Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge A Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution

Customer Reviews:

Interesting Perspective.......2007-09-21

I can't give 5 stars to this book because I know the history of Terence McKenna and his drug use. That said the book does pose interesting answers to age old questions.

"What was the fruit in the garden of Eden?"

"Why did our brains grow larger in ratio to our body weight than any animals in a relatively short amount of time?"

"Why is caffeine an acceptable drug to use daily? Should it be?"

I think people who read this should know it's an opinion given with historical facts to make his opinion seem like scientific and historical fact.

For instance he references what drugs were in use in certain cultures at what times then equates their overall temperament in historical events to the widespread use of those drugs. His claims may or may not have merit, we'll never know but it is an opinion none the less.

That said it is a very interesting read that is hard to put down. Attention keeping, he has one of a kind theories on lesser known early civilizations that could use a second look.

I was sorry to hear his library and personal notes burned up in a fire in early 2007, adding just more mystery to this one of a kind author.

Stoned Apes.......2007-07-31

I seriously was astounded by this book. Great historical knowledge on all sorts of drug and plant use from primates to Bush administration. McKenna really goes in depth about the evolution of language and consciousness. His theory that primates found psilocybin containing mushrooms growing in cow dung in the grasslands of Africa. Is represented quite well. He believes we may have literally "eaten our way to a higher conscious". McKenna really makes the war on drugs look like an absolute joke. He is subtly condescending of close minded politics yet brilliant and charming in informing readers of the power and potential of consciousness expanding drugs if taken properly.

Great Book.......2007-05-13

This book is very good if you are into evolution, shamanism, and the human life. I recommend everyone should read this book. You might get a new insight about life.

AMAZING BOOK!.......2007-02-04

I enjoyed this book and every single last bit of information with it! The information in here I highly agree with and realize is something that we as a nation need to start being a part of. We have learned from the 60's, but it was still a wonderful time. We can take that and modernize it, maybe even improve on some things. But first-we need to end the war on drugs. Overall-this book was great, I highly recommend it, one will learn so much.

An in depth look into Mr. McKenna's view of the mind of modern man........2007-01-11

I really did enjoy the honest and straightforward approach of Mr. McKenna's writing on the subject.

Human Nature After Darwin: A Philosophical Introduction

Average customer rating:

An excellent introduction
extremely disappointed in Janet Radcliffe Richards
Socrates on evolutionary ethics
Overlooked

Human Nature After Darwin: A Philosophical Introduction
Janet Richards
Manufacturer: Routledge
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Similar Items:

A Darwinian Left: Politics, Evolution, and Cooperation
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ASIN: 0415212448

Book Description

Human Nature After Darwin is an original investigation of the implications of Darwinism for our understanding of ourselves and our situation. It casts new light on current Darwinian controversies, and in doing so provides an introduction to philosophical reasoning and a range of philosophical problems. Janet Radcliffe Richards claims that many current battles about Darwinism, in particular about evolutionary psychology and religion, are based on mistaken assumptions about the implications of the rival views. Her analysis of these implications provides a much-needed guide to the fundamentals of Darwinism and the so-called Darwin-wars, as well as providing a set of philosophical techniques relevant to wide areas of moral and political debate. It also raises philosophical problems of knowledge and certainly, free will and responsibility, altruism, the status of ethics, and the relevance of Darwinism to questions of ethics, politics and religion. The lucid presentation makes the book an ideal introduction to both philosophy and Darwinism, as well as a substantive contribution to topics of intense current controversy. It will be of interest to students of philosophy, science and the social sciences, and critical thinking.

Customer Reviews:

An excellent introduction.......2005-08-02

This book is an excellent introduction to current Darwinian thinking about human nature. As the book discusses the implications of accepting Darwinism it does not put forward an awovedly materialist view backed by arguments, but the author's stance on this issue is nevertheless unequivocal.
The style is admirably clear, and the general claim that in most cases, the often supposed differences between non-Darwinian and Darwinian lines of thinking are only apparent ones is convincing.
However, there are some passages which I disagree with.

1. The distinction between the formal validity of conditionals and the existence of a causal or explanatory relation between the antecedent and the consequent is blurred. Radcliffe writes:

"finding out the truth of the conditional is not a matter of finding out whether the antecedent is true... or whether the the consequent is true. Even if you proved conclusively that either of those was true or false, you would still have no evidence at all for the truth of the conditional... In fact, even if you proved both antecedent and consequent true, or both false, or the consequent true and the antecedent false, that would still have no bearing on the truth of the conditional. In all these cases, the conditional could be either true or false...
This is because a conditional is a statement which is not about the truth of any individual proposition, but a particular connection between the two."(p. 92)

For someone trained in formal logic this should seem puzzling. Formally, the truth table of the conditional does determine when it is false, namely when the antecedent is true and the consequent is false. It may be debated whether this extensional truth table really captures the meaning of natural language conditional statements (many say it gives absurd results in some important cases), but it cannot be denied that it goes some way to achieve that. To consider conditionals as expressing a connection between the two contained propositions is to treat them intensionally, i. e. in a way in which their truth does not depend on their constituent propositions. This distinction is an important one, and it should have been indicated clearly in the text.

2. The discussion of the Divine Command view of ethics is simplistic in one respect. Radcliffe says if you think that the problem of Evil needs to be answered, you cannot consistently accept the Divine Command View, as it considers goodness as dependent on the will of God, moreover, it says that whatever God willed must be good. Thus if God willed that suffering be present in the world, this must be a good thing, too.
I think this line of argument would reduce the DC view to absurdity, and Radcliffe unjustly mocks it by saying "[if the DCV were true]we could just say 'War is a good thing after all'."
Of course, one could obviously point out in defence of the DCV that you need not forego it in order to see a real problem in the existence of Evil. One could deny that God willed the suffering (maybe other people did, or Satan in the case of natural disasters) and hold on to the DCV, and/or work out a theodicy in which all sufferings are eventually justified by some greater good, so one can keep the DCV consistently again.

3. There is another argument in the chapter that I disagree with and which I consider the weakest one of the book. It is about the inconsistency of moral relativism. R. says that relativism in its familiar formulations is incoherent, because "it specifies that no principle should be given precedence over others, but in doing so it gives itself precedence; it says that you should not impose your principles on others, but in doing so attempts to impose itself on the holders of other views, and displace theirs."

I have two objections:

a) relativism as a practical guide may be incoherent, but people often act incoherently, as witnessed by the problem of the weakness of will. In itself, there is nothing problematic with that: if all values are subjective, then perhaps there is no other possible way for us to think and act.

b) In addition to the pratical level, there is the meta-level of justification where moral relativism may well win the day. This issue is independent of whether relativism as a practical view is incoherent or not. Furthermore, I find R.'s claim that we can conduct a 'secular moral enquiry' to discover moral truth by using our reason entirely unconvincing. The proposed means, intuitive reasoning, can only work provided there is something objective to be ascertained. However, R. does not in the least argue that there must be objective moral truths: it is one thing to claim that the existence of objective moral standards does not presuppose the existence of God (I agree on this point), and another to substantiate the claim that there are objective moral standards in the first place. Of course, we could see this argument as one working out an implication of Darwinism (i. e. as arguing for the possibilty of a Darwinist ethics) and not as one for such a substantive claim. But in the light of everthing else R. says about morality, especially in the last chapter where she claims that there ARE some real differences between accepting the Darwininan and the non-Darwinian view (plus materialism), (notably concerning survival of death and the prearranged moral order of the universe), what she had said about objective moral truth beforehand does seem very curious. She concludes the first-mentioned chapter by saying 'there is no reason to think that if materialism is true we must be unable to reason morally'. Well, that may be so, but provided that moral reasoning is done by reflective persons, it may easily lead to its own demise, too, or at least we cannot exclude this possibility a priori.
In my view, if you accept the Darwininan view, the only available choice is moral nihilism, or perhaps a version of an "error theory" of morality.

