Ranking human conflicts and tyrannies

In my debates with some theists over the nature of human morality I am sometimes accused of being utopian. Of only seeing a good side to human nature. Ignoring the history of violence and persecution.

Maybe it’s just a matter of my critics finding a balanced view of human nature impossible. However, I reject their criticism because I have in fact written about the human nature and intuitions, such as the “then vs us” intuition, which have motivated negative examples of human activity.

Still, these critiques have put me in admirable company – Steven Pinker has received similar unwarranted criticism. Particularly in the publicity surrounding his new book: The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined.

I have a copy and look forward to reading it. His earlier books are impressive and this has certainly had excellent reviews.

Pinker argues, and provides evidence for his argument, that human violence has declined. He is not claiming this trend is inevitable or that it cannot be reversed. Just that it is a fact of recent history.

The Guardian recently published an interview with Pinker about his findings. You can read it at Steven Pinker: fighting talk from the prophet of peace. This included a table from the book that impressed me.  it was a list of the 21 worst atrocities (conflicts or tyrannies) in human history. Pinker recalibrated these, to express the number of victims in terms of an equivalent 20th Century population.

I have listed the data below in order of the recalibrated death tolls. It certainly provides some food for thought. (And, incidentally put’s paid to the simplistic ideologies which blame all wars and atrocities on either religion or atheism).

Ranking	Conflict	Century	Death toll*	Death toll (20C equivalent)**
1	An Lushan revolt	8th	36m	429m
2	Mongol conquest	13th	40m	278m
3	Middle East slave trade	7th-19th	18m	132m
4	Fall of the Ming dynasty	17th	25m	112m
5	Fall of Rome	3rd-5th	8m	105m
6	Timur Lenk	14th-15th	17m	100m
7	Annihilation of the American Indians	15th-19th	20m	92m
8	Atlantic slave trade	15th-19th	18m	83m
9	Second world war	20th	55 million	55M
10	Taiping rebellion	19th	20m	40M
11	Mao Zedong (mostly government-caused famine)	20th	40M	40M
12	British India (mostly preventable famine)	19th	17m	35m
13	Thirty years’ war	17th	7m	32m
14	Russia’s “time of troubles”	16th-17th	5m	23m
15	Josef Stalin	20th	20m	20m
16	First world war	20th	15m	15m
17	French wars of religion	16th	3m	14m
18	Congo Free State	19th-20th	8m	12m
19	Napoleonic wars	19th	4m	11m
20	Russian civil war	20th	9m	9m
21	Chinese civil war	20th	3m	3m

*Median/mode of figures cited in encyclopaedias or histories. Includes battlefield and civilian deaths
**Deaths were calculated against global population at time, then scaled up to mid-20th century level

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One of the figures from Pinker’s new book also illustrates his main point. This is his Figure 5.3: 100 worst wars and atrocities in human history.
Perhaps we are getting better?

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