Sat, Aug 29 · 7:00 PM CDT
On August 8, 2026, our group of five explored why humans are so easily predisposed to the absurd and preposterous. We began by reflecting on Steven Pinker’s celebration of mRNA vaccines as a triumph of rationality over COVID-19. Yet Pinker expressed dismay at the carnival of conspiracy theories spawned by the pandemic—ranging from claims that the virus was engineered as a bioweapon to fears that vaccines were designed to implant microchips—all asserted without evidence and endorsed by powerful elites deflecting blame. How far off track have we drifted when bleach manufacturers must issue urgent warnings against ingesting their caustic products after President Trump urged researchers to investigate gargling disinfectant or administering UV light internally to end the pandemic?
Even before the 2020 pandemic, headlines touted tall tales, and surveys showed a significant portion of the population believed in demonic possession, ESP, ghosts, astrology, and online psychics. Have we lost our collective mind? Reality exerts a powerful evolutionary selective pressure against fallacious thinking, so why do we continue swimming against the current of human folly?
Motivated reasoning—the practice of mustering rhetorical resources to defend a preferred conclusion—can occasionally drive progress (such as ending a plague), but it often highlights a debater's lack of wisdom or virtue. A barroom brawler or legal eagle would frequently rather be right than get it right, even when their "winning" arguments carry dire real-world consequences. Why do people retreat to comfort zones filled with the nostrums of demagogues and late-night TV advertisers? Both traffic in messages that bypass critical thinking, relying on emotional manipulation rather than empirical proof.
There is also deep comfort in group identity. Fulfilling a void in personal identity gives people permission to rationalize membership rather than perform the due diligence of evaluating evidence that would allow them to march to a different drummer. When presented with data showing changing crime rates linked to gun control enforcement, the numbers turn into an inkblot test—an example of what Pinker calls Myside Bias, where conclusions depend entirely on one's preexisting stance. Why do so many accept the claims of health officials who rely on anecdotes rather than impartially collected data, sowing doubt about vaccines and justifying budget cuts to public health infrastructure? Does the empty promise of "medical freedom" blind anti-vaxxers to the fact that subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE)—a rare and fatal consequence of natural measles—has no cure, yet is fully preventable with the MMR vaccine? Must we accept outbreaks of debilitating illness caused by contaminated produce simply because food inspectors were fired to save money?
Is progress the inevitable outcome of rationality overcoming bias, superstition, and myth? Or are we intuitive teleologists, naturally receptive to creationism, astrology, and the belief that everything happens for a reason? Science education ought to counter these intuitive superstitions, but how deep is our actual understanding of science? Is it a disservice to treat science like a modern religion, with lab-coated priests performing rituals and pontificating over experimental results? Can’t we simply learn to use science as a practical tool for rational thought?
Are we better off working democratically than following the dictates of a leader who claims, without a plan, "I alone can fix it"? When individuals take the Wason selection test, only one in ten gets it right. Yet, as cognitive psychologists Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber discovered, when people tackle the problem in groups, success skyrockets to 70%. In a group setting, the dynamic shifts from internal self-justification to social evaluation. Alone, we are notoriously bad at spotting flaws in our own thinking; together, we are remarkably adept at identifying flaws in others' arguments. A collaborative group acts as a corrective filter—rapidly dismantling incorrect biases and highlighting the right solution. Trust science when peers dispassionately review experiments, not when a partisan hack operates on feelings and political motives.
The arc of knowledge is long, and it bends toward rationality. Rather than rail against gravity, we can leverage aerodynamics to soar above the clouds. Rather than singing isolated solos in a cacophony of emotional manipulation, we can sing together as a chorus of reality revealed through rationality—creating harmony through collaborative discovery.
Join us for our next meeting as we debate whether we can live our lives rationally based on Steven Pinker’s Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters (Call Number: BF441.P56 2021) on August 29, 2026, from 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM CDT.