Despite the above critical remarks, in my overall assessment this is a superb book which everyone interested in evolutionary thinking should read. I hope I have not misrepresented the author's arguments in my criticism of them. I would appreciate if you shared your comments with me.

extremely disappointed in Janet Radcliffe Richards.......2004-05-14

I am a huge fan of Radcliffe Richards book "The Skeptical Feminist" which is an excellent presentation of logical arguments for feminism.

So I was extremely disappointed that Radcliffe Richards has joined the forces of Darwinian reductionism and evolutionary psychology. She claims she is simply presenting non-partisan logical arguments for Darwinian theories for our sober consideration, but her own biases come through fairly often - and she thanks a leading proponent of evolutionary psychology, Helena Cronin, in the front of the book.

Cronin wrote a paper "The Evolved Family" (available online) and in this paper she argues (based not on empirical evidence but rather on 'Darwinian logic') that since women as a group have evolved to value men almost exclusively for their income; and to prefer to spend time with their children to spending time at work, there should be a two-tiered system of employment - one for men and one for women - an official mommy track:

"Rather than taking male standards as the universal measure, or expecting both sexes to adopt androgynous working 'roles', the government should design family-friendly employment practices that reflect the different preferences of women and men."

She does not differentiate between mothers and childless women when discussing feminine preferences, so you can't tell if the Cronin plan calls for all women to be pushed into the mommy track, or just all fertile women or just women with children. And she doesn't bother to suggest a system in which a woman might plead for a special dispensation to join the male work force - perhaps the Queen could grant titles of 'honorary male.'

And it's striking how Radcliffe Richards chides those opposed to Darwinian reductionism for emotion-ridden criticisms of her side, when Cronin never mentions feminists without expressing biting contempt.

I can't believe Radcliffe Richards would countenance this radical right-wing social philosopher. Perhaps she became more conservative over the years. Feminism has lost a valuable friend.

Socrates on evolutionary ethics.......2002-05-25

If you have any interest in the ethical or political implications of evolutionary theory, read this book.

If you ever wished you could spend a week with Socrates, discussing a topic of contemporary interest, read this book.

If you have ever, are now, or intend in the future to write or talk about about evolutionary ethics, and you have not read this book, please quit wasting my time!

Overlooked.......2002-01-15

The publishers seem to have misunderstood (or at any rate, underrated) this superb book, which would profit from exposure to a wider audience. It's as if someone in a suit smelled a whiff of the lamp around here and exiled it to the ghetto of academic writing. This is a pity, but it is perhaps in part understandable. The nominal topic is "evolution," but the real subject is the activity of clear thinking. More directly -- no one excels Janet Radcliffe Richards in demonstrating how to use the tools of philosophy in the analysis or understanding of every day problems. There is an audience for this sort of thing. The publisher seems not to have found it and both auther and audience (saying nothing of the publisher) are the losers.

The Philosophy of Physics (The Evolution of Modern Philosophy)

Average customer rating:

Excellent historical and philosophical analysis plus one error
A comprehensive survey

The Philosophy of Physics (The Evolution of Modern Philosophy)
Roberto Torretti
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521565715

Book Description

This magisterial study of the philosophy of physics both introduces the subject to the nonspecialist and contains many original and important contributions for professionals in the area. Modern physics was born as a part of philosophy and has retained to this day a properly philosophical concern for the clarity and coherence of ideas. Any introduction to the philosophy of physics must therefore focus on the conceptual development of physics itself. This book pursues that development from Galileo and Newton through Maxwell and Boltzmann to Einstein and the founders of quantum mechanics. There is also discussion of important philosophers of physics in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and of twentieth century debates.

Customer Reviews:

Excellent historical and philosophical analysis plus one error.......2005-07-19

Torretti has done an excellent job of weaving the history and philosophy of physics into a rich ,flowing narrative that keeps the reader interested to the end of the book.Nor does the mathematical analysis get in the way.One can read this book and obtain great intellectual profit while simultaneously skipping most of the math.Torretti takes the reader on a journey that starts back in the 17th century with Galileo and Newton.He then moves on through the 18th and 19th centuries,covering the contributions of Kant and Boltzmann before arriving in the 20th century ,where he covers Mach,Einstein,Planck,Bohr,Heisenberg,and Schrodinger.All of the chapters are excellent.However,in my opinion,chapter 6 is the most interesting.It covers the famous 1926 meeting between Bohr,Heisenberg,and Schrodinger over how to deal with the apparent conflicts between Quantum Mechanics(microscopic particles )and General Relativity(macroscopic aggregates).The conflict between Einstein and Bohr over quantum mechanics and the famous exchanges between them centering on the concept of action at a distance, as presented by Einstein,Podolsky, and Rosen in their thought experiment concerning the mathematical spin properties of two particles and what interpretation makes sense(from Einstein's realist position)about the results,is very well done,although Torretti appears to be too eager to accept the philosophical conclusions of Bohr's argument(the purely mathematical points of debate ended in a draw,in my opinion.Bell's 1964 proof established that if the EPR argument is accepted,then quantum mechanics is not only incomplete,but inconsistent).If one accepts Bohr's argument,then a general field theory unifying the macro and micro analysis is not possible and you are left with distinct and separate fields of study forever.The reader might consider reading the same material as covered by Roger Penrose in his The Emperor's New Mind(1989,pp.279-284).Penrose is neutral.He,however,demonstrates that Einstein and his coauthors raised a very important question.I have deducted one star from my rating due to the numerous errors presented on pp.437-438,441 by Torretti in his discussions of Logical theories of probability ,in general,and John Maynard Keynes's logical theory of probability specifically.I will only correct a few of the errors present on those pages.First,Keynes's and Wittgenstein's theories are different.In fact,most probabilities for Keynes are interval(set)estimates and not precise,numerical probabilities as they are for Wittgenstein.Second,the Ramsey-De Finetti-Savage theory of subjective probability ,dealing with degrees of belief ,is a very special case of Keynes's general theory of probability,which deals with rational degrees of belief.The subjectivist theory of probability requires that all probabilities be linear,unique,additive,precise,single number,fully weighted estimates of degrees of belief that require the holder of such an approach to bet on all propositions.Unfortunately,Ramsey's reviews of Keynes's logical approach to probability dealt generally with only one chapter in Keynes's A Treatise on Probability(1921),chapter III.Keynes's full theory was developed in chapters 5,10,12,15,17,20,22,and 26.Torretti fails to subject the Ramsey claims to the careful scrutiny that one would expect a philosopher to bring to bear.

A comprehensive survey.......2000-01-13

This is an outstanding book about the conceptual development of modern theoretical physics, from Newton to Quantum mechanics, and its philosophical implications. The general slant of the work is mainly historical and philosophical, but it also makes extensive use of mathematics (calculus and vector spaces). A summary of the contexts may be in order here.

