A thoughtful book that should spark debate, with the author stressing that bringing a companion animal into one’s life is an...
Examination of the pros and cons of pet ownership from the standpoint of ethics.
Bioethicist Pierce (The Last Walk: Reflections on Our Pets at the End of Their Lives, 2012, etc.) challenges pet lovers to recognize that animal ownership is definitely a dicey affair; no matter how well loved they are, our pets are essentially being held captives. Arguably, the dogs and cats we consider family may be happy to live with us and would not choose to be free, but for a caged bird or a goldfish in a bowl, the situation is less equivocal. Pierce notes that children are fascinated by animals while still infants, and their relationships with their pets can play an important positive part in their lives, deepening their ability to empathize with and take responsibility for others—with the proviso that they learn to treat them as companions with complex needs rather than merely objects for their entertainment. The author also reminds us that pet ownership is a big business. The pet industry encourages pet ownership, by shaping “a cultural narrative in which pet keeping is part of a normal and happy life,” in order to merchandise the sale of the animals as well as “cages, tanks, foods, toys, veterinary products,” and more. People are encouraged to bring animals into their homes without considering their responsibility to provide them with food, shelter, exercise, and play. Pierce points to the failure of many owners to provide access to adequate veterinary care and the existence of animal shelters filled to capacity with unwanted, abandoned animals. The author reminds us that the animals we love and treat as companions “are denied nearly all of their natural behaviors, not to mention their freedom.”
A thoughtful book that should spark debate, with the author stressing that bringing a companion animal into one’s life is an ethical commitment that should not to be taken lightly.Pub Date: May 6, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-226-20989-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Univ. of Chicago
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2016
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
BOOK REVIEW
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