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The Philosophical Baby: What Childrens Minds Tell Us About Truth, Love, and the Meaning of Life |  | Author: Alison Gopnik
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
List Price: $25.00
Buy New: $16.47
as of 11/25/2009 07:38 CST details
You Save: $8.53 (34%)
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Seller: indoobestsellers
Rating:  10 reviews
Sales Rank: 2102
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 304
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.1
ISBN: 0374231966
Dewey Decimal Number: 155.413
EAN: 9780374231965
ASIN: 0374231966
Publication Date: August 4, 2009
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
How do babies think? What is it like to be a baby? How much do our experiences as children shape our adult lives? 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.
This new science holds answers to some of the deepest and oldest questions about what it means to be human. A new baby’s captivated gaze at her mother’s face lays the foundations for love and morality. A toddler’s unstoppable explorations of his playpen hold the key to scientific discovery. A three-year-old’s wild make-believe explains how we can imagine the future, write novels, and invent new technologies. Alison Gopnik - a leading psychologist and philosopher, as well as a mother - explains the groundbreaking new psychological, neuroscientific, and philosophical developments in our understanding of very young children, transforming our understanding of how babies see the world, and in turn promoting a deeper appreciation for the role of parents.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 10
 Parents, teachers, and any involved with kids will relish this November 17, 2009
Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA)
THE PHILOSOPHICAL BABY: WHAT CHILDREN'S MINDS TELL US ABOUT TRUTH, LOVE, AND THE MEANING OF LIFE comes from a leading child psychologist and philosopher who considers children's imaginations and ideas about love and morality, discovering keys to human nature in how they play and explore. Contrasting with common notions, babies have the ability to imagine and process complex information even beyond many adults: chapters explore this process and use psychology, neuroscience and philosophy to explore how kids experience the world. Parents, teachers, and any involved with kids will relish this.
Insight into the inner life of children November 9, 2009
Israel Ramirez (Springfield, PA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Have you ever wondered about the inner life of children, how they understand things, what their stream of consciousness is like, how they perceive the world, what their feelings are really like? I watched my own children grow up, talked with them daily, fed them, played with them, but always felt that I was missing a lot about their inner world. Gopnik answered some of my questions and showed me other questions that I hadn't thought of asking.
Gopnick argues, for example, that young children don't have the same self narrative adults have. I remember being appalled by my daughter's inability to describe what happened on her recent trip to the zoo. Gopnick argues that this happens because very young children haven't developed the story about themselves that allows them to go back and fetch prior events the way adults do. When I return from a trip to the zoo, I retain a story about finding a parking spot, paying admission, watching the monkeys near the entrance, etc. With very young children, there is no such narrative, only a series of events. These events are remembered. So if I ask a more direct question, like did you enjoy the monkeys in the big cage, she tells me about the big monkey chasing the smaller monkey.
Gopnik emphasizes the sophistication of children who can easily distinguish between imaginary, possible, and real objects. She tells us about how children can make sophisticated judgments about causal relationships after having seen only a few relevant events. She tells us how children can distinguish acts which are wrong because they hurt someone as opposed to things which are wrong because they are against the rules
Gopnik frames her discussion around philosophical themes such as reality versus fiction, discovery of reliable truth from messy observations, consciousness, nature of the self, love, morality, etc. She rightly argues that although topics such as these have long been important to philosophers, potential insights that could be provided by studying children have not been considered by philosophers.
Specialists will find this book unsatisfactory. There isn't a single graph. There are no statistics or numbers of any kind. There are no literature reviews describing areas where researchers get conflicting results. When experiments are reported at all, they are mentioned briefly with no detail. Gopnik is more interested in the big picture, discussing the main themes using mostly informal language. Just the same, she takes you through some of the toughest concepts in the field and isn't afraid to bring up technical terms, like lantern consciousness, whenever it is helpful to do so.
Finally, Gopnik's wit, graceful writing, and genuine feeling for children make her book a pleasure to read.
 Exactly like her other book November 2, 2009
A. Martens (Seattle, WA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I bought this because I really enjoyed "The Scientist in the Crib" and I was hoping for more along those lines. What I got however, was exactly the same book as The Scientist in the Crib - same experiments, same analysis, only I paid more for it and two of authors of the previous book were stripped of credit. This book would be great if I hadn't read it already.
Interesting, informative, but a little odd October 24, 2009
S. Koterbay (Johnson City, TN USA)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
As a philosopher (in addition to the moniker above) and as an impending father for the first time I was really excited to read this book, and it did not disappoint. All of a sudden, I'm excited about identifying counterfactual statements made by my son (well, about two years from now)! Gropnik has done an excellent job of weaving developmental psychology research, philosophical ideas about identity, and the perspective of being a parent into a cognizant text. Why only four stars instead of five? Well, a negative review cites the notion that parents already know all of this stuff (to put their opinion crudely), but I think the real source of the negativity arises from a problem I have with this book as well: over 250 pages, in a negotiation back and forth between different ideas, I began to lose track of who this book is written for. Is it written for parents? Philosophers? Psychologists? The answer is probably all three (admittedly a difficult act to do), but, at times, it seemed liked Gropnik was speaking to only one of the three, rather than all three. Still, highly recommended, especially if you're a first-time parent who is also a philosopher!
Interesting information October 17, 2009
S. Dahl (Seattle, WA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Although most people are probably already aware that babies are natural learners, this book summarizes recent research that gives us new ways to interpret their behaviors and inner experiences. This new information illuminates the limits in Piaget's theory of cognitive development, as well as other influential, but apparently incorrect or narrow, developmental theories. You'll find information about the existence and development of identity, morals, consciousness, brain development, knowledge, and imagination in babies and young children.
For the most part, the book is quite good and holds interest through out. However, the reason I have rated 4 stars instead of 5 is that the author promises to "talk about the spiritual significance of babies" (p. 18). However, in Chapter 9 she only discusses how babies inspire awe, magic, and love (see p. 238-243), so I found this chapter restrained and topical. Even so, I think it was an excellent book, hence the four stars.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 10
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