A fascinating tour of oddball wrongheadedness, with gentle but firm prescriptions for combatting it.
The bestselling author and publisher of Skeptic magazine investigates why people believe conspiracy theories.
For many contemporary Americans, QAnon is an alluring explanation for the unexplainable. Technically, writes Shermer, “it’s not even wrong” because its claims are so broad that it resists being proven wrong. There may be such a thing as a “deep state”—even if, as the author points out, most people aren’t good enough at keeping secrets or carrying out their part in conspiracies to make them work. As evidence, he cites two assassinations. The plot to kill Abraham Lincoln also included multiple other targets, but only John Wilkes Booth succeeded in his assignment. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand almost happened by accident, since Gavrilo Princip lost sight of his target and only stumbled on the car because of a driver’s error. The conspiracy theory that evolved led to catastrophe: Austro-Hungarians assumed that the Serbian government was in on the plot, and World War I ensued. “Imagine how differently the twentieth century would have unfolded without the Great War,” writes Shermer, “sparing the lives of tens of millions of people…[and] almost certainly…no Hitler, no Nazis, no World War II, and no Holocaust.” The author writes that while the conspiracy theories surrounding John F. Kennedy’s death are understandable, given that governments, spy agencies, and the CIA harbor secrets, there’s no good evidence to support any postulate other than that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. Noting that there are degrees of belief in conspiracy theory—36% of people Shermer surveyed believe that the government is hiding information about the JFK assassination, while, only 11% believe that 5G towers increase the risk of Covid-19 infection—the author suggests that perhaps the best thing to do with the QAnon believer at the dinner table is to try to listen sympathetically while pushing back respectfully. Better still is to stop the spread of misinformation in the first place, which is far more difficult.
A fascinating tour of oddball wrongheadedness, with gentle but firm prescriptions for combatting it.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-4214-4445-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Johns Hopkins Univ.
Review Posted Online: July 12, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2022
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
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Cogent, well-timed ideas for meeting today’s biggest challenges.
Helping liberals get out of their own way.
Klein, a New York Times columnist, and Thompson, an Atlantic staffer, lean to the left, but they aren’t interrogating the usual suspects. Aware that many conservatives have no interest in their opinions, the authors target their own side’s “pathologies.” Why do red states greenlight the kind of renewable energy projects that often languish in blue states? Why does liberal California have the nation’s most severe homelessness and housing affordability crises? One big reason: Liberal leadership has ensnared itself in a web of well-intentioned yet often onerous “goals, standards, and rules.” This “procedural kludge,” partially shaped by lawyers who pioneered a “democracy by lawsuit” strategy in the 1960s, threatens to stymie key breakthroughs. Consider the anti-pollution laws passed after World War II. In the decades since, homeowners’ groups in liberal locales have cited such statutes in lawsuits meant to stop new affordable housing. Today, these laws “block the clean energy projects” required to tackle climate change. Nuclear energy is “inarguably safer” than the fossil fuel variety, but because Washington doesn’t always “properly weigh risk,” it almost never builds new reactors. Meanwhile, technologies that may cure disease or slash the carbon footprint of cement production benefit from government support, but too often the grant process “rewards caution and punishes outsider thinking.” The authors call this style of governing “everything-bagel liberalism,” so named because of its many government mandates. Instead, they envision “a politics of abundance” that would remake travel, work, and health. This won’t happen without “changing the processes that make building and inventing so hard.” It’s time, then, to scrutinize everything from municipal zoning regulations to the paperwork requirements for scientists getting federal funding. The authors’ debut as a duo is very smart and eminently useful.
Cogent, well-timed ideas for meeting today’s biggest challenges.Pub Date: March 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781668023488
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2025
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