Progress of Humankind: End of Killing References

To listen to some in the media tell it, the world is an awful place and getting worse. But if I tried to make one argument in THE END OF KILLING, it’s that there are reasons to be hopeful—and those reasons have to do with data about basic human existence. By almost any measure, we’re safer and more prosperous as a species now than we were centuries ago, and while that’s not any reason to rest on our laurels, it is something worth keeping in mind when we talk about technology, the future, and human progress.

Consider the following charts:

  1. Literacy Rates
    Chart of literacy of world population over time | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
  2. Life expectancy
    Chart of Global Life Expectancy | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
  3. Extreme poverty
    Chart of World Population Living in Poverty Over Time | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
  4. Risks of death from war
    Battle-related Deaths in State Based Conflicts | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
    State-based battle-related deaths chart | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
    Chart showing Great Powers fighting over time | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
  5. Child labor rates
    Chart showing child labor incidence over time | Rick Smith, The End of Killing
  6. Infections from disease
    Chart showing infections from eradicable diseases | Rick Smith, The End of KillingAll the data/charts come from: https://ourworldindata.org/