I teach classes 28 weeks of the year, but the rest of the time I do research and write books.
Steven PinkerCommerce, trade and exchange make other people more valuable alive than dead, and mean that people try to anticipate what the other guy needs and wants. It engages the mechanisms of reciprocal altruism, as the evolutionary biologists call it, as opposed to raw dominance.
Steven PinkerNo matter how inured you get to atrocities, you're still always stunned and shocked by how cruel and wasteful Homo sapiens can be.
Steven PinkerSomething about the topic of consciousness makes people, like the White Queen in Through The Looking Glass, believe six impossible things before breakfast.
Steven Pinker