Robert Wright interviews Steven Pinker (7/7)

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Category:

Education

Tags:

• Steven Pinker
• evolution
• evolutionary
• psychology
• kin
• selection
• reciprocal
• altruism

[godfreysilas]

Pinker, to his detriment or credit, has woven a tapestry of wisdom which assumes the complexion of magic and wonder. His speed of ideational conception is resistant to description. You know brilliance when it deals with the subtle realms of thought with this level of grasp and speed. A feature that seems to auspiciously attend his brilliance is his tonal melody. He has eminently earned an exquisite facility for the English language...replete with the requisite cadence. Bravo. - Godfrey Silas

[Happypast]

thanks for uploading :)

[lardhat]

Excellent interview. Thanks.

[mutbutyt]

@pawsoned

I get it- you in fact do not have the cognitive ability to follows Pinker's arguments (it does take an ability to think laterally) "yada yada" is a ridiculous description of what he said. This is consistent with your artificial separation of knowledge - science/cognitive science etc, which suggests narrow-mindedness

[pawsoned]

@jamesberry53 For my money Wright was asking concise (straight) questions and Pinker as a popularizer of science (and N.B. not as a scientist per se, since he's only a psychologist a.k.a in a newfangled terms Cognitive scientist, linguist etc. etc) could at least EXPLAIN clearly some things and trying to refrain from floundering, but unfortunately I found listening to him a waste of time.

[jamesberry53]

@pawsoned I can respect that... However, I don't see much difference between Wright and Pinker in terms of "clarity"; if anything, Pinker takes more time to explain the nuances and terminology of his main arguments than does Wright. I would also question whether brevity is an appropriate benchmark in scrutinizing a scientist's argument. E=MC2 looks good on a t-shirt, but as a statement it carries no explanatory power. Complex problems may have elegant solutions, but getting there is messy work.

[pawsoned]

@jamesberry53 What I hear from Pinker is "yada, yada, yada". In my opinion he flounders because he fails to give satisfactory and clear answers. In short, if brevity is the soul of wit then Steven Pinker is a schmuck. If Pinker stands for 'objective' and profesional science, then it's all the worse for it, as far as I'm concerned.

[jamesberry53]

@pawsoned What floundering? Pinker never swayed from his original arguments or even substantially disagreed with Wright. "Doubt in science"... Doubt in science to do what, and why? Neither man ever targets "science" as the limiting agent in understanding consciousness; rather, it's humans' inherent intellectual (in)capabilities that pose problems. Also, as both men say, it's only in very rare air that these capabilities actually limit us. Most of the time science is a very useful tool.

[pawsoned]

Thumbs up for the interviewer thumbs down for the interviewee. Pinker's floundering really makes me doubt in science. What a waste of time on his pseudo-scientific hogwash

[SensibleDrugPolicy]

Very good interview.  Thanks for uploading it.