Rating: 
Summary: Very long, not for everyone, but reaffirms Romantic Pre
Review: Conceptions.This is a funny read, if you know any actual cognitive theory. So close and yet so far! It is almost as if 'How the Mind Works' is a propaganda tract of the Scienologists. It is that corrosive and detremental to the actual study of the brain (ignored, as religious freaks do) and natural selection (often ignored, as for example the weirdos think man evolved through bivalve clam life-forms) Buy it as a joke, like you all do Dianetkics or whatever that other silly stuff is.
Rating: 
Summary: how am I supposed to get Darwin out of my head now??
Review: Did I learn something from this book? Yes! Was this a good summary and synthesis of the Computational nature of our minds and natural selections' impact? Yes! Does this author seem a bit fixated on showing that everything ultimately comes down to these two issues? I think so... Did anyone else have the feeling that there is more to adaptation and survival than blind chance and that the arguments he was making for it could easily be turned around to prove that there is possibly a method and reason for the process? Here is my problem... He never even presented the possiblity that evolution may be the result of an intelligent force(at least to get the ball rolling). But more important that the source may not be God. How could he neglect this possibility when it seems that he is probably a believer in sentient artificial intelligence or at least would aknowledge its' possibility? I would even a knowledge the chance that all the social implications of our life and mind stem from our own genes need to reproduce but I still think he did not adress the social and cultural possibilities nearly enough. Social constructions of reality seem too interesting and important not to bring up with theories of the mind. Lastly, his theories on music get a little goofy. I think he needs to understand that equal tempermant is a recent western practice and that most other cultures of the world did not divide pitch up in such a manner. He never even discusses the relationship between music, dance and sex. That is a big omission. When he discussed Shenker analysis in music I couldn't help but see the similarity in how he used the same method for reducing the human experience. I mean "c" is a great note but come on.
Rating: 
Summary: Best book writen in the last few years
Review: If you wish to understand the way humans really work, read this book. The most brilliant summary in years. Go Dna!!
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful piece of science writing
Review: OK, so it was a bit long. But I thought Pinker wrote persuasively, coherently and best of all lucidly. His metaphors were apt and useful, and his use of language great. I found the book to be much better than The Language Instinct because of the ease of reading - true, it might be one-sided, in that Pinker was putting forward his best argument for the evolutionary model, but that is to be expected in a book (rather than a peer-reviewed paper). I suspect the polarized opinion concerning this book is more to do with the assumptions people brought to their reading than it is what was actually written.
Rating: 
Summary: A challenging, yet thought-provoking read
Review: I did think this was too long. 'The Language Instinct' was perfectly pitched, and this didn't quite match it. I shall assume you're interested in cognitive theories of mind, if you are then its worth getting to grips with. His emphasis on computational neural networks is spot on, we at thehub.com are aiming to articulate their relevance to attention/arousal and consciousness. As well as integrate them with the established neurophysiology and neurochemistry of attentional problems. Come.to/thehub.com if you're interested.
Rating: 
Summary: Too hard to read. Too random. Lost
Review: This book starts out with a statement with something to the effect that the author is making a bold statement using "how the mind works" as a title. He should have stopped there or retitled the book. It is hard to read and most of it impossible to follow. The book does have some good things to say but I think a little narrow minded in the area of religon and Faith in general. I don't reccomend it.
Rating:
Summary: Food for thought...
Review: It's a tall task: Pinker attempts to give an overview of the evidence supporting computational theory. He strikes a good balance of necessary simplification and comprehensive treatment of his subject. His frank disclosures about his own viewpoints are appropriately prominent (a point some of the other reviewers seem to have overlooked). But the main point is that Pinker provides an interesting, provocative, and at times disturbing theory. As an avid consumer of popular science literature, I applaud that.
Rating:
Summary: In the future...
Review: ... science will be a popularity contest. It's not so bad now, as science journals mercifully demonstrated in giving decidedly mixed reviews of Pinker's second foray into his shining wit and charisma (with a dash of science). But the impression this sort of book will undoubtedly make on young scientists-to-be is a disturbing thing to consider. Unlike Chomsky, the man whose theories Pinker pushes (they're both at MIT), Pinker can keep the reader's attention for more than a few seconds. Maybe that's why he thought he could get away with a 600-page book devoted to exhaustive and pointless discourses on (a) what everybody knows and (b) what practically no scientist, even other computationalists, takes seriously. Unfortunately, it doesn't work, and unless you're that kind of reader who can turn off your ability to think coherently and let the information just siphon in, I can't imagine who'd want to own this book. I give this book two stars instead of one because, gosh darn, he seems like such a nice guy, even when I think he's being intellectually bankrupt. If one's brain really is a computer, as Pinker asserts, then how do you restart yours after it's been cluttered up by _How the Mind Works_ and _The Language Instinct_?
Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly presented, accessible
Review: Just a short note: as he did in The Language Instinct, Pinker has worked hard at and succeeded in making heavy theoretical material available to a more general audience; this does not seem to compromise in any way his scholarship, contrary to unpopular opinion. I found this work essential to my work on my MEd and also found his work in general to be completely ignored by British researchers into the same issues!
Rating:
Summary: "Popularizer" in the worst sense of the word
Review: There's nothing wrong with science popularizers as such; we don't have nearly enough of them as it is, and too many people believe that various pseudoscientific theories are supported empirically. But Pinker, the most popular popularizer since Sagan, is frankly nothing but a propaganda machine. For those who disagree with the computational brain model, Pinker's pithy, self-satisfied rebuttals to opposing theories are a disgrace and would convince no one except the audience he is addressing: people who know little about neuroscience or cognitive psychology. Other computationalists, on the other hand (like a previous reviewer), should not only be turned off by his remarkably easy dismissal of dissenters, but his sometimes outrageous, often downright idiotic claims about the mind. Cognitive scientists know a lot less about the brain than Pinker would have you believe. If it weren't for a position at M.I.T. (that great home of the humanities! [ahem]), I suspect most critics would write Pinker off as a crank. As it is, most reviews I've seen praise his enthusiasm and wit but also admit that Pinker seems to think that writing a popularization means your imagination knows no bounds and you can write any nonsense as long as it pleases the public. This book is garbage... unless you're looking for something to talk about at a dinner party. It's positively depressing that it has sold as well as it has.
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