TED Talks: Robert Wright

I really enjoyed this TED talk, and find Wright to have a good sense of humor. The idea that a move toward empathy is our best chance at survival is important. But I struggle to see how it can work at the cultural level -- empathy is based in individual to individual interaction. But I'm willing to give Wright the benefit of the doubt.

Author Robert Wright explains “non-zero-sumness,” a game-theory term describing how players with linked fortunes tend to cooperate for mutual benefit. This dynamic has guided our biological and cultural evolution, he says -- but our unwillingness to understand one another, as in the clash between the Muslim world and the West, will lead to all of us losing the “game.” Once we recognize that life is a non-zero-sum game, in which we all must cooperate to succeed, it will force us to see that moral progress — a move toward empathy — is our only hope.

How cooperation (eventually) trumps conflict

Tags: Robert Wright, TED Talks, non-zero-sumness, evolution, game-theory, empathy, culture