How the Mind Works

if i could give it -3/5, i would

I think this a great way of addressing a widespread misunderstanding about genetics, biological evolution and human thought & behavior.

Slight background story: I was having a discussion with a guy on goodreads.com within his comments on his review of Why I Am Not A Muslim and eventually it came to this:

Myself: "It’s a categorical mistake to think this about biological evolution. To put it bluntly: our genes are selfish, but we are not (not necessarily, unconditionally so at least)."

Him: "One last question, so how are we different than our genes?"

And my reply and the whole point of this post:

This may sound mean, but it’s simple. You are not a gene, nor am I. We’re animals, unique and beautiful and ugly and all qualities in between, both as a species and as individuals.

Here’s an explanation though:

"But almost everyone misunderstands this theory. Contrary to popular belief, the gene-centered theory of evolution does not imply that the point of all human striving is to spread our genes. With the exception of the fertility doctor who artificially inseminated patients with his own semen, the donor to the sperm bank for Nobel Prize winners, and other kooks, no human being (or animal) strives to spread his or her genes. Dawkins explained the theory in a book called The Selfish Gene, and the metaphor was chosen carefully. People don’t selfishly spread their genes, genes selfishly spread themselves. They do it by the way they build our brains. By making us enjoy life, health, sex, friends, and children, the gene buys a lottery ticket for representation in the next generation, with odds that were favorable in the environment in which we evolved. Our goals are subgoals of the ultimate goal of the genes, replicating themselves. But the two are different. As far as we are concerned, our goals, conscious or unconscious, are not about genes at all, but about health and lovers and children and friends."

That seems to be enough to get the point across, but I think this is such a good point that I’ll type the next paragraph up as well:

"The confusion between our goals and genes’ goals has spawned one muddle after another. A reviewer of a book about the evolution of sexuality protests that human adultery, unlike the animal equivalent, cannot be a strategy to spread genes because adulteres take steps to prevent pregancy. But whose strategy are we talking about? Sexual desire is not people’s strategy to progagate their genes. It’s people’s strategy to attain the pleasures of sex, and the pleasures of sex are the genes strategy to propagate themselves. If the genes don’t get propagated, it’s because we are smarter than they are. A book on the emotional life of animals complains that if altruism according to biologists is just helping kin or exchanging favors, both of which serve the interests of one’s genes, it would not really be altruism after all, but some kind of hypocrisy. This too is a mix up. Just as blueprints don’t necessarily specify blue buildings, selfish genes don’t necessarily specify selfish organisms. As we shall see, sometimes the most selfish thing a gene can do is build a selfless brain. Genes are a play with in a play, not the interior monologue of the players."

-Steven Pinker, How The Mind Works, pp. 43-44

Also, for anyone interested in listening to the audiobook version:

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list...

The reader sounds like one of those prototypical 1950's or 60's educational film narrators. It works pretty well.

5/7. I liked this but I expected to like it more than I did. Some of that may be just because it was written a while ago, and I often felt like I was reading things I've already read about. Some parts I enjoyed more than others -- I enjoyed the later parts about relationships and humor more than the long chapter about the evolution of the eye, which was interesting but more in depth than I needed.

This is the book I've been needing to read for so long now, ever since I started questioning ecerything I've been told, or better said after learning that the answers I had about life and us humans were actually poor excuses of an answer.
This book is sharp, it's focused, well-balanced, and has humour, without it being in any way malitious to any other theories that have been proposed on the big questions we have in our minds: what and how does conscience work, what is moral, who is that "me" I feel, and where does it come from.
The authour wanted for us to get outside the framing of our minds and acknowledging it for what it is: a marvelous result of natural selection.

The title of the book should have read "How the Mind Works (According to Steven Pinker)." The picture he paints is not wrong, per se, but vastly overestimates the power of current cognitive modeling.

There is quite a bit of good material here reviewing computational theory of mind, modularity, evolutionary psychology, and related material in cognitive science written in Pinker's usual conversational style. However, I have to hop off the bandwagon at the halfway point on this one. Sure, computational theory of mind has produced a lot of fruitful research. The mind is, to some degree, modular. The brain, like all our other organs, is shaped by evolution. My main problem is in his jump from the modularity at "low-level" cognition (e.g., basic sensory input, certain parts of language) posited by Jerry A. Fodor to "massive modularity." There are some functions that are very localized in the brain that fit with modularity, but we would expect the brain to look very different if massive modularity were true. The brain is actually very plastic with many higher-order functions that aren't strictly localized. The same thing goes for his evolutionary explanations. I will happily agree that many cognitive systems and functions are adaptive -- having eyes and a visual system is obviously beneficial! When it comes to more complex social behaviors, we're in far more speculative territory.

