If we are not to abandon values such as peace and equality, or our commitments to science and truth, then we must pry these values away from claims about our psychological makeup that are vulnerable to being proven false.
Interpretation
Values like peace and equality must be defended from unfounded psychological claims.
In this quote, Steven Pinker emphasizes the importance of protecting foundational values such as peace and equality from being undermined by psychological assertions that lack evidentiary support. He argues that in order to uphold commitments to truth and science, we must ensure that our understanding of human psychology does not cloud or distort these critical values, which are essential for a just society.
In practice
This quote could be used in a debate on the importance of scientific integrity in promoting social values.
The foundation of individual rights is the assumption that people have wants and needs and are authorities on what those wants and needs are. If people's stated desires were just some kind of erasable inscription or reprogrammable brainwashing, any atrocity could be justified.
The linguistic clumsiness of tourists and students might be the price we pay for the linguistic genius we displayed as babies, just as the decrepitude of age in the price we pay for the vigor of youth.
We adults protect ourselves with laws, police, workplace regulations and social norms and there is no conceivable reason why children should be left more vulnerable, other that laziness or callousness in considering what life is like from their point of view.
The idea that children are passive repositories to be shaped by their parents has been massively overstated. A child's peer group is a far greater determinant of its development and achievements than parental aspiration.
Reason is non-negotiable. Try to argue against it, or to exclude it from some realm of knowledge, and you've already lost the argument, because you're using reason to make your case. ... We don't "believe" in reason.
Photography is a kind of virtual reality, and it helps if you can create the illusion of being in an interesting world.
I have a lot of faith. But I am also afraid a lot, and have no real certainty about anything. I remembered something Father Tom had told me--that the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns.
The psychology of a language which, in one way or another, is imposed upon one because of factors beyond one's control, is very different from the psychology of a language which one accepts of one's free will.
I've always argued that this country has benefited immensely from the fact that we draw people from all over the world.
There never were, in the world, two opinions alike, no more than two hairs, or two grains; the most universal quality is diversity.
...All endeavours which are directed to a purely worldly end...contain within themselves the germs of their own corruption.
A Jesus who never wept could never wipe away my tears.
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