Yale University Press signs Jonathan R. Goodman’s Invisible Rivals, outlining a new approach to the evolution of human behaviour: Humans are inherently neither nice nor nasty, but we use cooperative and competitive tools like choosing irons in golf.
Jean Thomson Black, Senior Executive Editor at Yale University Press bought World English and audio rights from Emma Bal at Madeleine Milburn Literary Agency, and Invisible Rivals will publish globally on 17 June.
Jonathan R. Goodman is a social scientist based at the Wellcome Sanger Institute and Cambridge Public Health, University of Cambridge. He writes about trust, inequality, and evolutionary theory for publications including the Financial Times, New Scientist, Nature, the Guardian, and Scientific American. He said: “Recent works in the human sciences have focused disproportionately on whether we are a cooperative or competitive – or even a good or bad – species. Yet to me there isn’t a fundamental morality common to all people: we have the capacity, not the instinct, to be moral – all that matters is how we use it. My thanks to Jean Thomson Black of Yale University Press and Emma Bal from the Madeleine Milburn Agency for helping me to make this argument.”
Thomson Black said: “Yale University Press is excited about and delighted to welcome to our list the uniquely stimulating Invisible Rivals. Jonathan R. Goodman’s fresh challenge to classic theories that view human nature as competitive or cooperative offers new wisdom about overcoming barriers that impede human development. We look forward to the conversations and debates this work will spark.”
Invisible Rivals has already gathered substantial and glowing advance praise:
“This book is important and timely, since it urges us all to discover the better angels of our nature – and also to confront our demons, in order to control them. At a time when the globe is plagued by rising autocracy, political polarization, geopolitical fights and battles around finite resources, Goodman uses history, evolutionary biology and anthropology to explain why humans are hard-wired to cooperate – but also designed to embrace conflict and competition, with potentially dark outcomes. He argues that we need to recognize these demons clearly, since a failure to tackle them opens the door towards ever-increasing exploitation and dysfunctional societies. Written in an easily accessible style, the book is both erudite and provocative – but also a fun and inspiring call to arms.” – Gillian Tett, Provost of King’s College, Cambridge and author of Fool’s Gold and Anthro-Vision.
“Jonathan R. Goodman has written a fascinating, unique book linking theories about our individual willingness, or reluctance, to cooperate, with practically how a society tries to address some of the largest global challenges of our time. I admire his ability to work across disciplines and at the interface of philosophy, evolutionary biology, public policy and politics to create a book unlike any other I’ve read.” – Devi Sridhar, Chair of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh Medical School.
“Competitive or cooperative? We are both, inextricably so; but what follows? Invisible Rivals takes us on a fascinating journey spanning anthropology, philosophy, evolutionary biology and more. Goodman’s argument is highly approachable, yet also original, eloquent and persuasive. Both lack of trust and trust without discernment endanger the public sphere. The message could hardly be more timely and urgent.” – Robert Attenborough, University of Cambridge and Australian National University.
“In his fascinating debut Invisible Rivals, Goodman debunks simplistic theories of human selfishness, providing a highly nuanced and contextual account of human competition and cooperation with important implications for how to solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, from global climate change to the spread of disinformation.” – Sander van der Linden, author of Foolproof: Why Misinformation Infects Our Minds and How to Build Immunity.
“Humans are inherently neither nice nor nasty, but we use cooperative and competitive tools like choosing irons in golf. It is as unsettling a point as it is important, and Jonathan R. Goodman makes it all but incontrovertible.” – David C. Lahti, the City University of New York.
