While excavating fossils in the tropics of Australia with a celebrity creationist, Will Storr asked himself a simple question. Why don't facts work? Why, that is, did the obviously intelligent man beside him sincerely believe in Adam and Eve, the Garden of Eden and a six-thousand-year-old Earth, in spite of the evidence against them?
It was the start of a journey that would lead Storr all over the world?from Texas to Warsaw to the Outer Hebrides?meeting an extraordinary cast of modern heretics whom he tries his best to understand. Storr tours Holocaust sites with famed denier David Irving and a band of neo-Nazis, experiences his own murder during ?past life regression" hypnosis, discusses the looming One World Government an iconic climate skeptic, and investigates the tragic life and death of a woman who believed her parents were high priests in a baby-eating cult.
Using a unique mix of highly personal memoir, investigative journalism, and the latest research from neuroscience and experimental psychology, Storr reveals how the stories we tell ourselves about the world invisibly shape our beliefs, and how the neurological ?hero maker" inside us all can so easily lead to self-deception, toxic partisanship and science denial.
Industry Reviews
"The subtle brilliance of "The Unpersuadables" is Mr. Storr's style of letting his subjects hang themselves with their own words." Michael Shermer, "The Wall Street Journal"
"A tour de force . . . A searching, extraordinarily thoughtful exploration of what it means to believe anything . . . There are entire novels that do less than Storr achieves here in a mere 30 pages . . . Running through all these stories is Storr s growing uncertainty about certainty." Laura Miller, "Salon"
"Drawing upon his well-documented store of inquisitiveness about superstition, eccentricity, and idiosyncratic beliefs, Storr has delivered an accessible look at the brain s capacity for adopting unconventional ideas . . . Storr s distillation of current thinking on the subject is a nice primer for the non-expert reader."" The Daily Beast"
"Throws new and salutary light on all our conceits and beliefs. Very valuable, and a great read to boot, this is investigative journalism of the highest order." "Independent, Book of the Week"
"Storr can open chapters like a stage conjurer, and his prose has an easy, laconic style embracing Jon Ronson s taste for the fabulously weird and Louis Theroux s ability to put his subjects at ease. He is a funny and companionable guide . . . [who] confounds expectations." "Guardian""
"Mr. Storr has an engaging, first-person style and makes it clear that his purpose is to grasp why people believe such irrationalities more than it is to debunk their specific beliefs. But he gives his readers enough information to test the verisimilitude of his characters' claim. The subtle brilliance of "The Unpersuadables" is Mr. Storr's style of letting his subjects hang themselves with their own words."--"Wall Street Journal"
"The subtle brilliance of "The Unpersuadables" is Mr. Storr's style of letting his subjects hang themselves with their own words." --Michael Shermer, "The Wall Street Journal"
"A tour de force . . . A searching, extraordinarily thoughtful exploration of what it means to believe anything . . . There are entire novels that do less than Storr achieves here in a mere 30 pages . . . Running through all these stories is Storr's growing uncertainty about certainty." --Laura Miller, "Salon"
"Drawing upon his well-documented store of inquisitiveness about superstition, eccentricity, and idiosyncratic beliefs, Storr has delivered an accessible look at the brain's capacity for adopting unconventional ideas . . . Storr's distillation of current thinking on the subject is a nice primer for the non-expert reader." "--The Daily Beast"
"Throws new and salutary light on all our conceits and beliefs. Very valuable, and a great read to boot, this is investigative journalism of the highest order." --"Independent, Book of the Week"
"Storr can open chapters like a stage conjurer, and his prose has an easy, laconic style embracing Jon Ronson's taste for the fabulously weird and Louis Theroux's ability to put his subjects at ease. He is a funny and companionable guide . . . [who] confounds expectations." --"Guardian"
"A tour de force . . . A searching, extraordinarily thoughtful exploration of what it means to believe anything . . . There are entire novels that do less than Storr achieves here in a mere 30 pages . . . Running through all these stories is Storr's growing uncertainty about certainty." -"Salon"
"Drawing upon his well-documented store of inquisitiveness about superstition, eccentricity, and idiosyncratic beliefs, Storr has delivered an accessible look at the brain's capacity for adopting unconventional ideas . . . Storr's distillation of current thinking on the subject is a nice primer for the non-expert reader." "-The Daily Beast"
"Throws new and salutary light on all our conceits and beliefs. Very valuable, and a great read to boot, this is investigative journalism of the highest order." --"Independent, Book of the Week"
"Storr can open chapters like a stage conjurer, and his prose has an easy, laconic style embracing Jon Ronson's taste for the fabulously weird and Louis Theroux's ability to put his subjects at ease. He is a funny and companionable guide . . . [who] confounds expectations." --"Guardian"
"Throws new and salutary light on all our conceits and beliefs. Very valuable, and a great read to boot, this is investigative journalism of the highest order." --"Independent, Book of the Week"
"Storr can open chapters like a stage conjurer, and his prose has an easy, laconic style embracing Jon Ronson's taste for the fabulously weird and Louis Theroux's ability to put his subjects at ease. He is a funny and companionable guide . . . [who] confounds expectations." --"Guardian"