The first chapter provides some background to Newtonian physics. The second, discusses Newton's concepts of mass, force, space, time and gravitation, and finishes with a technical section on Lagrange's analytical formulation of mechanics. The next chapter is strictly philosophical and offers an assessment of Kant's contribution to philosophy of nature in his Critique of Pure Reason. The chapter devoted to the 19th. Century deals successively with Non Euclidean geometries, field theories, and thermodynamics. It also reserves a long section for the work of the scientists-philosophers: Whewell, Peirce, Mach, and Duhem. The chapter on relativity stresses the geometrical approach, providing a detailed account of Minkoski's spacetime. It follows a review of the philosophical problems of special relativity, such as conventionality of simultaneity or the twin's paradox, and briefer sections on general relativity and relativistic cosmology. The chapter on quantum mechanics is quite technical and a bit tortuous. It begins with the older formalism of matrix and wave mechanics, and then it presents the standard Hilbert space formalism. There is a thorough analysis of philosophical problems, including the EPR argument, the measurement problem, hidden variables theories and quantum logic.

The last chapter contains general philosophical reflections on the nature of physical theories. The author subscribes to the so called estructuralist view of theories, an approach associated, among others, with the names of P. Suppes and J. Sneed in the US, and W. Stegmuller and W. Balzer in Germany. According to this conception, a physical theory is not a system of statements that intend to be true -or approximately true- of the physical world. Physical theories are rather concepts or predicates, which are true or false of a family of, purported models. These models, in turn, are idealized representations of physical systems or aspects of the physical world.

A final appendix provides the required definitions of higher mathematical concepts, such as vector spaces, Hilbert spaces, lattices, and topology. It is a very good refresher for the reader with enough mathematical background, but, on my view, it is too brief and compact for those who want to learn these topics from the scratch. The thirty three-page bibliography is rich and comprehensive, especially on original sources of modern physics in any language (nonetheless, there are some omissions of works quoted in abbreviated form in the footnotes). The scope of the book is really wide and almost complete, but I have missed a section on elementary particle physics.

Customer Reviews:

Excellent.......2006-01-04

A refutation of "scientific creationism" from a Christian standpoint with integrity towards the text.

Syncretistic, modern approach throws out too much.......2004-07-27

Conrad Hyers's slim volume, *The Meaning of Creation*, attempts to put an end to the Creation / evolution debacle by offering a fresh but purportedly conservative approach to Genesis 1 and 2.

According to Hyers, the actual conflict is not between Creation and evolution (both of which can be and are true), but between two ideologies, both of which are false : atheistic evolutionism («dinosaur religion») and «scientific» creationism («religion as dinosaur».) Though it is «neither good Bible nor good science» (p20), the latter has sought to impose itself as *the* orthodox approach to Genesis, outside of which lies heresy. Its literalist demands have thereby been «brought to the text, confused with the text, given the authority of the text, and absolutized along with the text, requiring the same allegiance as the text itself.» (p23)

Even though they may seem to be diametrical opposites, these two ideologies share the same premise : a projection of modern science onto Scripture. Both substitute «certain modern categories and concerns for those actually present in the biblical texts, and imagine ... that these contemporary problems are what the texts are about.» (p8.)

Instead, Hyers offers what he considers to be a truly conservative approach to Scripture, one which actually tries «to conserve ... the primary and original meaning of the text, in its own terms and historical milieu» (p8.) Seen in this light, Genesis does not contradict science because it is shown to «belong to a different literary genre, type of knowledge and kind of concern» and therefore to have «little to do» with science : it is not concerned with what arch-Creationist Henry Morris ludicrously calls God's «methods of creation», but with «the ultimate source of ... being, meaning and direction» (p33.)

Quite perceptively, Hyers remarks that under a show of strict adherence to the text, literalism actually «misses the symbolic richness and spiritual power of what *is* there» (p29), a flaw one encounters even in solid old-earth creationist writers like Glenn R. Morton.

To access that richness, we must understand Genesis as a «*theological* picture of the universe, and the respective places of nature, humanity and divinity within the *religious* order of things» (p38), a picture which attacks idolatry by demythologizing nature and showing the creatureliness of the sun, moon and stars deified by the Pagans.

Both scientific literalism and scientific symbolism must therefore be rejected in favour of religious symbolism. Genesis is a cosmological account, interested in God's imposition of order on chaos through the separation of entities from one another (p89.) In particular, it uses numbers numerologically, not numerically ; the six days are neither 24-hour periods nor geological eras, but «a liturgical-calendrical model based on the sacred division of the week and the observance of the sabbath» (p75.)

Hyers does not seek to reduce the Genesis accounts to a set of legends or fairy tales. He considers them to be myths, i.e. «vehicles of supreme truth» (p107), figurative expressions of «the most basic and significant truths of all, which give meaning, purpose and value to existence» (p104.) He does claim that «stories such as Cain and Abel, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel ... have a strong historical base» (p125), but when he actually spells out that base however, it turns out to be less than strong. For instance, «Eve's first eating of the tree of knowledge, which led to farming and eventually to urbanization, may have some historical basis in the probable origins of agriculture in simple plantings by women» (p101.) « Similarly, the flood story... is based in the flood experiences of the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys... It is quite possible that some people escaped into boats and took animals with them» (p102.)

The serpent itself is seen as a personification of the Baal-worshipping Canaanites, leading Hyers to a far from Catholic interpretation of God's promise about Eve's seed : «While Israel bruised the head of the Canaanites in conquest, the Canaanites continued to bruise the heel of Israel in corrupting its pastoral faith and desert virtues» (p123.)

As for Biblical inerrancy, little is left of it after Hyers' remark that «the Cannanites and their agricultural rites are given a long and dubious history» (p124) as the descendants of Cain.

Much is made of the opposition between Genesis 1 (the Priestly account), which Hyers believes was composed in the 6th century BC (p51) and Genesis 2 (the Yahwist account), which is said to be from the Solomonic period (10th century BC) and is therefore much earlier. The latter reflects pastoral, nomadic values and is critical of the abandonment of the ways of the Patriarchs which followed settlement and urbanization, and more especially the corruption of monotheism through the cosmopolitan polygamy of the «royal and palatial» Solomon (p142.)

By combining the Priestly and Yahwist worldviews, «Genesis... offers contrasting portraits of human existence : the urban and pastoral Adam and Eve, the royal couple and the servant pair... This very juxtaposition suggests that to acknowledge both sides of our Adamic nature is to be whole, to be fully human» (p151-2.) The resulting text therefore avoids both cynic and promethean extremes. Indeed, «the Priestly author, though positively related to civilization, is not a radical progressivist ; and the Yahwist, though critical of civilization and its evils, is not a radical primitivist» (p162)

The last chapter of the book tries to defend a vision of Creation as a «controlled accident», God using chance as part of the very process of Creation rather than controlling every single step. Creation is thus redefined as an artsy, avant-garde mix of «design and arbitrariness» (p181), a kind of jam session where God lets things happen as much as He makes them happen (p175), almost as if He wanted to be surprised by His Creation.

It is at this point that Hyers departs most from conservative positions, as he falls into some frankly blasphemous sort of feministic theology : «Divine foreknowledge, let alone divine predestination, would have no absolute place in this vocabulary. These are masculine concerns, attributed to a masculine god» (p175.)

