The Philosophical Baby: What Children's Minds Tell Us about Truth, Love and the Meaning of Life
Author(s): Alison Gopnik
In the last decade there has been a revolution in our understanding of the minds of infants and young children. We used to believe that babies were irrational, and that their thinking and experience were limited. Now Alison Gopnik -- a leading psychologist and philosopher, as well as a mother -- explains the cutting-edge scientific and psychological research that has revealed that babies learn more, create more, care more, and experience more than we could ever have imagined. And there is good reason to believe that babies are actually smarter, more thoughtful, and more conscious than adults. In a lively and accessible tour of the groundbreaking new psychological, neuroscientific, and philosophical developments, Gopnik offers new insight into how babies see the world, and in turn promotes a deeper appreciation for the role of parents in shaping the lives of their children.
Product Information
"Gopnik makes a good, and sometimes impassioned, case . . . [She] offers the captivating idea that children are more conscious than adults but also less unconscious, because they have fewer automatic behaviors . . . The Philosophical Baby is both a scientific and romantic book, a result of Gopnik's charming willingness to imagine herself inside the consciousness of young children." - Michael Greenberg, The New York Review of Books
"Gopnik's description of what psychological research reveals about babies' surprisingly sophisticated thinking is fascinating." - Drew DeSilver, The Seattle Times
"Gopnik is a fine writer, and her wit enlivens a subject that could easily veer into the overly abstract . . . She is also passionate about her subject. The Philosophical Baby isn't simply a summary of recent research on young minds. Rather, Gopnik seeks to place early childhood in the context of 2,500 years of Western philosophy." - Mark Sloan, San Francisco Chronicle
General Fields
- :
- : St Martin's Press
- : St Martin's Press
- : 0.263
- : 01 June 2010
- : 210mm X 157mm X 21mm
- : United States
- : books
Special Fields
- : Alison Gopnik
- : Paperback / softback
- : 288
- : illustrations
