Prof. Steven Pinker | The Evolution of Rationality (and Irrationality) | Lecture in Memory of Darwin

The 2nd Annual Lecture in Memory of Charles Darwin delivered by Prof. Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology, Harvard University.
The Evolution of Rationality (and Irrationality)
Today, humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding—and at the same time appears to be losing its mind. Why do we find ourselves flooded with fake news, medical quackery, and conspiracy theorizing? I propose that human intelligence evolved, together with language, sociality, and other unusual human traits, as an adaptation to the “cognitive niche”: the use of knowledge and reasoning to coordinate behavior and defeat other organisms’ fixed defenses. But this gives us “ecological rationality,” a kind of reasoning which depends on personal experience, is intermixed with subject matter knowledge, and which is deployed to advance personal and social goals. It contrasts with “formal rationality,” the use of datasets and content-neutral formulas, which developed only recently and must be laboriously acquired and applied in institutional contexts. The contrast helps explain how the same species can develop advanced science and technology yet remain vulnerable to cognitive biases and fallacies.
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#science #psychology #evolutionarypsychology #neuroscience #rationalthinking