Brief Table of Contents -- Detailed Table of Contents -- Preface -- Prologue: People Are Rational -- My Outrageous Idea -- The Main Arguments for the Closed Mind -- ARGUMENT #1. EMOTION -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT #2. WISHFUL THINKING -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT #3. LINGUISTIC OR CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORKS -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT # 4. IMMUNIZING STRATAGEMS -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT # 5. PROTECTIVE SHELL AND ESSENTIAL CORE -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT #6. BLIND FAITH -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT # 7. PEOPLE ARE ILLOGICAL WHEN TESTING THEIR BELIEFS -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT 8. MIND-VIRUSES -- REBUTTAL -- ARGUMENT # 9. DUMB DECISION RULES -- REBUTTAL -- Ghostly Logic -- The Orthodoxy -- The Turnover of Adherents -- My Sense of 'Rational' -- What Would an Irrational Human Look Like? -- Terrorism and Emotion -- The Problem -- My General Position. -- The Logic in Ideology -- Why Dawkins's Memetic ApproachIs Not Enough -- Is My Argument Open to Argument? -- The Examples of Marxism and Freudianism -- [ 1 ] The Persuader's Predicament -- Trading Off Closedness for Spreadability -- NARROW CURIOSITY OR GENERALWONDER? -- Truth Is an Advantage in Propaganda -- The Struggle for Coherence in Abrahamic Religions -- MONOD ON PERFORMANCE UNRELATED TO TRUTH -- GELLNER ON BURNING FAITH UNRELATED TO TRUTH -- Christianity Modified by Competition from Science -- The Persuasive Power of Informative Explanation -- Popper and Bartley on Ideologies -- RESIDUAL DOGMATISM IN POPPER -- RESIDUAL DOGMATISM IN BARTLEY -- Situational Logic -- THE PROPAGANDIST AND SITUATIONAL LOGIC -- Bartley's Test Case: Liberal Protestantism -- KARL BARTH -- PAUL TILLICH -- The Nightmare of Perfect Thought Control -- Martyrdom as a Rational Technique -- [ 2 ] Survival of the Truest -- Evolution and Human Rationality -- Does the Modularity of Mind Undermine Rationality? -- Evolutionary Epistemology.

A Darwinian Epistemology -- General and Specific Problem-Solving -- An Indirect Refutation of the Existence of the Impervious Believer -- Why You Are at Least as Sensible as a Snail -- LIONEL ROBBINS AND THE MODERN CONCEPTION OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE -- TRIAL AND ERROR IN ECONOMIC DECISIONS -- MAX WEBER -- The Fanatic -- GUSTAVE LE BON AND WALTER LAQUEUR -- SUICIDE TERRORISM PAYS -- ABSOLUTE VALUES -- Instrumental Rationality -- A POSSIBLE OBJECTION -- Rhetoric versus Theory -- J.L. AUSTIN -- SOCRATES -- UNFATHOMABLE LIES -- Exploratory Rationality -- Wishful and Fearful Rationality -- DAVID PEARS -- JON ELSTER -- GEORG LUKACS -- WISHFUL BELIEFS AND EXPLORATORY BEHAVIOR -- ABSOLUTE VERSUS VALUE-RELATIVE STUBBORNNESS -- HOFFER ON THE FANATICAL COMMUNIST -- DENISE MEYERSON ON ABSOLUTE IDEOLOGICAL STUBBORNNESS -- Logical Thinking Promotes Survival -- G.A. WELLS AND IMMEDIATE EXPERIENCE -- WOLPERT: BENDING LOGIC TO PRIOR BELIEF -- Natural Selection Doesn't Yield Perfection -- ECOLOGICAL RATIONALITY, AGAIN -- WASON'S EXPERIMENT -- A General Schema for the Evolution of Ideologies under Criticism -- RICHARD DAWKINS: THE HELLFIRE MEME -- FLORIAN VON SCHILCHER AND NEIL TENNANT -- Memetic Evolution of an Ideology -- 1. OCCASION -- 2. EMERGENCE -- 3. REFINEMENT -- 4. TESTING -- 5. PROPAGATION -- Why Ideologies Look Impervious to Criticism -- THE COMPLEXITY OF THE LEARNING TASK -- THE STUBBORNNESS OF IMPORTANT BELIEFS -- POPPER'S 'DOGMATISM' SOCIOLOGIZED -- THE EARLY LOSS OF INTELLECTUAL GIANTS -- RETENTION OF THE ORIGINAL TERMINOLOGY -- FEELING ASHAMED OF HAVING BEEN WRONG -- BAD FAITH AND COWARDICE -- PRESSURE TO CONFORM -- [ 3 ] Does Emotion Cloud Our Reason? -- Ideologies as Rationalizations of Irrational Emotions -- Hitler's Theory of Propaganda -- Intellectual Elites and Emotional Masses -- EVIDENCE FROM PSYCHOLOGY.

HIGH AROUSAL INTERFERES WITH THE TRANSMISSION OF NEW IDEAS -- INTENSE EMOTION TRANSMITS IDEAS ALREADY ACCEPTED -- Suggestion as Simple Assertion -- SUGGESTION AS IMPLICIT ARGUMENT -- Influencing versus Determining Public Opinion -- Long-Term Propaganda versus Political Canvassing -- Thinking about Abstract Ideas versus Thinking in Accord with Them -- Fitting the Theory to the Emotion -- Moral Feelings and Factual Assumptions -- The Role of Intense Emotion -- INTENSE EMOTION AND THE THEORY OF ADVERTISING -- [ 4 ] Ideologies as Shapeshifters -- Immunizing Stratagems -- Popper's Examples of Immunizing Stratagems -- The Demarcation Problem -- Damaging versus Eliminating a System of Ideas -- DO ALL IMMUNIZING STRATAGEMS ABANDON THE ORIGINAL THEORY? -- TYPES OF IMMUNIZING STRATAGEMS -- HARD CORE VERSUS PROTECTIVE BELT -- DUHEM'S PROBLEM -- CHANGING DEMARCATION BETWEEN THE HARD CORE AND THE PROTECTIVE BELT -- Ideological Movements Split -- UNFATHOMABLE IMPLICATIONS OF AN IDEOLOGY -- THE GENERAL STRUCTURE OF IMMUNIZING RESPONSES TO CRITICISM -- Case Study: Marxism -- Marx's Labor Theory of Value -- THE PROBLEM MARX'S THEORY OF VALUE WAS MEANT TO SOLVE -- INADVERTENTLY SELF-INFLICTED INJURIES TO MARX'S THEORY OF VALUE -- THE EVOLUTION OF THE LABOR THEORY OF VALUE IN VOLUME I OF CAPITAL -- ABANDONMENT OF THE THEORY OF EXPLOITATION AND PROFIT -- Case Study: Freudianism -- FREUD'S THEORY OF DREAMS IS TESTABLE -- THE CRITICIZABILITY OF FREUD'S 'BASIC THEORY' -- FURTHER EMPIRICAL REFUTATIONS -- Refutation versus Elimination of Ideologies -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.