How the Mind Works

How the Mind Works (ISBN 0-393-31848-6) is a book by Canadian-American cognitive scientist Steven Pinker, published in 1997. The book attempts to explain some of the human mind's poorly understood functions and quirks in evolutionary terms. Drawing heavily on the paradigm of evolutionary psychology articulated by John Tooby and Leda Cosmides, Pinker covers subjects as diverse as vision, emotion, feminism, and, in the final chapter, "the meaning of life." He argues for both a computational theory of mind and a neo-Darwinist / adaptationist approach to evolution, all of which he sees as the central components of evolutionary psychology. He criticizes difference feminism in his book because he believes scientific research has shown that women and men differ little or not at all in their moral reasoning. This book was a Pulitzer Prize Finalist.

Reception

Jerry Fodor, considered one of the fathers of the Computational Theory of the mind, criticized the book. Fodor wrote a book called The mind doesn't work that way, saying "There is, in short, every reason to suppose that the Computational Theory is part of the truth about cognition. But it hadn’t occurred to me that anyone could suppose that it’s a very large part of the truth; still less that it’s within miles of being the whole story about how the mind works". He went further saying "I was, and remain, perplexed by an attitude of ebullient optimism that’s particularly characteristic of Pinker’s book. As just remarked, I would have thought that the last forty or fifty years have demonstrated pretty clearly that there are aspects of higher mental processes into which the current armamentarium of computational models, theories and experimental techniques offers vanishingly little insight. And I would have thought that all of this is common knowledge in the trade. How, in light of it, could anybody manage to be so relentlessly cheerful? So, it occurred to me to write a book of my own."^{[citation needed]}

Pinker responded to Fodor's criticisms in Mind & Language. Pinker argued that Fodor had attacked straw man positions, wryly suggesting a possible title for his riposte as No One Ever Said it Did.

External links

• Pinker's website on How the Mind Works
• Video of a 1999 lecture based on the book
• Ten page review by William J. Rapaport (pdf version)
• "The Trouble with Psychological Darwinism" by Jerry Fodor, a critical review of How the Mind Works
• "The mind doesn't work that way", abstract of a book by Jerry Fodor in response to How the Mind Works