Robert Wright (journalist)

Robert Wright (born January 15, 1957) is an American author and journalist known for his wide-ranging interests in philosophy, society, science (especially evolutionary psychology), history, politics, international relations, and religion. He has published five books: Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information (1988), The Moral Animal (1994), Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny (1999), The Evolution of God (2009), and Why Buddhism is True (2017). Wright has taught at Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania; more recently, in 2019 he was Visiting Professor of Science and Religion at Union Theological Seminary, New York.<ref name="uts-profile">Template:Cite web</ref>

In addition to teaching, lecturing, books, and journalism, Wright has been an innovator in the development of content on the Internet. He is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Bloggingheads.tv, the founder and editor-in-chief of Meaningoflife.tv, the founder and chief correspondent of the Nonzero Newsletter and Nonzero Podcast, and the creator of the Nonzero Foundation.

Early life and education

Wright was born in Lawton, Oklahoma, into a Southern Baptist<ref name=enlightennextPg2>Template:Cite web</ref> family and attended public secondary schools in San Francisco, California, and San Antonio, Texas. A self-described "Army brat",<ref name=PBS>Template:Cite episode</ref> Wright attended Texas Christian University for a year in the late 1970s, before transferring to Princeton University, where he studied sociobiology, a precursor to evolutionary psychology.<ref name=enlightennextPg2 /> His teachers at Princeton included author John McPhee, whose style influenced Wright's first book, Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information.

Career

Journalism

Wright was employed as Senior Editor at The Sciences and The New Republic,<ref name=TNR>Template:Cite web</ref> and as an editor at The Wilson Quarterly.<ref name=Wilson>Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link</ref> As a contributing editor at The New Republic, he co-authored the "TRB" column.<ref name=TRB>Template:Cite news</ref> He has also worked at Time,<ref name=Time>Template:Cite magazine</ref> and Slate,<ref name=SlateArt>Template:Cite web</ref> and has written for The Atlantic Monthly,<ref name=AtlanticMonthly>Template:Cite web</ref> The New Yorker,<ref name=NewYorker>Template:Cite web</ref> and The New York Times Magazine. He has occasionally contributed to The New York Times, putting in a stint as guest columnist in April 2007 and in 2010 acting as a contributor to The Opinionator,<ref name=Opinionator>Template:Cite news</ref> a web-only opinion page. Wright assumed the title of senior editor of The Atlantic on January 1, 2012.<ref name=BHTV-Dunkirk>Template:Cite video</ref> In February 2015 the magazine's author page describes him as "a former senior editor at The Atlantic."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

University teaching and research

In early 2000s, Wright taught occasionally at Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania, leading a graduate seminar called "Religion and Human Nature" and teaching an undergraduate course called "The Evolution of Religion." At Princeton, Wright was a Laurence S. Rockefeller Visiting Fellow<ref name=Rockefeller>Template:Cite web</ref> and co-taught a graduate seminar with Peter Singer on the biological basis of moral intuition.<ref name=EvolutionGodAcknowledgments>Template:Cite book</ref> In 2014, Wright taught a six-week Coursera MOOC on "Buddhism and Modern Psychology".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 2019, Wright was a Visiting Professor of Science and Religion at Union Theological Seminary, New York.<ref name="uts-profile"/> Also in 2019, Wright was a Senior Fellow at the think tank New America.<ref name="NAprofile">Template:Cite web</ref>

Meaningoflife.tv

In 2002, Wright ventured into video-on-Internet with his MeaningofLife.tv website, developed by Greg Dingle,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> where he interviewed a range of thinkers on their ideas about science, philosophy, meditation, spirituality, and other topics. Meaningoflife.tv is sponsored by Slate magazine, and made possible through funding by the Templeton Foundation.<ref name=MeaningAboutUs>Template:Cite web</ref> Other hosts include John Horgan, Daniel Kaufman, Nikita Petrov, and Aryeh Cohen-Wade.

