While I have softened my opinion of this book since my unfavorable first impression of it, I maintain that is far more difficult to read than it has to be in many places. Case in point:
Geez, Karl, lay off the clauses!
In addition to that section on commodity fetishism, I have read only the chapters (26-33) on the "primitive accumulation" of capital. That section is not a bad read on the whole, and it seems like pretty well-researched historical scholarship on the transition from feudalism to capitalism. I would recommended it as an introduction to that subject (although there are surely more accessible options). Marx makes it quite clear that any claim to the moral legitimacy of capitalist wealth is no more convincing than the fairy tales of social contracts to justify governmental authority.
The fact, that in the particular form of production with which we are dealing, viz., the production of commodities, the specific social character of private labour carried on independently, consists in the equality of every kind of that labour, by virtue of its being human labour, which character, therefore, assumes in the product the form of value — this fact appears to the producers, notwithstanding the discovery above referred to, to be just as real and final, as the fact, that, after the discovery by science of the component gases of air, the atmosphere itself remained unaltered.
Geez, Karl, lay off the clauses!
In addition to that section on commodity fetishism, I have read only the chapters (26-33) on the "primitive accumulation" of capital. That section is not a bad read on the whole, and it seems like pretty well-researched historical scholarship on the transition from feudalism to capitalism. I would recommended it as an introduction to that subject (although there are surely more accessible options). Marx makes it quite clear that any claim to the moral legitimacy of capitalist wealth is no more convincing than the fairy tales of social contracts to justify governmental authority.
Hoffer is a harsh observer of the peculiarities of "the masses" and a cruel psychologist of the "frustrated individual." His insights into the way those two factors together produce mass movements seem realistic, disinterested, and worth serious consideration.
The author, who wrote for an anarchist publication in San Francisco, spends most of this book talking about himself. It would be far more interesting to someone in the Bay Area anarchist scene in the 80s. I have little interest in that extremely esoteric topic, however.
I bought it for the first section which follows up [book:Abolition of Work and Other Essays], which I read online and loved. He responds to negative reviews in his usual scathing, hilarious, ad hominem way. That part was great.
I bought it for the first section which follows up [book:Abolition of Work and Other Essays], which I read online and loved. He responds to negative reviews in his usual scathing, hilarious, ad hominem way. That part was great.
The unhealthy amount of Michael Crichton I read as a teenager could not have done anything for my creative abilities or literary taste. But I still think this book is pretty cool! (Is it wrong that I admit this only after the author has died?)
In this bizarrely unfocused follow-up to his very popular book [b:Flow The Psychology of Optimal Experience|66354|Flow The Psychology of Optimal Experience|Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170649609s/66354.jpg|64339], author, M.C., wields his sociologically naive, largely false assertions with reckless abandon despite his lack of expertise and even rudimentary knowledge of the disciplines relevant to his subject matter, human culture. Rather than respond at length to the book's most problematic (and I would consider unpublishable) statements at the risk of appearing hyperbolic, I have grouped the quotations themselves by the dominant fallacy I saw. Excluding these, the author made some insightful observations that might be useful from an individual perspective, but I'm certain these can be found in more detail in his previous book linked above.
Fetishism of Progress:
Pages 18-9: The conquerors of history basically "were driven by the same impulses that send birds migrating or lemmings scurrying toward the sea," and "our brain is programmed by genes to 'take care of Number One'."
Page 24: We must avoid "excessive humility" and keep changing to avoid being "overcome by more vital life-forms." This seems to imply that we might have gone extinct, for no apparent reason, if agriculture and states had not arisen a few thousand years ago.
Page 33: This is just wrong: "Most people who work experience a more enjoyable state of mind on the job than at home."
He show more implies that, if we accept hardships caused by our jobs like a two-hour commute, then we must love our work. But, in fact, most of us accept the hardship of our jobs only because we are coerced with the threat of being denied food and a place to sleep.
Page 97: "One of the few unequivocal achievements of cultural evolution has been to make blatant forms of sexual and child exploitation less likely." This ignores the vast majority of human cultures, especially hunter-gatherers.
Page 131: "When cavemen learned to scratch lines on stones and bones to mark the passing of the seasons, they took the first step toward the great emancipation of the mind from the constraints of the brain."
Page 157: M.C says more "complexity" is the only way "to secure us a livable future." But, while there is nothing inherently wrong with complexity, he can't accept the fact that there's nothing inherently good about it either. "Harmony" can exist in simple or complex systems.
Page 191-2: M.C. says children who aren't "too severely abused" are always in flow, until school starts to control their growth, and eventually they experience it only in leisure activities. But isn't school then a kind of abuse? In fact it is just the beginning of a lifetime of abuse by a coercive society that makes flow experiences few and far between. The logical implication for me is that flow is most probable outside of coercive institutions be they schools or workplaces or countries.
Page 198: Examples that "come close to" an "ideal society", according to M.C.: "In Bali or some isolated villages in Europe...a variety of traditional crafts are still practiced at a high level of skill by every member of the community." This sounds like an example of harmony with little complexity. This scenario is the norm in hunter-gatherer societies. Instead of spending energy trying to find "opportunities for flow" in the current system, why not consider how to make a society that provides more opportunities for flow?! Or, more accurately, doesn't constrict them?
Page 202: M.C. is perplexed that "in our culture the aversion to work is so ingrained that even though it provides the bulk of the most complex and gratifying experiences, people still prefer having more free time." This likely indicates that, since we spend most of our waking hours doing it, we simply become better at working than any other activity. But the aversion to work is not "ingrained" by culture; it's an authentic response to coercion! If anything is ingrained it is a guilt-motivated "work ethic."
Page 204: Contrary to the author's contention, we don't have to "learn to enjoy complexity" and to achieve flow. We already have a natural capacity for flow, but it gets frustrated by the coercive demands of civilization. This is Freud's best insight.
Overt sexism:
Page 46: "During most of evolutionary history, gender specialization was simple: men had to produce, women reproduce." Where did this claim come from?! In fact, both men and women typically produced in hunter-gatherer societies. Reproduction is in no way "women's function."
He seems completely oblivious to how breathtakingly offensive and unsupportable this assertion is. He continues, saying, Louis XVI's mother had 11 miscarriages and 8 live births in 14 years, and "this was by no means an unusual situation during the millions of years of human evolution." In fact this kind of fertility is only present in sedentary societies. Nomadic hunter-gatherer families do not lug 10 kids along on their seasonal rounds.
Racism/ethnocentrism:
Page 69-70: He counters the claim that "the farther south you go, the higher the level of civilization" by citing tribes in equatorial Africa, who he unquestionably sees as the lowest level of society he can imagine.
Page 72: WOW offensive: "the world of the Gusii [of West Africa:] does not look that much different from the world structured by genes...[Their goals:] are an extension of similar goals shared by nonhuman primates and by other lower species."
Page 76: Alluding to Julian Jaynes's, M.C. writes, "It has even been proposed that it was only three thousand years ago that people began to realize that they were thinking."
Page 77: "Selfishness is an eternal part of living, and ruthless bullies must have been abundant" in the past. In a hypothetical example, "Zorg, the imaginary leader of a group of hominids" prior to the evolution of consciousness, "when prompted by hunger or sexual desires,...takes advantage of his dominant position to take more than his share." "If he snarls, the others cringe." However, there is no evidence for anything like this kind of leadership role among nomadic hunter-gatherers!
Page 86: "Chapter 4: Predators and Parasites" "Oppression and parasitic exploitation are constant features of evolution." The equation of parasitism with exploitation and predation with oppression are unfounded. The resemblance between recent social phenomena and biological phenomena does not imply a causal relationship.
Page 144: "The idea of 'country' is a necessary and beneficial component of culture."
Reactionary politics:
Page 104: "The meme for freedom has become concentrated in the American culture, and this, more than any other single trait, determines its uniqueness."
Page 108: "Much of history has consisted of periods in which some people worked hard to save property, while others squandered their opportunities in careless living. As time passed, the ones who had squandered became incensed at the injustice of owning so little. Often a revolution followed..."
