Empires of Belief

Stuart Sim is retired Professor of Critical Theory at Northumbria University. He has published widely on critical theory, and is a Fellow of the English Association. Amongst his recent publications are The Lyotard Dictionary (2011), Addicted to Profit: Reclaiming Our Lives from the Free Market (2012), Fifty Key Postmodern Thinkers (2013), and, with Brett Wilson and Barbara Hawkins (eds) Art, Science & Cultural Understanding (2014).

• Acknowledgements1) Introduction: Empires of Belief, Campaigns for Scepticism2) Scepticism: A Brief Philosophical History3) Enlightenment Scepticism: A Campaign Against Unnecessary Hypotheses4) Super-Scepticism: The Postmodern World5) Science and Technology as Belief Systems6) Towards a Sceptical Politics7) Reasonable Doubt?8) Conclusion: The Sceptic Fights Back Notes Bibliography Index

In this vigorous and challenging book Stuart Sim calls for less belief and more doubt in a world that threatens to tear itself apart over competing certainties. But the book is much more than an analysis of feuding fundamentalisms: it is a call for sceptics everywhere to get organised and do something. -- Richard Holloway, writer and broadcaster, former Bishop of Edinburgh, author of Looking in the Distance A timely book reminding us that without scepticism, the world will be led into chaos by dogmatic and protectionist leaders who increasingly demand immunity from censure from the people they rule over. -- Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, columnist on the Independent and Evening Standard and author of Who Do We Think We Are? and Some of My Best Friends Are ! In this vigorous and challenging book Stuart Sim calls for less belief and more doubt in a world that threatens to tear itself apart over competing certainties. But the book is much more than an analysis of feuding fundamentalisms: it is a call for sceptics everywhere to get organised and do something. A timely book reminding us that without scepticism, the world will be led into chaos by dogmatic and protectionist leaders who increasingly demand immunity from censure from the people they rule over.