍🏫 Guest Bio:

Steven Pinker is Professor of Psychology at Harvard University and the author of numerous influential books, including:

• Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters

• Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress

• The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

  
  

  
  

He’s a prominent public intellectual, defender of Enlightenment values, and an optimist — but not the naive kind.

📚 Recommended Reading:

• • Enlightenment Now – Steven Pinker
    

  • The Better Angels of Our Nature – Steven Pinker
    

  • Whole Earth Discipline – Stewart Brand
    

  • Apocalypse Never – Michael Shellenberger
    

🎵 Tom Lehrer’s song "We Will All Go Together When We Go"

💬 Quote Highlights:

“The news by its very nature is bound to oversample bad things and neglect good things.” — Steven Pinker

“Not all cultures are going to agree with the latest cause from elite left-wing urban American universities.” — Steven Pinker

“Nuclear weapons can end civilization in a matter of hours. It’s astonishing that literally the end of the world is not an issue.” — Steven Pinker

“Let's treat environmental problems as challenges to be solved, not moral failings to be punished.” — Mark Lynas

🌐 About WePlanet:

WePlanet is a global movement of citizens and scientists dedicated to defending the science and solutions we need to protect our environment and civilisation. Learn more at weplanet.org.

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