Pages 264-5: "Many hard-working people, who are sometimes called workaholics, would disdainfully deny that they enjoy their jobs, an admission that would rob these jobs of their importance."
Why are jobs "important" independent of the worker's opinion to the contrary? M.C. seems determined to lie on behalf of workers who probably were telling the truth. The reason is his apparent affinity for the protestant work ethic. He believes that "Weber may have sold capitalism short;" that it's "the best game in town." He fails to see the obvious contradiction between flow and coercion.
Page 273: "Millions of immigrants from feudal societies, without any experience of democracy, have been lifted to a higher level of political awareness after being exposed to the laws of the United States."
And there you have it: we progress from Zorg to Africa to capitalism and the good ol' U.S. of A. Brilliant. show less
Fetishism of Progress:
Pages 18-9: The conquerors of history basically "were driven by the same impulses that send birds migrating or lemmings scurrying toward the sea," and "our brain is programmed by genes to 'take care of Number One'."
Page 24: We must avoid "excessive humility" and keep changing to avoid being "overcome by more vital life-forms." This seems to imply that we might have gone extinct, for no apparent reason, if agriculture and states had not arisen a few thousand years ago.
Page 33: This is just wrong: "Most people who work experience a more enjoyable state of mind on the job than at home."
He show more implies that, if we accept hardships caused by our jobs like a two-hour commute, then we must love our work. But, in fact, most of us accept the hardship of our jobs only because we are coerced with the threat of being denied food and a place to sleep.
Page 97: "One of the few unequivocal achievements of cultural evolution has been to make blatant forms of sexual and child exploitation less likely." This ignores the vast majority of human cultures, especially hunter-gatherers.
Page 131: "When cavemen learned to scratch lines on stones and bones to mark the passing of the seasons, they took the first step toward the great emancipation of the mind from the constraints of the brain."
Page 157: M.C says more "complexity" is the only way "to secure us a livable future." But, while there is nothing inherently wrong with complexity, he can't accept the fact that there's nothing inherently good about it either. "Harmony" can exist in simple or complex systems.
Page 191-2: M.C. says children who aren't "too severely abused" are always in flow, until school starts to control their growth, and eventually they experience it only in leisure activities. But isn't school then a kind of abuse? In fact it is just the beginning of a lifetime of abuse by a coercive society that makes flow experiences few and far between. The logical implication for me is that flow is most probable outside of coercive institutions be they schools or workplaces or countries.
Page 198: Examples that "come close to" an "ideal society", according to M.C.: "In Bali or some isolated villages in Europe...a variety of traditional crafts are still practiced at a high level of skill by every member of the community." This sounds like an example of harmony with little complexity. This scenario is the norm in hunter-gatherer societies. Instead of spending energy trying to find "opportunities for flow" in the current system, why not consider how to make a society that provides more opportunities for flow?! Or, more accurately, doesn't constrict them?
Page 202: M.C. is perplexed that "in our culture the aversion to work is so ingrained that even though it provides the bulk of the most complex and gratifying experiences, people still prefer having more free time." This likely indicates that, since we spend most of our waking hours doing it, we simply become better at working than any other activity. But the aversion to work is not "ingrained" by culture; it's an authentic response to coercion! If anything is ingrained it is a guilt-motivated "work ethic."
Page 204: Contrary to the author's contention, we don't have to "learn to enjoy complexity" and to achieve flow. We already have a natural capacity for flow, but it gets frustrated by the coercive demands of civilization. This is Freud's best insight.
Overt sexism:
Page 46: "During most of evolutionary history, gender specialization was simple: men had to produce, women reproduce." Where did this claim come from?! In fact, both men and women typically produced in hunter-gatherer societies. Reproduction is in no way "women's function."
He seems completely oblivious to how breathtakingly offensive and unsupportable this assertion is. He continues, saying, Louis XVI's mother had 11 miscarriages and 8 live births in 14 years, and "this was by no means an unusual situation during the millions of years of human evolution." In fact this kind of fertility is only present in sedentary societies. Nomadic hunter-gatherer families do not lug 10 kids along on their seasonal rounds.
Racism/ethnocentrism:
Page 69-70: He counters the claim that "the farther south you go, the higher the level of civilization" by citing tribes in equatorial Africa, who he unquestionably sees as the lowest level of society he can imagine.
Page 72: WOW offensive: "the world of the Gusii [of West Africa:] does not look that much different from the world structured by genes...[Their goals:] are an extension of similar goals shared by nonhuman primates and by other lower species."
Page 76: Alluding to Julian Jaynes's, M.C. writes, "It has even been proposed that it was only three thousand years ago that people began to realize that they were thinking."
Page 77: "Selfishness is an eternal part of living, and ruthless bullies must have been abundant" in the past. In a hypothetical example, "Zorg, the imaginary leader of a group of hominids" prior to the evolution of consciousness, "when prompted by hunger or sexual desires,...takes advantage of his dominant position to take more than his share." "If he snarls, the others cringe." However, there is no evidence for anything like this kind of leadership role among nomadic hunter-gatherers!
Page 86: "Chapter 4: Predators and Parasites" "Oppression and parasitic exploitation are constant features of evolution." The equation of parasitism with exploitation and predation with oppression are unfounded. The resemblance between recent social phenomena and biological phenomena does not imply a causal relationship.
Page 144: "The idea of 'country' is a necessary and beneficial component of culture."
Reactionary politics:
Page 104: "The meme for freedom has become concentrated in the American culture, and this, more than any other single trait, determines its uniqueness."
Page 108: "Much of history has consisted of periods in which some people worked hard to save property, while others squandered their opportunities in careless living. As time passed, the ones who had squandered became incensed at the injustice of owning so little. Often a revolution followed..."
Pages 264-5: "Many hard-working people, who are sometimes called workaholics, would disdainfully deny that they enjoy their jobs, an admission that would rob these jobs of their importance."
Why are jobs "important" independent of the worker's opinion to the contrary? M.C. seems determined to lie on behalf of workers who probably were telling the truth. The reason is his apparent affinity for the protestant work ethic. He believes that "Weber may have sold capitalism short;" that it's "the best game in town." He fails to see the obvious contradiction between flow and coercion.
Page 273: "Millions of immigrants from feudal societies, without any experience of democracy, have been lifted to a higher level of political awareness after being exposed to the laws of the United States."
And there you have it: we progress from Zorg to Africa to capitalism and the good ol' U.S. of A. Brilliant. show less
Full text here: http://www.ditext.com/goldman/russia/russia.html
Renowned anarchist Emma Goldman was deported by the US to Russia in 1919 for her "anti-war agitation." This is her firsthand account of the two years she spent living and traveling in Lenin's post-revolutionary Russia and her impressions of the state of the revolution. She goes in with the most optimistic of expectations, but what she observes is not pretty.
Renowned anarchist Emma Goldman was deported by the US to Russia in 1919 for her "anti-war agitation." This is her firsthand account of the two years she spent living and traveling in Lenin's post-revolutionary Russia and her impressions of the state of the revolution. She goes in with the most optimistic of expectations, but what she observes is not pretty.
This is likely the only historical survey of western civilization that I'll ever read with genuine excitement and interest, and my most naive wish after reading it was that it could become a standard introductory text for students of world history.
It goes without saying that Perlman's essay is not "objective". In other words, it is no candidate for perpetuating the business of progress, which is the unspoken agenda of "objectivity". This account of His-Story is openly disparaging of the He's which constitute and write it as well as the Leviathans which they run. It is an account that is zealously life-affirmative. And it is written in conscious contrast to the libraries of historical literature that demean life and freedom by glorifying the abstract, artificial constructs of Progress, Civilization, and production.