As an introduction to cognitive science, it does present the material in an accessible way. However, it will be difficult to for the layperson to pick apart where Pinker's description is backed by solid evidence and where it lapses into questionable claims and rank speculation. There's a bit of fluff, too, especially near the end when it begins to cross over into the more overt political rambling characteristic of The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature.

Fodor's The Mind Doesn't Work That Way: The Scope and Limits of Computational Psychology (http://cogweb.ucla.edu/Abstracts/Fodo...) makes for a decent corrective, though I have problems with it as well. I'm in total agreement on one point with Fodor, though: When it comes to cognitive science, we're just getting started.

VALUTAZIONE PERSONALE: 3,4

How Mind Works é senza dubbio uno dei saggi più lunghi e corposi che mi sia capitato di leggere: ho impiegato moltissimo tempo a terminarlo, un po' a causa dei mille impegni che, purtroppo, riducono sempre più il tempo da dedicare alla lettura, un po' per la sua lunghezza e, perché no, per la noia che alcune sezioni del libro mi hanno trasmesso, in particolar modo i primi capitoli, sebbene, col senno di poi, é risultato evidente che siano quelli più importanti e significativi nell'esporre al lettore la teoria di base dell'autore circa il funzionamento della mente umana.

Per i suddetti motivi, giunto al termine di questo libro, mi ritrovo senza dubbio in difficoltà nel ricordare tutti i passaggi: posso tuttavia cogliere il nocciolo della questione e sintetizzare dicendo che alla base di tutte le considerazioni che l'autore espone al lettore vi é la teoria computazionale della mente. A cosa si riferisce, nella sostanza? Non mi resta che citare direttamente un passo del libro:

"Lo speciale status del cervello deriva dalla sua speciale funzione, che ci permette di vedere, pensare, provare sensazioni, scegliere e agire. Questa funzione speciale è l’elaborazione di informazioni, o computazione. Informazione e computazione risiedono in pattern, o configurazioni, di dati e in rapporti di logica che sono indipendenti dal medium fisico che li trasporta. Quando telefono a mia madre in un’altra città, il messaggio rimane lo stesso che va dalle mie labbra alle sue orecchie, anche se cambia forma fisica: da aria in vibrazione a elettricità in un filo, a cariche nel silicio, a luce guizzante in un cavo a fibre ottiche, a onde elettromagnetiche, e ritorno seguendo il percorso inverso. Analogamente, il messaggio rimane lo stesso quando, dopo aver cambiato forma nella sua testa diventando una cascata di neuroni che si attivano e di sostanze chimiche che si diffondono attraverso sinapsi, lei lo ripete a mio padre seduto sul lato opposto del divano. Allo stesso modo, un dato programma può correre su computer fatti di tubi a vuoto, commutatori elettromagnetici, transistor, circuiti integrati, o piccioni viaggiatori ben addestrati, e ottiene gli stessi risultati per le stesse ragioni. Tale intuizione, espressa per la prima volta dal matematico Alan Turing, dagli informatici Allen Newell, Herbert Simon e Marvin Minsky e dai filosofi Hilary Putnam e Jerry Fodor, è ora detta teoria computazionale della mente".

Altro punto fondamentale é il seguente: l'ingegneria inversa.
Ancora, per dirla con le sue stesse parole:

"...la mente è un sistema di organi di computazione designato per selezione naturale a risolvere i problemi posti ai nostri antenati dalla loro condizione di cacciatori-raccoglitori, in particolare come capire e sfruttare oggetti, animali, piante e altre persone. Tale sintesi è scomponibile in più affermazioni. La mente è ciò che il cervello fa; in particolare, il cervello elabora informazioni, e pensare è una sorta di computazione. La mente è organizzata in moduli, o organi mentali, dotati ognuno di una specializzazione che ne fa un esperto in un singolo terreno d’interazione con il mondo. La logica base dei moduli è specificata dal nostro programma genetico. Il loro funzionamento si è modellato per selezione naturale in modo da risolvere i problemi della vita di cacciatori e raccoglitori condotta dai nostri antenati durante la maggior parte della nostra storia evoluzionistica. I vari problemi dei nostri antenati erano sottocompiti di un unico grande problema dei loro geni: massimizzare il numero di copie capaci di giungere alla generazione successiva. In quest’ottica, la psicologia è ingegneria inversa. Nell’ingegneria normale si costruisce una macchina per un certo scopo; nell’ingegneria inversa si cerca di capire per quale scopo una macchina è stata costruita. "

Posso dunque concludere dicendo che tutti i più grandi aspetti della psicologia umana progressivamente esposti nei vari capitoli vengono affrontati ed elaborati tenendo conto dei due capisaldi precedentemente citati, e non vi sono dubbi che moltissimi passaggi sono estremamente stimolanti per il lettore e che, almeno personalmente, mi hanno "convinto" nella loro semplicità quanto efficacia propositiva.

