'Hope for Cynics' and 'On Freedom' ask big-picture questions about how we live

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4.2 • 672 Ratings

🗓️ 4 October 2024

⏱️ 22 minutes

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Summary

In today's episode, two new nonfiction books take on big themes: cynicism and freedom. In his new book, Hope for Cynics, Stanford psychology professor Jamil Zaki argues that cynicism is unhealthy not only for individuals, but also for communities and even entire nations. He speaks with Here & Now's Deepa Fernandes about why Americans have grown more cynical over the last 50 years and how a close friend inspired Zaki to move towards "hopeful skepticism." Then, Yale historian Timothy Snyder joins NPR's Scott Simon from Ukraine to talk about how the American definition of freedom can be too narrow. They also discuss how Snyder's thinking on freedom has been shaped by his time in Ukraine.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong.
0:05.5	Election years have a way of pushing people to think big picture about the state of our country, the state of democracy, the state of us.
0:14.0	Today on the pod, we've got two writers who can help guide us through those big picture questions.
0:19.1	In a bit, we'll hear from Timothy Snyder.
0:20.8	He's a historian and a specialist in Eastern and Central European history.
0:25.2	You might be familiar with his 2017 book On Tyranny,
0:29.0	which chronicled the rise of tyranny and how we might prevent it.
0:32.1	He's got a follow-up now titled On Freedom about the ways we define freedom.
0:36.9	But first, Stanford professor
0:39.0	Jamil Zaki has this interesting book called Hope for Cynics. It's a science-based data-backed
0:45.0	argument against cynicism, which he defines as thinking most people are selfish and greedy.
0:51.5	And I'm not going to lie, I was a little defensive listening to the
0:54.7	first part of this interview because as a reporter, I just think that it's safe to assume most
0:59.5	people have ulterior self-serving motivations. But as he points out in this interview with
1:05.0	here and Nesdipa Fernandez, there is a difference between cynicism and skepticism.
1:11.2	That's ahead.
1:16.2	A lot of short daily news podcasts focus on just one story.
1:18.9	But right now, you probably need more. On Up First from NPR, we bring you three of the world's top headlines every day in under 15 minutes.
1:26.1	Because no one's story can capture all that's happening in this big
1:30.4	crazy world of ours on any given morning. Listen now to the Up First podcast from NPR.
1:36.7	You may remember hearing Stanford Professor Jemil Zaki on here and now talking about empathy
1:42.4	and how developing it, even for those with whom we have
	...

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