Some readers might find the author's linguistic liberties and central analogy peculiar, but they are critical devices for shifting the reader's perspective outside the historical narratives we're accustomed to learning. He uses "Levaithan" prominently as a synonym for the state and civilization and "zek" (actual slang from [b:The Gulag Archipelago|70561|The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956|Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170735849s/70561.jpg|2944012] for inmates in Soviet labor camps) for worker, slave, or proletarian. The Leviathan is depicted visually as a monstrous mechanical worm and conceptually as Thomas Hobbes's [b: show more formulation|91953|Leviathan (Penguin Classics)|Thomas Hobbes|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1171239204s/91953.jpg|680963] of the state as a head (the king) and a body (the citizens), all zeks--human beings incorporated into the beast.
Compared to the somber prose of [a:Frederick W. Turner|181381|Frederick W. Turner|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg]'s equally critical [b:Beyond Geography|1133668|Beyond Geography: The Western Spirit Against the Wilderness|Frederick W. Turner|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1181257100s/1133668.jpg|1120884], Perlman's is straightforward yet full of passion. Turner's style suits his tragic work, while Perlman wrote what feels like an unfinished hero story, the hero, Ahura Mazda, the light, life, community, and freedom struggling against Ahriman, darkness, death, hatred, and enslavement. This history is no uninformed polemic; it is a thorough, exhaustive, informative polemic that spans from the origin of the species to the present, looking forward to the end of Leviathan and the return of the light.
Despite my wish, although it is as valid as any standard account, I know that this book or one like it could never be accepted as a valid account of history anywhere Leviathan functions, which, at present, is the whole planet. If this account of history became widely accepted, Leviathan would face its end.
Check out the first chapter here show less
It goes without saying that Perlman's essay is not "objective". In other words, it is no candidate for perpetuating the business of progress, which is the unspoken agenda of "objectivity". This account of His-Story is openly disparaging of the He's which constitute and write it as well as the Leviathans which they run. It is an account that is zealously life-affirmative. And it is written in conscious contrast to the libraries of historical literature that demean life and freedom by glorifying the abstract, artificial constructs of Progress, Civilization, and production.
Some readers might find the author's linguistic liberties and central analogy peculiar, but they are critical devices for shifting the reader's perspective outside the historical narratives we're accustomed to learning. He uses "Levaithan" prominently as a synonym for the state and civilization and "zek" (actual slang from [b:The Gulag Archipelago|70561|The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956|Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170735849s/70561.jpg|2944012] for inmates in Soviet labor camps) for worker, slave, or proletarian. The Leviathan is depicted visually as a monstrous mechanical worm and conceptually as Thomas Hobbes's [b: show more formulation|91953|Leviathan (Penguin Classics)|Thomas Hobbes|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1171239204s/91953.jpg|680963] of the state as a head (the king) and a body (the citizens), all zeks--human beings incorporated into the beast.
Compared to the somber prose of [a:Frederick W. Turner|181381|Frederick W. Turner|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg]'s equally critical [b:Beyond Geography|1133668|Beyond Geography: The Western Spirit Against the Wilderness|Frederick W. Turner|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1181257100s/1133668.jpg|1120884], Perlman's is straightforward yet full of passion. Turner's style suits his tragic work, while Perlman wrote what feels like an unfinished hero story, the hero, Ahura Mazda, the light, life, community, and freedom struggling against Ahriman, darkness, death, hatred, and enslavement. This history is no uninformed polemic; it is a thorough, exhaustive, informative polemic that spans from the origin of the species to the present, looking forward to the end of Leviathan and the return of the light.
Despite my wish, although it is as valid as any standard account, I know that this book or one like it could never be accepted as a valid account of history anywhere Leviathan functions, which, at present, is the whole planet. If this account of history became widely accepted, Leviathan would face its end.
Check out the first chapter here show less
wasn't that into it. uh, my only compliment is that it is brief.
This is a very sober, straightforward assessment of human society in it's ecological context throughout history. There are not many books out there like this one, which is depressing given how extremely unlikely it is that the human population is anywhere near the carrying capacity of a world without fossil fuels. If you want to reproduce after reading this, you probably have a learning disability.
After one false start three or four years ago, I picked this up again early last year. I'll admit, it was pretty rough going for me, but that's largely because the first half of the book doesn't concern the "megamachine"--my main interest in Mumford's thought. His roundabout phrasing structure also makes for reading that sometimes feels something like a maze and can be difficult to settle into. There were still enough significant insights to justify reading it. Some standouts below.
Mumford on the historical origin of the problem of death: "The desire for life without limits was part of the general lifting of limits which the first great assemblage of power by means of the megamachine brought about. Human weaknesses, above all the weakness of mortality, were both contested and defied.
"But if the biological inevitability of death and disintegration mock (sic) the infantile fantasy of absolute power, which the human machine promised to actualize, life mocks it even more. The notion of 'eternal life,' with neither conception, growth, fruition, nor decay--an existence as fixed, as sterilized, as loveless, as purposeless, as unchanging as that of a royal mummy--is only death in another form....(T)his assertion of absolute power was a confession of psychological immaturity--a radical failure to understand the natural processes of birth and growth, of maturation and death." (203) Deny that, Ernest Becker!
On the workers of the megamachine: "Each standardized component, below the show more top level of command, was only part of a man (sic), condemned to work at only part of a job and live only part of a life. Adam Smith's belated analysis of the division of labor, explaining changes that were taking place in the eighteenth century toward a more inflexible and dehumanized system, with greater productive efficiency, illuminates equally the earliest 'industrial revolution.'" (212)
On the burgeoning scientific/capitalist mind and its eventual costs: "These technical premises seemed so simple, their aim so rational, their methods so open to general imitation, that Leonardo never saw the need to put the question we must now ask: Is the intelligence alone, however purified and decontaminated, an adequate agent for doing justice to the needs and purposes of life?" (288) show less
Mumford on the historical origin of the problem of death: "The desire for life without limits was part of the general lifting of limits which the first great assemblage of power by means of the megamachine brought about. Human weaknesses, above all the weakness of mortality, were both contested and defied.
"But if the biological inevitability of death and disintegration mock (sic) the infantile fantasy of absolute power, which the human machine promised to actualize, life mocks it even more. The notion of 'eternal life,' with neither conception, growth, fruition, nor decay--an existence as fixed, as sterilized, as loveless, as purposeless, as unchanging as that of a royal mummy--is only death in another form....(T)his assertion of absolute power was a confession of psychological immaturity--a radical failure to understand the natural processes of birth and growth, of maturation and death." (203) Deny that, Ernest Becker!
On the workers of the megamachine: "Each standardized component, below the show more top level of command, was only part of a man (sic), condemned to work at only part of a job and live only part of a life. Adam Smith's belated analysis of the division of labor, explaining changes that were taking place in the eighteenth century toward a more inflexible and dehumanized system, with greater productive efficiency, illuminates equally the earliest 'industrial revolution.'" (212)
On the burgeoning scientific/capitalist mind and its eventual costs: "These technical premises seemed so simple, their aim so rational, their methods so open to general imitation, that Leonardo never saw the need to put the question we must now ask: Is the intelligence alone, however purified and decontaminated, an adequate agent for doing justice to the needs and purposes of life?" (288) show less
I was interested in this book because of the hypocritical inconsistency exhibited by many secular types who, reasonably enough, deny the existence of "God" but bristle at the prospect that we all live in a completely determined universe. They (and I include myself here) reflexively feel that while science rightly treats the entirety of the natural world as subject to the same universal (deterministic) laws, they must preserve an idea of human free will as an exception to the laws of physics, in exactly the same way that theists allow for intervention by "God". As Dennett puts it, this indeterminism insists that human beings are little godlets, or miracle workers, able to defy the otherwise universal laws of physics. Dennett understands that we want to believe that we are always "able to choose otherwise" in a given situation because, if we're not, there seems to be no basis for moral responsibility: praise and blame only make sense in relation to free choices, and why care about anything if we can never deserve praise or blame for whatever good or bad we do? His thesis, in short, is that it is unnecessary to invoke miraculous powers to solve this apparent problem. Thanks to natural selection, humans have more freedom than has ever existed in the history of the universe. Although this freedom is not exempt from the physical laws governing every particle in the universe, and is hence determined, it is only determined in the same sense that a coin toss is determined. That is show more to say our choices are determined by so many intervening variables that no observer can possibly know their outcomes. Dennett's view is that in the important sense of everyday life, humans make free choices. The key distinction here is between the physical level, the fundamental variables that determine the outcome of the coin toss, versus the design level, what agents are actually able to observe and experience. The latter is what matters to all of us, and the observable operation and evolution of freedom on that level--in our everyday experience--gives us a sufficient (Dennett argues, more well-founded) basis for moral responsibility.
