The Language Instinct
by Steven Pinker · first published 1994
53% recommend42% neutral5% critical
Why HN recommends it
Popular-science introduction to how language is acquired and how the mind handles it, covering universal grammar and the debunking of Sapir-Whorf. Suits readers without a linguistics background, including NLP newcomers.
Common criticism: Some say its universal grammar arguments have aged poorly
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
From the Preface... I have never met a person who is not interested in language. I wrote this book to try to satisfy that curiosity. Language is beginning to submit to that uniquely satisfying kind of understanding that we call science, but the news has been kept a secret. For the language lover, I hope to show that there is a world of elegance and richness in quotidian speech that far outshines the local curiosities of etymologies, unusual words, and fine points of usage. For the reader of popular science, I hope to explain what is behind the recent discoveries (or, in many cases, no
Affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
Related books
2007–2025How the Mind Works
Steven Pinker
Recommended by 23 · mentioned by 3123 recommend · 31 mention23 recommend · 3123 recommend
2012–2020Probabilistic logic networks
Ben Goertzel
Recommended by 2 · mentioned by 32 recommend · 3 mention2 recommend · 32 recommend
2008–2023The Stuff of Thought
Steven Pinker
Recommended by 10 · mentioned by 1610 recommend · 16 mention10 recommend · 1610 recommend
2007–2024The Problem of Pain
C. S. Lewis, James Simmons
Recommended by 5 · mentioned by 55 recommend · 5 mention5 recommend · 55 recommend
2017–2024Astrophysics for People in a Hurry
Neil deGrasse Tyson, Sandra Martha Dolinsky, María del Carmen Román de la Peña
Recommended by 10 · mentioned by 1210 recommend · 12 mention10 recommend · 1210 recommend
2012–2025My Ántonia
Willa Cather
Recommended by 11 · mentioned by 1411 recommend · 14 mention11 recommend · 1411 recommend
2008–2024Black holes and time warps
Kip S. Thorne
Recommended by 16 · mentioned by 1816 recommend · 18 mention16 recommend · 1816 recommend
2007–2024The Blank Slate
Steven Pinker
Recommended by 42 · mentioned by 7742 recommend · 77 mention42 recommend · 7742 recommend
…Elements of Style, by William Strunk and E. B. White. I liked writing since I learned how to. I didn't find this book until I was 17, and it unlocked me to write in a way that better helped others. The Language Instinct, by Steven Pinker. I guess I like writing and language. Like C. S. Lewis, Steven Pinker has a way of writing about hard things that makes them easy to understand, even enjoyable. The subject matter is…
on “Ask HN: Mind bending books to read and never be the same as before?” ↗Steven Pinker's book ‘The Language Instinct’ talks about pretty much everything a layman would want to know about the basics of language, in layman's terms. It covers syntax, Chomskian grammars, prescriptive vs descriptive grammar, history and…
on “A Simple Structure Unites All Human Languages” ↗If you enjoyed this article, check out the book _The_Language_Instinct_ by Steven Pinker, which is all about the cognitive basis behind language. He has a good followup that I haven't quite gotten through yet, called _The_Stuff_of_Thought_ that's a bit more about how rules…
on “Rules no one teaches but everyone learns” ↗As others have pointed out, this seems to be due to the writer not learning English as their first language. I love this, and it reminds me of Steven Pinker's "The Language Instinct" where he mentions some stats about the most common dialects of English world-wide are not actually in "native" English speaking countries, but in regions in south-east Asia, as well as India and, increasingly,…
on “PostgreSQL: Jsonb has committed” ↗…is blind to the rest of the processes and it is tricked into believing that it does all the calculations while it merely reads the results from other processes. Also, I highly recommend the book The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker.
on “A man who can read letters but not numbers exposes roots of consciousness” ↗Steven Pinker's wonderful book "The Language Instinct" claims the the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is bunk. It's not the strongest part of the book, but still well worth reading. As a taste, Pinker tracks the evolution of the myth that the eskimos have more…
on “The reason why Blub programmers have such a hard time picking up more powerful languages.” ↗…questions that are dealt with in undergraduate linguistics courses. I don’t have time to continue discussing this today unfortunately, but if you’re really interested in this stuff, you should reader The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker. He does a far better job at systematically explaining these issues than I do. Something like The Foundations of Language by Jackendoff is much more technical but also a very good introduction.…
on “You're the Smartest Guy In The Room ... but please, try to restrain yourself.” ↗…thought in my head isn't in the form of an extremely ambiguous language like English or ASL or whatever I happened to learn as a child. It's the other way around: the thoughts come first. Check out The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker for a nice overview on the scientific understanding around this.
on “How Deaf People Think” ↗Steven Pinker has dispelled this notion in his book The Language Instinct. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Language_Instinct
on “How the language you speak changes your view of the world” ↗…never exercised. That period of development does not come back. Their brains are simply underdeveloped, in a fundamental way. I'd say that qualifies as less intelligent. I'd recommend picking up "The Language Instinct" by Steven Pinker.
on “Apes may be closer to speaking than many scientists think” ↗…she was taught to read in school -- specifically not having been taught phonics. I figured that was nonsense, and blamed a peculiar-to-her learning disability. At some point I read Steven Pinker's "The Language Instinct" (which is 20+ years old at this point!), which describes all the research on learning to read... and which pretty conclusively proved to me that my ex was right. For at least some subset of kids, not…
on “The flawed three-cueing system for teaching reading” ↗…capacity to comprehend the nuances of snow. We just add modifiers (e.g., 'wet' and 'fluffy') to "snow", instead of using a different word. And, actually, it turns out the Eskimos use modifiers, too. The Language Instinct is a great read. Pinker's got a real talent for popular science writing that's accessible but not dumbed down. Check out his first hit, How the Mind Works, if you're interested in general cognitive…
on “The reason why Blub programmers have such a hard time picking up more powerful languages.” ↗I was looked at like a freak when I mentioned this in my pre/post-natal class, but I got a lot out The Language Instinct, by Steven Pinker. Evolutionary neurobiology is a great way to think about skill acquisition in young children.
on “Ask YC: Hacker moms & dads, what do you read?” ↗Five (or six) good books about five different sciences: Materials Science: Gordon, Structures, or Why Things Don't Fall Down. Linguistics: Pinker, The Language Instinct Evolutionary Biology: Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker Molecular Biology: David Clark, Molecular Biology Made Simple and Fun Physics: the canonical answer is "Feynman". I won't argue with that. His little…
on “5 Great Science Books to Expand Your Mind” ↗…too much about neuroscience, I think, so sometimes when he ventures that way in The Blank Slate I'm unconvinced, but the core of his arguments always stand. My first encounter with his works was The Language Instinct, which was required reading for a course I took on psycholinguistics. If that were more recent, I would have mentioned it in my initial post, because that book completely changed my understanding of human…
on “Ask HN: What have you changed your mind about recently?” ↗