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There are really two main c I contend that there are two Steven Pinkers. This book comes straight from the pen of Pinker 2. his most recent Better Angels of Our Nature). Pinker 2 retains the writing ability, but instead uses it for pushing his pet theories, usually political in nature (cf. Pinker 1 is an eloquent, witty, and insightful writer on the issues of cognitive psychology and linguistics who has the rare talent of making his subjects accessible and appealing to academic and lay audiences. I contend that there are two Steven Pinkers. It's just thick enough that some paragraphs warrant a second going over, but just engaging enough that it won't leave you frustrated and bored.more I would recommend this book to everyone I know. Music sounds better, machines are blowing my mind, babies are tiny geniuses! Hell, I may even read some poetry. Thinking of human nature in this way makes me appreciate everything "human" in a much deeper sense. Reading about the evolution of the human mind, and how our basic drives-and the complex mechanisms we've developed to serve them-manifest themselves within culture, and simultaneously CREATE 's just.positively uplifting. Reading this book is as close as I've come to a "religious experience". The only place I've ever found deeper meaning is in biology and physics and neurology.
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Newsflash: if you don't take a lot for granted, religious theory makes NO SENSE. It's not that I hate religion, or the idea of god, it's just that I can't really get my mind around it after a childhood devoid of spirituality. When I was a kid, I used to envy the religious folks who seemed to be having such deep meaningful fun all the time. I've always been and always will be (god willing). All this is done in the style that earned his previous books many prizes and worldwide acclaim: wit, lucidity, and insight into matters great and small.more Pinker shows that an acknowledgement of human nature that is grounded in science and common sense, far from being dangerous, can complement insights about the human condition made by millennia of artists and philosophers. It denies our common humanity and our individual preferences, replaces hardheaded analyses of social problems with feel-good slogans, and distorts our understanding of government, violence, parenting, and the arts. He disarms even the most menacing threats with clear thinking, common sense, and pertinent facts from science and history.ĭespite its popularity among intellectuals during much of the twentieth century, he argues, the doctrine of the Blank Slate may have done more harm than good.
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Pinker injects calm and rationality into these debates by showing that equality, progress, responsibility, and purpose have nothing to fear from discoveries about a rich human nature. Each dogma carries a moral burden, so their defenders have engaged in desperate tactics to discredit the scientists who are now challenging them.
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He shows how many intellectuals have denied the existence of human nature by embracing three linked dogmas: the Blank Slate (the mind has no innate traits), the Noble Savage (people are born good and corrupted by society), and the Ghost in the Machine (each of us has a soul that makes choices free from biology). He shows how many intellectuals have denied the existence of human nature by embracing three linked dogmas: the Blank Slate (the mind has no innate traits), the Noble Savage (people are born good and corrupted by society), and the Ghost in the Machine (eac In The Blank Slate, Steven Pinker explores the idea of human nature and its moral, emotional, and political colorings. In The Blank Slate, Steven Pinker explores the idea of human nature and its moral, emotional, and political colorings.