Written in unfailingly clear and concise prose, this challenge to basic assumptions about human nature points the way toward...
This second book in a three-part series sets forth the premise that human beings are naturally social and cooperative, and that they can take practical steps each day to ground their thoughts, feelings and actions in an ethic that promotes well-being for all.
In a world seemingly overrun with violence and based on a Darwinian principle of survival of the fittest, how can one possibly operate from a standpoint of not only causing no harm but of actively encouraging beneficial outcomes for others? Riddle never claims it will be easy. She acknowledges that we live in a universe that “encourages us to focus on self-interest and to live from a fear-based myth of scarcity” that makes it difficult to even imagine a world where causing harm is no longer the norm. But as much as the author is an idealist dedicated to the betterment of humankind, she is equally pragmatic and dedicates most of her book to offering numerous exercises and daily practices that people can follow as they seek to consistently develop a habit of harmlessness. The one downside to Riddle’s work appears in “Part Two, Immersion in Harmlessness—The Butterfly Shift,” where Riddle’s fondness for minutia becomes overwhelming. Her step-by-step instructions take up a third of the book and seem excessively scripted. It seems unlikely that, in our daily interactions with others, we can realistically be expected to assess the difference between a compassionate shift, a grateful shift or a joyous shift while we simultaneously choose the best recipient of our attention, leverage our emotions and review our action options, all with an aim of creating an optimal mini-immersion experience in harmlessness. Riddle is at her most accessible when she reveals how fully awash we are in a culture that values the individual over the group to the point where we have come to conceive of human development as a solitary experience rather than a lifetime of interactions with others.
Written in unfailingly clear and concise prose, this challenge to basic assumptions about human nature points the way toward a kinder, gentler world.Pub Date: June 24, 2010
ISBN: 978-1452036328
Page Count: 288
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Sept. 7, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
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