Experimental psychologist Steven Pinker is the best-selling author of How the Mind Works, The Language Instinct, and The Blank Slate. His new book, The Stuff of Thought, was published last month by Viking.
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (Prestwick, $5). This is one of three novels I cited at the end of The Blank Slate because each exemplifies one or more of the great themes of human nature in a way that resonates with modern studies from the biological and cognitive sciences. Successive scenes in Huck Finn illustrate the “culture of honor” that leads men to cycles of violence. The first scene occurs among lowlifes, where the conflict ends in bluster and face-saving, the next among the aristocracy, where it ends in horrific tragedy.
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