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A review by bucketoffish
Do Humankind's Best Days Lie Ahead?: The Munk Debates by Matt Ridley, Alain de Botton, Steven Pinker
1.0
This book consists of a debate transcript between Steven Pinker, Matt Ridley, Alain de Botton, and Malcolm Gladwell, as well as pre-debate interviews with each of the speakers and a post-debate analysis. The topic was "Do humankind's best days lie ahead?".
Overall, I thought the debate was terrible. Both Botton and Gladwell made good points in their pre-debate interviews, but were unable to bring them up clearly in the actual debate. Botton in particular seemed like he was rambling, and it was difficult to tell during the debate what he was talking about. All parties involved constantly talked past and over each other, and very few points were actually addressed. I think you can see this in the pre and post-debate polls of the audience, which showed that very few people changed their minds. Makes sense when there was barely any actual discussion. The points made by Pinker were already accepted by all four speakers before the debate began, and the actual points where they differed were not given due attention.
In order to have an effective debate, everybody needs to start on the same page. I think it would have helped if one of the pro debaters tried to clarify the opposing position. Imagine if Pinker had said, "Botton, I think you're saying that material progress can't really be the only judge of whether or not it's pleasant to be a human being. There's things like loneliness, anxiety, depression, and loss of agency that are elevated in the present day, correct? Well, my response to that is to look at how social attitudes have changed towards mental health. Therapy is more available these days, and more people are aware and thinking about these problems. Data also shows that we're kinder to each other. Instances of bullying in schools, for example, have been on a downward trend... [etc.]". If we had more of this kind of discussion instead of the endless crosstalk, the debate could have been interesting and ended up changing some people's minds.
The debate format has problems too. The free-for-all section needs to go. Absolutely nothing useful was said there. Additionally, each speaker needs more time. It's not sensical to invite four people on stage and to give them a combined hour of speaking time. I think two people, two hours is a better format, and if there is a free-for-all section, the moderator needs to make sure that people don't interrupt each other.
At the very least, it was nice to hear a summary of Pinker's ideas. I feel like it's less necessary now to read The Better Angels of Our Nature.
Overall, I thought the debate was terrible. Both Botton and Gladwell made good points in their pre-debate interviews, but were unable to bring them up clearly in the actual debate. Botton in particular seemed like he was rambling, and it was difficult to tell during the debate what he was talking about. All parties involved constantly talked past and over each other, and very few points were actually addressed. I think you can see this in the pre and post-debate polls of the audience, which showed that very few people changed their minds. Makes sense when there was barely any actual discussion. The points made by Pinker were already accepted by all four speakers before the debate began, and the actual points where they differed were not given due attention.
In order to have an effective debate, everybody needs to start on the same page. I think it would have helped if one of the pro debaters tried to clarify the opposing position. Imagine if Pinker had said, "Botton, I think you're saying that material progress can't really be the only judge of whether or not it's pleasant to be a human being. There's things like loneliness, anxiety, depression, and loss of agency that are elevated in the present day, correct? Well, my response to that is to look at how social attitudes have changed towards mental health. Therapy is more available these days, and more people are aware and thinking about these problems. Data also shows that we're kinder to each other. Instances of bullying in schools, for example, have been on a downward trend... [etc.]". If we had more of this kind of discussion instead of the endless crosstalk, the debate could have been interesting and ended up changing some people's minds.
The debate format has problems too. The free-for-all section needs to go. Absolutely nothing useful was said there. Additionally, each speaker needs more time. It's not sensical to invite four people on stage and to give them a combined hour of speaking time. I think two people, two hours is a better format, and if there is a free-for-all section, the moderator needs to make sure that people don't interrupt each other.
At the very least, it was nice to hear a summary of Pinker's ideas. I feel like it's less necessary now to read The Better Angels of Our Nature.