In the past, Jon Ronson has written and filmed ordinary people doing extraordinary things, extraordinary folk doing scary things and scary individuals attempting to prove just how ordinary they are. The likes of David Icke (former Coventry goalie who believes that blood-quaffing reptiles rule the world), Jonathan King (celebrity sex offender), Natascha Kampusch (empathetic Austrian schoolgirl held captive in a cellar for over 3000 days) and George Exoo (suicide facilitator) have been among his subjects through a rich and varied journalistic career.

His next book, The Psychopath Test, gets its Scottish debut airing at the Edinburgh International Science Festival and his audience will hear more tales from the edge of reason, as he seeks to discover whether mental illness is rife among those walking the corridors of power. To assist in his latest simultaneously witty and terrifying journey are ex-MI5 officer turned conspiracy theorist extraordinaire David Shayler, a former Haitian death squad commandant and a pinstripe-suited man who claims to have faked a little bit of madness to avoid a heavy prison sentence but ended up being chucked into Broadmoor to share a postcode with Ian Brady and Peter Sutcliffe.

Ronson will be appearing with the festival’s guest director, Richard Wiseman, whose books include Quirkology and 59 Seconds. He wonders not whether we might all be psychopaths, but if we all have a natural telepathy.

The Jam House, Edinburgh, Sunday 17 April.