The enigma of reason / Hugo Mercier, Dan Sperber.
Reason, we are told, is what makes us human, the source of our knowledge and wisdom. If reason is so useful, why didn't it also evolve in other animals? If reason is that reliable, why do we produce so much thoroughly reasoned nonsense? In their groundbreaking account of the evolution and worki...
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| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
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Cambridge, Massachusetts :
Harvard University Press,
2017.
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Table of Contents:
- Introduction: A double enigma
- Part I. Shaking dogma: Reason on trial
- Psychologists' travails
- Part II. Understanding inference: From unconscious inferences to intuitions
- Modularity
- Cognitive opportunism
- Metarepresentations
- Part III. Rethinking reason: How we use reasons
- Could reason be a module?
- Reasoning: intuition and reflection
- Reason: what is it for?
- Part IV. What reason can and cannot do
- Why is reasoning biased?
- Quality control: how we evaluate arguments
- The dark side of reason
- A reason for everything
- The bright side of reason
- Part V. Reason in the wild: Is human reason universal?
- Reasoning about moral and political topics
- Solitary geniuses?
- Conclusion: In praise of reason after all.