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The cover of Why People Believe Weird Things

Why People Believe Weird Things

Michael Shermer

Why do intelligent people believe strange things, and which habits of thinking can protect you from pseudoscience?

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At a glance

Author
Michael Shermer

Why read it

  • You will learn how science differs from pseudoscience, not only in evidence but in how each changes
  • You will spot how failures get rationalised in pseudoscience, though failures are how real science gets closer to truth
  • You will notice that everyone, not only cranks, resists fundamental change through an ideological immune system

Who it is for

  • A reader repeatedly pulled toward conspiracy claims
  • A teacher or parent teaching critical thinking
  • A skeptical friend who argues with believers

Contents

  1. FOREWORD
  2. The Positive Power of Skepticism
  3. INTRODUCTION TO THE PAPERBACK EDITION
  4. Magical Mystery Tour
  5. A Note on the Revised and Expanded Edition
  6. PROLOGUE
  7. Next on Oprah
  8. PART 1
  9. SCIENCE AND SKEPTICISM
  10. I Am Therefore I Think
  11. What Is a Skeptic?
  12. Science and Skepticism
  13. The Essential Tension Between Skepticism and Credulity
  14. The Tool of the Mind
  15. The Most Precious Thing We Have
  16. Pirsig’s Paradox
  17. Pseudoscience and Pseudohistory
  18. How Science Changes
  19. The Triumph of Science
  20. How Thinking Goes Wrong
  21. Hume’s Maxim
  22. Problems in Scientific Thinking
  23. 1. Theory Influences Observations
  24. 2. The Observer Changes the Observed
  25. 3. Equipment Constructs Results
  26. Problems in Pseudoscientific Thinking
  27. 4. Anecdotes Do Not Make a Science
  28. 5 Scientific Language Does Not Make a Science
  29. 6 Bold Statements Do Not Make Claims True
  30. 7 Heresy Does Not Equal Correctness
  31. 8 Burden of Proof
  32. 9. Rumors Do Not Equal Reality
  33. 10. Unexplained Is Not Inexplicable
  34. 11. Failures Are Rationalized
  35. 12. After-the-Fact Reasoning
  36. 13. Coincidence
  37. 14. Representativeness
  38. Logical Problems in Thinking
  39. 15. Emotive Words and False Analogies
  40. 16. Ad Ignorantiam
  41. 17. Ad Hominem and Tu Quoque
  42. 18. Hasty Generalization
  43. 19. Overreliance on Authorities
  44. 20. Either-0r
  45. 21. Circular Reasoning
  46. 22. Reductio ad Absurdum and the Slippery Slope
  47. Psychological Problems in Thinking
  48. 23. Effort Inadequacies and the Need for Certainty, Control, and Simplicity
  49. 24. Problem-Solving Inadequacies
  50. 25. Ideological Immunity, or the Planck Problem
  51. Spinoza’s Dictum
  52. PART 2
  53. PSEUDOSCIENCE AND SUPERSTITION
  54. Deviations
  55. Through the Invisible
  56. What Is an Altered State of Consciousness?
  57. The Near-Death Experience
  58. The Quest for Immortality
  59. Science and Immortality
  60. Historical Transcendence—Is It So Small a Thing?

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