Podcast Summary: How I Write – Steven Pinker: Harvard Professor Explains The Rules of Writing

Date: June 4, 2025
Host: David Perell
Guest: Steven Pinker

Episode Overview

In this insightful episode of "How I Write," host David Perell sits down with cognitive psychologist, linguist, and Harvard professor Steven Pinker to unravel the essential elements of powerful nonfiction writing. The discussion moves from the practical mechanics of good prose to deeper cognitive and societal reasons behind both effective and ineffective communication. Pinker also addresses the influence of artificial intelligence on the craft of writing today. Writers, students, academics, and anyone interested in how clear ideas are born and shared will find practical wisdom and food for thought throughout this conversation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Is There So Much Bad Writing? (00:37)

• Pinker debunks the myth that bad academic and bureaucratic writing is always deliberate. He attributes the problem mainly to the "curse of knowledge"—when writers can't imagine not knowing what they know.
• Hanlon’s Razor: Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence or ignorance.
• Illustrative Story: Pinker recalls a molecular biologist at TED who lost his lay audience instantly by failing to explain fundamental premises, showing how unintentional obscurity arises from the curse of knowledge.

“Not everyone knows what you know. The curse of knowledge… is the difficulty that we all have in knowing what it’s like not to know something that we know.”
— Steven Pinker [02:54]

Timestamp: [00:37 - 04:24]

2. Overcoming the Curse of Knowledge in Your Own Writing (04:24)

• Empathy Isn’t Enough: Pinker describes trying to imagine the reader’s knowledge state but admits you often can’t tell when you’re falling short due to your own blind spots.
• External Readers: He stresses the importance of showing drafts to non-specialists—be that his editor or his (brilliant but non-expert) mother—to expose what’s unclear.
• Insularity in Academia: Even academics outside one’s subfield often can’t understand colleagues’ jargon-laden prose.

“When my mother was alive, I would always show her a draft of my book… she wasn’t a cognitive psychologist… she was an intellectually curious, well-read person, but not a peer.”
— Steven Pinker [05:12]

Timestamp: [04:24 - 07:05]

3. Concrete Language, Visual Metaphors, and Sensory Writing (07:05)

• Language Is a Means, Not an End: Understanding isn’t just words; it’s about evoking ideas and mental images.
• Visual Metaphors: Good writing leverages sensory and visual imagery, not just abstract concepts, letting readers “see” what is described.
• Historical Example: Writers before abstraction dominated had to rely on commonly shared, vivid imagery, making older prose feel more gripping and evocative.

“Language is kind of overrated… what understanding consists of is not a bunch of words. It’s a means to an end… those ideas very often are visual, motoric, emotional… but they’re sensory.”
— Steven Pinker [07:41]

“Instead of saying something like aggression or antisocial behavior, they might say ‘the spirit of the hawk kneaded into our flesh.’”
— Steven Pinker [09:40]

Timestamp: [07:05 - 11:50]

4. The Cognitive Difficulty of Writing vs. Speaking (11:50)

• Natural vs. Learned Skills: Speaking is innate, while writing requires explicit learning—it lacks shared context, immediate feedback, and social cues.
• Even within a field, much communication relies on participants sharing a base of knowledge and context—writing to a wide audience is harder because context must be built from scratch.

“They can get away with using terms that in context are perfectly clear… in writing, you're wrenched from the context. Someone's picking a book up off the shelf and they've never met you…”
— Steven Pinker [12:30]

Timestamp: [11:50 - 14:17]

5. Generalizations and Examples: The Writer’s Balancing Act (14:17)

• Generalizations Without Examples Are Meaningless; Examples Without Generalizations Lack Point: Both are needed, and the swing between context (examples) and compression (generalizations) is what makes strong writing.
• Pinker illustrates with language examples: how words’ meanings drift from their roots, underscoring the value of concrete context.

“A generalization erases detail. It sweeps over particulars… The example pins it down.”
— Steven Pinker [14:40]

Timestamp: [14:17 - 17:35]

6. The Quirks and Poetry of Language (17:35)

• Language Is Full of Fossils: Pinker shares Richard Lederer’s whimsical meditations on English quirks (e.g., why “fingers don’t fing”), reflecting how meaning evolves.
• Words and compounds often outlive their original logic, yet the oddities reveal much about how language and thought change.

“Language is so ancient… a lot of words can completely obscure their origin. But they're kind of like fossils of processes in the language that are long dead.”
— Steven Pinker [18:30]

Timestamp: [17:35 - 20:07]

7. Beauty, Rhythm, and Euphony in Prose (20:07)

• Sound Matters: Pinker advocates reading prose aloud to catch awkwardness, rhythm, and alliteration. Euphony—the pleasure of beautiful sound—can elevate writing.
• Subtle Alliteration and Avoiding Excess Sibilance: These small touches can create a “spark of pleasure.”

