Alison Gopnik Quotes
It’s not that children are little scientists — it’s that scientists are big children. Scientists actually are the few people who as adults get to have this protected time when they can just explore, play, figure out what the world is like.

-Alison Gopnik
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‎Literature is the equivalent of the climate scientist’s computer simulations: set up some new starting conditions, run the whole complicated process and see what happens.

-Alison Gopnik
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Asking questions is what brains were born to do, at least when we were young children. For young children, quite literally, seeking explanations is as deeply rooted a drive as seeking food or water.

-Alison Gopnik
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The very best outcome is that our children will end up as decent, independent adults who will regard us with bemused and tolerant affection; for them to continue to treat us with the passionate attachment of infancy would be pathological. Almost every hard decision of child-rearing, e . . . Read more

-Alison Gopnik
It’s not that children are little scientists but that scientists are big children.

-Alison Gopnik
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Initially children use just a few names, mostly for familiar things and people. But when they are still just beginning to talk, many babies will suddenly start naming everything and asking for the names of everything they see. In fact, what’sat? is itself often one of the earliest w . . . Read more

-Alison Gopnik
those abilities lead children to create imaginary friends—and lead grown-ups to create plays and novels. Imagining how they could be different actually lets children, and adults, become different. We can turn ourselves into our imaginary alter egos.

-Alison Gopnik
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We decided to become development psychologists and study children because there aren't any Martians. These brilliant beings with the little bodies and big heads are the closest we can get to a truly alien intelligence (even if we may occasionally suspect that they are bent on making us their slaves.)

-Alison Gopnik