Vinod Goel

I have spent 20+ years studying the cognitive and neural basis of human reasoning and problem-solving. My primary methodologies have been brain imaging (fMRI) and lesion studies. Some years ago it occurred to me that there is very little real-world human behavior that I (or my colleagues) can actually explain. In response to this sobering realization I've spent the last few years reconceptualizing everything I know about reasoning and human behavior. The result is a model of tethered rationality that I think gets us closer to explaining teenage daughters, Trump neighbors, and vaccine deniers. The model is developed in a book entitled "Reason and Less: Pursuing Food, Sex, and Politics" (The MIT Press, 2022):
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/reason-and-less