One of the better examinations of the origins of the scientific revolution.
An exploration of the period, beginning in 1600, “during which empirical inquiry evolved from the freewheeling, speculative frenzy of old into something with powers of discovery on a wholly new level.”
Throughout most of history, writes NYU philosophy professor Strevens, all cultures believed everything worth knowing was already known. Asked to explain the motion of the heavens, the nature of disease, or the makeup of matter, wise men in ancient Egypt, Greece, or China thought deeply and gave answers that were mostly wrong. The great leap forward came after about 1600 with the scientific revolution, which led to dazzling progress and continues to do so. There is no shortage of explanations of how scientists work. Strevens concisely summarizes the most prominent and gives them credit when he feels credit is due. Central to his thesis is what he calls the “iron rule of explanation,” which denies that knowledge follows from thinking, logic, or infallible authority. Wise men in earlier times would have disagreed because they routinely mixed philosophy with observations, and their work was suffused with teleology: the belief that everything has a purpose. Aristotle taught that objects fall because their natural place is the center of the universe. The iron rule ignores what scientists believe and “makes no attempt to…decide winners and losers.” It does not settle arguments but prolongs them by demanding an empirical test, one that all agree will provide useful evidence. “It is a rule for doing rather than thinking,” writes the author. No political, religious, or philosophical reflection allowed; just the facts. Strevens emphasizes that the rule applies to communicating research findings, generally in a professional journal, and scientists remain free to express personal feelings and find deeper meanings. Many—perhaps too many—take advantage of this, writes the author, who provides a thought-provoking and likely-to-be-controversial explanation of how scientists finally got it right.
One of the better examinations of the origins of the scientific revolution.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-63149-137-5
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Liveright/Norton
Review Posted Online: July 21, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2020
A stirring, lyrical meditation on transfiguration.
The quest for illumination, examined by an English philosopher.
Critchley, who admits to being “temperamentally a mystic,” celebrates the “cultivation of practices which allow you to free yourself of your standard habits…and stand with what is there ecstatically,” a process that has come to be known, sometimes pejoratively, as mysticism. The word itself, he reveals, emerged from the 17th century’s “modern, enlightened worldview” to describe “an existential ecstasy that is outside and more than the conscious self.” This feeling of ecstasy, Critchley asserts, has the potential of liberating us “from misery, from melancholy, from heaviness of soul, from the slough of despond, from mental leadenness.” Although mystics report intense experiences of what they call God, Critchley argues that mysticism can transcend religion to be primarily aesthetic: joy and rapture can be inspired by art, poetry, and, especially for him, music. In his journey into mysticism, Critchley draws on the writings of mystics, including Julian of Norwich, Bernard of Clairvaux, Margery Kempe, Meister Eckhart, and contemporary writers such as Annie Dillard and T.S. Eliot. For Critchley, Dillard’s Holy the Firm and Eliot’s Four Quartets explore “the relation between art and the divine.” Both writers struggle to convey “some dimension of experience that cannot be expressed verbally and is perhaps closer to music.” Critchley is moved by any music that “triggers the energy of religious conversion”: the post-punk band the Teardrop Explodes, for example, and the Krautrock group Neu! “We know that the modern world is a violently disenchanted swirl shaped by the speculative flux of money that presses in on all sides,” Critchley writes. “Yet, when we listen to the music that we love, it is as if the world were reanimated, bursting with sense, and utterly alive.” Erudite and impassioned, Critchley’s intimate examination of mysticism speaks to a yearning for personal transformation and nothing less than enchantment.
A stirring, lyrical meditation on transfiguration.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781681378244
Page Count: 320
Publisher: New York Review Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An erudite and artful, though frustratingly restrained, look at Old Testament stories.
The Book of Genesis as imagined by a veteran voice of underground comics.
R. Crumb’s pass at the opening chapters of the Bible isn’t nearly the act of heresy the comic artist’s reputation might suggest. In fact, the creator of Fritz the Cat and Mr. Natural is fastidiously respectful. Crumb took pains to preserve every word of Genesis—drawing from numerous source texts, but mainly Robert Alter’s translation, The Five Books of Moses (2004)—and he clearly did his homework on the clothing, shelter and landscapes that surrounded Noah, Abraham and Isaac. This dedication to faithful representation makes the book, as Crumb writes in his introduction, a “straight illustration job, with no intention to ridicule or make visual jokes.” But his efforts are in their own way irreverent, and Crumb feels no particular need to deify even the most divine characters. God Himself is not much taller than Adam and Eve, and instead of omnisciently imparting orders and judgment He stands beside them in Eden, speaking to them directly. Jacob wrestles not with an angel, as is so often depicted in paintings, but with a man who looks not much different from himself. The women are uniformly Crumbian, voluptuous Earth goddesses who are both sexualized and strong-willed. (The endnotes offer a close study of the kinds of power women wielded in Genesis.) The downside of fitting all the text in is that many pages are packed tight with small panels, and too rarely—as with the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah—does Crumb expand his lens and treat signature events dramatically. Even the Flood is fairly restrained, though the exodus of the animals from the Ark is beautifully detailed. The author’s respect for Genesis is admirable, but it may leave readers wishing he had taken a few more chances with his interpretation, as when he draws the serpent in the Garden of Eden as a provocative half-man/half-lizard. On the whole, though, the book is largely a tribute to Crumb’s immense talents as a draftsman and stubborn adherence to the script.
An erudite and artful, though frustratingly restrained, look at Old Testament stories.Pub Date: Oct. 19, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-393-06102-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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