Pinker: The Blank Slate

In The Blank Slate, Pinker argues that there is a sequitur in the opposing argument to the blank slate that promotes the fear of inequality. He states “The idea is that is we’re blank slates, we must be equal. …. But if the mind has any innate organization, according to this fear, then different races, sexes, or individuals could be biologically different and that would condone discrimination.” Pinker’s counter argument is “ It confuses the value of fairness with the claim of sameness.”


Pinker’s counter argument confronted my value of all human being equal. His argument was particularly irritating to me because I found it reductive in nature. Pinker’s argument fails to acknowledge the history and complexity of our social construct. I acknowledge role of biology in the traits he mentions such as race and sex; however, his argument ignores that the implication of these traits which I believe are more sensitive to social influence than biological. There is no denying that physical differences in individuals has been used as merit to justify discrimination and oppression towards minority groups. It raises the question, can equity and fairness exist independently? I acknowledge the validity of his argument in theory; however, reality is not theoretical or simple. I believe the source of this value has been from my upbringing. I grew up watching my father crawl into a conference room that some of his peers could easily walk into despite having the same qualifications. Is that fair?





Pinker takes the side of the war that claims that free will is governed by the natural sciences. In this specific argument, as explained in the article “It (The Blank Slate-John Locke) undermined the hereditary royalty and aristocracy, who could claim no innate wisdom or virtue if their minds started out as blank as everyone else’s."