All of this makes pretty good sense to me, despite my ingrained aversion to determinism. My only problem with Dennett, and I am still mulling whether I think it taints his whole philosophical outlook, is that he is utterly uncritical of his own implicit mainstream views of technological progress (which he presumes even now to be an inevitable, unstoppable impulse of human culture) and the state (which he presumes to be the only solution to organizing human society). He reaffirms these positions in his pejorative use of the terms "anarchy" and "Luddites" and in his praise of "civilization". "Science" is his main affinity, and those very institutions are prerequisite for its existence. It should not be a surprise then that they aren't in question here. What remains to be answered for me is, what is the benefit of a scientific deterministic worldview when we have concluded that the state system and the technological progress that created it (and that it demonstrably perpetuates in return) were not, are not, and cannot be desirable? Early in the book, (with none of his characteristic well-reasoned argument) Dennett parodies postmodern critics of science who characterize it as "just another in a long line of myths". But he proves himself, disappointingly, to be an equally simple-minded partisan of "science"; he sees history and the future going in only one direction, that of more elaborate guns, memes, and steel for which our "freedom" is evolving to help us to be prepared. The book leaves me more worried about the possibilities of a future with more science than about the question of my own free will. Personally, I hope that imperialistic science eventually becomes a detour, albeit an informative one, from which a freer, wiser humanity was able to return, instead of the dead end of absolute control which is its inexorable instinct. show less
All of this makes pretty good sense to me, despite my ingrained aversion to determinism. My only problem with Dennett, and I am still mulling whether I think it taints his whole philosophical outlook, is that he is utterly uncritical of his own implicit mainstream views of technological progress (which he presumes even now to be an inevitable, unstoppable impulse of human culture) and the state (which he presumes to be the only solution to organizing human society). He reaffirms these positions in his pejorative use of the terms "anarchy" and "Luddites" and in his praise of "civilization". "Science" is his main affinity, and those very institutions are prerequisite for its existence. It should not be a surprise then that they aren't in question here. What remains to be answered for me is, what is the benefit of a scientific deterministic worldview when we have concluded that the state system and the technological progress that created it (and that it demonstrably perpetuates in return) were not, are not, and cannot be desirable? Early in the book, (with none of his characteristic well-reasoned argument) Dennett parodies postmodern critics of science who characterize it as "just another in a long line of myths". But he proves himself, disappointingly, to be an equally simple-minded partisan of "science"; he sees history and the future going in only one direction, that of more elaborate guns, memes, and steel for which our "freedom" is evolving to help us to be prepared. The book leaves me more worried about the possibilities of a future with more science than about the question of my own free will. Personally, I hope that imperialistic science eventually becomes a detour, albeit an informative one, from which a freer, wiser humanity was able to return, instead of the dead end of absolute control which is its inexorable instinct. show less
This is a fun, but probably not all that productive, diatribe against Murray Bookchin, the founder of the school of thought known as "social ecology", and his ideas.
I enjoyed it more for the more general rejection of leftism because of its authoritarian, technophilic tendencies.
I enjoyed it more for the more general rejection of leftism because of its authoritarian, technophilic tendencies.
A short and diverse compilation of excerpted writing from the Greeks to the present that comes from the anti-civilization and primitivist currents that, the editor argues, have rightly opposed "progress" since the origins of civilization.
I found it to be a powerful and uncommon illustration of the potential depth of a critique of domestication and an exploration of wildness in all domains of human being.
I found it to be a powerful and uncommon illustration of the potential depth of a critique of domestication and an exploration of wildness in all domains of human being.
This was, overall, a very good collection that includes a very wide variety of perspectives on Nietzsche's relevance to anarchism. Some contributions are deep; others, relatively shallow; some, political; others, more philosophical; some defend Nietzsche at the expense of the anarchist tradition; others, the reverse. But, sadly, I'll remember this book mostly by its two worst contributions (both translated from italian), one of which I literally could make no sense at all, and the other was only decent by comparison. I highly recommend this book to devotees of Nietzsche, but encourage you to skim or skip the two articles just mentioned.
This was pretty interesting. Jensen made himself a character in his own novel, which I guess is a more honest way to promote your opinions and ideas in a fictional format than the usual proxy characters one encounters in these kinds of books. His character is the narrator and protagonist, so I estimate that about half of the book reads more like his usual nonfiction than what I expect from a novel.
A main theme: Like any invasive species after an extended period of population explosion which crowds out native species, "civilized" humans will eventually face a limit to which we will succumb, at which point native species can recover.
There were a only a few moments in the actual story that I really enjoyed. Otherwise it was unspectacular. Placed alongside his previous work, it takes a slightly different, semi-mystical angle on his usual subject matter.
A main theme: Like any invasive species after an extended period of population explosion which crowds out native species, "civilized" humans will eventually face a limit to which we will succumb, at which point native species can recover.
There were a only a few moments in the actual story that I really enjoyed. Otherwise it was unspectacular. Placed alongside his previous work, it takes a slightly different, semi-mystical angle on his usual subject matter.
By writing this, Paul McLaughlin has done a great service. He has effectively explained the reasoning behind the fundamental anarchist position shared by diverse thinkers from William Godwin in the 18th century to Murray Bookchin in the 21st. Through impeccable argumentation, McLaughlin consistently makes anarchism commonsensical. I imagine that it may cause readers to exclaim despite themselves, "Ha! There's nothing wrong with 'anarchy' after all."
I liked it not only because of my fundamental agreement with his reasoning, but also because of the skillful execution that made it a real pleasure to read. His writing is some of the most lucid prose I have encountered from the discipline of philosophy. And I generally admire the clever arguments philosophers like him often come up with and their untangling of often confused or conflated concepts. He begins with the misleadingly modest definition: anarchism is skepticism towards authority. From there, he takes you on a roller coaster ride of edge-of-your-seat philosophy.
In a shining example of his persuasive argument, on page 62, McLaughlin compares his philosophy of anarchism to a "'weak' Atheism:" Because no known form of Theism has made a convincing case for the existence of God, there is good reason not to believe in God. Likewise, no convincing case has yet been made for the moral authority of the state, so there is good reason not to believe it is legitimate. In neither case is it necessary to prove the logical show more impossibility of the claim in question. It is quite enough for most atheists to simply conclude there is no reason to believe in God. There is, therefore, no better reason to believe in state legitimacy. In fact, I suspect that many people do not believe in it--making them, by McLaughlin's definition, anarchists.
Further (p. 80), returning an accusation often leveled against anarchists, he says that political theorists who still argue for some kind of state legitimacy are quintessential utopians with "ideal visions of the state that they seek to impose on reality." The reality of the state has never come close to any such positive ideal nor is there any indication that it ever will.
The slowest portions of the book for a non-philosopher are the analyses of the early anarchist works by Godwin, Proudhon, and Stirner, which the author keeps brief--probably for the impatient reader's benefit--and soon resumes his otherwise vigorous clip.
