Irrationality - A History of the Dark Side of Reason

Contributor(s): Professor Richard Bradley, Professor Justin E. H. Smith | Julian Le Grand will talk with Justin E. H. Smith about his new book, Irrationality - A History of the Dark Side of Reason.
Irrationality ranges across philosophy, politics, and current events. Challenging conventional thinking about logic, natural reason, dreams, art and science, pseudoscience, the Enlightenment, the internet, jokes and lies, and death, the book shows how history reveals that any triumph of reason is temporary and reversible, and that rational schemes, notably including many from Silicon Valley, often result in their polar opposite. The problem is that the rational gives birth to the irrational and vice versa in an endless cycle, and any effort to permanently set things in order sooner or later ends in an explosion of unreason. Because of this, it is irrational to try to eliminate irrationality. For better or worse, it is an ineradicable feature of life.
Meet our speaker and chair
Justin E. H. S