The foundation of individual rights is the assumption that people have wants and needs and are authorities on what those wants and… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
A word is an arbitrary label - that's the foundation of linguistics. But many people think otherwise. They believe in word magic:… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
No one knows what the nongenetic causes of individuality are. Perhaps people are shaped by modifications of genes that take place after… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Evolutionarily speaking, there is seldom any mystery in why we seek the goals we seek — why, for example, people would rather… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
It's likely that taboo words are stored in the right hemisphere of the brain. Massive left hemisphere strokes or the entire surgical… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
As every student in Philosophy 101 learns, nothing can force me to believe that anyone except me is conscious. This power to… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Language surely does affect our thoughts, rather than just labeling them for the sake of labeling them. Most obviously, language is the… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Knowledge is a continuous fabric, in which ideas are connected to other ideas. Reason-free zones, in which people can assert arbitrary beliefs… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
The more you think about and interact with other people, the more you realize that it is untenable to privilege your interests… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
You know that when Irving puts the dog in the car, it is no longer in the yard. When Edna goes to… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Knowing there is a world that will outlive you, there are people whose well-being depends on how you live your life, affects… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
As technology accumulates and people in more parts of the planet become interdependent, the hatred between them tends to decrease, for the… — 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
As individual people, embedded in our daily lives, of course we're interested in what makes one person different from another. We've got… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Being smarter gives you a tailwind throughout life. People who are more intelligent earn more, live longer, get divorced less, are less… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
If you look in general at people who live in anarchy, they have quite high rates of death from either homicide or… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
Why do people believe that there are dangerous implications of the idea that the mind is a product of the brain, that… — Steven Pinker Copy Share Image
One of the things that people complain about is loneliness, disconnectedness. If you live in a society where your life is rarely… — 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