McLaughlin sums up the literature as follows: "in the spirit of Enlightenment rationality and reasoning [anarchists} acknowledge the justifiability of authority, but maintain their right to question its justification in each and every instance and to challenge those instances which are unjustified by any recognizable standard..." (p.169) Despite the apparent validity of this philosophical position, anarchism has always been the target of (mutually contradictory) straw-man criticism. It is "condemned for its lack of alternatives (when it refrains from speculation about the future) and condemned for its utopianism (when it appears to speculate about the future)." (p.171 Note 2)
The author concludes by trying to show how anarchist critique is relevant to major contemporary social problems--politics, international relations, the environment, and economics. This section basically states the obvious conclusions that anyone should be able draw from anarchism, but it is a nice bonus to be reminded of the parsimony it brings to what otherwise seem like unrelated social issues. Here is one last quote to drive it home:
"Then there are spurious intellectual discussions about 'voter apathy' and so on, as if such factors could possibly explain and somehow justify massive disengagement from our political processes. Indeed, such discussion is hugely insulting to those who choose to abstain from the political lottery on principle or out of plain disgust (and who, incidentally, might participate in dramatic numbers if a 'none of the above' option were offered on the ballot, a solution to the turnout problem that has been vigorously thwarted since it would make an implicit rejection of the political process as it stands more explicit)." (p.174) show less
I liked it not only because of my fundamental agreement with his reasoning, but also because of the skillful execution that made it a real pleasure to read. His writing is some of the most lucid prose I have encountered from the discipline of philosophy. And I generally admire the clever arguments philosophers like him often come up with and their untangling of often confused or conflated concepts. He begins with the misleadingly modest definition: anarchism is skepticism towards authority. From there, he takes you on a roller coaster ride of edge-of-your-seat philosophy.
In a shining example of his persuasive argument, on page 62, McLaughlin compares his philosophy of anarchism to a "'weak' Atheism:" Because no known form of Theism has made a convincing case for the existence of God, there is good reason not to believe in God. Likewise, no convincing case has yet been made for the moral authority of the state, so there is good reason not to believe it is legitimate. In neither case is it necessary to prove the logical show more impossibility of the claim in question. It is quite enough for most atheists to simply conclude there is no reason to believe in God. There is, therefore, no better reason to believe in state legitimacy. In fact, I suspect that many people do not believe in it--making them, by McLaughlin's definition, anarchists.
Further (p. 80), returning an accusation often leveled against anarchists, he says that political theorists who still argue for some kind of state legitimacy are quintessential utopians with "ideal visions of the state that they seek to impose on reality." The reality of the state has never come close to any such positive ideal nor is there any indication that it ever will.
The slowest portions of the book for a non-philosopher are the analyses of the early anarchist works by Godwin, Proudhon, and Stirner, which the author keeps brief--probably for the impatient reader's benefit--and soon resumes his otherwise vigorous clip.
McLaughlin sums up the literature as follows: "in the spirit of Enlightenment rationality and reasoning [anarchists} acknowledge the justifiability of authority, but maintain their right to question its justification in each and every instance and to challenge those instances which are unjustified by any recognizable standard..." (p.169) Despite the apparent validity of this philosophical position, anarchism has always been the target of (mutually contradictory) straw-man criticism. It is "condemned for its lack of alternatives (when it refrains from speculation about the future) and condemned for its utopianism (when it appears to speculate about the future)." (p.171 Note 2)
The author concludes by trying to show how anarchist critique is relevant to major contemporary social problems--politics, international relations, the environment, and economics. This section basically states the obvious conclusions that anyone should be able draw from anarchism, but it is a nice bonus to be reminded of the parsimony it brings to what otherwise seem like unrelated social issues. Here is one last quote to drive it home:
"Then there are spurious intellectual discussions about 'voter apathy' and so on, as if such factors could possibly explain and somehow justify massive disengagement from our political processes. Indeed, such discussion is hugely insulting to those who choose to abstain from the political lottery on principle or out of plain disgust (and who, incidentally, might participate in dramatic numbers if a 'none of the above' option were offered on the ballot, a solution to the turnout problem that has been vigorously thwarted since it would make an implicit rejection of the political process as it stands more explicit)." (p.174) show less
M.C. really annoyed me with this. He turned this book into a platform to disseminate and memorialize his own anti-environnmentalist sermons. I already knew this was probably the case, so I wouldn't have paid a cent for it. Thank you bit torrent.
Massey and Denton propose a theory of the American "urban underclass" that is based on premise that residential segregation--the ghetto--is a condition that has been created and perpetuated by white America throughout the 20th century and intensifying since the 1950s. Based exclusively on US Census data, they show that African Americans are by far the most segregated demographic in the US: the richest African Americans are still more segregated than the poorest Hispanics.
The consequences of residential segregation are devastating and, Massey and Denton argue, are the precipitating factors in the perpetuation of the urban underclass. They include poorly funded neighborhood schools (which fail to give students exposure to a more diverse racial environment, multiplying the challenge of escaping the cycle perpetuating the ghetto) and isolation from social networks (that are the primary connection to jobs and upward mobility for whites).
White flight and black exclusion are the two ways that residential segregation is perpetuated. If exclusion methods like neighborhood associations, real estate agent steering, and threats of violence do not do the job and the black population grows beyond 10% or so, whites leave the neighborhood in droves for the suburbs. When polled, few African Americans say they prefer to live in all black neighborhoods. To the contrary, they overwhelmingly support an even proportion of 50% black and 50% white, supporting the argument that the ghetto is show more imposed by whites upon blacks.
Massey and Denton's hypothesis does not require (though they do mention approvingly) the assumption that black urban culture itself contributes to urban poverty, a view that African American Studies scholars like Robin D.G. Kelly reject. Residential segregation alone can account for the crisis. For this reason, I think it is an issue that deserves more attention than any other facing urban America today, and this book convinced me. show less
The consequences of residential segregation are devastating and, Massey and Denton argue, are the precipitating factors in the perpetuation of the urban underclass. They include poorly funded neighborhood schools (which fail to give students exposure to a more diverse racial environment, multiplying the challenge of escaping the cycle perpetuating the ghetto) and isolation from social networks (that are the primary connection to jobs and upward mobility for whites).
White flight and black exclusion are the two ways that residential segregation is perpetuated. If exclusion methods like neighborhood associations, real estate agent steering, and threats of violence do not do the job and the black population grows beyond 10% or so, whites leave the neighborhood in droves for the suburbs. When polled, few African Americans say they prefer to live in all black neighborhoods. To the contrary, they overwhelmingly support an even proportion of 50% black and 50% white, supporting the argument that the ghetto is show more imposed by whites upon blacks.
Massey and Denton's hypothesis does not require (though they do mention approvingly) the assumption that black urban culture itself contributes to urban poverty, a view that African American Studies scholars like Robin D.G. Kelly reject. Residential segregation alone can account for the crisis. For this reason, I think it is an issue that deserves more attention than any other facing urban America today, and this book convinced me. show less
Sachs is a very accessible writer, which was somewhat surprising to me since all I knew about him was that his book was about the brain. He presents a long chain of case studies grouped into categories, which reads pretty much like a magazine feature. I expected that a neuroscientist would fill the pages with arguments for a particular theory about this or that phenomena, but I was wrong. I suppose the overriding thesis is that the brain is a very complicated organ, and variation in our brains result in variation in our perception of music.
The surprising part to me was that, except for the occasional mention of a certain region of the brain known for certain kinds of functions, scientists don't know much of anything with any certainty about how or why the brain works. If it weren't for the very coarse technical measurements he cites and the fancy names for psychiatric conditions, the book could have been written in another century. Nonetheless, it was an interesting read about the varieties of musical experience.
The surprising part to me was that, except for the occasional mention of a certain region of the brain known for certain kinds of functions, scientists don't know much of anything with any certainty about how or why the brain works. If it weren't for the very coarse technical measurements he cites and the fancy names for psychiatric conditions, the book could have been written in another century. Nonetheless, it was an interesting read about the varieties of musical experience.
With this book, Harris accomplished an undertaking that few could achieve. He produced an overview of human biological and cultural evolution up to the present day that duly incorporates evidence from every field of anthropology in a way that is both entertaining and comprehensible for the general and academic reader.
