Time for another list, as much for my own future reference as any other reason:
I just finished Chris Mooney's The Republican War on Science, in which Mr Mooney (co-host of The Intersection blog, one of my favourite Science sites) runs through the many ways in which George W Bush's administration and Republican conservatives in general have tried to undermine and/or co-opt Science to push their own anti-Science agendas. He focuses on examples such as the banning of embryonic stem cell research, overturning environmental protection measures, introducing "intelligent design" into the public education system as a viable alternative to evolution, establishing a fake link between abortions and breast cancer while denying the obvious connection between junk food and obesity, and several others. It's a good, albeit somewhat-dry, read. A passage that really spoke to me was "When politicians use bad science to justify themselves, rather than good science to make up their minds, we can safely assume that wrongheaded and even disastrous decisions lie ahead." I'm tempted to say that it's an easier pill to swallow now that Bush is gone, but of course Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and the rest of the anti-intellectual Conservatives are still out there, trying to twist the universe into whatever fits into their narrow interpretations of ancient texts.
Our Choice by Al Gore - I mentioned this in passing previously, as a means to an end (it prompted a certain line of thinking for me). As for the book itself, I'm finding it to be something of a "good textbook", in that it's answering a lot of my questions about various aspects of Climate Change while not necessarily providing all that much in the way of entertainment. A few years ago I would've put this book down for that reason and never picked up it up again; today, however, I'm interested enough in the material that I can handle a small chore like this in the pursuit of knowledge.
Unweaving the Rainbow by Richard Dawkins - After being so thrilled by Dawkins' The God Delusion, it was a no-brainer that I'd go in search of something else by him. I've only just begun it, but it gets off to a good start. If it lives up to my expectations, I plan to get a copy of The Greatest Show on Earth next, presumably once it comes out in softcover. Dawkins is quickly becoming someone whose insights I pay a lot of attention to.
Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving - I'm a big Irving fan, with The World According to Garp being one of my favourite books. I think I've read nearly every one of his novels, liking most of them quite a bit. Last Night has one of the worst opening few chapters that I've ever encountered by Irving, to the point where I would've given up on it had it been written by almost any other author. However, I stuck with it, and things improved about 25% of the way in, and I'm now enjoying it well enough. The characters are likable, which is a typical trait of his books, although I'm finding the non-linear storytelling a bit annoying. At this point, I'd say it's not one of the author's best, but I'm only a little more than halfway done.
Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem - Regular readers of this blog may recall that I'm a Lethem-lover. He's shown up quite a few times here, and always in a positive light. His Science Fiction stories are always more character-focused than most SF, which is probably why I like it so much. Chronic City, on the other hand, seems more like straight-up fiction than SF, with the protagonist living in New York City in a contemporary setting. He has a strange and interesting circle of friends, including an astronaut fiancee trapped in a slowly-dying space station as well as a reclusive critic who's obsessed with obscure movies and the secret messages contained within Marlon Brando films. It's extremely well-written and I'm having a ball with it so far (about 1/4 of the way in at the moment).
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment