Preamble. A mathematician's murder.
Introduction: Reason's twin ; Enlightenment into myth ; The present moment ; Irrationality : a road map.
Chapter one. The self-devouring octopus, or, Logic: The operation of falsity ; Explosions ; Kaspar Hauser and the limits of rational choice ; Carrying on about the ineffable.
Chapter two. "No-brainers", or, Reason in nature: An ordered whole ; Brute beasts ; An imperfect superpower ; Small pain points.
Chapter three. The sleep of reason, or, Dreams: Upon awakening ; Breaking the law ; Spirits, vapors, winds ; Hearing voices ; Bitter little embryos ; Postcriptum fabulosum.
Chapter four. Dreams into things, or, Art: Many worlds ; Bleeding out ; Genies, genius, and ingenium ; What is art? ; The two magisteria.
Chapter five. "I believe because it is absurd", or, Pseudoscience: The stars down to other earth ; Let a hundred flowers bloom ; Alternative facts, and alternatives to facts ; The paranoid style in the twenty-first century.
Chapter six. Enlightenment, or, Myth: Better the light ; The world-soul on horseback ; Poetic history ; Enlightenment into myth, again ; Why democracy?.
Chapter seven. The human beast, or, The Internet: An escargotic commotion ; The modern Shiva ; Nothing human is alien ; More gender trouble ; An age of extremes.
Chapter eight. Explosions, or, Jokes and lies: Into nothing ; Charlie Hebdo and After ; Pseudologia generalis ; Croaking.
Chapter nine. The impossible symbolism, or, Death: "In the long run we are all dead" ; Radical choices ; Youth and risk ; The impossible syllogism ; Tie me up ; Cargo cults ; In loving repetition.