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For a journalist, Storr is refreshingly honest and interesting. The Heretics investigates those with outlandish beliefs, but Storr threats them with respect and dignity, even at times when perhaps the reader wishes he wouldn't.

Great book. Really fascinating insight into the human mind, and it's creation of narratives.

In addition to being boring, Storr tries too hard to attempt to give most of these lunatics at least a little bit of credibility. They deserve none. Instead of reading this, read "Them: Adventures With Extremists" by Jon Ronson.

We are at risk of bumping into the fact that our own stories can lie to us if we are never given reason to consider it. I wonder how often we are seduced by attractive plots that we have happened across in life: tricked into faulty beliefs by our hatred for Goliath.

In Iceland--a country that boasts a one-hundred percent literacy rate--contractors carrying out huge public works, such as road building, have to consult with specialists to ensure that they bypass the homes of fairies and gnomes, while builders hire 'elf spotters' to scope the land before work begins on a new house.

Some cultures experience emotions that are unique. In New Guinea, the Gururumba men have a mental state that is known as 'being a wild pig' in which they run around stealing things and attacking passersby. Dylan Evans of the University of Bath writes that this emotion 'is seen as an unwelcome but involuntary event' so some people suffering from it are given special consideration which includes relief from financial obligations.'

For a 1979 study that has been widely replicated, academics at Vanderbilt University in Nashville took fifteen patients who had been complaining of depression and anxiety and sent them to see various psychotherapists. At the end of their treatment, they showed no more improvement than a control group who had been seen by fake therapists and received no training whatsoever.

Another great idea by #audible on Instagram!!! Im a Libra but I don‘t agree 🤦🏻‍♂️😂😂😂 what are you and what would you want to be?

Our brains are weird.

I don't read a lot of non-fiction, but I read this one last summer and still think about it all the time. It changed the way I view pretty much everything. A brilliant, fascinating and entertaining book about the nature of knowledge, belief and identity.