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''Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time'' is a 1997 book by science writer Michael Shermer. The foreword was written by Stephen Jay Gould. ==Content== In the first section, Shermer discusses the ideas that he has towards skepticism. He also explains his conversion to Deism from New Age mysticism (to which he had converted from being a Fundamentalist Christian Baptist). In part two Shermer explains paranormal thinking and how one comes to believe in things without evidence. He uses Edgar Cayce as an example, and while he agrees with parts of Ayn Rand's Objectivism, he criticizes its moral absolutism and argues that many follow her philosophy unquestioningly, which he believes contradicts free thinking.〔.〕 Part three begins with Shermer describing several debates he had with Duane Gish. He lays out some creationist arguments in 25 separate claims, and attempts to debunk each one with his own evidence. He closes retelling how a constitutional ban on teaching creationism in public schools was narrowly upheld at the Supreme Court of the United States in 1987. Shermer shows that the Holocaust deniers reject proven facts for, as he states, ideological reasons. Like the creationists, he asserted, many Holocaust deniers believe that the evidence sides with them. He describes meeting and arguing with the deniers and lays out their arguments then shows evidence to support his own statements. In part five Shermer relates Frank J. Tipler to Voltaire's character Pangloss to show how smart people deceive themselves. Shermer explores the psychology of scholars and business men who give up their careers in their pursuit to broadcast their paranormal beliefs. In his last chapter, added to the revised version, Shermer explains that "intelligent people" can be more susceptible to believing in weird things than others. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Why People Believe Weird Things」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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