Know-It-All Society: Truth and Arrogance in Political Culture

Michael P. Lynch

Aug 2019 · Highbridge Audio · Narrated by William Sarris

About this audiobook

Taking stock of our fragmented political landscape, Michael Patrick Lynch delivers a trenchant philosophical take on digital culture and its tendency to make us into dogmatic know-it-alls. The internet-where most shared news stories are not even read by the person posting them-has contributed to the rampant spread of "intellectual arrogance." In this culture, we have come to think that we have nothing to learn from one another; we are rewarded for emotional outrage over reflective thought; and we glorify a defensive rejection of those different from us. Interweaving the works of classic philosophers such as Hannah Arendt and Bertrand Russell and imposing them on a cybernetic future they could not have possibly even imagined, Lynch delves deeply into three core ideas that explain how we've gotten to the way we are: our natural tendency to be overconfident in our knowledge; the tribal politics that feed off our tendency; and the way the outrage factory of social media spreads those politics of arrogance and blind conviction. In addition to identifying an ascendant "know-it-all-ism" in our culture, Lynch offers practical solutions for how we might start reversing this dangerous trend.

About the author

Michael P. Lynch is the director of the Humanities Institute and a professor of philosophy at the University of Connecticut. His books include True to Life, an Editor's Choice by the New York Times Book Review. A frequent contributor to the New York Times, Lynch lives in Storrs, Connecticut.

William Sarris is an accomplished voice actor and narrator. In addition to narrating audiobooks, he has been the voice for radio and TV commercials, e-learning, medical training, online videos, and non-broadcast media. He is based in Connecticut.