Knowledge is a continuous fabric, in which ideas are connected to other ideas. Reason-free zones, in which people can assert arbitrary beliefs safe from ordinary standards of evaluation, can only corrupt this fabric, just as a contradiction can corrupt a system of logic, allowing falsehoods to proliferate through it.

You wouldn't believe the kind of hate mail I get about my work on irregular verbs.

A successful learner, . . . must be constrained to draw some conclusions from the input and not others.

... people notice differences and expect every difference in form to convey some difference in meaning.

If the cartoon were completely accurate, though, life would be a cacophany of spoinks.

An ideology can provide a satisfying narrative that explains chaotic events and collective misfortunes in a way that flatters the virtue and competence of believers, while being vague or conspiratorial enough to withstand skeptical scrutiny.

By all measures men are the more violent gender.