Mark Zuckerberg announces next 'Year of Reading' Facebook pick
Zuckerberg is asking Facebook users to join him in reading certain titles this year. The next book to be part of the program is Steven Pinker's 'The Better Angels of Our Nature.'
'The Better Angels of Our Nature' is by Steven Pinker.
Facebook鈥檚 Mark Zuckerberg has selected the next title for his book club.
Zuckerberg said earlier this month that his goal for the New Year was to read a new book every other week and asked Facebook users to join him. His page for the challenge is titled 鈥淎 Year of Books鈥� (it currently has almost 300,000 likes) and the first book he selected, 鈥淭he End of Power鈥� by Mois茅s Na铆m, shot up bestseller lists on websites like Amazon. Na铆m participated in a question-and-answer session on the 鈥�.听
Now the book 鈥淭he Better Angels of Our Nature鈥� by Steven Pinker has been named as the second title in the reading challenge. The pick was revealed on the "Year of Reading" on Jan. 18.听
In our 2011 review of the book, Monitor critic Jordan Michael Smith wrote that the book is 鈥渆xhilarating and exasperating, impressive and embarrassing. Pinker musters a lot of data to show that, contrary to impressions gleaned from the nightly news, violence both between states and within them have declined significantly. Little of this is new鈥�. The book is continually provocative and thoughtful, it must be said, even if it is not always persuasive. Occasionally the data is misleading鈥�. But for the most part the book鈥檚 numbers are solid鈥�. Where Pinker goes wrong 鈥� sometimes deeply wrong 鈥� is in some of his other explanations of these phenomena. He is far too optimistic about the irreversibility of progress that has been made.鈥