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Title: Life Is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition by Wendell Berry ISBN: 1-58243-141-8 Publisher: Counterpoint Press Pub. Date: 15 May, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.72 (18 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: E. O. Wilson is misunderstood
Comment: Wendell Berry is a true master of prose, and perhaps among the finest fiction writers of this century. But he doesn't seem to understand science, or the pre-eminent scientist/philospher of the current age, E. O. Wilson.
Wilson has never made any claim that science is "good", as many reviewers and Berry seem to insinuate. Wilson simply is philosophizing on the reductionist techniques that humans use to dissect and understand their physical world. Berry becomes incensed that scientists would try to reduce the world down to its component parts. Well sorry to disappoint, Mr. Berry, but they do. It's simply an observation.
Wilson does use some judgemental language when comparing the scientific method to religious superstitions that were rampant prior to the Enlightenment. Berry uncleverly titles his book an "essay against modern superstition", presumably meaning science.
I have become a fan of Dr. Wilson, and I believe that Mr. Berry has much in common with him-- both are inveterate conservationists who value the health of our planet. Wilson's final chapter is a polemic on the dire consequences we face if we do not evolve our thinking away from resource consumption and toward the salvation of our physical environment.
I simply think that Berry has misunderstood Wilson's treatise on Consilience. Berry would rather gaze out his window at all the flora and fauna and regard it all as "miraculous", and not make any attempt at understanding the processes leading to the rapid disintigration of our planet.
Rating: 4
Summary: Slow reading, good politics
Comment: To my bleeding-heart-liberal-with-a-vengeance eyes, Berry is one of the few political thinkers worth listening to nowadays. Unlike most of the talking heads on either side of the supposed fence, Berry is actually interested in the reality of the good society, rather than the fakery of the great one. He's no utopianist, and his willingness to challenge conventional thinking and knee-jerk responses is refreshing and beautiful.
This book is primarily about science, and how its deification and industrialization in the past two centuries have not necessarily been a Good Thing. There is nothing that unusual about his opinion, but what makes Berry worth listening to is his willingness to engage with scientists and science-followers as a firm outsider. He clearly believes that the most essential things in a democracy are the willingness to think critically and communicate honestly, even where one is unsure. Very, very few people in the mainstream, or even the "alternative", media share these values. Which is too bad, because I believe that most of the rest of us do. Political labelling is ultimately as destructive and vainglorious as religious or ethnic or sexual labelling. Like all words, they are useful up to a point, but stare at them too long and they begin to disintegrate into meaningless scratches.
On the aesthetic level, the book is engaging, often moving, but slow. It is best digested in small parts. Even though it's a good play, I thought his analysis of King Lear was a bit precious.
Rating: 2
Summary: discouraged by 'poetic' approach, "eloquence"
Comment: I bought this book as someone interested in both science and the humanities. I am a research psychologist, but I have often doubted at points in my career that science is adequate for the job of understanding humans. So, I was potentially sympathetic to this book.
That said, however, the tone of the first chapter was so negative, based on unsubstantiated ranting, that I did not find I was interested in continuing on. The author would make direct causal links from an ephemeral thing such as the notion of reductive science to the suicide rate among farmers. In the process, assuming I knew anything about the suicide rate of farmers - I have no idea what the pattern looks like, what it coincides with, and he just doesn't tell you. Shall I just assume that pattern supports his opinion, then?
I realize that I am asking the author to take a scientific approach to his somewhat "anti-science" opinion. Perhaps I give myself away as "hopeless" to those that support his opinion there. But the problem is, I wasn't opposed to this opinion - I was receptive to it - but I wanted something solid which I could anchor the negative effects of science on, and an understanding of the proper role, the benefits and place of both science and non-science. I did not feel it was forthcoming from this author. The piece I read, I felt, did not help me towards the goal of understanding what science is good for, what its limits are, and what properly belongs beyond those limits. I think it's an important thing to address, and from the reviews I thought this book would contribute there, but I found it lacking, and a bit off-putting.
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Title: In the Presence of Fear: Three Essays for a Changed World (The New Patriotism Series, Vol. 1) by Wendell Berry ISBN: 0913098604 Publisher: Orion Society Pub. Date: 01 December, 2001 List Price(USD): $8.00 |
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Title: What Are People For? by Wendell Berry ISBN: 0865474370 Publisher: North Point Press Pub. Date: April, 1990 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture by Wendell Berry ISBN: 0871568772 Publisher: Sierra Club Books Pub. Date: March, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Gift of Good Land: Further Essays Cultural and Agricultural by Wendell Berry ISBN: 0865470529 Publisher: North Point Press Pub. Date: June, 1983 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry by Wendell Berry, Norman Wirzba, Edited, Introduced by Norman Wirzba ISBN: 1582431469 Publisher: Counterpoint Press Pub. Date: 16 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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