Amazon.co.uk Review
The book is aimed at "people who wonder where the taboo against human nature came from", and promises to explain "the moral, emotional and political colorings of the concept of human nature in modern life". For Pinker, the belief that we are all born as "blank slates" upon which culture places its decisive imprint is not only wrong but dangerous. He persuasively argues that "the conviction that humanity could be reshaped by massive social engineering projects led to some of the greatest atrocities in history". This is all very well, but at over 500 pages it can also be daunting for the general reader, as Pinker takes on all-comers, from biologists and sociologists to a dizzying array of classical thinkers from Calvin and Hobbes to Marx and Dawkins. The sections on gender will undoubtedly inflame many feminist writers (the most persuasive of which Pinker sadly neglects to discuss), and the criticisms of modern art are flimsy, but The Blank Slate is an impressive and sustained broadside that cannot be ignored. -–Jerry Brotton --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
Product Description
"In a work of outstanding clarity and sheer brilliance Steven Pinker banishes forever fears that a biological understanding of human nature threatens humane values" - Helena Cronin, author of THE ANT and THE PEACOCK.
"A mind blowing, mind openingexposé. Pinker's profoundly positive arguments for the compatibility of biology and humanism are unrivalled for their scope and depth and should be mandatory, if disquieting, reading"
Patricia Goldman-Rakic - Past President of the Society for Neuroscience.
About the Author
Steven Pinker is the best selling author of THE LANGUAGE INSTINCT and HOW THE MIND WORKS.
He is Professor of Psychology and Director of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience at MIT.