*The Meaning of Creation* is at its best when trying to recapture the mindset of the inspired writers of Genesis, but it errs on the side of modernism in the interpretations it offers. It should therefore be read not as a final answer to the problem, but as an introduction to a more empathetic exegesis for all those whose minds are entrapped in scientific literalism.

towards a exegetical solution in the creation evolution mess.......2003-02-10

it is one of those drop everything and read now type of books. very much appropriate to a discussion of gen 1 and 2, and the extended discussion of creation evolution, with attention to the relationship of religion and science.

his thesis is that the first two chapters of genesis are polemic against the neighboring cultures of the hebrews. simply put genesis has nothing to do with modern science at all. we impose our catagories of thought, but more importantly we impose what we want to hear onto these chapters.

just a few quotes will help:
it is quite doubtful that these texts have waited in obscurity through the millennia for their hidden meanings to be revealed by modern science. it is at least a good possibility that the "real meaning" was understood by the authors themselves. pg 3

and in response to henry morris who wrote "the creation account is clear, definite, sequential and matter-of-fact, giving evey appearance of straightforward historical narrative"

---hyers writes on pg 23 "this may indeed be the way things appear to certain modern interpreters at considerable remove from the context in which the texts were written, living in an age so dominated by scientific and historical modes of thought. It may also be the way things appear to those for whom modern science and historiography offer the criteria by which religious statements are to be understood and judged to be true or false. Yet it is by no means obvious that this represents the literary form or religious concern of the Genesis writers"

the problem of the debate over origins from genesis is like pogo said in the widely quoted cartoon "we have met the enemy and he is US".
the reason we have so much smoke over genesis is that we forgot the first rule of hermenutics. approach the text as the first readers did, with their assumptions, their world and life view. with the issues they were interested in understanding in the forefront. NOT OURS. the extension of scripture to all times and ages is done after this culture and historic criticism. not before.

therefore genesis is a religious not a scientific document addressed to the questions of that time. polytheism, and sacralization of the physical world. this is in alignment with _battle for god_ by karen armstrong and her analysis of logos and mythos. our problem is that we so depreciate mythos as being NOT TRUE that we very much miss the point of the first two chapters of Genesis....

Good read for everyone.......2002-06-06

This book presents the argument that Genesis 1 and 2 should not be taken as scientific or historical fact. Instead these two passages should be viewed within the context they were written. For example, Genesis 1 is not an historical account of creation but a polemic against the gods of other nations. The author's arguments are convincing. If everyone accepted this view of Genesis 1 and 2 there would be no creation/evolution debate.

Probably the finest book ever written on this topic.......2001-09-04

Probably the finest book ever written on this topic. Hyers points out the hermeneutical dilemmas associated with the reading of the Genesis creation accounts. The Creation/Evolution controversy should never have arrived at a scientific level, and Hyers wants his audience to understand why. This well written work separates itself from the hodgepodge of works that have come out the past several years attempting to integrate theology and science. Hyers' work does not add another trumpet to that redundant performance. Rather, he looks at the literary genre and how it is being violated by the literalists. He also examines how our modern literalistic culture places a harmful interpretive shade over our eyes as we read ancient texts written during a time rich with allegory. And he explains the neglect of authorial intent in the Genesis creation accounts--texts which appear to be more of a response to one or both of the ancient cosmologies neighboring the Hebrews.

Hyers is sensitive to those who cling to traditional interpretations of the creation accounts in Genesis, and is careful not to insult the intelligence of anyone. Hyers is a conservative theologian, but his definition of conservative is to conserve the original meaning of the text, as opposed to conserving a traditional interpretation of the text.

Book Description

Dozens of books, articles, television shows, and films relating "near-death" experiences have appeared in the past decade. People who have survived a close brush with death reveal their extraordinary visions and ecstatic feelings at the moment they died, describing journeys through a tunnel to a realm of light, visual reviews of their past deeds, encounters with a benevolent spirit, and permanent transformation after returning to life. Carol Zaleski's Otherworld Journeys offers the most comprehensive treatment to date of the evidence surrounding near-death experiences. The first to place researchers' findings, first-person accounts, and possible medical or psychological explanations in historical perspective, she discusses how these materials reflect the influence of contemporary culture. She demonstrates that modern near-death reports belong to a vast family of otherworld journey tales, with examples in nearly every religious heritage. She identifies universal as well as culturally specific features by comparing near-death narratives in two distinct periods of Western society: medieval Christendom and twentieth-century secular America. This comparison reveals profound similarities, such as the life-review and the transforming after-effects of the vision, as well as striking contrasts, such as the absence of hell or punishment scenes from modern accounts. Mediating between the "debunkers" and the near-death researchers, Zaleski considers current efforts to explain near-death experience scientifically. She concludes by emphasizing the importance of the otherworld vision for understanding imaginative and religious experience in general.

Customer Reviews:

Its a bit difficult, not a casual read.......2006-02-28

I have started reading this book and I am sad to say its a bit difficult to read. There is no subject that intrigues me more than the near death experience, and I read everything I can find on the subject. This is one of those books that you have to read in dead silence or you will miss something in her very long, very complicated paragraphs. I suppose it is Carol's doctoral thesis or something. Its written in a flat accademic fashion that is a bit cold and technical. I am still going to plod through this book, but I will have to sit at a desk to do it, with pen, paper and dictionary in hand. I hope the information gleened will be worth the difficulty of getting through the research. I can only hope.

Scholary and dense but very informative.......2004-06-05

Otherworld Journeys: Accounts of Near-Death Experiences in Medieval and Modern Times by Carol G. Zaleski, is a scholarly look at "near death experiences" from the middle ages to the current times. It is a tad bit dated, but is still a wonderful jumping off point into this exciting area of study. She does her research very well, and presents a very thorough survey from both literature sources as well as first hand accounts, summarizing the major similarities between the time periods as well as their distinct differences. At the end she recounts some of the numerous theories out there surrounding NDE research, and gives her summation of the work she has completed. This book has a very scholarly tone to it, a very interesting read, but could be hard for some people to truly appreciate.

Fair and Fascinating study.......2000-08-02

I imagine it would be difficult to write an unbiased book about near-death experiences, especially if you had a religious bone to pick. However, Carol Zaleski succeeds in writing a very scholarly, fair-minded book, and avoids the trap of attempting to envangelize the reader. Either you believe people have out-of-body experiences, or you don't and Zaleski doesn't attempt to convert you. What she does do (and this is what makes "Otherworld Journeys" so fascinating) is examine the influence of culture and religion on near-death experiences. A twentieth-century American will not report the same near-death experience as, say, a thirteenth-century Italian. Why that is true is for the reader to decide, in light of the evidence presented by this interesting and well-researched account.

I felt "Otherworld Journeys" was a definite keeper and well worth re-reading.

her study is a great contribution.......2000-03-27

i am not saying WOW (except for her photo-she is one of the most beautiful girls in the world) you gotta read this book but, i have spend an appreciable amt of time reading it twice and it is unbiased research giving solid reasons to both accept and disbelieve. only time will tell.

Excellent work, if by now somewhat dated.......1999-09-08

Carol Zaleski's book is clearly one of the best books on NDEs, still quite relevant even though a bit dated. This is interesting reading not only for her balanced presentation of the pro and con viewpoints of leading researchers on NDEs, but also for her contrasting NDEs of the latter 20th century with NDEs experienced by Christians of medieval times.

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Turning the baloney-detector on Philip Johnson
Science can be Dogma, Scientists can be fanatic.
watered down
Some of you are missing the point!
Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds

Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds
Phillip E. Johnson
Manufacturer: InterVarsity Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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No Doubt About It: The Case for Christianity
Truth Decay: Defending Christianity Against the Challenges of Postmodernism
Is Jesus the Only Savior?
Five Views on Apologetics
Darwin on Trial

ASIN: 0830813624

Customer Reviews:

Turning the baloney-detector on Philip Johnson.......2007-09-22

For someone who purports to build a case against evolution with a fair & open mind, Johnson sure stacks the deck by intentionally biased means. His primary techniques, repeated over & over, are: 1) quoting scientists out of context, & 2) lightly dismissing pro-evolution evidence that deserves serious consideration.