After covering the biological evolution of modern humans from the earliest hominins, Harris begins presenting his case that after a certain point he calls "cultural takeoff" (35-40,000 years ago) cultural selection began serving as a proxy for natural selection in most facets of social life. He argues that many widespread human behaviors do not serve to maximize individual reproductive success, and it is actually minimized by such universal practices as female infanticide, abortion, contraception. His explanation for the shift is that, through cultural selection, the sexual instinct has been "decoupled" from the reproductive instinct, so investment in reproductive success is no longer a priority.
As one might expect, who is familiar with his work, Harris restricts his discussion of culture to functional explanations of why diverse traditions are best suited to given ecological and social environments. His theoretical perspective is decidedly evolutionary though not in the narrow sociobiological sense. Since the theme of the book is the evolution of culture, Harris is in his element, and the explanation he gives for the transition from redistributive chiefdoms show more to states, though admittedly anecdotal, has me completely convinced.
One of my favorite sections is titled "Was there life before chiefs?" Harris describes a few of countless examples of hunting and gathering societies which functioned without permanent positions of authority. Granting that societies with reciprocal exchange are economically egalitarian, Harris does not romanticize arguing that, in at least some of these, women are subordinate to men. He attributes this to the slight physical advantage of males over females.
The book ends on a dark note, reminding readers that, while human choice has been involved in every moment of the process of cultural selection, the major transformations of human societies have not been chosen as the big picture has always seemed to elude us. The last century has demonstrated this failure of foresight as new technologies have managed to threaten human and non-human life in new more acute ways than ever before. He poses the problem of how humans might gain some control over the process of cultural evolution before it kills us. show less
After covering the biological evolution of modern humans from the earliest hominins, Harris begins presenting his case that after a certain point he calls "cultural takeoff" (35-40,000 years ago) cultural selection began serving as a proxy for natural selection in most facets of social life. He argues that many widespread human behaviors do not serve to maximize individual reproductive success, and it is actually minimized by such universal practices as female infanticide, abortion, contraception. His explanation for the shift is that, through cultural selection, the sexual instinct has been "decoupled" from the reproductive instinct, so investment in reproductive success is no longer a priority.
As one might expect, who is familiar with his work, Harris restricts his discussion of culture to functional explanations of why diverse traditions are best suited to given ecological and social environments. His theoretical perspective is decidedly evolutionary though not in the narrow sociobiological sense. Since the theme of the book is the evolution of culture, Harris is in his element, and the explanation he gives for the transition from redistributive chiefdoms show more to states, though admittedly anecdotal, has me completely convinced.
One of my favorite sections is titled "Was there life before chiefs?" Harris describes a few of countless examples of hunting and gathering societies which functioned without permanent positions of authority. Granting that societies with reciprocal exchange are economically egalitarian, Harris does not romanticize arguing that, in at least some of these, women are subordinate to men. He attributes this to the slight physical advantage of males over females.
The book ends on a dark note, reminding readers that, while human choice has been involved in every moment of the process of cultural selection, the major transformations of human societies have not been chosen as the big picture has always seemed to elude us. The last century has demonstrated this failure of foresight as new technologies have managed to threaten human and non-human life in new more acute ways than ever before. He poses the problem of how humans might gain some control over the process of cultural evolution before it kills us. show less
An articulate expression of anger at the portrayal of urban black America as culturally dysfunctional in American academia, politics, and media. Looks at urban issues through the lens of resistance and cultural expression. Rejects the use of white middle-class values in evaluating black culture.
Aside from the title essay, which is indisputably awesome and important and I'm sure his most enduring work, I can only adequately represent Black in his own words:
"Those on the receiving end of coercion don't quibble over their coercers' credentials. If you can't pay or don't want to, you don't much care if your deprivation is called larceny or taxation or restitution or rent."
"If you like to control your own time, you distinguish employment from enslavement only in degree and duration."
"Terrorism is not so much a matter of mayhem and murder as it is of sartorial correctness. Soldiers are terrorists who were careful to dress for success."
"BLOOD BANK? Is there any other kind?"
"THE BORN AGAIN? Twice too often."
"CIVILIZATION? The biosphere's skin disease."
"CLASS WAR? The war to end all wars."
"DISEASE? Very dangerous: a leading cause of doctors."
"FEMINISM? Equality with men: a paltry ambition."
"FREE TIME? Work the boss doesn't pay you for."
"FULL EMPLOYMENT? A threat, not a promise."
"RELIGION? Deifying your defects."
"UTOPIA? Nostalgia for the future."
As always with Black, there is a bit of content in this anthology which I don't really care much about, but it is insignificant overall.
I think it is safe to say that Bob Black is as close to channeling Tyler Durden as any living person can claim to be, except he's funnier and more logical--maybe he was Palaniuk's inspiration.
Read this book online at http://www.inspiracy.com/black/
"Those on the receiving end of coercion don't quibble over their coercers' credentials. If you can't pay or don't want to, you don't much care if your deprivation is called larceny or taxation or restitution or rent."
"If you like to control your own time, you distinguish employment from enslavement only in degree and duration."
"Terrorism is not so much a matter of mayhem and murder as it is of sartorial correctness. Soldiers are terrorists who were careful to dress for success."
"BLOOD BANK? Is there any other kind?"
"THE BORN AGAIN? Twice too often."
"CIVILIZATION? The biosphere's skin disease."
"CLASS WAR? The war to end all wars."
"DISEASE? Very dangerous: a leading cause of doctors."
"FEMINISM? Equality with men: a paltry ambition."
"FREE TIME? Work the boss doesn't pay you for."
"FULL EMPLOYMENT? A threat, not a promise."
"RELIGION? Deifying your defects."
"UTOPIA? Nostalgia for the future."
As always with Black, there is a bit of content in this anthology which I don't really care much about, but it is insignificant overall.
I think it is safe to say that Bob Black is as close to channeling Tyler Durden as any living person can claim to be, except he's funnier and more logical--maybe he was Palaniuk's inspiration.
Read this book online at http://www.inspiracy.com/black/
This is an incredibly eye-opening book and the most widely read on this subject. It starts with the a priori assumption that all beings deserve equal consideration, from which follows the axiom of Utilitarianism that the interest of any one individual is of no more importance than the interest of another. "At an absolute minimum," Singer says, all beings have "an interest in not suffering." Because all animals (or at the very least all mammals) can suffer, there is as much reason to prevent their suffering as to prevent human suffering. The fact that this principle of the equal consideration of interests is usually not extended to non-humans indicates that "speciesism" is a social problem at least as pernicious as racism or sexism.
He illustrates this point with the example of our consideration and treatment of human infants, or adult humans with permanent brain damage or with severe learning disabilities. It is generally assumed that we should consider the interests of humans such as these as no less important than our own, though their cognitive abilities are at most no greater the most intelligent nonhumans. Thus, it follows that if we are consistent we cannot deny the same considerations to any being with the same interests. Or we may also decide that it is acceptable to eat or perform scientific experiments on brain damaged humans, too. But we cannot arbitrarily exclude nonhumans from consideration, unless we baldly admit that we are guilty of speciesism, for reasons show more no better than the prejudice of racists and sexists.
The biggest part of the book is dedicated to exposing the atrocities that are being committed in animal research labs and in factory farms. Singer's research on these issues is thoroughly documented, based on objective and original sources, and provides many little-known mind-blowing statistics. (Around 60 million mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters, and rabbits were used in labs in 1965; of 1.6 million animals reported by the USDA in 1988, over 90,000 were reported to have experienced "unrelieved pain or distress;" p.37) Citing this book, Derrick Jensen rightly says it is not for the faint of heart, but its information is incredibly important given the dismal ignorance about (denial of?) these realities.
Striking a weird note, Singer says that in a totally vegetarian world he hopes that eventually "the only herds of cattle and pigs to be found will be on large reservations" but the question remains whether they should be born at all. He doesn't go into any more detail than this, but the reserve idea strikes me as pretty absurd. I don't see cattle and pigs acquiring the status of pets; their domestication was exclusively agricultural. Their companionship was neither the intent nor a consequence of their breeding, and zoo animals are only interesting for their lack of domestication. (The only tenable alternatives seem to be extinction or readaptation to the forces of natural selection.)
