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vanessakm's review
3.0
Much like [b:The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark|17349|The Demon-Haunted World Science as a Candle in the Dark|Carl Sagan|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1405201597s/17349.jpg|252618], this book was written as a manifesto against irrational thought. Some of the specific areas the author goes into are climate change (the #1 political concern I have, and gee didn't this fucking election make me feel better about that?), anti-vaccination hysteria, creationism and so on.
There is a wealth of information on logical fallacies here, and the book is generously cross-referenced. Grant wants you to be able to find and use this information. My favorite new fallacy is the Dunning-Kruger Effect, which is basically when people with no special knowledge of a subject (or special knowledge in general) decide they are better qualified than experts in the field to draw conclusions about it.
A little dry in parts, but a good book to have in your arsenal. Subscribing to logical fallacies is not harmless. It threatens our health, our educational system, and literally the fate of our planet right now. As Grant points out, the natural world rolls on whether we believe in what it is doing or not.
There is a wealth of information on logical fallacies here, and the book is generously cross-referenced. Grant wants you to be able to find and use this information. My favorite new fallacy is the Dunning-Kruger Effect, which is basically when people with no special knowledge of a subject (or special knowledge in general) decide they are better qualified than experts in the field to draw conclusions about it.
A little dry in parts, but a good book to have in your arsenal. Subscribing to logical fallacies is not harmless. It threatens our health, our educational system, and literally the fate of our planet right now. As Grant points out, the natural world rolls on whether we believe in what it is doing or not.
stuff4bd's review
3.0
To be fair the rating I’ve given is judging the book against what I thought it should be rather than what it was. I wanted all of the book to be like the first 80ish pages with guidance on investigating sources, discerning the good scientific studies fro the bad, etc.
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