“Euphony, that is sound, that is—is there some poetry in the prose? … If you can’t articulate it smoothly, probably your reader won’t be mentally sounding it out smoothly either.”
— Steven Pinker [20:44]

Timestamp: [20:07 - 22:35]

8. The Waste and Frustration of Bad Academic Writing (22:35)

• Communicating Beyond Peers: Pinker decries the inaccessibility of much academic writing—not only is it a waste for the public (who often fund research), but also for peers who lose precious time decoding unclear ideas.
• Foregone Beauty: Well-crafted writing can and should be pleasurable to read.

“There’s an awful lot of really brilliant work… why are they doing it? Just to entertain each other in a closed little circle? … There’s also foregone opportunity for pleasure and beauty.”
— Steven Pinker [22:57]

Timestamp: [22:35 - 25:13]

9. Freshness from Children and the Value of Original Eyes (25:13)

• Kids as Metaphor Makers: Children’s explanations are “poetry,” appealing to concrete images because they haven't yet learned abstractions or cliches.
• "Freshness" & Originality: Childlike wonder and startling phrases are valuable antidotes to jargon and cliché.

“Because they haven’t accumulated this mass of abstractions like the writers of a few centuries ago… they have to appeal to something they can see and that other people can see.”
— Steven Pinker [25:36]

Timestamp: [25:13 - 27:13]

10. Humor, Brevity, and the Soul of Wit (27:13)

• Freshness in Humor: Humor in writing, like good writing itself, relies on novelty and brevity.
• Classic Lessons: Pinker references Hamlet (“Brevity is the soul of wit”) and Strunk & White (“Omit needless words”) as perennial guides to concise and therefore effective writing.

“When you’re using humor, the shorter, the pithier, the funnier… If you drag it out, then you know it ain’t funny.”
— Steven Pinker [31:55]

Timestamp: [27:13 - 32:36]

11. Erosion (and Democratization) of Prose Style Over Time (32:36)

• Older Writing vs. Today: Older writing might be harder to read, but feels more beautiful and reverent, in part because writers drew on classics and visual metaphors.
• Informalization: Over the last century, prose—and society—have become less formal and hierarchical, emphasizing authenticity and spontaneity rather than carefully constructed grandeur.

“Since they didn't have the benefit of decades and decades of abstractions and cliches… they had to put new ideas into forms their readers could understand.”
— Steven Pinker [33:33]

Timestamp: [32:36 - 38:05]

12. Artificial Intelligence, LLMs, and the Future of Style (38:05)

• AI Writing Is Clear but Generic: Large language models (LLMs) produce structurally sound, jargon-free writing—yet it’s often dull and predictable, a pastiche rather than original.
• Potential for Improvement: Perhaps LLMs can be prompted or trained for style, but their default is to “average out” to clarity and blandness.
• Debate on Pattern Extraction vs. Human Mind: Pinker concedes that AI shows the surprising power of statistical pattern recognition at a massive scale, but maintains that human learning is still interactive and context-driven.

“The output of LLMs is… well written… but it is so generic and prosaic. You can almost recognize the output of a large language model. It's so banal.”
— Steven Pinker [38:35]

Timestamp: [38:05 - 43:24]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Writing Practice:
  “Read aloud or at least mumble to yourself… if you can’t articulate it smoothly, probably your reader won’t…” —Steven Pinker [20:44]

• On Academic Prose:
  “It does get under my skin when academics devote so much brainpower into the scholarship and then just blow off the essential task of letting the world know what you've done.” —Steven Pinker [24:25]

• On Language Change:
  “Language is so ancient… a lot of words can completely obscure their origin. But they're kind of like fossils of processes in the language that are long dead.” —Steven Pinker [18:30]

• On Brevity:
  “Omit needless words. Omit needless words. Omit needless words.” —Steven Pinker (quoting Strunk) [29:13]

• On AI & Prose:
  “LLMs produce structurally sound, jargon-free writing—yet it’s often dull and predictable.” —Steven Pinker [38:35]

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:37] – Why most bad writing is accidental, not malicious
• [04:41] – Pinker’s personal strategies to overcome the curse of knowledge
• [07:41] – The importance of visual imagery in writing
• [09:40] – Historical lushness of prose: before jargon
• [12:30] – The unnaturalness of writing compared to speaking
• [14:40] – Why examples are essential to anchor generalizations
• [17:35] – Linguistic oddities: Lederer’s wordplay and what it means
• [20:44] – Sound, rhythm, and the aesthetics of reading aloud
• [22:57] – The waste of bad academic writing
• [25:34] – Fresh, original language from children
• [27:13] – The role of humor and brevity in great writing
• [32:36] – The long decline of formality in prose
• [38:35] – The strengths and limitations of AI-generated writing
• [41:36] – Would Pinker write differently in the age of LLMs?

Conclusion

Steven Pinker’s conversation with David Perell is a masterclass in diagnosing and curing the ailments of modern writing. From dissecting the cognitive root of unclear prose, to advocating for concrete language, vivid imagery, and auditory aesthetics, Pinker maps a path from communication confusion to clarity—and perhaps even to beauty. Their wide-ranging reflection on the impact of artificial intelligence and changing social norms rounds out a valuable guide for any writer aiming to reach, engage, and delight a broad, modern audience.