He also raises the issue of nonhuman carnivores, and goes so far as to consider whether humans might have an obligation to eliminate carnivorous species in order to reduce suffering. Thankfully he dismisses this idea, but disturbingly not because he finds it inherently wrong (no joke!); he just thinks that humans have thus far demonstrated a practical inability to police all of nature. Taken to its logical conclusion here, it's obvious to me his whole utilitarian system falls apart, and even a logically less airtight ecological ethic (that values whole species and communities) aligns much better with the larger reality. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the plight of animals used in labs and factory farms can hardly be represented better than Singer does.
In the final chapter Singer responds to his detractors. He includes a great refutation of the Carrot juice is murder! claim that that we must either cause suffering or starve, which is too clever not to share: Even if plants can feel pain just like animals, it still makes more sense not to eat flesh if we don't want to inflict pain. This is because, by eating an animal, we are "responsible for the indirect destruction of at least ten times as many plants" (100 calories of an animal's flesh required his/her consumption of at least 1000 calories). If carrot juice is murder, then rabbit stew is genocide. show less
He illustrates this point with the example of our consideration and treatment of human infants, or adult humans with permanent brain damage or with severe learning disabilities. It is generally assumed that we should consider the interests of humans such as these as no less important than our own, though their cognitive abilities are at most no greater the most intelligent nonhumans. Thus, it follows that if we are consistent we cannot deny the same considerations to any being with the same interests. Or we may also decide that it is acceptable to eat or perform scientific experiments on brain damaged humans, too. But we cannot arbitrarily exclude nonhumans from consideration, unless we baldly admit that we are guilty of speciesism, for reasons show more no better than the prejudice of racists and sexists.
The biggest part of the book is dedicated to exposing the atrocities that are being committed in animal research labs and in factory farms. Singer's research on these issues is thoroughly documented, based on objective and original sources, and provides many little-known mind-blowing statistics. (Around 60 million mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters, and rabbits were used in labs in 1965; of 1.6 million animals reported by the USDA in 1988, over 90,000 were reported to have experienced "unrelieved pain or distress;" p.37) Citing this book, Derrick Jensen rightly says it is not for the faint of heart, but its information is incredibly important given the dismal ignorance about (denial of?) these realities.
Striking a weird note, Singer says that in a totally vegetarian world he hopes that eventually "the only herds of cattle and pigs to be found will be on large reservations" but the question remains whether they should be born at all. He doesn't go into any more detail than this, but the reserve idea strikes me as pretty absurd. I don't see cattle and pigs acquiring the status of pets; their domestication was exclusively agricultural. Their companionship was neither the intent nor a consequence of their breeding, and zoo animals are only interesting for their lack of domestication. (The only tenable alternatives seem to be extinction or readaptation to the forces of natural selection.)
He also raises the issue of nonhuman carnivores, and goes so far as to consider whether humans might have an obligation to eliminate carnivorous species in order to reduce suffering. Thankfully he dismisses this idea, but disturbingly not because he finds it inherently wrong (no joke!); he just thinks that humans have thus far demonstrated a practical inability to police all of nature. Taken to its logical conclusion here, it's obvious to me his whole utilitarian system falls apart, and even a logically less airtight ecological ethic (that values whole species and communities) aligns much better with the larger reality. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the plight of animals used in labs and factory farms can hardly be represented better than Singer does.
In the final chapter Singer responds to his detractors. He includes a great refutation of the Carrot juice is murder! claim that that we must either cause suffering or starve, which is too clever not to share: Even if plants can feel pain just like animals, it still makes more sense not to eat flesh if we don't want to inflict pain. This is because, by eating an animal, we are "responsible for the indirect destruction of at least ten times as many plants" (100 calories of an animal's flesh required his/her consumption of at least 1000 calories). If carrot juice is murder, then rabbit stew is genocide. show less
The long emergency : surviving the end of oil, climate change , and other converging catastrophes of the twenty-first century by James Howard Kunstler
Kunstler is more current but no more informative than William Catton in [b:Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change|319810|Overshoot The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change|William R. Catton|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1173735076s/319810.jpg|310571], and he certainly lacks the radical social awareness of Heinberg in [b:The Party's Over: Oil War and the Fate of Industrial Societies|138040|The Party's Over Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies|Richard Heinberg|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172092006s/138040.jpg|448156]. He's a cynic. But there's no comparison where sense of humor and writing skill are concerned. For that, he earns an extra star.
can only attest to the famous essay "the original affluent society" that begins the book. awesome.
This helped me understand the difference between fiat money and what Paul refers to as "sound" money. No doubt he's right that the Fed, like all powerful institutions, exists to concentrate its power further. The most interesting idea to me is that when the Fed creates money (i.e. inflates the dollar) the first receivers of the new money (banks, government agencies, corporations) can use it before it loses its value. By the time it reaches the last receivers (the average consumers) its value has been lost because the market has realized inflation has occured. Sound money in contrast requires no central bank because the money supply remains constant. (Virtually the only example of this kind of currency used consistently for the last 6,000 years is gold.)
I'm no economist, but it seems like all the money from all the economic recovery programs of the last year is still being played with by the first receivers as the Dow has surged and unemployment has climbed to 10%. If those last receivers ever see the money and unemployment goes down, the dollar will lose value, and probably quite a bit of it. People will find their paychecks don't buy very much, and their savings, as Paul would put it, have essentially been stolen by the banks, government agencies and biggest corporations.
But this information can be found elsewhere, and I wouldn't recommend reading this for a concise explanation of such things. Paul uses scare-words like communism and totalitarianism and platitudes like show more freedom and self-reliance to make his points. He is clearly playing to a certain demographic of which I'm not a member. I obtained this book illegally, though, so I can't complain. Libertarians only go halfway with their advocacy of "freedom." The state is only part of the system of oppression. Private wealth has been concentrated in the hands of a few since it came to exist along with the state. The two are inseparable and have become the hosts for unchecked technological progress that together threaten to do much worse than further disposses the majority. The solution has nothing to do with the movement to end the Fed. show less
I'm no economist, but it seems like all the money from all the economic recovery programs of the last year is still being played with by the first receivers as the Dow has surged and unemployment has climbed to 10%. If those last receivers ever see the money and unemployment goes down, the dollar will lose value, and probably quite a bit of it. People will find their paychecks don't buy very much, and their savings, as Paul would put it, have essentially been stolen by the banks, government agencies and biggest corporations.
But this information can be found elsewhere, and I wouldn't recommend reading this for a concise explanation of such things. Paul uses scare-words like communism and totalitarianism and platitudes like show more freedom and self-reliance to make his points. He is clearly playing to a certain demographic of which I'm not a member. I obtained this book illegally, though, so I can't complain. Libertarians only go halfway with their advocacy of "freedom." The state is only part of the system of oppression. Private wealth has been concentrated in the hands of a few since it came to exist along with the state. The two are inseparable and have become the hosts for unchecked technological progress that together threaten to do much worse than further disposses the majority. The solution has nothing to do with the movement to end the Fed. show less
Wright's presentation is an engaging critique of human technical/material progress from the origin of the species to the present. He satisfied my appreciation for doom and gloom but not so much my guilty desire for evidence of widespread unspoiled life in harmony with nature prior to civilization. Instead he suggests that humans built civilization as soon as they had the chance, evidenced by the development of agriculture, etc., apparently at the same time the longest period of climate stability (the Holocene) commenced. He suspects Homo sapiens of violent conflict and eventual genocide against neanderthals as well having as a significant role in the extinctions of the Pleistocene megafauna, which he also suggests was a reason for the advent of agriculture and mass migration.
He sees all these as just the first in a recurrent, seemingly inevitable, series of "progress traps" into which every previous civilization has fallen and subsequently collapsed. He also recognizes the the qualitatively different character of this particular iteration of the "great experiment," pointing out that while all previous collapses have had causes and consequences that were localized, the modern environmental crisis and civilization responsible are both global. The collapse must be global too.
