The sources of these figures can be found on the website “ Our World in Data ” As this graph shows, life expectancy really only increased from the end of the 19th century, given that in 1800 there was no country with life expectancy above 40 years.Ģ/ 100 million (more than): the number of children saved from death thanks to the fight against infectious diseases since 1990. Before going into the work in depth and discussing its claims, which we will do in the second part of this piece, we would like to begin whetting your appetite by giving you just a small handout of the most compelling data supporting the author’s affirmation that we have excellent reasons to continue believing in Reason.ġ/ 71.4 years: this was the average life expectancy of an individual in 2015.

Its principle thesis is that “since the 18th Century and as a result of the philosophy of the Enlightenment, the world – contrary to current popular opinion – has never had it so good, because it has realised the ideals of the Enlightenment, based on knowledge, science and reason.” It is this theory that the author sets out to prove, with supporting statistics. This 500-page work, complete with over seventy-five infographics and a copious bibliography, is a real bible for a site like European Scientist. “Enlightenment Now” is the title of the latest book by the Canadian-American Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, and author of the best-selling “The Better Angels of Our Nature”.

Steven pinker now