1. Our-of-context: It is not a secret, hidden from the public, that there are, & have been, mildly differing interpretations of the precise ways in which evolution works. The best known recent example of this is the proposal by Stephen Jay Gould & Niles Eldredge that the history of life on earth exhibits Puncuated Equilibria, as distinct from the incremental gradual changes that Charles Darwin envisioned. This hardly makes Stephen Jay Gould & Niles Eldredge anti-evolutionists. It does however allow Mr. Johnson to quote Niles Eldredge out of context, as if he were precisely an anti-evolutionist:

"No wonder paleontologists shied away from evolution for so long. It never seems to happen...that's how the fossil record has struck many a forelorn paleontologist looking to learn something about evolution." pp. 60-61.

Johnson oh so conveniently neglects to explain how Eldredge & Gould resolve this apparent dilemma in a manner that is perfectly consistent with neo-Darwinism, in fact in a manner that in my opinion (bolstered by my geology PhD) strengthens neo-Darwinism.

Similarly, Johnson abuses the work of Tim Berra (OSU zoology prof, pp. 62ff), George C. Williams (evolutionary biology prof, emer., Stony Brook; pp. 70ff.), and others.

Laymen may innocently misinterpret the healthy vigorous debate that constantly stirs within the scientific conmmunity regarding details of the evolutionary process as indicating some sort of growing weakness in the overall theory itself. Nothing could be farther from the truth. But Johnson is not an innocent layman, he is willfully misconstruing the thoughts & words of others. To a scientist, this is perhaps the purest form of evil, & consequently it makes me wonder how Johnson manages to square his actions with his Christianity.

2. Lightly dismissing substantive evidence. There are many examples of this scattered throughout Defeating Darwin, but one example will suffice, since it is repeated at least 10 times in Johnson's book. This is his constant derision of the thirty years of work by Peter & Rosemary Grant (& their multitude of students & associates) on the year-by-year changes in the fauna of the Galapagos. Johnson sneers at this massive body of work as "measuring finch beaks", of no relevance whatsoever. But he just happens to neglect to remind his readers that the Galapagos were precisely Darwin's unexpected natural laboratory that suggested the theory of evolution to him in the first place.

Consequently, when the Grants report on the remarkable physical changes that can occur in some species in a single season, that does in fact point precisely to the powerful potential for speciation to occur, given even a very minor amount of geologic time.

Two other points about the book: First, Johnson surprisingly does not speak in this book of 'speciation'. That used to be his mantra: micro-evolution yes, speciation no. Apparently he realizes that he is slowing but surely being driven from that particular battlement by the patiently accumulating work of tens of thousands of evolutionary scientists. Instead, Johnson focusses on demanding proof of the evolution of the first lifeform on earth from non-living organic chemicals. This is as reasonable as my refusing to believe that Philip Johnson exists, unless he can show me the particular sperm & egg cell that gave rise to his embryo-hood. But this sort of pretended willful ignorance is, I suppose, a highly useful tactic on his part, occupying a battlement that he knows can never be stormed, however silly a point it might be.

Second, this book advances no positive program of its own. It is an attack on evolution, but it fails at every instance to state what Johnson would substitute for evolution in the biology & earth science courses of this nation, beyond Behe's Intelligent Design. And presenting ID takes about 5 minutes, for what is there to discuss once the teacher has established that a supernatural intelligence (wink, wink) was responsible for Life, every different species, & every organ of moderate or greater complexity.

One is pretty much forced to conclude, by default, while reading Johnson's repeated pieties, that he imagines the remainder of the semester will be filled with detailed studies of the New Testament (& how many open-minded questions will be asked then?).

Science can be Dogma, Scientists can be fanatic........2007-06-02

Obliviously, most of the negative reviewers didn't even read this book. The main focus of this brief book is to give a quick introduction to philosophical, scientific and theological arguments against the Evolution. What most of the negative reviewers are missing is his main point: Evolution as asserted by Dawkins and other fanatics, means the universe and all life in it came by about by chance - it doesn't mean you disagree with darwin's finches or other microevolution.
He brings up cases of logical, particularly from microbiologists - objections to evolution that are shot down by 'fanatics' and just as illogical as fundmentalist creationists. For example a 15 year boy in denver objected to NOVA special on evolution being shown in his school. The press portrayed him as a fanatic, but his objection was that the flaws in the show, such as 'the first form of life was a bacteria that fed off of other bacteria' (!).
In short, this isn't the either or argument that the press makes it out to be - evolution cannot and has not explained all aspects of life -and for example Richard Dawkin's reductionist theories that we are just walking bits of DNA meant to pass on DNA passes the line from science to fanatical dogma

watered down.......2007-04-05

This was an unecessary book. It is simply a watered down version of Darwin on Trial. This book leaves out the evidence of the scientific flaws of Darwinism that Darwin on Trial contained. Also be warned, Johnson is not a 6 day creationist nor is he a scientist like Duane Gish. He is more in line with intellegent design. You can decide if that is a good or bad thing.

Some of you are missing the point!.......2007-03-01

There are scores of books on scientific arguments with evidence available for those who want to know. This book is designed to get people to use critical thinking and common sense to start a new dialogue on the origins of life. This is the sole purpose of this book, persuading a person to fairly look at both sides. IMHO the naturalistic evidence is so lacking that belief in evolution is equivalent to belief in God as creator in that neither side can explain exactly how it was done. However, the prescence of conciousness and information alone argue in favor of ID for the origins of life on earth. Many people are totally unwilling to consider any evidence contrary to naturalistic theory. And the reference made by another reviewer about Billy Graham is a little lacking. Mr Johnson explains quite clearly that Billy didnt have the time to fully investigate all the evidence and chose instead to believe God. This is not the same as being afraid to evaluate the evidence for fear of finding out you are wrong. In addition I think that most people would agree that just in the last 30 years there have been new discoveries in many fields that place intelligent design in a much more favorable light. So in the past Billy Graham's contemporaries may very well have been swayed by the evidence of naturalistic origins. Today, I think that anyone who honestly weighs the evidence on both sides would be hard pressed to believe that all we see in nature could have arisen by chance.

Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds.......2007-02-28

I recommend this book if you're someone who is straddling the line between believing evolution and creationism, or believe both. This book will teach you how creationism and evolutionism cannot coexist. I'm almost 14 years old, and I can understand this book, surely anyone else can. This book clearly portrays the falseness of evolution and makes it easy to understand that they can't be true at the same time. Remember, it takes more faith to believe evolution than creationism, because with creationism at least you have a starting point with God, and evolution you have nothing!

The American Amusement Park Industry: A History of Technology and Thrills (Twayne's Evolution of Modern Business Series)

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robfb
Academic study, not lighthearted or fun but excellent

The American Amusement Park Industry: A History of Technology and Thrills (Twayne's Evolution of Modern Business Series)
Judith A. Adams
Manufacturer: Twayne Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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American Amusement Park
Amusing the Million: Coney Island at the Turn of the Century (American Century)

Accessories:

Roller Coaster Tycoon

ASIN: 0805798226

Customer Reviews:

robfb.......2001-08-04

Although I completely agree with the previous review, I would like to emphasize how well this book is written. This book is part of Twayne's Evolution of American Business Series and, as such, does not hide raw data from the reader. However, one can easily ignore the tables and skip a few paragraphs in each chapter and still feel very satisfied with the book.

