by Steven Pinker (read by Victor Bevine)
Second entry in my *20 for '21 challenge
Cognitive psychologist and linguist Steven Pinker dumps his bucket!
Please don't ask me to tell you what his book is about or what I have learned from it because I can't. The book is over twenty hours long and covers so many different topics that all connect to the study of human nature. All I did was listen. I didn't take notes. I'm not in college any more and it's not like I have an exam on the topic at the end of the semester -- although this would be an interesting college course.
What I can tell you is that it is informative, entertaining, interesting and, most our all, readable. It is not full of jargon and is definitely written for the layman, not the profession. If you have the patience to sit through twenty plus hours, you will find the book thought-provoking --even if the thought is to fling the book across the room because it challenges your way of thinking. The book reads like a well-structured series of lectures and moves from point to point logically. I can't criticize or comment on his methodology or his science because I have no basis for judgement; this is not my field of expertise. I can say that it will get the gray matter working, one way or another.
Four and a half starts for clarity, for not treating the reader like an ignoramus and for daring to challenge conventional wisdom.
*****
For those who really want to know what the book is about:
Publisher's Summary: In The Blank Slate, Steven Pinker, one
of the world's leading experts on language and the mind, explores the
idea of human nature and its moral, emotional, and political colorings.
With characteristic wit, lucidity, and insight, Pinker argues that the
dogma that the mind has no innate traits - a doctrine held by many
intellectuals during the past century - denies our common humanity and
our individual preferences, replaces objective analyses of social
problems with feel-good slogans, and distorts our understanding of
politics, violence, parenting, and the arts.
Injecting calm and
rationality into debates that are notorious for ax-grinding and
mud-slinging, Pinker shows the importance of an honest acknowledgment of
human nature based on science and common sense.
*****
*20 for '21 is a a reading challenge that I borrowed from bookish buddy Mike Finn. The idea is to listen to 20 audiobooks that are 20 hours or more in length in 2021. Last year I managed to read six books for the challenge; this year I am hoping to so better -- if I can find 20 books of that length that I actually want to read.
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