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The Language Instinct
- How the Mind Creates Language
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 18 hrs and 55 mins
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Publisher's summary
In this classic, the world’s expert on language and mind lucidly explains everything you always wanted to know about language: how it works, how children learn it, how it changes, how the brain computes it, and how it evolved. With deft use of examples of humor and wordplay, Steven Pinker weaves our vast knowledge of language into a compelling story: language is a human instinct, wired into our brains by evolution.
The Language Instinct received the William James Book Prize from the American Psychological Association and the Public Interest Award from the Linguistics Society of America. This edition includes an update on advances in the science of language since The Language Instinct was first published.
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With dazzling wit and astonishing insight, Bill Bryson - the acclaimed author of The Lost Continent - brilliantly explores the remarkable history, eccentricities, resilience, and sheer fun of the English language. From the first descent of the larynx into the throat (why you can talk but your dog can't) to the fine lost art of swearing, Bryson tells the fascinating, often uproarious story of an inadequate, second-rate tongue of peasants that developed into one of the world's largest growth industries.
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More satire than history
- By Barbara Kindle Customer on 12-18-15
By: Bill Bryson
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Mind in Motion
- How Action Shapes Thought
- By: Barbara Tversky
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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In Mind in Motion, psychologist Barbara Tversky shows that spatial cognition isn't just a peripheral aspect of thought, but its very foundation, enabling us to draw meaning from our bodies and their actions in the world. Our actions in real space get turned into mental actions on thought, often spouting spontaneously from our bodies as gestures. Spatial thinking underlies creating and using maps, assembling furniture, devising football strategies, designing airports, understanding the flow of people, traffic, water, and ideas.
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Physically difficult to listen to
- By Claire Hay on 11-08-19
By: Barbara Tversky
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The Art of Language Invention
- From Horse-Lords to Dark Elves, the Words Behind World-Building
- By: David J. Peterson
- Narrated by: David J. Peterson
- Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins
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From master language creator David J. Peterson comes a creative guide to language construction for sci-fi and fantasy fans, writers, game creators, and language lovers. Peterson offers a captivating overview of language creation, covering its history from Tolkien's creations and Klingon to today's thriving global community of conlangers.
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Great resource, but not conducive to audiobook
- By Ashley T. on 04-18-16
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The Blind Watchmaker
- Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
- By: Richard Dawkins
- Narrated by: Richard Dawkins, Lalla Ward
- Length: 14 hrs and 40 mins
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The Blind Watchmaker, knowledgably narrated by author Richard Dawkins, is as prescient and timely a book as ever. The watchmaker belongs to the 18th-century theologian William Paley, who argued that just as a watch is too complicated and functional to have sprung into existence by accident, so too must all living things, with their far greater complexity, be purposefully designed. Charles Darwin's brilliant discovery challenged the creationist arguments; but only Richard Dawkins could have written this elegant riposte.
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Challenging textbook more than an enjoyable listen
- By Eric on 01-15-12
By: Richard Dawkins
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The Ravenous Brain
- How the New Science of Consciousness Explains Our Insatiable Search for Meaning
- By: Daniel Bor
- Narrated by: Walter Dixon
- Length: 11 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Consciousness is our gateway to experience: it enables us to recognize Van Gogh’s starry skies, be enraptured by Beethoven’s Fifth, and stand in awe of a snowcapped mountain. Yet consciousness is subjective, personal, and famously difficult to examine: philosophers have for centuries declared this mental entity so mysterious as to be impenetrable to science. In The Ravenous Brain, neuroscientist Daniel Bor departs sharply from this historical view, and proposes a new model for how consciousness works.
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Effectively demystifies consciousness
- By Gary on 11-18-12
By: Daniel Bor
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The Complete (Short) Guide to Absolutely Everything
- Adventures in Math and Science
- By: Adam Rutherford, Hannah Fry
- Narrated by: Hannah Fry, Adam Rutherford
- Length: 7 hrs and 2 mins
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Geneticist Adam Rutherford and mathematician Hannah Fry guide listeners through time and space, through our bodies and brains, showing how emotions shape our view of reality, how our minds tell us lies, and why a mostly bald and curious ape decided to begin poking at the fabric of the universe.
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A great listen and fun way to learn some things
- By R. Mueller on 06-10-23
By: Adam Rutherford, and others
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Memory Craft
- Improve Your Memory with the Most Powerful Methods in History
- By: Lynne Kelly
- Narrated by: Nancy Linari
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
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Groundbreaking anthropologist and memory champion Lynne Kelly reveals how we can use ancient and traditional mnemonic methods to enhance and expand our memory.
