Here, Pinker demonstrates that many of the sophisticated hunting and decision techniques employed by the San suit their goals admirably. In the first chapter, he notes that while rationality often appears to be in short supply, he provides evidence for its universality even among hunter–gatherer tribes, with the San of southern Africa being his example. But as I’ll discuss, despite his considerable knowledge and expository skills, he stumbles in areas where his own motivated reasoning clouds subject matter he is either attempting to explain or dismiss. The book provides a useful introduction on various tools and models that arguably characterize rational thinking. As a famous professor of psychology at Harvard, Pinker is arguably well-equipped to provide a comprehensive survey on various sorts of cognitive biases and ways of thinking about rationality. This mostly takes the form of a wide-ranging tour, acquainting us with various forms of fallacious reasoning as well as tools to improve our reasoning faculties. In his latest book, Rationality: What It Is, Why It Matters, Why It Seems Scarce, Steven Pinker brings attention to how we might strengthen our reasoning powers, as well as be more cognizant of the ways we might fall short.
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