I orginially purchased the book to learn the history of the Walt Disney World Resort. What I gained was a thorough review of the amusement park history from the 12th century Bartholomew Fair to Universal Studios Florida in 1990 (the book was published in 1991). From trolley parks to Coney Island, from Disneyland to Cedar Point, Ms. Adams covers all the bases.

A wonderful book!

Academic study, not lighthearted or fun but excellent.......2000-07-04

This is a wonderfully researched, thoughtful treatise on the amusement park industry. It is not for those who want a pictorial history, or a romp with colorful characters like George Tilyou. Tilyou is here, but he is surrounded by demographic charts showing the age breakdown of the New York City population during Coney Island's history. There is a great deal of financial information, as well, such as consumer spending on 23 recreational products or services for the years 1909-1923. You get the idea--it is an academic book (but there are some photos, mainly historical).

But as such, it's awesome. There is probably no other book like it. Many academic books are not only dry, they are poorly written, but this one is neither. Here is a sample (since this is the first review and there is little here about the book):

"The major historian of the amusement industry, William F. Mangels, author of "The Outdoor Amusement Industry from Earliest Times to the Present" (1952) was himself a carousel manufacturer. In 1907 Mangels patented a device that imparted an improved, smooth, galloping motion to the horses and in time became common on all carousels. He and his carver, Marcus Charles Illions, produced finely carved carousels, including the Feltman merry-go-round at Coney Island. This man, who in 1912 also created the first wave machine for the swimming pool at Palisades Park, New Jersey, preserved the heritage of the amusement industry in America by organizing and developing the American Museum of Public Recreation."

For the same reason, here is the Table of Contents:

1. The Origins 2. The Form Emerges 3. Coney Island and the Enclosed Park 4. From Trolley to Automobile 5. The Disney Transformation 6. Theme Parks 7. Walt Disney World Resort 8. Overview and Postscript

A: Some Parks That Established the Traditional, Pre-Disneyland Culture B: Industry Associations and Publications Chronology Notes and References Selected Bibliography

Index

Book Description

In Volume 1 of Game Theory and the Social Contract, Ken Binmore restated the problems of moral and political philosophy in the language of game theory. In Volume 2, Just Playing, he unveils his own controversial theory, which abandons the metaphysics of Immanuel Kant for the naturalistic approach to morality of David Hume. According to this viewpoint, a fairness norm is a convention that evolved to coordinate behavior on an equilibrium of a society's Game of Life. This approach allows Binmore to mount an evolutionary defense of Rawls's original position that escapes the utilitarian conclusions that follow when orthodox reasoning is applied with the traditional assumptions. Using ideas borrowed from the theory of bargaining and repeated games, Binmore is led instead to a form of egalitarianism that vindicates the intuitions that led Rawls to write his Theory of Justice.

Written for an interdisciplinary audience, Just Playing offers a panoramic tour through a range of new and disturbing insights that game theory brings to anthropology, biology, economics, philosophy, and psychology. It is essential reading for anyone who thinks it likely that ethics evolved along with the human species.

Customer Reviews:

Important Contribution to Political Philosophy.......2001-02-13

Binmore treats ethics not as a system of rules justified by Reason, but as by contrast, ethics the scientific study of how humans behave and think. Binmore reports extensively on contemporary ethnographies of hunter-gatherer societies, believing that such societies mirror the social and material conditions the human race faced during its formative period as a species. Such societies have no division of labor except for gender, and are politically egalitarian, decision-making power being quite equally distributed among the adult males of the community. Binmore infers that fairness norms must be self-enforcing, and cannot depend on a hierarchical leader (a "philosopher-king") to enforce ethical principals. Moreover, since a division of labor (except for gender) is absent, deliberations in such groups approximate the `original position.'

Binmore thus offers us a "coevolution of genes and culture" in which the acceptance of original position moral arguments is written into our genes, but the cultural content depends on local environmental conditions and random variation. Again drawing on the ethnographic literature, Binmore focuses on food sharing as the most important rule of justice to be decided by a foraging group. In foraging societies, high variance foodstuffs such as meat are equally shared, irrespective of who made the kill. Equal sharing is thus a moral rule justified by reasoning from the original position of hunters who do not know exactly which among them will be lucky or skilled.

Binmore uses evolutionary game theory to analyze social interactions. This adds a welcome degree of clarity to ethical reasoning. Indeed, Binmore is quite clear that all of his substantive results depend on the plausibility of the game theoretic models he presents and analyzes.

While fairness norms are biologically determined for Binmore, the players in Binmore's games are rational self-interested agents. Thus all of the results of two-person game theory based on the rational actor model can be deployed in analyzing social justice. It follows in particular that "[i]n a well-ordered society, each citizen honors the social contract because it is in his own self-interest to do so, provided that enough of his fellow citizens do the same." (5) There is no sense in which moral behavior is opposed to self-interested behavior. Moreover, since players do not behave ethically in bargaining, there is no sense in which the institutions resulting from their bargaining have any abstract normative standing. "Evolutionists simply seek to understand," says Binmore, "why some types of human organization survive better than others.... evolutionary ethics offers no authority whatsoever to those who wish to claim that some moral systems are somehow intrinsically superior to others.' (179)

Different societies can thus embrace different institutions because comparisons in the original position depend on `empathetic preferences' that are culturally specific. It is in part for this reason that Binmore calls himself a `whig,' by which he means a moderate progressive, not seduced by the grand visions of a totally alternative society as proposed by the Left and the Right. The latter two, he claims, make social judgments in a universal, ahistorical manner that have nothing to do with the actual fairness processes in real societies.

Just Playing is an important and welcome contribution to the literature. The book does, however, have some faults. The most salient is that crucial analytical material and discursive asides jumbled together. One must read the whole book, and make numerous references back and forth, to understand the basic argument. Moreover, the book is intended for a general audience interested in political philosophy, yet even professional economists will find the analytical parts difficult to follow.

Another problem is that Binmore uses evolutionary game theory where it suits him, but abandons it when it does not. For instance, while Binmore uses naturalism to justify the assertion that Homo sapiens is genetically programed to accept the original position, but he gives no empirical evidence that this is in fact the case. Moreover, it is implausible that evolution imprinted us with an original position orientation, but in no other way affected our moral behavior, so that the assumption of Homo economicus remains valid for bargaining purposes. Laboratory experiments reveal forms of prosocial behavior (e.g., rejecting `unfair' offers in an ultimatum game, or punishing free riders in a public goods game) that relate directly to questions of justice and fairness, yet contradict the Homo economicus model. The notion that human sociality can be explained by `enlightened self-interest,' even when accompanied by respect for the original position, will not likely survive a close study of the evidence (See my book Game Theory Evolving, Princeton University Press, 2000).

Upgrading Rawls' "Theory of Justice".......2000-06-24

In his exciting theory of the social contract Ken Binmore takes up the discussion that took place in the 70ies after the publication of John Rawls' "Theory of Justice". While he sticks to the idea of a social contract reached through voluntary agreement in the Original Position, he also considers the utilitarian critique such as Harsanyi's. But Binmore does much more than that. He translates Rawls' metaphysical idea of a reflective equilibrium into a two-stage bargaining game with flesh and bones. He stresses the tautological character of game-theoretic tools which in this context becomes an advantage. By comparison of the ethical properties of allocations reached via competitive markets and those reached through bargaining in the original position he tries to identify a demarcation line for the decentralized aggregation of individual preferences. Binmore's book is going to be a challenge to any reader interested in the problem of explaining progress in human societies.

