Cognitive Scientist Steven Pinker to Speak on Asking the Right Questions at University of Richmond
March 24, 2004
Dr. Steven Pinker, a leading cognitive scientist known for asking and answering daring questions about the functions of the human mind, will lecture March 24 at the University of Richmond on asking the right questions.
His talk, which is one of the university's Richmond Quest events, will begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Jepson Alumni Center. It is free and open to the public.
Formerly a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Pinker holds an endowed professorship at Harvard University. He is the author of the 1998 Pulitzer finalist "How the Mind Works," as well as "The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature" and numerous academic and popular articles, including pieces in The New York Times, Nature and Time. Newsweek recently named him one of the "100 Americans for the Next Century."
Every other year, the university looks for a compelling question the entire university community can explore through a series of specially developed lectures, programs and courses. This year's question is, "How do we know which questions to ask?"
Past Quest speakers have included Nobel laureate Toni Morrison, Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein, political commentator Molly Ivins and comedienne Lily Tomlin.