The Crisis of Critical Thinking in the Age of Conspiracy Theories

Faculty Talks Outside the Box

Popular political discourse suggests a crisis in critical thinking, in which a general suspicion against the self-accounts of the powerful has become a suspicion against simply everything: facts face off against alternative facts, different camps on any point of contention urge the undecided to “do your own research,” critical reason opposes critical reason, and conspiracy theories metastasize. This talk will consider critique in its early modern origins, in the aftermath of the French revolution, and in the present day. We will also consider one philosopher’s proposals for a pragmatic postcritical thought. 

Free and open to the public.