People are under the impression that dictionaries legislate language. What a dictionary does is keep track of usages over time. — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“At every moment we choose, consciously or unconsciously, between good things now and better things later.” — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
I never outgrew my conversion to atheism at 13, but at various times was a serious cultural Jew. — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“A sense of solidarity among fifteen-to-thirty-year-olds would be a menace to civilized society even in the best of times.” — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
I teach classes 28 weeks of the year, but the rest of the time I do research and write books. — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
When time permits, I try to see interesting people in the cities I visit. In Seattle, I met Paul Allen, the co-founder… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Natural selection is not the only process that changes organisms over time. But is the only process that seemingly designs organisms over… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
If people are innately saddled with certain sins and flaws, like selfishness, prejudice, sort-sightedness, and self-deception, then political reform would seem to… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“and here is where unsentimental history and statistical literacy can change our view of modernity, for they show that nostalgia for a… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
I would argue that nothing gives life more purpose than the realization that every moment of consciousness is a precious and fragile… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“In fact, as of May 15, 1984, the major powers of the world had remained at peace with one another for the… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
I teach classes 28 weeks of the year, but the rest of the time I do research and write books. While I'm… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“Education is an admirable thing,” wrote Oscar Wilde, “but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“What could be more fundamental to our sense of meaning and purpose than a conception of whether the strivings of the human… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“And with an average trial length at the time of eight and a half minutes, it is certain that many of the… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
When people talk, they lay lines on each other, do a lot of role playing, sidestep, shilly-shally and engage in all manner… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
The indispensability of reason does not imply that individual people are always rational or are unswayed by passion and illusion. It only… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“Reason is up to these demands because it is an open-ended combinatorial system, an engine for generating an unlimited number of new… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“As one becomes aware of the decline of violence, the world begins to look different. The past seems less innocent; the present… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“we enjoy the peace we find today because people in past generations were appalled by the violence in their time and worked… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
“In the foreign country, we call the past, crucifixion was a common punishment. It was invented by the Persians, carried back to… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
The problem with the emotions is not that they are untamed forces or vestiges of our animal past; it is that they… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
We know about every massacre that has taken place close to the present, but the ones in the distant past are like… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Forcing modern speakers of English to not - whoops, not to split an infinitive because it isn't done in Latin makes about as much… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
Consistent style prevents presentation from getting in the way of content. — Steven Pinker Copy Share
The supposedly immaterial soul, we now know, can be bisected with a knife, altered by chemicals, started or stopped by electricity, and extinguished by… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
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… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
As many political writers have pointed out, commitment to political equality is not an empirical claim that people are clones. — Steven Pinker Copy Share
Since violence is largely a male pastime, cultures that empower women tend to move away from the glorification of violence and are less likely… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
When it comes to explaining human thought and behavior, the possibility that heredity plays any role at all still has the power to shock.… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
Morality is not just any old topic in psychology but close to our conception of the meaning of life. Moral goodness is what gives… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
“The biblical story of the binding of Isaac shows that human sacrifice was far from unthinkable in the 1st millennium BCE. The Israelites boasted… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
Part of the bargain of being alive is that one takes a chance at dying a premature or painful death, be it from violence,… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
In fact, without a specification of a creature's goals, the very idea of intelligence is meaningless. A toadstool could be given a genius award… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
“The obvious cure for the tragic shortcomings of human intuition in a high-tech world is education. And this offers priorities for educational policy: to… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
If you look in general at people who live in anarchy, they have quite high rates of death from either homicide or warfare or… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
“In some eras, self-control defines the paragon of a decent person: a grown-up, a person of dignity, a lady or a gentleman, a mensch.… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
Knowledge is a continuous fabric, in which ideas are connected to other ideas. Reason-free zones, in which people can assert arbitrary beliefs safe from… — Steven Pinker Copy Share
