Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

3 For a detailed discussion of the unprecedented peacefulness of the last few decades, see in particular Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined (New York: Viking, 2011); Joshua S. Goldstein, Winning the War on War: The Decline of Armed Conflict Worldwide (New York: Dutton, 2011); Gat, War in Human Civilization.

4 ‘World Report on Violence and Health: Summary, Geneva 2002’, World Health Organization, accessed 10 December 2010, http://www.who.int/whr/2001/en/whr01_annex_en.pdf. For mortality rates in previous eras see: Lawrence H. Keeley, War before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996).

5 ‘World Health Report, 2004’, World Health Organization, 124, accessed 10 December 2010, http://www.who.int/whr/2004/en/reporto4_en.pdf.

6 Raymond C. Kelly, Warless Societies and the Origin of War (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000), 21. See also Gat, War in Human Civilization, 129–31; Keeley, War before Civilization.

7 Manuel Eisner, ‘Modernization, Self-Control and Lethal Violence’, British Journal of Criminology 41:4 (2001), 618–638; Manuel Eisner, ‘Long-Term Historical Trends in Violent Crime’, Crime and Justice: A Review of Research 30 (2003), 83–142; ‘World Report on Violence and Health: Summary, Geneva 2002’, World Health Organization, accessed 10 December 2010, http://www.who.int/whr/2001/en/whr01_annex_en.pdf; ‘World Health Report, 2004’, World Health Organization, 124, accessed 10 December 2010, http://www.who.int/whr/2004/en/reporto4_en.pdf.

8 Walker and Bailey, ‘Body Counts in Lowland South American Violence’, 30.

19 And They Lived Happily Ever After

1 For both the psychology and biochemistry of happiness, the following are good starting points: Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom (New York: Basic Books, 2006); R. Wright, The Moral Animal: Evolutionary Psychology and Everyday Life (New York: Vintage Books, 1994); M. Csikszentmihalyi, ‘If We Are So Rich, Why Aren’t We Happy?’, American Psychologist 54:10 (1999): 821–7; F. A. Huppert, N. Baylis and B. Keverne (eds.), The Science of Well-Being (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005); Michael Argyle, The Psychology of Happiness, 2nd edition (New York: Routledge, 2001); Ed Diener (ed.), Assessing Well-Being: The Collected Works of Ed Diener (New York: Springer, 2009); Michael Eid and Randy J. Larsen (eds.), The Science of Subjective Well-Being (New York: Guilford Press, 2008); Richard A. Easterlin (ed.), Happiness in Economics (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2002); Richard Layard, Happiness: Lessons from a New Science (New York: Penguin, 2005).

2 Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011); Inglehart et al., ‘Development, Freedom and Rising Happiness’, 278–81.

3 D. M. McMahon, The Pursuit of Happiness: A History from the Greeks to the Present (London: Allen Lane, 2006).

20 The End of Homo Sapiens

1 Keith T. Paige et al., ‘De Novo Cartilage Generation Using Calcium Alginate-Chondrocyte Constructs’, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery 97:1 (1996), 168–78.

2 David Biello, ‘Bacteria Transformed into Biofuels Refineries’, Scientific American, 27 January 2010, accessed 10 December 2010, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=bacteria-transformed-into-biofuel-refineries.

3 Gary Walsh, ‘Therapeutic Insulins and Their Large-Scale Manufacture’, Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology 67:2 (2005), 151–9.

4 James G. Wallis et al., ‘Expression of a Synthetic Antifreeze Protein in Potato Reduces Electrolyte Release at Freezing Temperatures’, Plant Molecular Biology 35:3 (1997), 323–30.

5 Robert J. Wall et al., ‘Genetically Enhanced Cows Resist Intramammary Staphylococcus Aureus Infection’, Nature Biotechnology 23:4 (2005), 445–51.

6 Liangxue Lai et al., ‘Generation of Cloned Transgenic Pigs Rich in Omega-3 Fatty Acids’, Nature Biotechnology 24:4 (2006), 435–6.

7 Ya-Ping Tang et al., ‘Genetic Enhancement of Learning and Memory in Mice’, Nature 401 (1999), 63–9.