How the Mind Works by Pinker

I've read the first chapter and part of the second and my first impression is that I'm reading lots of words and getting very few ideas or facts. However, after walking away and now coming back I think perhaps he is preaching to the choir. I already believe in neural networks and the physicality of the mind. However, I'm only a short ways into the book and perhaps he will give me more meat soon.

Here are my first thoughts which may not represent what he means at all. First, the mind is a group of organs developed through natural selection to solve problems our ancestors faced during the stone age – how to talk, how to walk, how to see, how to make predictions.

Second, the radical part of his theory is that the rules we use to process new information are hard wired into the components of our brain. When I am presented with a stimulus then my brain runs a process of "if, then, else" using data I have accumulated over my life time. It is not obvious that my program is the same as your program because my inputs vary from yours in the same way that both of us can write a blog entry using Microsoft Word but the text created is unique based upon what we know and wish to present. Intelligence is simply the rational use of rules to pursue goals around obstacles in our path. It is not a supernatural otherness existing outside the physicality of our brains.

The idea that people have an innate human nature and not one simply shaped by our culture leads some scientists and people to fear that

• society will discriminate because if we can only be as good as our hardware then it is ok to treat some people better than others;
  
• genes will excuse all bad behavior as we have no control over what our wiring makes us do; and
  
• anything that we do (murder, rape, etc.) is natural and therefore good.
  

Dr. Pinker counters these arguments but it is not necessary to explain that here as it is not necessary to understanding the theory.

Here are some interesting videos

This first video takes real audio and is a lecture Pinker gave at Rice University which summarizes several things from the first couple of chapters. Fast forward through the first 8 minutes of introduction speakers.

Pinker Lecture at Rice University
http://realaudio.rice.edu/PresLect/Pinker/PinkerVid.ram


Here are some more videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A_r6_GGv3U&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuwNfPca_Pw&feature=related

http://robertsandberg.net/2009/06/23/steven-pinker-the-blank-slate-fallacy