How the Mind Works

One of the top cognitive psychologists in the world, Steven Pinker, accomplishes for the rest of the mind what he accomplished for language in his 1994 book, The Language Instinct, with this remarkable bestseller. He describes the nature of the mind, its evolutionary history, and how it enables us to see, think, feel, laugh, engage with others, appreciate the arts, and consider life's mysteries. And he does it with the humor that led New York Times Book Review writer Mark Ridley to remark, "No other science writer makes me laugh so much. [Pinker] deserves the superlatives that are lavished upon him." The book's claims are as audacious as its title suggests. Pinker challenges popular beliefs like the idea that parents socialize their children, that nature is good and modern society is corrupt, and that intense emotions are illogical. He also rehabilitates some outmoded beliefs like the idea that the mind is a computer and that natural selection shaped human nature. Los Angeles Times Book Prize winner Publishers Weekly's Best Book of 1997 and a New York Times Notable Book of the Year front page reviews in the Boston Globe Book Section, Washington Post Book World, and San Diego Union Book Review; featured in Time, New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Nature, Science, Lingua Franca, and Science Times