If you feel like the world is heading for disaster, look around. People are living longer, healthier, freer, and happier than ever before. In a breathtaking overview of the state of humanity in the third millennium, psychologist and science writer Steven Pinker urges us to look beyond sensational news headlines and the catastrophic predictions that so cleverly exploit our inherent cognitive biases. Instead, he calls on us to turn to the numbers, using seventy stunning charts to demonstrate the unprecedented progress not only in the West but throughout the world, in everything from health and well-being to security, peace, and human rights. This progress is not an accident or the result of external forces. It is a gift to the modern world from the Enlightenment, who first conceived of the idea that knowledge could be used for the well-being of all humanity. The ideas of the Enlightenment are not naive dreams. On the contrary, they worked—and that is an undeniable fact. Yet, right now, these ideas especially need our defense, as they counter the characteristic flaws of human nature—tribalism, authoritarianism, the demonization of others, and magical thinking—that modern demagogues so love to exploit. Yes, the problems facing humanity are enormous, but they are all solvable if we, continuing the work of the Enlightenment, use reason, trust science, and are guided by the ideals of humanism.