Episode 130 - Jakub Ferencik

SRTN's visiting Philosopher, Jakub Ferencik is back! We first heard from Jakub in Episode 60. Since then, Jakub has written another book (!) entitled Beyond Reason: Why We Fail at Understanding Each Other.

 

Our discussion here ranged through many issues but focused on the primacy of reason as an arbiter of truth. Jakub and Ken engage in a lively conversation that is timely but steeped in the historical tradition, which they interrogate.

 

About Beyond Reason -

 

Why is it that everyone around us professes certainty amidst so much confusion, extremism, and polarization? Everyone has answers and yet so few questions are truly resolved. Academics debate endlessly, politicians manipulate desperately, and parents misguide in the same way that they were misled. In this book, Ferencik argues that the only way to come close to resolving our ideological battles is to assume that we are fallible; he claims that certainty is the enemy of progress. For much of history, dogma restricted the progress our ancestors hoped for. Today, we are similarly threatened by dogma. But in our case, we have tools we can work with to become more balanced, tolerant, and kind to those who disagree with us. If we are to truly aim at objectivity, we must read widely, disagree kindly, rethink voraciously, and move beyond reason.