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This short reflection is motivated by my vague uneasiness about some twists of the ways in which people – “ordinary” people as well as those with academic background and aspirations – sometimes talk about (and praise) rationality.

Often one is well served by a readiness to revise one’s view of other people’s work. I have since early on had a dismissive attitude to the philosophy of Simon Blackburn, partly due to his contribution to a meta-ethical conversation that I as a student found dreary, and partly due to his negative review of Iris Murdoch’s Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals – a book I continue to find important. Recently, however, I came across one of his ideas in a context outside philosophy – in a popular book by the Swedish historian Sverker Sörlin – and was forced to reconsider.