Steven Arthur Pinker (born 1954) is a Canadian-American evolutionary psychologist and linguist frequently involved in academic controversies.
Pinker is quoted twice in Joseph Henry Press publicity for J. Michael Bailey‘s anti-transgender book The Man Who Would Be Queen, though he’s only attributed once. Pinker and many other members of Steve Sailer‘s Human Biodiversity Institute were key figures in promoting Bailey’s book in 2003.
Background
Pinker moved to Harvard in 2003 after 20 years at MIT working in the Brain and Cognitive Sciences department. He is the author of many books on mind and language, including:
- The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language
- Words and Rules: The Ingredients of Language
- How the Mind Works
“Pinker argues that much of who we are, our personalities, our intelligence, our developmental “stages” are mostly a deep-seated program inherited through our genes. He says the environment’s role has been overstated by left-leaning scientists who would prefer to believe that all of us begin the same and are then shaped by economic and social circumstances.”
Pinker’s writing was also used by Bailey in his since-canceled Human Sexuality class.
Logrolling for Bailey
On the book’s back cover:
“With a mixture science, humanity, and fine writing, J. Michael Bailey illuminates the mysteries of sexual orientation and identity in the best book yet written on the subject. The Man Who Would Be Queen may upset the guardians of political correctness on both the left and the right, but it will be welcomed by intellectually curious people of all sexes and sexual orientations. A truly fascinating book.” — Steven Pinker, Peter de Florez Professor, MIT, and author of How the Mind Works and The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature”
Joseph Henry Press marketing materials (unattributed):
J Michael Bailey’s The Man Who Would Be Queen is an engaging book on the science of sexual orientation. …highly sympathetic to gay and transsexual men…” — The Guardian (London), June 28, 2003
Below is the full review:
J Michael Bailey’s The Man Who Would Be Queen (Joseph Henry) is an engaging book on the science of sexual orientation. Though highly sympathetic to gay and transsexual men, it has ignited a firestorm by claiming that transsexuals are not women trapped in men’s bodies but have either homosexual or autoerotic motives.
References
Pinker S (27 June 2003). Pages for Pleasure. The Guardian. http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,986174,00.html
Rogers A (August 27, 2019). Jeffrey Epstein and the Power of Networks. Wired. https://www.wired.com/story/jeffrey-epstein-and-the-power-of-networks/
Aldhous P (July 12, 2019). Jeffrey Epstein’s First Criminal Case Was Helped By A Famous Harvard Language Expert. Buzzfeed News. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/peteraldhous/jeffrey-epstein-alan-dershowitz-steven-pinker
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,3926387,00.html
Notes to address later:
Affective neuroscience
Sailer reviews Pinker
Pinker computational model of brain
Evidence-based medicine
Duke Center for Clinical Health Policy Research
1) Simon Baron-Cohen, The Essential Difference, The truth about the Male & Female Brain(Basic Books)
Steven Pinker:”a striking new theory”;
Seed Magazine(sponsor of Pinker at 92y.org):”Succeeds in illuminating how fundamental differences between male and female thinking can be blamed on that single, scrawny Y”;
Deborah Blum, author of Sex on the Brain;
Nature;
Newsweek.
2) Tama Janowitz, Peyton Amberg.
3)Homosexuality and Civilization by Louis Crompton(Harvard University Press).
4)television series, “10-8,” episode, “Gun of a Son,”
“The skill of being a good liar is to weave an occasional lie into a largely truthful matrix, so people won’t simply write you off as not worth paying attention to.
— Steven Pinker, 8 February 2001