Sex and Suits: The Evolution of Modern Dress (Kodansha Globe)

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Excellent work
What We Wore & Why, From Fashion's Birth to the Modern.
Dry and lacking any real substance...
An Interesting Historical Perspective

Sex and Suits: The Evolution of Modern Dress (Kodansha Globe)
Anne Hollander
Manufacturer: Kodansha Globe
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Textile & Costume | Design & Decorative Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

General | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Seeing Through Clothes
Feeding The Eye : Essays
Adorned in Dreams: Fashion and Modernity
Uniforms: Why We Are What We Wear
The Fashion System

ASIN: 1568361017

Customer Reviews:

Excellent work.......2006-04-05

The book is very informative about western fashion, as constrasted to traditional forms of dress, such as the sari or chador. It's mainly about how the suit evolved. In the process, it explains a great deal about fashion, why fashion changes, why fashion is not linked to social and political changes as we so often imagine, and why it means so much to us. Whether we like it or not, Hollander points out we all dress according to fashion (we're not still wearing doublets, after ll) and what we wear gives information about us. She examines why the man's suit, which began in the late 1700s, has lasted for so long, why it has satisfied so many in all cultures, though it began in the west. She examines the tradition by which the suit and by extension all male clothing has been regarded as serious, while women's fashion has been regarded as silly and frivolous. She points out that to look good in so many situations, a man puts on a suit and is transformed into something respectable and also something sexy. On the other hand, a woman has many more choices, and many more chances of going wrong in her selections. The book is fascinating. It is not a light read, however. Her sentences are beautiful and complicated and have to read with attention. I can't read them and watch TV at the same time.

What We Wore & Why, From Fashion's Birth to the Modern........2004-11-27

"Sex and Suits" traces the evolution of dress, in men and women, from the abandonment of traditional dress and the adoption of "fashion" in Western Europe of the late Middle Ages until just a decade ago. Author Anne Hollander is an art historian who chooses to view dress as art, not as specifically symbolic of socio-political circumstances. I found this a welcome limitation. Although the creation of fashion 600 years ago was, indeed, the result of an extraordinary change in the self-images of Western humans, there is more than enough fascinating and revealing material to be covered in discussing fashion in its own right. Hollander asserts that male fashion has always been the avant-garde, with women's fashion only recently having caught up. And she focuses particularly on the evolution of the tailored suit, that neo-classic staple of truly modern dress that appeared in its current form about 2 centuries ago.

"Sex and Suits" observes that fashion came to be in the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance, when men and women began to express their sex by dressing differently, although still making use of the same basic forms and ornamentation. The author then notes the divergence, if not actually schism, that occurred during the 17th century with the formation of the first professional dressmakers guild. Then, for the first time, women designed and constructed women's clothes and male tailors made men's, creating a difference in the way clothes were conceived and made that would take 150 years to change and whose effects last into our own time. As the 19th century approaches, the book temporarily abandons discussion of female fashion to concentrate on the genesis of the modern male suit, the quintessence of Modern Fashion. The suit is described and lauded from its neo-classicist roots to its only slightly altered contemporary form. Eventually, we pick up the progression of women's fashion again, from the first male "fashion designers" for women in mid-19th century Paris, to the late-19th and early-20th century, when women's fashion finally became modern, on to the throwback years of the 1950s, with its conformity and frivolity. The second half of the 20th century sees men's and women's fashion become thoroughly modern, converging and borrowing from one another, including the universal adoption of jeans and t-shirts that were previously men's work clothes and undergarments.

The last section of "Sex and Suits" offers an interesting essay on how and why contemporary people choose to dress as they do. Anne Hollander sees fashion, itself, as a good thing with great personal and social implications, but never calls any particular fashion either good or bad. She explains what the fashion was and why . Her prose is literate and packed with detail. "Sex and Suits" shows us just how much has been and continues to be communicated through dress, and banishes the thought that clothes are unimportant.

Dry and lacking any real substance..........2004-06-03

If you're looking for a good clothing history, don't bother with this book. Hollander's arguments are poorly written and unsupported. There's no evidence that she did any research.

An Interesting Historical Perspective.......1997-03-23

Forget the titillating implication of the title, this is a serious and well-written history of how we came to wear the clothes we do. Undoubtedly loaded with the author's biases, it still gives some perspective on the styles, especially in men's suits, that we rarely think about. Not a "Gee, Whiz" type of book but worth reading.

Mystery of Mysteries: Is Evolution a Social Construction?

Average customer rating:

indispensable to philosophy
This book will change how you read "Evolution" literature
promises much, delivers little
Didn't do what I thought this would do.
Calming the storm

Mystery of Mysteries: Is Evolution a Social Construction?
Michael Ruse
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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Taking Darwin Seriously: A Naturalistic Approach to Philosophy
Can a Darwinian be a Christian?: The Relationship between Science and Religion
Darwin and Design: Does Evolution Have a Purpose?
Darwinism and its Discontents
Monad to Man: The Concept of Progress in Evolutionary Biology

ASIN: 0674005430

Book Description

With the recent Sokal hoax--the publication of a prominent physicist's pseudo-article in a leading journal of cultural studies--the status of science moved sharply from debate to dispute. Is science objective, a disinterested reflection of reality, as Karl Popper and his followers believed? Or is it subjective, a social construction, as Thomas Kuhn and his students maintained? Into the fray comes Mystery of Mysteries, an enlightening inquiry into the nature of science, using evolutionary theory as a case study.

Michael Ruse begins with such colorful luminaries as Erasmus Darwin (grandfather of Charles) and Julian Huxley (brother of novelist Aldous and grandson of T. H. Huxley, "Darwin's bulldog" ) and ends with the work of the English game theorist Geoffrey Parker--a microevolutionist who made his mark studying the mating strategies of dung flies--and the American paleontologist Jack Sepkoski, whose computer-generated models reconstruct mass extinctions and other macro events in life's history. Along the way Ruse considers two great popularizers of evolution, Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould, as well as two leaders in the field of evolutionary studies, Richard Lewontin and Edward O. Wilson, paying close attention to these figures' cultural commitments: Gould's transplanted Germanic idealism, Dawkins's male-dominated Oxbridge circle, Lewontin's Jewish background, and Wilson's southern childhood. Ruse explicates the role of metaphor and metavalues in evolutionary thought and draws significant conclusions about the cultural impregnation of science. Identifying strengths and weaknesses on both sides of the "science wars," he demonstrates that a resolution of the objective and subjective debate is nonetheless possible.

Customer Reviews:

indispensable to philosophy.......2005-07-10

I had come to realize that my philosophizing was a function of my physiological status at any time. One's philosophical mood is a reflection of one's state of health, or lack of it, to some extent, at least. This led me to suppose that processes by which a human embryo develops gradually into a philosopher are more general processes than the philosophers who develop out of them. While the work product a philosopher creates is more specific, still, than the life of a philosopher.

So I turned to investigate whether work had been done in the area of explaining philosophy by means of biology.

It has been my great pleasure to discover Michael Ruse had already made good progress along these lines. He explains that this book is a subsequent development to his previous book, "Monad to Man," which explored the explanation of biology by philosophical methods.

He does justice to the conclusions drawn since the dawn of philosophy concerning the indeterminacy of reality. And he takes the failure to draw any determinate conclusion as an achievement which leads to something worth pursuing as a result. Far from being a pessimistic treatment of the perennial lack of consensus plaguing human investigations, Michael Ruse draws a sense of optimism from his studies, that this path leads along a direction which will ultimately matter.

