Alan Sokal: On Pseudo-Science, Religion and Misinformation in Public Life May 8, 2008

In 1996, Alan Sokal, Professor of Physics at New York University, published, after being reviewed and accepted, a paper in the cultural-studies journal Social Text entitled Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity. Sokal immediately confessed that the whole article was a hoax designed to expose and parody the style of extreme postmodernist criticism of science, and became front page news around the world, triggering a fierce and wide-ranging controversy.

Sokal remains a powerful voice in the debate about the status of evidence-based knowledge. In Beyond the Hoax he targets pseudo-science, religion, and misinformation in public life arguing that clear thinking, combined with a respect for evidence, are of the utmost importance to the survival of the human race in the twenty-first century.

Official Website: http://www.ideasfestival.co.uk/alan_sokal.html