112 Quotes by Alison Gopnik

Caring for children has always been one of the deepest and most satisfying things that a human being does, and yet it is hard to keep a healthy attitude toward it in our competitive, outcome-oriented society.

Ineffective or weak brain connections are pruned in much the same way a gardener would prune a tree or bush, giving the plant a desired shape,

Owning our past allows us to own our future.

The largest and most powerful computers are still no match for the smallest and weakest humans.

It's turns out to be much easier to simulate a grandmaster chess player than it is to simulate a 2-year-old.

Instead of just saying, "I love my baby and I pick him up because he's adorable and it's so nice to cuddle with him," we practice attachment parenting. We let our children play outside and have age-appropriate freedoms and are labeled free-range parents.

The more obsessively we focus on what a particular food is going to do for us, the less healthy we've become. Simple pleasures become complicated.

Some people say that parents don't matter, and that's not true at all. The irony is that we pay attention to all these things that don't matter, and not to what does matter, such as parents having enough resources to provide an environment where their children have both security and freedom.

To support the people we care about is intrinsic, it is not instrumental. It's not something we do because we're hoping to get some other outcome.