Lewis Wolpert (1929–2021)

This bloke doesn't mess around.

Here he serves up a huge amount of information in a confined space and manages to make it feel like a walk in the park.

I am studying a second year biology degree course and this book covers the same material that my textbooks take 600 plus pages to introduce and he does it in just over 200. Obviously you don't get all the fine detail but he certainly doesn't skimp too much.

The subject matter should fascinate you because it is you. We are used to popular show more science tackling broad concepts like evolution or relativity. Sometimes we get a narrower theme such as stars or atoms. Wolpert must think that all these folks are just softies, he goes for a huge subject and covers practically all of it. Cell biology and the nature of life plus not a bad stab at the meaning of life (ok I'm reading between the lines a little there).

Entertaining and enlightening, two of my favourite words. Go buy it. show less

If you want to know why many people ignore rational scientific explanations in favour of mysticism and religion, this is a book definitely worth the read. The hypotheses of this scientific examination of the basis of human belief, is that humans developed their belief systems in concert with their ability to make tools. This requirement to understand cause and effect in order to make tools also makes humans seek a causal reason for existence and so on. He shows the reader that beliefs are show more part of our biological makeup and genetically printed onto our brains – some of course much more than others.

Although Wolpert presents his scientific hypothesis in a persuasive and logical manner, he manages to keep a tone of respect and restraint when discussing the evolution of psychology and belief systems, recognizing and acknowledging contemporaries who hold the current superstitions of our society. It is his displays of tolerance which appeal to the layman, avoiding conflict and absolutism while still holding firmly onto his opinions. He also avoids falling into the trap of treating the subject with lengthy academic mind-bending arguments, leaving the book accessible to a very wide reader-ship.

Wolpert touches on many different facets of belief – including health (naturopathy, psychotherapy and other parasciences), paranormal phenomena, false beliefs such as mental illness and myths, morality, science and religion.

There are lots of anecdotal illustrations to add to his gentle arguments. I found the arguments in the science chapter very well done. He explains why it is so difficult to comprehend science and says:

“Almost without exception, any common-sense view of the world is scientifically false. Obvious examples are the movement of the sun with respect to the earth…………No matter where one looks in science, its ideas confound common sense….”

He goes on to argue that man seeks a causal explanation for events in his life – such as ‘I went out in the cold and this caused my flu….” However, he presents his views in such a tolerant manner, that I almost wished that I could rescind my atheism and take comfort from a belief system such as religion, as his own son does. He says:

“…..people have the right to hold whatever beliefs appeal to them, but with a fundamental provision that those beliefs must be reliable if they lead to actions that affect the lives of other people.”

Wolpert puts forward many interesting arguments for his own scientific belief system. The main criticism of the book must be the editorial laxity – with quite a few clumsy sentences and in fact one or two non-sentences. My favourite chapters were the ones dealing with science and health, which for me came across with absolute clarity of reasoning. It was very reassuring. The religious and mythical arguments were gentle and logical, in keeping with the more didactic approach of Dawkins and others.

In the end his message is clear. He says:

"The freedom to have beliefs is very important, but it carries with it the obligation to carefully examine the evidence for them."


Highly recommended. show less

A crackingly good thought provoker, after all we each have the subject of this book in between our ears and so we can each judge the various observations and suggestions in the light of our own experiences.

I found Wolpert very honest and open both in terms of self disclosure and with regard to the fact that most of the book is speculation. Well informed, intelligent, evidence based and persuasive speculation but speculation none the less.

This book whetted my appetite far more than Michael show more Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things" because it concentrated much more on general findings and ideas which can explain a multitude of things rather than Shermer's cataloguing of strangeness followed by some generalisations.

Quite a bit of interesting detail regarding the results of observations and experiments, quite a surprising amount of which I managed to confirm during a weeks holiday's worth of conversation with friends and family.

So yes OK this book is not packed with detailed empirical evidence and careful measurement. But it is a very interesting discussion by an intelligent author with an interest in a wide range of subjects which he has managed to bring together into a fairly cohesive story .

A good introduction to an argument which is sure to develop as science examines this issue in more detail in the years to come. show less

Malignant Sadness: The Anatomy of Depression lives up to its title, explaining the state of our knowledge and enlightening bystanders who have never been crippled by psychic pain about intense unhappiness. Wolpert's training as a developmental biologist helps him sift through the scientific literature, while his devastating episode of depression is the base of his descriptions of its subjective experience.

Given his background, one would expect Wolpert to emphasise biological causes and show more relief, but he gives psychological and environmental factors their due. As anyone with a debilitating disease will agree, any course of action promising recovery is worth pursuing, and Malignant Sadness carefully looks into many alternate explanations and therapies. Evolution, psychotherapy, Prozac and its ilk, and non-Western medicine all play roles in Wolpert's drama, and his engaging prose keeps the reader intrigued throughout

Depression is to sadness what cancer is to normal cell division, says Wolpert. Hence "malignant sadness," or depression, is sadness gone out of control. After a brief and moving description of his own experience with "malignant sadness," Wolpert takes a brief walk through contemporary knowledge of depression, then embarks on a detailed discussion of how depression is defined in the psychiatric handbook, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. In two provocative chapters, Wolpert discusses whether depression is a malady specific to the West, or whether it is found in all societies around the world (in general, his answer is that it exists in non-Western cultures but that there it tends to be expressed in physical rather than emotional symptoms). In a very thorough section on who is susceptible to depression, he rattles off the results of study after study with little examination; some of the findings are familiar (women are more susceptible to depression than men), others less so (postpartum depression has been found in cultures as different as Malaysia, Japan and Brazil). show less