Author

M.I.T. has a reputation for turning out Dilberts. They may be brilliant in what they do, but no one can understand what they say.

From Steven Pinker

The rules of friendship are tacit, unconscious; they are not rational. In business, though, you have to think rationally.

From Steven Pinker

Heritability pertains to the entirety of the genome, not to a single gene.

From Steven Pinker

The brain is not a bag of traits. It's startlingly complex. There are few or no single genes with a consistent effect on the mind.

From Steven Pinker

I think that communism was a major force for violence for more than 100 years, because it was built into its ideology - that progress comes through class struggle, often violent.

From Steven Pinker

Democracy is an imperfect way of steering between the violence of anarchy and the violence of tyranny, with the least violence you can get away with.

From Steven Pinker

If the myth of pure evil is that evil is committed with the intention of causing harm and an absence of moral considerations, then it applies to very few acts of so-called 'pure evil' because most evildoers believe what they are doing is forgivable or justifiable.

From Steven Pinker

For one thing, before the 20th century, there were plenty of genocides. We tend to forget about them, partly because they weren't as well documented and partly because, until recently, people didn't care. We used euphemisms like 'sackings' and 'sieges' instead of calling them 'genocides.'

From Steven Pinker

A decent government with an effective, but not gratuitously violent, police force and a fair court system are essential. This deters and incapacitates psychopaths, bullies and hotheads - and if it earns the confidence of the people, they don't have to become violent in self-defence.

From Steven Pinker

Photography is a demanding action sport. The light can change so quickly. I often find myself sprinting so that I can catch the perfect light falling on a photogenic subject.

From Steven Pinker

Steven Pinker

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