

You Know That I Know | Interview: Steven Pinker
89 snips Sep 24, 2025
Renowned cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker, author and Johnstone Professor at Harvard, dives into the intriguing world of common knowledge. He explains its essential role in societal coordination, using examples like traffic lights and market transactions. The conversation touches on how social trust differs across cultures and the impact of the internet on accountability. Pinker also addresses the importance of language in shaping our understanding of psychology, while defending free expression against misconceptions of violence.
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What Common Knowledge Is
- Common knowledge is when everyone knows something and knows that everyone else knows it ad infinitum, and it enables coordination.
- It underpins conventions like traffic rules, money, and social rituals that require mutual expectations.
Eye Contact As A Coordination Tool
- Eye contact and conspicuous signals generate common knowledge by letting each person know the other noticed the same thing.
- Nonverbal displays like staring, laughing, and blushing evolved to create shared, noticeable states.
Three Models Of Human Relationships
- Human relationships use three evolved models: communality, authority, and equity, with a modern fourth of contractual relations.
- Cultures differ by which model applies to which relationships and resources.