Everything Wrong with Gad Saad’s Book The Parasitic Mind

It’s no secret that there are a lot of bad ideas that spread, which make most of us rational thinkers wonder what’s going on. It’s 2020, and there are entire conventions of people who believe the world is flat.

Meanwhile, QAnon is being banned from most social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, and it seems like YouTube may follow suit soon. As you may remember, last month I had a video debunking QAnon COVID conspiracies wrongly taken down. Fortunately, it was put back up because I was explaining how absurd it is to tell people not to wear masks during a pandemic.

I often sit back and wonder how many people can share so many bad ideas, so when I heard Gad Saad had a new book coming out titled The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense, I did what I usually do. I set a calendar reminder so I could get it on launch day and check it out.

Prior to stumbling across the book, I knew nothing about Gad Saad, but after some research, I found that he’s a professor in the field of evolutionary psychology. Since I loved Good Reasons for Bad Feelings by Randolph Nesse and Why Buddhism is True by Robert Wright, I figured this would be a great book to check out.

I think it’s important to make it abundantly clear that I had no prior knowledge of who Gad Saad was before getting this book because after reading his book, I’m sure his loyal followers will call me a “snowflake” for pointing out the many flaws in his arguments. As we’ll discuss later, while Gad and others accuse people of pandering and identity politics, it’s blatant that they’re doing the exact same thing for a niche group of followers. Aside from the pandering, there’s hypocrisy littered throughout the book, and I think it’s important that we criticize weak arguments from those we hold up as intellectuals.

Now, before moving forward with my criticisms, I do want to say that I agree with Gad Saad’s overall thesis, which is that we should be able to have mature debates while using science and evidence to back our arguments. In his book, he brought up some interesting and solid points about biological differences, and I thought his argument comparing criticisms of Islam and Christianity really interesting.