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I picked up this book since Richard Dawkins talked about his work with Mr Pinker on his chapter of evolution. Like Richard Dawkins, Steven Pinker doesn't shy away from controversy, and just like Dawkins he's extremely well educated in his subjects in the smallest of details.
He lights up a giant science blowtorch to both the left and the right's notions regarding human nature.
As a parent of two children I was particularly interested in his parenting section, where the argument of "nature VS nurture" is torched. Explanations for how a parent does and doesn't shape their kids are unique, basically he's saying that parents are less significant than the rest of the environment (country, region, city/town) and what the culture that environment provides. While this might appear a "it takes a village" leftist argument, in reality it's just a common sense argument that I see every day as a person who left home to move to a different part of the world and after meeting a girl there; watch as my children grow up here and how different they are from me as a child and are more like other children here. Yet at the same time his use of adoption studies and separated twin studies are at once fascinating and also hard to argue against as he explains how much of us is in the genes and not in that environment.
On crime and IQ he dispels moral notions and poses new ones as he explains our newfound ability to determine a person's pre-disposition to violent or peaceful conflict resolution via brain scans, which he admits should have been expected after the extraordinary 19th century case of Phineas Gage surviving a traumatic brain injury and his behavior change predicted it.
He also tackles race, gender, and many other hot issues.
- Paperback: 560 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Books; Reprint edition (August 26, 2003)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0142003344
- ISBN-13: 978-0142003343
- Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
- Average Customer Review: 367 customer reviews
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #55,191 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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