"PHILOSOPHICALLY SPEAKING...":

This month's Oxford University Press "philosopher of the month" is Karl Popper. Popper was an Austrian-British philosopher who did most of his work on the philosophy of science but, based largely on his experience and observation of the rise of Nazism and WWII, also wrote a famous work of political philosophy.

"When I speak of reason or rationalism, all I mean is the conviction that we can learn through criticism of our mistakes and errors, especially through criticism by others, and eventually also through self-criticism. A rationalist is simply someone for whom it is more important to learn that to be proved right; someone who is willing to learn from others.... [The genuine rationalist] does think that, in the sphere of ideas, only critical discussion can help us sort the wheat from the chaff. He is well aware that acceptance or rejection of an idea is never a purely rational matter; but he thinks that only critical discussion can give us the maturity to see an idea from more and more sides and to make a correct judgement of it."
For a brief overview of Popper, see blog.oup.com/2017/08/sir-karl-raimund-popper-timeline-philosophy