Julian Baggini

"Some may be surprised to have found that my defence of reason has been so eager to point out its limitations. With friends like me, you might wonder if reason needs enemies. But reason needs this kind…"

"This point is critical. Reason is often assumed to be by definition disinterested. Disinterested reason has its place, of course, in mathematics and science, but sometimes it can legitimately be very …"

"If the house on the lake can become a new iteration of a philosophical retreat, that would pay homage to its first owner much more than any number of selfie-snapping visitors could."

"As I suggested at the opening of this part of the book, to avoid hubris we ought to think of this beast as more like a mule than a thoroughbred. Our rationality is a somewhat messy thing that cannot b…"

"Philosophers understandably focus on the nature of reason itself. However, in order for reason to flourish, it needs to be practised in the right environment. And that is sadly often lacking in the ve…"

"Only our most intimate friends know our deepest flaws, and in the same way the greatest skeptics about reason should be those who seek to defend it. If we do not debunk the grandiose myths of reason t…"

"Really good philosophising requires something more than a razor-sharp brain, something that is sometimes called subtlety of mind, a philosophical sensibility or insight. I call it judgement, which I d…"

"The rehabilitation of reason is urgent because it is only through the proper use of reason that we can find our way out of the quagmires in which many big issues of our time have become stuck. Without…"