One of the things cognitive science teaches us is that when people define their very identity by a worldview, or a narrative, or a mode of thought, they are unlikely to change-for the simple reason that it is physically part of their brain, and so many other aspects of their brain structure would also have to change; that change is highly unlikely.

For centuries, we in the West have thought of ourselves as rational animals whose mental capacities transcend our bodily nature. In this traditional view our minds are abstract, logical, unemotionally rational, consciously accessible, and, above all, able to directly fit and represent the world. Language has a special place in thie view of what a human is - it is a privileged, logical symbol system internal to our minds that transparently expresses abstract concepts that are defined in terms of the external world itself.

One of the things cognitive science teaches us is that when people define their very identity by a worldview, or a narrative, or a mode of thought, they are unlikely to change-for the simple reason that it is physically part of their brain, and so many other aspects of their brain structure would also have to change; that change is highly unlikely.

Do we really think that the United States will have the protection of innocent Afghans in mind if it rains terror down on the Afghan infrastructure? We are supposedly fighting them because they immorally killed innocent civilians. That made them evil. If we do the same, are we any less immoral?

We categorize as we do because we have the brains and bodies we have and because we interact in the world as we do.

The essence of metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another.

Barack Obama understands what Ronald Reagan learned, which is that people vote not on the basis of issues and policy details, but on the basis of something deeper, namely, what are your values? Are you authentic? Do you say what you believe? Do you communicate with us? And do we identify with you? You don't know what particular issues are going to come up in the future, so you have to depend on someone's values, and whether they are telling you the truth, and whether you can trust them in office. Obama's been running a campaign on that basis.