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Best
- By Phil F. on 01-31-22
By: Lynne Kelly
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The Cosmic Serpent
- DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
- By: Jeremy Narby
- Narrated by: James Patrick Cronin
- Length: 4 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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This adventure in science and imagination, which the Medical Tribune said might herald "a Copernican revolution for the life sciences", leads the listener through unexplored jungles and uncharted aspects of mind to the heart of knowledge. In a first-person narrative of scientific discovery that opens new perspectives on biology, anthropology, and the limits of rationalism, The Cosmic Serpent reveals how startlingly different the world around us appears when we open our minds to it.
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Very Good Religious Text
- By Blair K. Hartman on 08-09-17
By: Jeremy Narby
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Brain Rules (Updated and Expanded)
- 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
- By: John Medina
- Narrated by: John Medina
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
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Performance
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In the New York Times bestseller Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rule - what scientists know for sure about how our brains work - and then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives. Medina’s fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science.
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Dear Publishers . . .
- By Bekah on 04-06-17
By: John Medina
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First published in 2000, Words and Rules remains one of Pinker's most provocative and accessible books, illuminating the fascinating relationship between the brain, the mind, and how language makes us humans.
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Amazing how much irregular verbs can teach.
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Pinker is truly a brilliant and lucid explainer...
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Excellent, but a difficult listen.
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Don't bother. Outdated science & poor logic...
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The Better Angels of Our Nature
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I'd kill for another book this good
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The Sense of Style
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In The Sense of Style, the best-selling linguist and cognitive scientist Steven Pinker answers these questions and more. Rethinking the usage guide for the 21st century, Pinker doesn’t carp about the decline of language or recycle pet peeves from the rulebooks of a century ago. Instead, he applies insights from the sciences of language and mind to the challenge of crafting clear, coherent, and stylish prose.
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A great book, done a great injustice by the audio
- By M. Kunze on 10-17-14
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Pinker is truly a brilliant and lucid explainer...
- By Rudi on 06-17-09
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Excellent, but a difficult listen.
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Don't bother. Outdated science & poor logic...
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I'd kill for another book this good
- By Eric on 11-11-11
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A great book, done a great injustice by the audio
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Rationality
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In the 21st century, humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding - and at the same time appears to be losing its mind. How can a species that developed vaccines for COVID-19 in less than a year produce so much fake news, medical quackery, and conspiracy theorizing? Pinker rejects the cynical cliché that humans are an irrational species - cavemen out of time saddled with biases, fallacies, and illusions.
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Steven Pinker's Frozen Worldview from the 90s
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Is the world really falling apart? Is the ideal of progress obsolete? In this elegant assessment of the human condition in the third millennium, cognitive scientist and public intellectual Steven Pinker urges us to step back from the gory headlines and prophecies of doom, which play to our psychological biases. Instead, follow the data: Pinker shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise, not just in the West but worldwide.
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We live in the best of all times
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Who knew rhetoric could be so much fun?
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Challenging textbook more than an enjoyable listen
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Babel No More
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We all learn at least one language as children. But what does it take to learn six languages...or seventy? In Babel No More, Michael Erard, "a monolingual with benefits," sets out on a quest to meet language superlearners and make sense of their mental powers. On the way he uncovers the secrets of historical figures like Italian cardinal Giuseppe Mezzofanti, who was said to speak seventy-two languages; Emil Krebs, a pugnacious German diplomat, who spoke sixty-eight languages; and Lomb Kat, a Hungarian who taught herself Russian by reading Russian romance novels.
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Heavy on anecdote, light on science
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Think with Pinker
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Cognitive scientist Professor Steven Pinker has spent his life thinking about thinking, and now he wants us to join him. With the aid of his critical thinking toolkit, he hopes to help us make smarter choices, become more rational, gain a greater understanding of the confused world we live in—and maybe even become better citizens. In this fascinating series, produced in partnership with the Open University, he examines the different ways the human brain can be tripped up, from understanding probability to the difference between correlation and causation.
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Insightful, Useful, & a Must for Reasoning Persons
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The Story of Human Language
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Language defines us as a species, placing humans head and shoulders above even the most proficient animal communicators. But it also beguiles us with its endless mysteries, allowing us to ponder why different languages emerged, why there isn't simply a single language, how languages change over time and whether that's good or bad, and how languages die out and become extinct.
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You'll Never Look at Languages the Same Way Again
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Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue
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A survey of the quirks and quandaries of the English language, focusing on our strange and wonderful grammar. Why do we say "I am reading a catalog" instead of "I read a catalog"? Why do we say "do" at all? Is the way we speak a reflection of our cultural values? Delving into these provocative topics and more, Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue distills hundreds of years of fascinating lore into one lively history.
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Great for casual linguists
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On Language
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Described by the New York Times as "arguably the most important intellectual alive," Noam Chomsky is known throughout the world for his highly influential writings on language and politics. Featuring two of Chomsky's most popular and enduring books in one omnibus volume, On Language contains some of the noted linguist and political critic's most informal and accessible work to date, making it an ideal introduction to his thought.
