Word: pinkering
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Renowned MIT linguist Steven Pinker engaged an audience of 400 in the classic nature versus nurture debate last night—saying heredity plays a more dominant role than many behaviorists of the last century have asserted...
Speaking at the Askwith Forum at the Graduate School of Education, Pinker denied the possibility of poet Philip Larkin’s well-known adage that your parents “f--- you up, your mum and dad / They may not mean to but they do”—a passage he quoted, to the delight of the crowd...
...Steven Pinker were redesigning Harvard’s core curriculum, all undergraduates would have to read three philosophers—Descartes, Locke, Rousseau—and then reject much of what they learned. In The Blank Slate, released last month, MIT’s renowned cognitive psychologist plies the tools of his discipline to dispel pervasive myths about human nature. The book’s title comes from Locke’s famous belief that a baby’s mind is a “blank page” bereft of knowledge about the world. For Pinker, this utterly...
Despite his massive explanatory power, Pinker is careful not to overstate his claims. Biology may tell us how we are, but it does not dictate how we should be. The Blank Slate may argue for a scientific approach to human nature, but it counters determinism at every step. Its vision is at once all-encompassing and, potentially, inconsequential...
...Pinker will discuss The Blank Slate in a public conversation with Howard Gardner today at 6 p.m. in the Askwith Education Forum, Harvard Graduate School of Education...