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Tuesday, May 13, 2003
posted by gbarto at 2:11 PM:
Book review: Straw Dogs by John Gray (not of Men Are From Mars... fame):I happened to skim the first pages of Straw Dogs while in a bookstore this morning. The idea - what if we consider the universe as other than man-centered? - is not new but may merit further investigation. I'll note that even if it isn't, it may be useful for us to consider it that way since for us it is. But moving along...
Further investigation may, as I noted, be merited. But investigation requires data collection followed by hard thought about what the data means. In this, Gray seems pretty weak. Admittedly, I haven't read the whole book - the clerk was looking nervous about someone wandering in off the street, taking a book and making notes - but the first 30 or 40 pages aren't encouraging. Gray seems on a regular basis to invoke Darwin with assumptions about a) what Darwin deduced about mankind's place in the world and b) what this proves beyond question to all people save unthinking right-wing religious reactionaries. It's hard to believe, though, that the book could be as controversially stunning as the dusk jacket claims if this is so. Alas, it seems that this gentleman is as dogmatic about a by now outmoded understanding of what Darwin revealed as are the backward reactionaries with whom he would do battle. He does not question, does not probe, does not demand that Darwin stand up to the scrutiny to which he would subject everything else.
An example of how Gray misses the mark: He cites a prominent geneticist (should have written down the name) who says we'll soon start designing our own genes, and wonders at the ludicrousness of thinking this frees us to set our own destiny. He almost... almost... manages to ask the question of whether our genes won't decide for us what kind of genes to design within the geneticist's own understanding of the world. But he is too quickly off on a jag about the foolishness of belief in human exceptionalism and why this is all Christianity's fault and how different things would have been if the simple Hindus or the stoic Confucians or the pick your non-Christian simple but true stereotypical religious denomination or sect had produced the mind that founded Darwinism. In short, like so many "brave" works, this is another unthinking hatchet job on Western and Christian thought that misses its own best points because it is too busy frothing or wondering at the majesty of the East to take the trouble to think things through.
Straw Dogs alludes to the Dao in its title; here's the passage (Henrick's translation):
Heaven and Earth are not humane;/They regard the 10,000 things as straw dogs./The Sage is not humane;/He regards the common people as straw dogs.Such a sentiment is pretty common in the anti-Christian left: Their contempt for the idea of the divinely created human is too great for their professed love of the common people to overcome their disdain. Contempt and disdain alike are, of course, emotions. Emotions that can get pretty intense. Gray took a shot at a philosophical work, perhaps, but his emotional discomfort about his Christian heritage was too great for him to move from dogmatic anti-Christianity to actual analysis. Pity.
If you're looking for a really great book that can actually land a punch or two on the old orthodoxy instead of just spouting the new one, there is a really great book - or series of books - with an innovative approach to deflating the old myths and showing how ridiculous what we defend as good and proper or divinely ordained can seem. It hasn't convinced me, but it's made me think about my own beliefs and smile at them more than once, while Gray merely left me shaking my head at how poorly passion substitutes for argument. The first book is called The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. The philosophy is clearer and better argued, the examples are clearer and it's actually fun to read.
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