Sep 18, 2012
Steven Pinker on taboo, political correctness, and more
This interview is topically diverse with little to no segues, so it comes across (to me, at least) as disjointed, but since pretty much everything Steven Pinker ever says is intriguing and helpful, it’s worth watching anyway…
(via Boing Boing)
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I’m glad we gave Steven Pinker the authority to define the word “better”. He clearly knows what’s best for society.
I also think it’s pretty funny that he’d deem the research behind genetic inferiority/superiority “pseudo-science,” and in the same breath regard the psychology determining the origins of taboo authoritative. I’d love to see the “science” behind that psychology research. My guess it it looks pretty similar to that genetic research. If there ever was a pseudo-science, it’s psychology.
I think that’s interesting too, but not to the exclusion of any one explanation. In the “psuedo” science of healing, everything works. Voodoo, Reiki, Chemo, Radiation, Prayer, Touch (which may include surgery. How do you explain it without adressing psychology. Cultural acceptance of what’s normal to your group? We’re back taboos and psychology.
Interesting. He’s an original thinker.
Political Correctness is a collective delusion and the Western world is full of idiotic sheople.