In this Ted video, Steven Pinker talks about the major decline in world violence despite what we read and hear through the media.

One of the reasons he suggests is the uprising of technology. He says that because we can more accurately imagine what it’s like to be someone in another part of the world, this humanization lets us sympathize more and connect with what is obviously someone very similar to ourselves. In the same vein, he suggests that international trade puts a value on other nations and we are then less likely to “bomb the guy that made my minivan.”