Tuttavia, alcune considerazioni mi hanno indotto a mantenere un atteggiamento tiepido, entusiasta ma al contempo sufficientemente distaccato e critico nei confronti di ciò che leggevo:

1) How Mind Works é un libro estremamente datato (la prima edizione risale ai primi anni Novanta), soprattutto per i temi trattati: campi come la neurobiologia e la neuropsicologia sono in rapida evoluzione. Sebbene nella prefazione a questa edizione l' autore afferma che l'impianto generale del saggio continua ad essere valido, non sono sufficientemente edotto su queste materie e sui suoi più recenti sviluppi per poter credere acriticamente ad una affermazione simile;
2) l'efficacia divulgativa di Pinker, su temi così opinabili e controversi, mi é parsa piuttosto limitata: non perché non sia capace nell'esporli ai non addetti ai lavori (sebbene alcuni passaggi non sono semplicissimi da capire per chi non ha almeno delle conoscenze basilari in questo campi, mentre altri li ho trovati mortalmente noiosi proprio per il modo in cui erano esposti), ma perché ho avuto l' impressione che l'autore non avesse potuto fare a meno di polemizzare, talvolta anche inopportunamente, con i suoi oppositori, nonché di apparire politically uncorrect ogni qualvolta se ne presentasse l' occasione.
Insomma, non mi ha fatto impazzire il suo stile divulgativo, per dirla in breve.

In conclusione, vale davvero la pena cimentarsi nella lettura di questo librone? Le idee proposte sono estremamente interessanti,e vale la pena approfondirle e tenerle in buona considerazione; il lavoro bibliografico é enorme e di certo non si può dire che sia qualitativamente scadente, tutt'altro.
É "l'anzianità" del libro, nonché lo stile espositivo dell' autore ( sempre secondo il mio umilissimo parere) che fanno pendere la bilancia dal lato opposto: insomma, andrei sicuramente alla ricerca di un testo piú aggiornato e più efficace nell' esposizione di questi argomenti.

I didn't enjoy this book. I struggled through to halfway because a friend insisted it gets better later on. However, the main thing I didn't like was his writing style and I'm pretty sure that doesn't change. In summary I'd say he waffles a lot, the book is poorly structured, he argues points poorly and I found the content uninformative.

I prefer to hear the bad news before the good, so let’s begin with the negative feedback:
Through the whole book, Pinker often engages with a certain subject by stating the inaccurateness by thinkers that are not mentioned. For example (p.509):

”Many intellectuals believe that primitive warfare is rare, mild and ritualized, or at least was so until the noble savages we're contaminated by contact with the Westerners. But this is romantic nonsense.”

This argument is repeatedly used in the book as a way to introduce the various subjects. I would agree that we should directly mention other thinkers’ faults, instead of fabricating something less ”hurtful”.

Secondly, Pinker often falls in his own traps. In one of his later books, The Sense of Style (2014), he introduced the book by stating one of the primary reasons for bad writing; the Curse of Knowledge. This cognitive bias refers to the phenomena that the knowledge that we have gathered becomes obvious: you forget the time you weren’t yet aware of that particular information, so you rest on the assumption that others presumably know it as well.

In non-fiction books, we see this bias when the authors don’t explain concepts that are self-explanatory to them. You just can’t always predict what kind of readers will read your book. Just like (barely) every author of non-fiction books, Pinker also makes use of this bias. As a psychology student myself it’s less difficult (but I have to admit, I don’t know everything), but my dad who works in insurance had a hard time reading a few pages.

As you can see, I gave this book five stars. So it can’t be all bad. Firstly, most of the (psychological) knowledge is still very relevant in today's psychological (and more importantly, political) environment, even though it’s at least 20 years old. Whether you like it or not, Pinker deserves credit for this. Many of the ‘assumptions’ that reviewers mention, about are equally as valuable after two decades. Some of these assumptions can’t be classified as assumptions anymore. The now politically incorrect value that some of the paragraphs hold (mostly in the chapter: Family Values) are very effective in debates that for example show the (biological/psychological/reproductive/etc.) differences between men and women.

Lastly, as I’ve stated, I study psychology. This book was a great way to go over the different subjects and building on existing knowledge. The subjects can often be perceived as dull and technical. But Pinker does a great job by adding humor and information of different academic fields to make these subjects easily consumed. Incorporating various disciplines does not only tells you something about the interests of the author but also about (in this case) psychology itself: that psychology is not only composed of psychology. When Pinker writes about an economic concept, to me, it feels as like he is really interested in the whole discipline. This makes me want to read more different books on different subjects to increase my field of interest. The ’power’ to make you want to read more books is (for me) probably the most valuable feature of a book.

Have a great new year’s eve!