Steven Pinker: The Norms Are Breaking- The Fifth Column

28 thoughts on “Steven Pinker: The Norms Are Breaking- The Fifth Column”

1. The thing with the Monty Hall problem that's important to get through to people is that Monty Hall is NOT picking a door at random. He knows which door has the prize, and will always reveal a goat. It's often easier to picture how it works for people if you simply have more doors. So instead of three doors let's say he has 1000 doors. Regardless of whether you picked a door with the prize in it or not, the 998 doors he's going to reveal will be goats. It's functionally a question of would you rather have the door you chose first or all the other doors combined.

2. I was willing to listen to this prattle until he talked about how government isn’t responsible for policing the bi partisan representation in academia in the same breath as saying the millions in research grants don’t support the whole enterprise. Where in the constitution is it written that the government must use Harvard for research. It goes both ways. Finally the total and utter horse feces that is the lie about learning something from rich kids from overseas that Harvard shakes down for full freight tuition. 500k for a liberal arts degree. Harvard is a PE firm that doesn’t pay taxes linked to a diploma factory. A flim flam that has run up loans on entire generations. If any one institution needs to be trashed it is the industrial student loan complex.

3. Andrew Breitbart was Orson Bean's son-in-law

4. There is a "Polack" joke in Flashdance (1983), the cook in the strip club makes an off-colour joke, and when I watched it, it went so far over my head I had to Google what he was saying and what a "Polack" was. I am a millennial for reference.

5. Harvard rejected all the intelligent solutions to their problems, so they got a dumb solution from Trump instead. Shockedpikachuface

6. amazing convo. he is such a phenomenal thinker. to be clear I'm speaking about professor Pinker! My favorite pod.

7. Call is come from inside the house. Please someone tell Mr pinker that he is pretty much example of broken system

8. Love listening to to and reading Pinker, even when I strongly reject some position or solution he favors.

   Also, while I definitely agree that policing scientific journals is definitely not a constitutionally legitimate function of government, neither is funding education of any type. Harvard does not need and is not entitled to taxpayer money.

9. Democracy might be the least oppressive alternative when one answer is absolutely required for an entire population. But democracy is easy to abuse. Without a limiting principle, democracy is just mob rule.

   This was the theory behind a constitutional republic, where a constitution sets out what is and is not open for vote.

   When several answers can differ and still coexist, liberty is far less oppressive and far more ethical than democracy.

10. Great interview. More like this, pls 🙏

11. "Newfie jokes"
    GONE
    No government plan
    No Newfie too movements

    It was stupid humour
    And the Newfoundlander are awfully nice people
    It sopped

    Now
    You have to go to Newfoundland
    To hear newfie jokes

    Till recently
    In the US
    We hae been basking in hillbilly jokes, still

    another difference between the US and Canada

12. If B. L. M,
    J. Lives matter way more
    And P lives dont really matter

    That is the wether(sic) of the day

13. I feel like Pinker answered very similar questions about race, genetics, and IQ a bit differently in past settings ?

14. Genocide denial is hate speech.

15. Harvard and its ilk have done far more to break norms than anything Trump did. The spiral of silence stuff, making Dershowitz persona non grata, giving Claudine Gay's plagiarism a pass, and much more

16. "It bleeds into antisemitism" when protesting a genocide at Harvard gets you beaten by the police after a call from wealthy jewish donors.

17. Steven Pinker completely ignores Leftist discourse over the last decade, including prominent Democrat politicians accusing half the country of being deplorable, garbage, racists, Nazis, etc. His precious norms have been violated egregiously by his friends and allies, but to him, this is perfectly fine.

18. Genius

19. Stop avoiding the IQ question Steve. You know the research. You know the difference between groups in intelligence. Behind closed doors you have addressed this. This is exactly why these Ruffo types win. Because they will call this out and you all become ideological leftists and refuse to openly discuss the data. You saw what Reich's lab found. You know the behavioral genetics data. Are you also scared to be slammed like your friends Sam Harris? Easy to stand up to the boy king. This is what makes you a hero. Yet you refuse to discuss

20. Harvard allowed Jewish students to be tormented on campus. If not for Trump that would still be going on. Pinker is mad that Tump had the bravery to stop that. In that way Trump certainly broke norms. If Kamala had been elected it would be going on today leading even to murder. So don’t be alarmed prof. Your leftward norms will come back in full force soon enough.

21. Great podcast guys!

22. So much anti-woke justification (mainly the interviewers) passing for permission to say bigoted things.

23. When he brings up extreme minority positions that hold sway—–what's the point? Go back to the majority bigoted positions that held sway a generation ago or so?

24. Pinker shows a tendency here is to address concerns about right-wing nuttiness through the lens of the Trump administration. Some of this is deflection of criticism of broader problems on the right.

25. Antisemitism is everywhere in the US–said the podcast host. Just too much special pleading here. And the idea that Jewish people and Jewish viewpoints lack representation in the media is incredibly blinkered; and the way he set up the George Floyd and BLM frame too.
    Pinker did provide an analytical distinction between anti-Israel and antisemitism, though wish washy. Disappointing.

26. He’s such a delight. Such a good speaker

27. how refreshing

28. There is a reason that at BLM protests they shout "no justice, no peace". For much of US history cops were able to kill black people without repercussions. That has started to change recently in part thanks to the efforts of BLM. When there is a hate crime committed against jews, you do see the perpetrator face justice. That is why you see massive protests in one case and not the other. The protests are a response to structural racism.

Comments are closed.