Why Mind Viruses Are Real
11th November 2024
Mind viruses seem to be all the rage these days. In his 2020 bestseller Parasitic Mind, evolutionary psychologist Gad Saad identifies “the tyranny of political correctness” and other “infectious ideas” that are harming our societies. A year later, from a different ideological angle, the philosopher Andy Norman published Mental Immunity, a guide to boosting your mental immune system against infectious “mind parasites.” And in his popular science book Foolproof (2022), psychologist Sander Van der Linden advocates “mental inoculation” against misinformation, fake news, and conspiracy theories. In various ways, each of these books suggests that beliefs act like infectious parasites spreading from one brain to the next.