New syndicated column, Think!, to debunk, delight and tout importance of critical thinking in a changing, knowledge-based world

Michael R. LeGault, author of one of this year’s most controversial and talked about books, Think! Why Crucial Decisions Can’t be Made in the Blink of an Eye, is announcing the launch of a new syndicated column dedicated to the on-going exploration of the themes in his book. The column will expose, and suggest ways of alleviating, the root causes of declining reasoning and thinking skills in American and Western society. LeGault will argue flawed thinking, rather than general social or political trends, is the main cause of various problems such as increasing obesity, declining educational performance, political polarization, aversion to risk taking, greater reliance on therapy and drugs to modify and control behavior, gender disparity in higher education and poor decision- and policy-making in private and public sectors. But the column will also use the Think! theme as a lens to gain a fresh, unique perspective on the day’s breaking news and cultural and social phenomena—for example why attitudes about age are changing, the sex-appeal of Stephen Hawking and what it says about the differences between men and women, why the theory of man-induced global warming is more like religion than science, what Tony Dungy’s efforts to cope with the loss of his son tell us about social imperatives to erase memory and the adverse effect this has on critical thinking. The column will also delve into “non-sequitors,” such as “The man and the cueball—how men have learned to make bald sexy,” and “Go ahead, rate me—our fixation with evaluation,” and “The changing tactics of panhandling.”

The column’s debut will roughly coincide with the launch of the trade paperback edition of Think! scheduled for October. Since the release of Think! in January 2006, LeGault had given over 70 television and radio interviews, including interviews on CNN, FOX, ABC and C-SPAN.