Steven Pinker, The Blank Slate

[Mik Desta]

Pinker argues that modern science has challenged three "linked dogmas" that constitute the dominant view of human nature in intellectual life:

the blank slate (the mind has no innate traits)—empiricism

the noble savage (people are born good and corrupted by society)—romanticism

the ghost in the machine (each of us has a soul that makes choices free from biology)^[1]

Much of the book is dedicated to examining fears of the social and political consequences of his view of human nature:

"the fear of inequality"

"the fear of imperfectibility"

"the fear of determinism"

"the fear of nihilism"