There is, after all, a pervasive preference on the left for notions that humanity can change for the better. Malleability is thought preferable to original sin. So, hope lies with cultural relativism, the social construction of knowledge, and sometimes even a romantic connection with the dregs of Lamarckian evolutionary theory that even the insanity of Lysenko's Stalinist biology has not quite extinguished. Steven Pinker is clear on this point. It is hard for liberal minds to admit that much more than hair color and the human capacity to make two kidneys rests in our genes.
Malleability is certainly politically preferable to the guff of eugenics.
Chomsky's assertion of an immutable and innate capacity for language challenged that easy opinion a generation ago, and Steven Pinker has delivered to the current generation a splendid book that rescues the best of Chomsky's insights while adding not a few of his own. But Pinker is no mere popularizer, much less a hagiographer. He locates humanity's capacity for language firmly in evolutionary theory and fact. The biological premise upon which the innateness hypothesis stands is available to any among the intelligent laity. We take longer than any other animal to develop basic motor skills, to acquire economic self-sufficiency, and to become capable of reproduction.