Steven Pinker
Steven Pinker
Steven Arthur "Steve" Pinkeris a Canadian-born American cognitive scientist, psychologist, linguist, and popular science author. He is Johnstone Family Professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, and is known for his advocacy of evolutionary psychology and the computational theory of mind...
NationalityCanadian
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth18 September 1954
CountryCanada
loneliness people feelings
One of the things that people complain about is loneliness, disconnectedness. If you live in a society where your life is rarely threatened and most of your relationships are more on an economic exchange basis, then this could leave people feeling less connected.
children invent language thrown
Indeed, children thrown together in a community that doesn't have a language of its own will invent one in order to communicate with each other.
question
That isn't really a question that can be answered.
learned projects quicker
I learned to focus my energy on high-quality, long-term projects rather than lower-quality projects with quicker payoffs.
obsessions reflects
I'm very interested in language because it reflects our obsessions and ways of conceptualising the world.
people similar street
no more similar than two people plucked off the street at random.
applying aspects behavior charged family mindset psychology taking
Evolutionary psychology is taking that mindset and applying it to more emotionally charged aspects of behavior, such as sexuality, violence, beauty, and family feelings.
argue feelings hurt hurts question somebody university
Even if he does occasionally hurt people's feelings -- he occasionally hurts my feelings -- but I'm a big boy. I can get over it. I can argue back. We really need somebody to question the way a university is run.
agenda behavior blank century doctrine explain few mechanisms past psychology sciences simple slate social sought
During the past century the doctrine of the blank slate has set the agenda for much of the social sciences and humanities, ... ... Psychology has sought to explain all thought, feeling, and behavior with a few simple mechanisms of learning.
behind bones buried creature evolving left rot skull thousands
You have to remember that not every creature that was evolving left behind its skull or its tools for our convenience tens of thousands of years later. Most bones or most tools rot or get buried and are never found again.
change gone perfect permanent religion religions themselves
Violence and religion have often gone together, but it's not a perfect correlation, and it doesn't have to be a permanent connection, because religions themselves change.
behavior brain coming lever reason systems temptation understand
There's no reason that we should give up that lever on people's behavior - namely, the inhibition systems of the brain - just because we're coming to understand more about the temptation systems.
ecosystem evolved fill niches
The way to understand how different species evolved is to think about the niches that they fill in an ecosystem - basically, how they make a living.
argued genetic humans identify learning massively point trying unless
I've never argued that humans are massively hot-wired. What I was trying to point out was that you can't understand how we learn unless you identify the learning mechanisms. And these have some genetic basis.