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Ideas of Steven Pinker, by Text

[American, fl. 1998, Professor of Psychology at Harvard University.]

2002 The Blank Slate
Pref p.-11 Many think that accepting human nature is to accept innumerable evils
Ch.3 p.30 In 1828, the stuff of life was shown to be ordinary chemistry, not a magic gel
Ch.4 p.70 Good reductionism connects fields of knowledge, but doesn't replace one with another
Ch.5 p.76 Roundworms live successfully with 302 neurons, so human freedom comes from our trillions
Ch.5 p.78 Connectionists say the mind is a general purpose learning device
Ch.5 p.79 Neural networks can generalise their training, e.g. truths about tigers apply mostly to lions
Ch.5 p.80 There are five types of reasoning that seem beyond connectionist systems [PG]
Ch.5 p.86 Is memory stored in protein sequences, neurons, synapses, or synapse-strengths?
Ch.7 p.130 All the evidence says evolution is cruel and wasteful, not intelligent
Ch.7 p.130 Intelligent Design says that every unexplained phenomenon must be design, by default