The Believing Brain

From Ghosts and Gods to Politics and Conspiracies - How We Construct Beliefs and Reinforce Them as Truths

By: Michael Shermer

Narrated by: Michael Shermer

In this, his magnum opus, the world’s best known skeptic and critical thinker, Dr. Michael Shermer—founding publisher of Skeptic magazine and perennial monthly columnist (“Skeptic”) for Scientific American—presents his comprehensive theory on how beliefs are born, formed, nourished, reinforced, challenged, changed, and extinguished. This book synthesizes Dr. Shermer’s 30 years of research to answer the question of how and why we believe what we do in all aspects of our lives, from our suspicions and superstitions to our politics, economics, and social beliefs.

In this book Dr. Shermer is interested in more than just why people believe weird things, or why people believe this or that claim, but in why people believe anything at all. His thesis is straightforward: We form our beliefs for a variety of subjective, personal, emotional, and psychological reasons in the context of environments created by family, friends, colleagues, culture, and society at large; after forming our beliefs, we then defend, justify, and rationalize them with a host of intellectual reasons, cogent arguments, and rational explanations. Beliefs come first, explanations for beliefs follow.

Dr. Shermer also explains the neuroscience behind our beliefs. The brain is a belief engine. From sensory data flowing in through the senses, the brain naturally begins to look for and find patterns, and then infuses those patterns with meaning. These meaningful patterns become beliefs. Once beliefs are formed, the brain begins to look for and find confirmatory evidence in support of those beliefs, which adds an emotional boost of further confidence in the beliefs and thereby accelerates the process of reinforcing them—and round and round the process goes in a positive feedback loop of belief confirmation. Dr. Shermer outlines the numerous cognitive tools our brains engage to reinforce our beliefs as truths and to insure that we are always right.

©2011 Michael Shermer (P)2011 Michael Shermer

Critic reviews

“The physicist Richard Feynman once said that the easiest person to fool is yourself, and as a result he argued that as a scientist one has to be especially careful to try and find out not only what is right about one's theories, but what might also be wrong with them. If we all followed this maxim of skepticism in everyday life, the world would probably be a better place. But we don't. In this book Michael Shermer lucidly describes why and how we are hard wired to 'want to believe'. With a narrative that gently flows from the personal to the profound, Shermer shares what he has learned after spending a lifetime pondering the relationship between beliefs and reality, and how to be prepared to tell the difference between the two.” (Lawrence M. Krauss, Foundation Professor and Director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University, author of Quantum Man: Richard Feynman's Life in Science)

“ The Believing Brain is a tour de force integrating neuroscience and the social sciences to explain how irrational beliefs are formed and reinforced, while leaving us confident our ideas are valid. This is a must read for everyone who wonders why religious and political beliefs are so rigid and polarized—or why the other side is always wrong, but somehow doesn't see it.” (Dr. Leonard Mlodinow, author of The Drunkard’s Walk and The Grand Design with Stephen Hawking)

It's all in your head

I was knocked out once. Nothing. Can't even remember the time I was out. I am guessing death is the same. I am also finding this book to back up a lot of my other ideas. Your brain has to make sense out of the world, stimuli and memories and so fills it in with voices, ghosts and flying saucers. Then you have to make up a reason for all this, after all it can't just be me otherwise I would fit in better, surely! Well Michael Shemer explains it all, lost me a little in the bit about the universe and alternative universes, but I will go back to that another time. Once you listen to Michael, who narrates his (not the best to listen to but passable) book, you start to see that it might just be time to stop believing and get on with it, living that is. He dose not say it does not exist, but as a scientist, or at least someone using science, just because it does not have a normal reason does not mean it is supernormal, it means we just don't have a normal answer yet. Worth listening to and once you have, you can discuss with your brainy intelligent friends his theories and feel a little more wiser than the 'spoon benders'.

Great !!!!!! Will listen again. So far, Shermers

What does Michael Shermer bring to the story that you wouldn???t experience if you just read the book?

It is a great story itself.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The first story he told.

Any additional comments?

One of the better audible books I've listened to. I was really into the stories. Very good.