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Difficult in audio format
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By: Noam Chomsky, and others
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The Language Hoax
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This short, opinionated audiobook addresses the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which argues that the language we speak shapes the way we perceive the world. Linguist John McWhorter argues that while this idea is mesmerizing, it is plainly wrong. It is language that reflects culture and worldview, not the other way around.
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I really love listening to language--and McWhorter
- By Rachel on 03-24-16
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Linguistics
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Linguistics falls in the gap between arts and science, on the edges of which the most fascinating discoveries and the most important problems are found. Rather than following the conventional organization of many contemporary introductions to the subject, the author of this stimulating guide begins his discussion with the oldest, "arts" end of the subject and moves chronologically through to the newest research - the "science" aspects.
By: P.H. Matthews
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Louder Than Words
- The New Science of How the Mind Makes Meaning
- By: Benjamin K. Bergen
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- Length: 8 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Whether it’s brusque, convincing, fraught with emotion, or dripping with innuendo, language is fundamentally a tool for conveying meaning - a uniquely human magic trick in which you vibrate your vocal cords to make your innermost thoughts pop up in someone else’s mind. You can use it to talk about all sorts of things - from your new labradoodle puppy to the expansive gardens at Versailles, from Roger Federer’s backhand to things that don’t exist at all, like flying pigs.
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Fun But Technical--Glad I Got It On Sale
- By Gillian on 05-22-17
What listeners say about The Language Instinct
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Rafa
- 10-03-23
Pronunciation
Inconvenient pronunciation of Wh. La la la la la la la la la la ta
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- jim
- 02-18-23
Speaker Overpronounces S's
The guy who reads the book either has a speech impedement or he is trying to get revenge by overpronouncing the S's. After listening to 5 minutes on my commute, i started flipping out and spent the rest of my commute trying to mimic how he was mispronouncing the S's. By the end of the day, after my commute home, I had given myself a sore throat because i kept trying to immitate how the guy was overpronouncing the S's. And believe me, I turned the treble all the way down, and the bass all the way up. I deserve a refund on this one....
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- Hermanubis
- 07-21-22
Other titles are better
I love Pinker, but this is excruciatingly boring, go read The selfish gene by Dawkins instead, or The Selfish Gene, or Sapiens , or Guns Germs and Steel
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- R. Bellerose
- 05-16-22
Dense
Some chapters of this are more detailed and technical than one can absorb in an audiobook, which made the listening a little longer than I might have liked, but it held my interest and has changed my view of language for the better, I hope. Professor Pinker’s disdain for fuzzy reasoning is always appreciated.
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- Amazon Customer
- 04-25-22
An absolutely fascinating book
A must-read (or hear) for anyone with an interest in language/linguistics, school reform, or psychology.
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- Joe Walsh
- 04-04-22
Makes a Good Argument
Converted me to believe that there must be a language instinct. A relevant read despite its age, as the advances of the last decades have not substantially changed our understanding of this.
The few mistakes hardly detract from the main argument (e.g a false claim about additional expressive power in BEV, arguing against using genetic variation as support for a claim and then using it as support later, and a few others). The main claim of the book survives these oversights intact, as most are just factoids for reader interest rather than supporting evidence.
I admit being annoyed by one argument style: Pinker many times dismisses research or lines of questioning with "No one should be interested in this because it is boring." Do not tell me what I should not be interested in, the right to judge something as boring belongs entirely to me. The book would be better without these smug pronouncements.
Still, I can wholeheartedly recommend this to anyone with even a passing interest in language.
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- Peter A. Crist
- 03-17-22
Many secrets of language revealed
I have been a lover of language and linguistics for many years. This was one of the most eye-opening, mind opening and entertaining books I have listened to in quite some time.
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- Tim
- 03-11-22
From a Typer
As a person being nonverbal, I've always had a problem with my grammar because I communicate through an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) device and I never learned the proper way to speak. I still need to remind myself to type in complete sentences and make sure that I'm using proper grammar. I thought that "The Language Instinct" was extremely fascinating. I totally understand my ongoing mistakes when I'm communicating with others. When I'm working, I like to listen to audiobooks. It was very distracting to me when I was corresponding with my colleagues through email because I was noticing myself using the same bad habits with my grammar from the book.
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- Anonymous User
- 12-22-21
interesting and rich source of knowledge
i enjoyed listening to this book for its good contents and a good narration , it is a wide sammary of the subject of language that touches culture history anatomy and more to explains the beautiful complexity of the subject of languige
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- nick
- 11-09-21
Arcane
Very nich and subspecialized. I just let the audio ran and pick up what I can.
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