Book review of Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters by Steven Pinker

Given our present second of obvious nationwide derangement, when massive areas of tradition and politics appear to have slipped all tethers to actuality, Pinker’s ambition to light up such an important matter gives the welcome prospect of a return to sanity. And in some ways he succeeds — as with all of his books, this one is erudite, lucid, humorous and dense with fascinating materials. His attribute brew of Yiddish jokes, brainy comics and incisive argumentation is a pleasure to learn, even when the topics are technical and mathematical. It’s no small achievement to make formal logic, sport principle, statistics and Bayesian reasoning pleasant matters filled with appeal and relevance.