Great narrative and objective analysis

What made the experience of listening to The Believing Brain the most enjoyable?

The content, construction and flow of this book make it, to me, a 'must read' for anyone interested in belief systems, psychology, ethics, brain functioning, mysticism, religion, spirituality and human motivation.

What about Michael Shermer’s performance did you like?

MS does a good reading without trying to 'sell' his ideas.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

It is long and I play/replay it over a matter of days.

Any additional comments?

The only trite aspect of the production is the addition of melodramatic music at the end of some chapters. It is unnecessary, cheapens the reading, and is totally out of style with the content of the book and production.

Skeptics of the World Unite

I have to admit at the beginning that I have a significantly pro-skeptic bias. I love skeptics, so it is hard for me not to like the book. An interesting book that belongs on my shelf between my books on psychology and science (The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives, Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions) and my books on agnosticism, skepticism, neo-atheism and the evolution of religion (The Evolution of God, The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, The God Delusion). Anyway, 'Believing Brain' was worth my time and was a nice homage to science, and the scientific method.

Really, really interesting stuff.

I was skeptical of this book at first. Then I really got into it. And found myself nodding along as I listened. Perhaps I was merely subdued by my innate confirmation bias... ;-) Good stuff.

Starts Strong, Then Wanders

The Believing Brain starts strong, delivering on its title promise about why people believe such strange things. Then the author begins to wander. By mid-way the book starts becoming a recap of material from other books.

The section on politics particularly wanders. For an extended section it's about the author's own political beliefs, and subtly why those beliefs are rational, implying others' beliefs are not.

From there the book goes on to discuss cognitive biases, the history of science, and the scientific method. All of these topics are much better covered in other books specific to those subjects.

SHERMER'S CONUNDRUM

A conundrum is a difficult problem or question. Michael Sherman deals with the biggest conundrum of all. Shermer is an academic psychologist, writer, myth buster, and faith breaker. Shermer characterizes himself as a religious skeptic.

Shermer notes that science is the key to knowledge. Science requires experimentally reproducible results, and when experimental results cannot be precisely reproduced, knowledge changes. Man is on the verge of scientifically proving that Higgs Boson particles exist, 16 years after they were conceptually discovered.

“Patternicity” and “agenticity” are essential characteristics of an inquiring, scientific mind. One must presume that is why Shermer chooses to call himself a skeptic rather than an atheist when asked if he believes in God; i.e. more like a person losing faith rather than God.

Starts out strong, but ends with a detour

Would you consider the audio edition of The Believing Brain to be better than the print version?

The ideas explored in the book are fascinating, but I wouldn't have picked it up if there was another narrator.

What other book might you compare The Believing Brain to and why?

I listened to other books on the brain, psychology, and society but they didn't provide as much background as The Believing Brain. I really learned a lot more about the psychology of the brain and will likely pick up a few of the books he cited, that cover similar themes.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

I tend to listen to books on a congruent basis, alternating between music and other areas of interest. This was just long enough to listen to on my breaks from work, while not taking too long to complete.

Mostly fair look at why we want to believe

It's a good listen. Shermer has a great rhythm that keeps almost the entire narration from feeling tedious. The arguments he presents are compelling and based on his decades of research. However, the one chapter he dedicates to political ideology seems a bit too biased. He plainly states his views and after discouraging stereotypes, seems to imply that political leanings are one area where reason can't trump impulse. Indeed, the chapter almost feels like a justification for his own political beliefs.

The main detractor... Despite all of his evidence, he never addressed whether behavioral traits are really inherent or encouraged through social norms.

Must read for skeptics of skeptics

Would you listen to The Believing Brain again? Why?

Yes. It is a good book to have solidly present in one's head at all times.

Any additional comments?

I (for complex reasons — I suppose they are always complex) had a penchant for being gullible which got worn down through education, but after a crisis in my mid-thrities, I decided to become "open" (thereby casting away deliberately many mental restraints). I decided it was simply better strategy, even if that meant being gullible. However, in time I shifted back to a more critical, intellectually rigorous position. For someone like myself, Schermer's book is just the thing to steady a sometimes vacillating mind.