Bloggingheads.tv

Wright and Mickey Kaus comparing stuffed moose visual aids on Bloggingheads.tv

On November 1, 2005, Wright, blogger Mickey Kaus, and Greg Dingle launched Bloggingheads.tv,<ref name=BloggingHeadsAbout>Template:Cite web</ref> a current-events diavlog. Bloggingheads diavlogs are conducted via webcam, and can be viewed online or downloaded either as WMV or MP4 video files or as MP3 sound files. New diavlogs are posted approximately 5-10 times a week and are archived. While many diavlogs feature Wright, other hosts at Bloggingheads.tv include Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, Bill Scher, Matt Lewis, Kat Rosenfield, Phoebe Maltz-Bovy, and Aryeh Cohen-Wade.

Views on religion

Wright has written extensively on the topic of religion, particularly in The Evolution of God. In 2009, When asked by Bill Moyers if God is a figment of the human imagination, Wright responded:<ref name="Moyers">Template:Cite episode</ref>

On The Colbert Report, Wright said he was "not an atheist" but did not subscribe to any of the three Abrahamic religions.<ref name=Colbert>Template:Cite web</ref> He opposes creationism, including intelligent design. Wright has a materialist conception of natural selection; however, he is intrigued by the possibility of some larger purpose unfolding, natural selection possibly being itself the product of design,<ref name="Dennett1">Template:Cite episode</ref> in the context of teleology.<ref name="teleology">Template:Cite episode</ref> Wright describes what he calls the "changing moods of God," arguing that religion is adaptable and based on the political, economic, and social circumstances of the culture, rather than strictly scriptural interpretation.<ref name="GoogleTalk">Template:Cite episode</ref>

Wright has also been critical of organized atheism. He has described himself as a secular humanist.<ref name=Secular>Template:Cite video</ref> Wright makes a distinction between religion being wrong and bad and resists the notion that its bad effects necessarily outweigh its good effects. He sees organized atheism as attempting to actively convert people in the same way as many religions do. Wright has said that it is counterproductive to think of religion as being the root cause of today's problems.<ref name=Secular2>Template:Cite video</ref>

In Why Buddhism is True, Wright investigates a secular, Westernized form of Buddhism focusing on the practice of mindfulness meditation and stripped of the element of reincarnation.<ref name="Vox">Template:Cite web</ref> He believes Buddhism's diagnosis of the causes of human suffering is largely vindicated by evolutionary biology and evolutionary psychology, justifying his book's title.<ref name="kirkus">Template:Cite web</ref> He further argues that the modern psychological idea of the modularity of mind resonates with the Buddhist teaching of no-self (anatman).<ref name="kirkus"/>

Personal life

Wright lives in Princeton, New Jersey, with his wife Lisa; they have two daughters.<ref name=PBS /> Two of their dogs, named Frazier<ref name=Dog1>Template:Cite video</ref> and Milo,<ref name=Dog2>Template:Cite video</ref> have been featured in Bloggingheads.tv episodes.

Books

• 1989 Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information. Template:ISBN
• 1994 The Moral Animal: Why We Are the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology. Template:ISBN
• 1999 Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny. Template:ISBN
• 2009 The Evolution of God. Little, Brown and Company. Template:ISBN
• 2017 Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment. Template:ISBN

Awards and recognition

• The Evolution of God was one of three finalists for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.<ref name=pulitzer>Template:Cite web</ref>
• The New York Times Book Review chose Wright's The Moral Animal as one of the ten best books of 1994;<ref name=MoralAward>Template:Cite news</ref> it was a national bestseller and has been published in at least twelve languages.
• Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny was a The New York Times Book Review Notable Book in the year 2000 and has been published in at least nine languages. Fortune magazine included Nonzero on a list of "the 75 smartest [business-related] books of all time."<ref name=Fortune>Template:Cite news</ref>
• Wright's first book, Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information, was published in 1988 and was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award.<ref name=NBCC>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Wright's column "The Information Age," written for The Sciences magazine, won the National Magazine Award for Essay and Criticism.Template:Citation needed

External links

• Template:Twitter
• Template:IMDb name
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• EvolutionofGod.net - A website for Wright's book The Evolution of God
• Nonzero.org Template:Webarchive - A website for Wright's book Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny
• Bloggingheads.tv
• MeaningofLife.tv Template:Webarchive
• Wright's Mindful Resistance newsletter
• Contributions to Slate magazine
• Literary Nonfiction Piece on Wright