54 Steven Pinker - The Science Behind Writing Well

Inquiring Minds

Science, Society & Culture, Neuroscience, Female Host, Interview, Social Sciences, Critical Thinking

4.4 • 848 Ratings

🗓️ 2 October 2014

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

San Francisco! Come see us interview Adam Savage live on Oct. 28!http://www.bayareascience.org/event/im-story-collider/On the show this week we talk to celebrated Harvard cognitive scientist and psycholinguist Steven Pinker about his new book The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century.Pinker explains how to write in clear, "classic" prose that shares valuable information with clarity (but never condescension). He also tells us why so many of the tut-tutting grammar "rules" that we all think we're supposed to follow—don't split infinitives, don't use the passive voice, don't end a sentence with a preposition—are just nonsense.iTunes: itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/inquiring-minds/id711675943RSS: feeds.feedburner.com/inquiring-mindsStitcher: stitcher.com/podcast/inquiring-mindsSupport the show: https://www.patreon.com/inquiringminds

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	It's Friday, October 3rd, and you're listening to Inquiring Minds.
0:05.0	I'm Chris Mooney.
0:06.0	And I'm Inj Viscontas.
0:07.0	Each week we bring you a new in-depth exploration of the space where science, politics, and society collide.
0:13.0	We endeavor to find out what's true, what's left to discover, and why it all matters.
0:17.0	You can find us online at motherjones.com slash inquiring minds, on Twitter at
0:22.7	inquiring show, and on Facebook at slash inquiring minds podcast. And you could subscribe to the show
0:28.9	on iTunes, Stitcher, or any other podcasting app. This episode is sponsored by Audible.com, a leading provider of spoken audio information and entertainment with over 150,000 titles to choose from.
0:50.2	And they have a great offer for our inquiring minds listeners. You can get a free
0:54.4	audiobook. Yep, totally free. To get it, just go to audiblepodcast.com
0:59.0	slash inquiring minds. Again, that's audiblepodcast.com slash inquiring minds.
1:05.0	So for a long time, I have been frustrated by grammar. And I don't mean that I'm bad at grammar.
1:13.4	I mean, I'm a writer.
1:14.2	You kind of need to know this stuff.
1:15.8	But what I'm frustrated by is the seeming incoherence of many of these so-called rules
1:21.3	that people tell us we are supposed to follow if we are to write well.
1:25.2	A lot of these do not make sense. I will list just one of them,
1:29.9	the idea that you cannot split infinitives. In other words, you can't say, I'm going to really
1:34.8	take apart stupid grammar rules right now. Instead, you have to say, I'm going really to take
1:39.7	apart stupid grammar rules right now, and that itself is stupid. And that's why I have to say that
1:46.3	Stephen Pinker's new book is the book for me. In the sense of style, this cognitive scientist
1:51.9	and linguist, who is also a writer of gorgeous prose, helps us understand how to use language
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Inquiring Minds, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Inquiring Minds and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.