More from Pinker

Another interesting snippet from Pinker's book that I was not aware of concerns New Guinea. In the 1920s, some Australians went prospecting for gold in the interior. Much to their amazement they found some New Guineans who had apparently no awareneness of the rest of humanity. In other words, they must have been separated from the rest of us about 40,000 years ago and had no further contact. The Australians encountered them in 1930. How extraordinary to think that such an event could happen as late as 1930.