Pulitzer Finalist Speaks at AU

by Robert Meekins

Steven Pinker gives a speech about understanding our human nature

Questions about human nature pull at the very fabric of our beings. Cognitive scientist Steven Pinker writes that to understand ourselves and people around us, "we all need theories about what makes people tick." Perhaps that explains why members of the Adelphi community came out in droves on November 10th to listen to Dr. Pinker's theory of human nature.

Dr. Pinker is currently a professor of psychology at the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Pinker's work reached the mainstream of the American public in 1998 with the publication of his Pulitzer Prize finalist work, How the Mind Works.

Last week, at the annual Lindemann Lecture in Human Development, Pinker came to Adelphi to discuss the content of his magnum opus on human nature, The Blank Slate. That book explores the history and ideas behind the "nature vs. nurture" question. This debate, which has been the center of discussions about human nature for centuries, spotlights those who believe that human nature is hereditary and programmed (nature) against others who argue that human nature is the product of socialization and experience (nurture).

Explaining the history of these theories, Pinker said, "For millennia, the major theories of human nature have come from religion," specifically from the Judeo-Christian tradition. That model, Pinker continued, asserted that humans are made in the image of God, and that the purpose of life is to use our moral and rational faculties to overcome sin and love God.

According to Pinker, the last several centuries have seen the decline of this Judeo-Christian concept and the rise of three other theories elucidated by "three dead white European males." The first, developed by the English philosopher John Locke, is called the blank slate. This idea, Pinker stated, is the "standard secular theory." The blank slate posits that the human mind is like "white paper" and obtains its character and abilities from experience.

The second major theory, conceived by another English philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau, is the concept of the noble savage. Pinker described the noble savage, as capturing "the belief that humans in their natural state are selfless, peaceable, and untroubled, and that blights such as greed, anxiety, and violence are the products of civilization."

Finally, Pinker highlighted the third landmark theory, established by Rene Descartes: the ghost in the machine. This hypothesis, Pinker exclaimed, holds that human nature is a dual phenomenon, including a divisible body and an indivisible mind. Thus, Pinker declared, Descartes viewed the body as a mechanical, chemical machine, and the mind as a moral, responsible "ghost."

Dr. Pinker, himself, argues that none of these theories is sufficient to understand human nature. He stated that the intellectual discussion of the last few centuries essentially denies "an innate organization" of human nature.

In other words, Pinker is convinced that there is truth in the nearly extinct "nature" explanation of humanity. Pinker draws from the fields of cognitive science, neuroscience, and behavioral genetics to refute the purely "nurture" arguments. He described five major challenges from cognitive science: the mental world can be grounded in the physical world by the concepts of information, computation, and feedback; the mind cannot be a blank slate, because blank slates don't do anything; an infinite range of behavior can be generated by finite combinatorial programs of the mind; universal mental mechanisms can underlie superficial variation across cultures; and, the mind is a complex system composed of many interacting parts.

As one example of his theory, he discussed the influence of genetics on human nature by addressing the phenomenon of identical twins. Pinker stated, "Identical twins think and feel in such similar ways that they sometimes suspect that they are linked by telepathy. When separated at birth and reunited as adults, they say they feel they have known each other all their lives. Testing confirms that identical twins are similar in verbal, mathematical, and general intelligence, in their degree of life satisfaction, and in personality traits."

However, Pinker stated, "I am not, as many people assume, countering an extreme 'nurture' position with an extreme 'nature' position." Instead, Pinker suggests that "the truth lies somewhere in the middle."

Pinker believes that it is of the utmost importance to sort out these arguments. He writes, "The refusal to acknowledge human nature distorts our science and scholarship, our public discourse, and our day-to-day lives."