Open: The Story of Human Progress by Johan Norberg (PDF)

Description

Humanity’s embrace of openness is the key to our success. The freedom to explore and exchange – whether it’s goods, ideas or people – has led to stunning achievements in science, technology and culture. As a result, we live at a time of unprecedented wealth and opportunity. So why are we so intent on ruining it? From Stone Age hunter-gatherers to contemporary Chinese-American relations, Open explores how across time and cultures, we have struggled with a constant tension between our yearning for co-operation and our profound need for belonging. Providing a bold new framework for understanding human history, bestselling author and thinker Johan Norberg examines why we’re often uncomfortable with openness – but also why it is essential for progress. Part sweeping history and part polemic, this urgent book makes a compelling case for why an open world with an open economy is worth fighting for more than ever.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Here’s my (spoiler alert!) synopsis: Civilization requires openness.Johan Norberg’s root point (as I see it) is that the immense complexity of human nature is firmly anchored in the millennia since our proto-sapiens ancestors came down from the trees. Our evolved traits beget a social order quite different from our simian cousins. We collaborate, innovate, and form trading networks with outsiders. We are born to solve problems, energized by challenges. And we can selectively subdue our primal “us versus them” impulses to form broad cooperative communities. There the raw zero-sum world of nature can be superseded by positive-sum societies in which human progress is liberated from inherited constraints.It took untold ages for this to happen, even longer to become obvious. We needed first to speak, make tools, alphabets, moveable type, information archives, and to create knowledge networks to match our trade networks. About 200 years ago this cumulative progress began to accelerate dramatically. By fits, starts, and irregular leaps forward and backward, we created the modern world by trial and error, and most of all by increasingly open collaboration. We began solving the enormously complex problems we inherited from nature (predators, starvation, resource exhaustion, disease, droughts & floods) and began to mitigate the residual defects of our own nature (wars, violence, crime, & power lust).In that geological moment millions of innovations pulled humanity out of the pit of grinding poverty & humiliating servitude. Wealth expanded exponentially–roughly 3,000% and counting–to levels unimaginable to our ancestors. Global poverty in the last 50 years has plummeted. Despite the impressions from our daily news, wars, crime, violence and infant mortality have dwindled, lifespans tripled, useful inventions now come in avalanches that make progress conspicuous. Liberal democracy and human rights have expanded dramatically. Malthusian limits to human flourishing were pushed over the event horizon as the world’s population approaches 8 billion with third world poverty dropping dramatically.Simultaneous advances in science, technology and medicine are in the last hundred years–or even the last decade–boggle the mind if you try to mentally list them. But even faster acceleration is coming. That wonderful collaboration catalyst, the internet, now fully global, is a fire hose of solutions extinguishing problems. Almost all these advances were spontaneous and unplanned. Innovation is too serendipitous to be constrained. And it works its magic with open, voluntary cooperation. Trying to control it enervates. Close the blinds, and that creativity is channeled into dark purposes.Even at high speed, progress still moves unevenly. And perennially threatened with backward leaps. The monkey parts of our nature are still with us. Demagogues & dictators are rousing nationalist mobs to carry us back to an idyllic past (or utopian future) free of all the unresolved tensions that come with modernity.Intellectuals complain we must stop this chaotic race into the future and submit to a redemptive master plan. In academic echo-chambers students are taught that reason, objectivity, tolerance, and open inquiry are only tools of oppression. Or that progress can only come through enforced political correctness, income equality, and an open-ended quest for social justice based on group identity.Will we push on to an open, prosperous and optimistic future–or retreat into a mythic golden era last seen in 1984? If openness is lost, progress won’t just halt in place. Openness is just as necessary for the flow of wealth as to invent it. If we drift back to authoritarian rule all 8 billion of us will likely experience the return of the Malthusian limits we had just vanquished.Norberg’s hypotheses and conclusions aren’t unique. Steve Pinker and Matt Ridley (and others) have said quite similar things, but he’s not simply rephrasing others’ arguments. Bottom line: Agree with it or not, it’s a damn good–and very thought provoking–book!

⭐A manifest for openness. Most of the arguments presented in this book are already well-known.

⭐This awesome book goes into great depth explaining how open societies work and why they thrive. Most importantly, it shows how openness is the defining characteristic of our human nature and why individual freedom defines the path.

⭐In a time of social and political polarization, this book does an excellent job of describing why societies benefit from openness and diversity. It needs to be done thoughtfully but is possible if citizens are willing to think for themselves and consider both sides of issues

⭐This is a great sequel to Sapians, a brief history. Some really interesting concepts and really enjoying, easy reading.

⭐This certainly ranks among the better books that I’ve read. If you have any interest in history, economics, anthropology or psychology, then this book is for you.

⭐This book is more important now than ever. We currently live in a climate where both political sides are convinced the other side is on the brink of authoritarianism. Johan Norberg explores this fundamental divide of open versus closed societies. In a clear and illuminating manner, with countless facts to reinforce his thesis, he demonstrates conclusively the superiority of open societies and shows that all of the luxuries we currently take for granted are products of freedom.This is a fast-paced, educational, and entertaining history comparing numerous different cultures. Norberg is the latest of several authors who show how good life can be today and counter the doom and gloom narrative on the 24-hour news cycle. The big question is: if open societies are so clearly superior, why are they so rare, and why are they difficult to maintain? Historically, the answer is authority. Whether political or religious, the elite would stamp out any thinking that did not conform to some official narrative. Dissenters were not tolerated and the power of the state or church got rid of them. With the cancel culture, there appears to be an element of that today in America, but the more pressing problem is a lack of clear thinking. The problem is philosophical. Everybody is for freedom, yet everybody talks past each other because their definitions are vastly different. Lack of clear thinking leads to more emotional decisions and movements, which increases tribalism and results in my gang versus your gang mentalities and resolving disagreements through force, which is the cornerstone of all authoritarians.The history communicated in this book is worth the read alone. By almost any metric conceivable, life today is vastly improved compared to previous generations. Trade is a good thing, human interaction leads to new knowledge. New knowledge is what advances different sciences and leads to the concrete benefits that improve one’s life and standard of living. Free speech is critical, debate leads to progress. The ultimate evil that can stop this positive feedback loop is the initiation of force, and the ultimate wielder of force is the state. Political power is different than economic power. Ambiguous definitions wipe out legitimate concepts that are needed to properly distinguish different ideas.Highly recommend. The more people that read this, the better. Ideas are the answer to both sides’ fear of authoritarianism.

⭐Another brilliant book. Norberg is one of the most lucid exponents of the values of liberalism and the open society the world has today. Read, enjoy and find yourself agreeing again and again.

⭐This book is amazing. If you wonder about globalism, we have had globalism forever. There are no examples all through history where protectionism has prospered and endless examples of the benefits of free trade. Well written and researched it will change your world view.

⭐I am very excited to read.The cover had a bit of a streak on it when I received.The book appears to have been dropped at some occasion. The top left was dog-eared and the spine has a bit of a twist in it..

⭐Great book about how Enlightenment values have led to human prosperity and happiness.

⭐Excellent summary of how things have gotten better in ten key areas

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