Science Fiction Weekly just published my interview with Nick Sagan. This one’s a full-length Q&A, not one of the short pieces I do for SCI FI Wire.

Here’s an excerpt:

Sagan: Without a drastic change to human nature, I think it’s reasonable to doubt that world peace will ever be anything more than a pipe dream. Thousands of years of recorded human history, and look at where we are today. Look at what we are. Genetically, we’re not so far from chimpanzees. Are chimps capable of cooperation, compassion, tolerance and compromise? Yes, but they’re far more likely to form tyrannical hierarchies and then persecute, rape and kill chimps from other groups. That’s deeply ingrained primate behavior. It goes back millions of years. A few thousand years of human culture and philosophy have a hard time standing up to “might makes right.” In the animal kingdom, might typically prevails, and our genes know this. They tell us to fight or flee, lead or obey, exploit or be exploited. We can talk about egalitarian utopias all we like, but the aggression lurks within us just the same.

Go read it, then come back and tell me how awesome it is.