I was pleased to learn this book has become part of a trilogy. I look forward to reading both "Monad to Man" and the culminating "Darwin and Design."

This book will change how you read "Evolution" literature.......2004-06-05

This book will change the way you read literature discussing the theory of Evolution. I stongly recommend that you read this book if you are interested in the debate about what we should teach our children in science class.

Michael Ruse is a philospher and an expert in the history of Biological Evolutionary thought. His goal is to evaluate two alternatives about about the nature of science. He wishes to evaluate if science measures a reality that is independent of the scientist, as Karl Popper would propose, or alternatively that what we see is governed by the paradigm or world view we have selected (and which is often inpenetrable to new concepts), as Thomas Kuhn might propose. His method is to analyse the writings of a selection of Evolutionists from Erasmus Darwin (grandfather of Charles) to current day Evolutionists. Ruse's favorite word is "epistemic" (from the Greek word meaning "knowledge"). He uses it in the sense of "objective testable, reproducible science".

For me much of the value of this book was the analysis rather than the final conclusions. What becomes clear is that Evolutionists simply cannot resisist the temptation to expand their writing outside of pure scientific study into the "non-epistemic" world of reading between the lines and speculating what might have happened in the earth's past history. This is particulary true of Evolutionists public or lay literature. What you can be fairly sure of is this, if you have read anything about evolution lately, and you are not a specialised scientist, what you read is almost certainly of the non-epistemic unscientific kind. Why would evolutionists do this? They are creating coherence, making sense of the world around them, scientific or not.

This leaves me with some conclusions thanks to Ruse.
1)Much of what appears as literature in "evolutionary science" is surely no better scientifically than literature about "intelligent design". The desire for Coherence drives both paradigms.
2)If the Thoery of evolution has become progressively more scientific over the last 150 years as Ruse proposes, is the theory we have now merely a scientific veneer covering a non-epistemic core?
3)Ruse says that in 1981 in the Little Rock Arkansas "balance treatment" case he argued that Creationism was unscientific. Would he now take the stand and warn parents that most of what their children heard about evolution was like-wise non-epistemic?

promises much, delivers little.......2004-02-17

Michael R's book starts out well, providing a lively introduction with the now famous Sokal incident, reviews Popper and Kuhn (sorta) on Provability or Falsifiability, and then promises to address this question ( is science provable objective truth or subjective cultural currency) using evolution and biology as the plow horse. As one of the other reviewers observed, he is obviously having a lot of fun. He seems to have either consumed his energies in the interesting mini-bios, or lost his thread, but after the introduction, he never seriously returns to the question at hand. He does the obligatory savaging of Teilhard, treats Gould as a cartoonist, gives some interesting biographical bits on former famous fat people, but never steps up seriously to his main question, waffling the question ata the end. Of course there are elements of truth in two competing points of view. Of course there are serious and honest scientists on both sides. But where do you stand, Prof. R?

Frankly, I was expecting an answer. I did not get one.

Didn't do what I thought this would do........2003-05-16

People will likely come at this book from one of two directions; philosophy or biology. The book is certainly not dissapointing at all coming from the latter angle. It is a great history and analysis of some great evolutionary thinkers: Dawrin (both of them), Huxley, Dobzhansky, Dawkins, Gould, Lewonton and a handful more. Ruse focuses on how they came about their ideas, how others recieved them at the time and whether their ideas and writings hold up to certain epistemic and non-epistemic metavalues of sciecne: predictability, objectivity, conscilience.

It is when coming from the philosophy angle that the book fails to hold up. After all, from its title, we expect to be treated to a query on whether evolutionary biology has made it over the hurdle from metaphysical philosophy to bonafide science (and many readers will not even have been aware that this was even a question). The first chapter is an introductory overview of the dilemma. There are two views of science: one objective and descriptive of the world out there (a la Karl Popper) and one more subject dependent, influenced by cultural factors enough not to yield true description of reality (a la Thomas Kuhn). Ruse discusses the difference in these two thinkers writings. Coming from a reader whose read both authors, his description of Kuhnian 'subjectivism' is well off the mark and his synopsis of Popperian objectivism also could use a fair amount of tweaking. Instead of Kuhn, maybe Dewey would've been a better choice.

It is after the first chapter that the chapters become short summaries of key thinkers: the first half devoted to history and biography and the second, a review of each thinkers scientific achievements and whether they represent sceince or metaphysical philosophy. The chapters on the two Darwins, Dawkins, E.O. Wilson and Lewonton are incredible and penetrating. The others are adequate. All of these are followed by a brief conclusion chapter to tie up loose ends, too brief for the books purposes

In the end, maybe Ruse got so caught up in how much fun he was having with the individual histories that he forgot to focus on the question. The nature of science was to be our topic and sometimes we get a glimpse of analysis on the question but not enough to warrant the books subtitle. For those concerned with the history of the field of evolutionary science - from its days as natural philosophy to the present - this book will no doubt satisfy. As an examination of where evolutionary sciecne does and does not hold up as an objective (or subjective) discipline, Ruse leaves us dissapointed.

Calming the storm.......2002-09-20

Michael Ruse may be the gentlest man in the world. Here, he certainly has no peer in providing a comprehensive history of evolutionary biology without descending into the acrimony and vituperation that has plagued the field. He opens with a review of "the science wars," particularly the humanities' assault on science over the past generation. He chooses evolutionary thought for his focus, because he's familiar with the topic, having addressed several books to the field. In this book, he evokes the work of twelve scholars in assessing the impact of "culture" on evolutionary research.

As Ruse sees it, "the debate is between objectivity and subjectivity." These "scientific values" are used in reviewing the work of his chosen personalities. They are assessed in light of his overview of Karl Popper's "objectivism" versus Thomas Kuhn's "paradigms of thought." Ruse follows the tortured path of this debate with compelling skill. His guidance is sure-footed, keeping our attention and maintaining a balanced course along the way. It's a perilous journey, since many of the personalities are current and none hesitant about making known their displeasure. Stephen Gould, Richard Dawkins, Richard Lewontin and Edward Wilson have all tilted at the academic lists. Ruse negotiates this hazardous milieu effectively.

Ruse synthesizes many works in assessing the cultural milieu of each of his subjects. Darwin's comfortable upper-middle class lifestyle, Gould's rampant Marxism, Wilson's Southern fundamentalist upbringing have been examined by many others over the years. Ruse adds a fresh level of organization to these accounts, giving each of his subjects a "level playing field" position as he relates them to the larger issue. He faults none of them, for none consciously sought to inflict a social standard on society. They were all men of their times, writing to an audience they understood. Although Ruse has some mild reservations about the "popularization" of science by such figures as Dawkins, Gould or even Ed Wilson, he doesn't openly condemn them, nor does he feel they're honing axes. He understands the need for science to reach a broad public, even at the risk of flawed comprehension.

As a philosopher, Ruse's conclusion may surprise the unwary. He finds the charge of "cultural determinism" wanting, especially among today's active scientists. The quest for objectivity has intensified over succeeding generations to become the fully established standard. Is the assault on science responsible for tightening the discipline of its practitioners? Again, Ruse rebuffs the claims of the deconstructionists, arguing that science, by the very nature of its practices, has provided a core of self-discipline improving the way in which science is reported by its members. Even if they stray from the norm in other ways, it isn't the impact of "cultural" mores that tempts them from the path of full objectivity. Ruse deserves full accolades for this study, long needed to counter the foolish assaults science and
scientists have endured.

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