Will I love The Death of Expertise?

Nichols doesn’t just critique anti-intellectualism—he lays bare the cultural shift that made it acceptable to dismiss expertise altogether. What resonated with me is his central claim: that the erosion of trust in specialists is not merely ignorance, but a form of civic arrogance, reinforced by misinformation and a collapsing public discourse.

I don’t agree with all of his diagnoses—particularly when it comes to the role of the academy—but I share his concern that the rejection of expertise isn’t just bad for science or public health. It’s corrosive to democracy itself. This book made me reflect on how we, as citizens,… show more.

A biting quip in the debate about whether computers are on the verge of surpassing (or have already surpassed) human intelligence is, “It is not that computers are getting smarter but that humans are getting dumber.”

In the same spirit, Nichols argues that “These are dangerous times. Never have so many people had access to so much knowledge, and yet been so resistant to learning anything.”

I liked this book so much that I’ve become friends with Tom Nichols. I interviewed him for my book, for the extra chapters my publisher made me write for the paperback edition, and once, I believe, just because I wanted to talk to him. This former Naval War College professor and Jeopardy! champion cares so much about democracy that he left the Republican party after Donald Trump was elected president.