But his solution is insufficient at best: "The reform that is needed is not anti-capitalist, anti-American, or even deep environmentalist; it is simply the transition from short-term to long-term show more thinking." He, like almost everyone who remains in the mainstream, naively thinks the necessary changes can be made as long as the New Right and Christians anticipating the end of the world are kept at bay so that this magical political change may proceed. Instead, the predictable "ideological pathology" of progress persists in a post-Bush world. As the world observes in 2009, Wright's warning rings true: "Hope elects the politician with the biggest empty promise."
The "ideological pathology" (my favorite term in the book) of the pursuit of infinite growth isn't limited to the Christians or Republicans, and there is no reason to hope that it will be challenged within the mainstream as long as the Orwellian illusions like "green shoots" can be effectively evoked. But I agree that long-term thinking is the key to escaping the progress trap. Governments have proven they are part of the trap, however. show less
He sees all these as just the first in a recurrent, seemingly inevitable, series of "progress traps" into which every previous civilization has fallen and subsequently collapsed. He also recognizes the the qualitatively different character of this particular iteration of the "great experiment," pointing out that while all previous collapses have had causes and consequences that were localized, the modern environmental crisis and civilization responsible are both global. The collapse must be global too.
But his solution is insufficient at best: "The reform that is needed is not anti-capitalist, anti-American, or even deep environmentalist; it is simply the transition from short-term to long-term show more thinking." He, like almost everyone who remains in the mainstream, naively thinks the necessary changes can be made as long as the New Right and Christians anticipating the end of the world are kept at bay so that this magical political change may proceed. Instead, the predictable "ideological pathology" of progress persists in a post-Bush world. As the world observes in 2009, Wright's warning rings true: "Hope elects the politician with the biggest empty promise."
The "ideological pathology" (my favorite term in the book) of the pursuit of infinite growth isn't limited to the Christians or Republicans, and there is no reason to hope that it will be challenged within the mainstream as long as the Orwellian illusions like "green shoots" can be effectively evoked. But I agree that long-term thinking is the key to escaping the progress trap. Governments have proven they are part of the trap, however. show less
Dawkins thinks we don't need religion, and the world would be a better place without it. I agree with many of his arguments.
It is interesting that he, like his philosophical opposite [a:Neil Evernden|195260|Neil Evernden|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] (not a creationist), brings up paedomorphisis to explain the presence of uniquely human attributes. He does so in speculating on the evolutionary origins of religion--that there is a possible connection between the "imaginary friend" phenomenon in childhood and the apparent universality of religion. One possibility is that, due to evolved paedomorphosis--the retention of juvenile traits into adulthood--the phenomenon now persists throughout our life cycle as a God or gods. The reverse alternative is that the imaginary friend is an artifact remaining from the evolutionary "pulling back" of the god phenomenon to an earlier developmental stage, so that it now only exists in some children. I like the former idea, and it might dovetail quite well with Evernden's natural alien idea. Our specific need for a culture to complete our premature nature might include a need for some cultural recognition of these gods and imaginary friends, which religion provides.
As with [a:Daniel Dennett|1387|Daniel C. Dennett|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1222670683p2/1387.jpg], however, I can't leave my differences with Dawkins unmentioned. Like Dennett, he finishes his book extolling the virtues of science as it show more pushes "the limits of understanding" or, "Even better, we may eventually discover that there are no limits." But it sounds clear to me that his objective is for humans to become like gods. Correct me on this, but that sounds familiar. Religious somehow. Don't I recall a biblical myth involving a character called Lucifer along these lines?
Religion per se is not a problem and may be unavoidable. Specific ideological pathologies are, however, like the runaway train of industrial technology we worship as "progress" or the worship of a God in whose name millions are killed. In fact both of these are, in my view, part of an overarching ideological pathology that taints our civilization. Dawkins might say I want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but this is just what he wants to do with religion. The difference is his solution is logically impossible and inconsistent, while mine is at least logically consistent. show less
It is interesting that he, like his philosophical opposite [a:Neil Evernden|195260|Neil Evernden|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] (not a creationist), brings up paedomorphisis to explain the presence of uniquely human attributes. He does so in speculating on the evolutionary origins of religion--that there is a possible connection between the "imaginary friend" phenomenon in childhood and the apparent universality of religion. One possibility is that, due to evolved paedomorphosis--the retention of juvenile traits into adulthood--the phenomenon now persists throughout our life cycle as a God or gods. The reverse alternative is that the imaginary friend is an artifact remaining from the evolutionary "pulling back" of the god phenomenon to an earlier developmental stage, so that it now only exists in some children. I like the former idea, and it might dovetail quite well with Evernden's natural alien idea. Our specific need for a culture to complete our premature nature might include a need for some cultural recognition of these gods and imaginary friends, which religion provides.
As with [a:Daniel Dennett|1387|Daniel C. Dennett|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1222670683p2/1387.jpg], however, I can't leave my differences with Dawkins unmentioned. Like Dennett, he finishes his book extolling the virtues of science as it show more pushes "the limits of understanding" or, "Even better, we may eventually discover that there are no limits." But it sounds clear to me that his objective is for humans to become like gods. Correct me on this, but that sounds familiar. Religious somehow. Don't I recall a biblical myth involving a character called Lucifer along these lines?
Religion per se is not a problem and may be unavoidable. Specific ideological pathologies are, however, like the runaway train of industrial technology we worship as "progress" or the worship of a God in whose name millions are killed. In fact both of these are, in my view, part of an overarching ideological pathology that taints our civilization. Dawkins might say I want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but this is just what he wants to do with religion. The difference is his solution is logically impossible and inconsistent, while mine is at least logically consistent. show less
My first Kafka. This is a concentrated expression of the alienation and subtle coercion one experiences in modern state societies. The following quotation that I heard today could have been spoken by Kafka's perceptive narrator.
"A state which should rely upon force alone would soon fall.... Hence the state, in order to maintain itself, used and forged many instruments of indoctrination--the family, the church, the school--to build in the soul of the citizen a habit of patriotic loyalty and pride... Above all, the ruling minority sought more and more to transform its forcible mastery into a body of law which, while consolidating that mastery, would afford a welcome security and order to the people, and would recognize the rights of the 'subject' sufficiently to win his acceptance of the law and his adherence to the state."
Will Durant
"A state which should rely upon force alone would soon fall.... Hence the state, in order to maintain itself, used and forged many instruments of indoctrination--the family, the church, the school--to build in the soul of the citizen a habit of patriotic loyalty and pride... Above all, the ruling minority sought more and more to transform its forcible mastery into a body of law which, while consolidating that mastery, would afford a welcome security and order to the people, and would recognize the rights of the 'subject' sufficiently to win his acceptance of the law and his adherence to the state."
Will Durant
Callenbach details an environmentalist utopia in the form of a nation comprising Washington, Oregon and Northern California which seceeded from the US. Written in the 70s, it is supposed to take place in the not-too-distant future.
The narrator is a reporter from Washington, D.C., who narrates through his newspaper features and his diary. The book is unimpressive in its plot and style, but that is all just a vehicle for the fictional sociology and technology.
The society is relatively decentralized, democratic, and communal. The descriptions of technology are ridiculous; everything is supposed to recycled and recyclable. Cars are banned. Walking, bicycles, and high-speed trains are the only methods of transportation.
The book has great intentions, but the author clearly took on more than he could handle as a writer or plausible futurist.
The narrator is a reporter from Washington, D.C., who narrates through his newspaper features and his diary. The book is unimpressive in its plot and style, but that is all just a vehicle for the fictional sociology and technology.
The society is relatively decentralized, democratic, and communal. The descriptions of technology are ridiculous; everything is supposed to recycled and recyclable. Cars are banned. Walking, bicycles, and high-speed trains are the only methods of transportation.
The book has great intentions, but the author clearly took on more than he could handle as a writer or plausible futurist.