"When it comes to what we believe, humans see what they want to see. In other words, we have what Julia Galef calls a "soldier" mindset. From tribalism and wishful thinking, to rationalizing in our personal lives and everything in between, we are driven to defend the ideas we most want to believe--and shoot down those we don't. But if we want to get things right more often, argues Galef, we should train ourselves to have a "scout" mindset. Unlike...

"Can reading a book make you more rational? Can it explain why there seems to be so much irrationality in the world, including, let's be honest, in each of us? These are the goals of Steven Pinker's follow-up to Enlightenment Now (Bill Gates's "new favorite book of all time"). Humans today are often portrayed as cavemen out of time, poised to react to a lion in the grass with a suite of biases, blind spots, fallacies, and illusions. But this, Pinker...

"Everyone has an inner nerd just waiting to be awakened by the right passion. In Everything All at Once, Bill Nye will help you find yours. With his call to arms, he wants you to examine every detail of the most difficult problems that look unsolvable--that is, until you find the solution. Bill shows you how to develop critical thinking skills and create change, using his "everything all at once" approach that leaves no stone unturned"--www.amazon.com...

bell hooks is one of America's most engaging public intellectuals. In this richly illustrated two-part interview, hooks argues that we can acknowledge the impact of media without denying our own agency or the pleasure we derive from popular culture. Rather than ignoring or denying the power of representation, hooks advocates for critically confronting the influence of media in our lives.