I was really disappointed in this book. Wilson seems to suffer from the same problem a lot of economists display when they take on topics outside their own field - a failure to engage with the existing literature in the area. It seems as if Wilson thinks he is the only thinker concerned with the relationship between the sciences and humanities. I'm pretty sure he's wrong about that, but even if he thinks he's right, he should still explain the fact and outline the arguments of those who have come closest to what he's saying.

As a consequence, this is a just a book about what one person thinks without any useful clues as to where to look for similar or related arguments. It leaves the reader completely at a dead end, which is very disappointing.

The ideas themselves are fine, but don't seem particularly sophisticated. I will read some reviews of the book in the hope that one of them can lead me further into this interesting area. ( )

Im Spannungsfeld zwischen Evolutionstheorie und Kreationisten nimmt dieses Buch bzw. der Autor klar Stellung. E.O. Wilson (EOW) klärt auf: komplexe Gesellschaften entstanden durch ein Geflecht unterschiedlicher, zufälliger Bedingungen, die sich weiterentwickelten im Spannungsfeld zwischen egoistischen und altruistischen Verhaltensweisen.

Dieser ewige Konflikt, also zwischen Einzel- und Gruppeninteressen wählen zu müssen, bezeichnet EOW so: „Vielleicht war es nur mit diesem Konflikt möglich, dass sich im Universum Intelligenz auf Höhe des menschlichen Verstandes und sozialer Gefüge überhaupt herausbilden konnten. Irgendwann werden wir einen Weg finden, mit unserem angeborenen Konflikt zu leben, und vielleicht erfreuen wir uns sogar daran, weil wir ihn als Urquell unserer Kreativität erkennen.“ (S.34)

Ich bin kein Biologe oder Naturwissenschaftler und werde immer etwas skeptisch, wenn ich im Klappentext lese, es sei jemand der berühmteste Wissenschaftler, hier Biologe seiner Zeit. Ich lese auf und versuche zu verstehen, das Gute behalten, das Fragwürdige aussortieren. Hier gab es fast nur Behaltenswertes, auch Skeptisches, Offenes. Gut so, denn mithin muss man sein eigenes Gehirn einschalten.

Nicht ganz einfach zu lesen, erschließen sich hier eine Menge an klugen Einsichten, z.B. im Nachdenken darüber, wenn Gruppenverhaltensweisen alles dominieren würden: „…so würden wir zu engelsgleichen Robotern - einer Art übergroßer Ameisen.“

Individuen haben im Lauf der Evolution immer Ähnliches, Gleiches, Bekanntes bevorzugt, Fremdes zunächst mit Skepsis behandelt, völlig normal also, wenn man Anderes erstmal ausschließt und nur über komplizierte Anpassungsmechanismen hereinlässt, gezielt, und nie zu viele.

Ich kann alle Gedanken vor allem auch deshalb nachempfinden, weil hier ein Konzept des Menschlichen vertreten wird, das ich ebenso vertrete: „Es gibt keine Vorherbestimmung, kein unergründliches Rätsel des Lebens. Dämonen und Götter buhlen nicht um unsere Treue. Nein, wir sind auf uns selbst gestellt, unabhängig, allein und angreifbar, eine biologische Art, die dem Leben in einer biologischen Welt angepasst ist.“

Nur mit gedanklicher Unabhängigkeit und intelligenter Selbsteinschätzung können wir überleben, dabei sind nach EOW die größten Bremser metaphysische Konstrukte, die konsequent aus dem öffentlichen Raum zu entschleunigen sind.

Er fordert dafür u.a.: „…dass die Anführer aller Religionen und Sekten mit Unterstützung von Theologen die übernatürlichen Einzelelemente ihres Glaubens öffentlich darstellen und in Konkurrenz zu anderen Glaubensrichtungen verteidigten müssen, begleitet von eine kausalen und historischen Analyse.“

Nicht Blasphemie dürfte also im Vordergrund stehen, sondern objektive, diskursive Auseinandersetzung über Sinn oder Unsinn bzw. die Einordnung der Götter in den biologischen Zusammenhang. Ich fürchte, auf diesen Befreiungsschlag müssen wir noch lange warten und auf das Ende aller Kriege im Namen von Religionen. „Fanatikern wie Diktatoren würde die Macht zwischen ihren Fingern zerrinnen, wenn sie ihre Annahmen erklären (Sprechen Sie bitte klar und deutlich!) und ihre zentralen Glaubenssätze rechtfertigen müssten.“

Ein ganz hervorragendes Buch, nicht ganz einfach zu lesen, aber mit größten Erkenntnisgewinnen. ( )

Not the book I was expecting, based on both the title and the reputation of the author. The book praises modern technology, as if more of what is destroying Earth's ecosystems is a good thing. The book assumes that human means all humans. In this book he only talks about one culture of humans, the dominant culture based on the war-focused Indo-European cultures. Civilization has not turned out to be good news for future humans and non-humans. This book praises modernity, almost overlooking the ongoing destruction caused by this culture. He doesn't mention any other human culture, many of which are much wiser and live in balance with the living world. A disappointing book. I was hoping he was going to talk about listening to indigenous peoples of the world, and turning away from the cities and technologies that are causing great harm. ( )

Douglas Adams said, "The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is 42." :-)

Of course the writing of Douglas Adams and Edward O. Wilson are worlds apart in intent. I found this book interesting and informative, though it necessitates careful reading to appreciate all that E. O. Wilson says. I believe this book should be read by all that are interested in our futures. If you have read Richard Dawkins, it would behove you to also read this book to get a more balanced appreciation of the progress of evolutionary science.

In the following, I include paraphrasing of passages from the book to give you and inkling of what to expect, hopefully whetting your interest. To me, his writing is well organized, and is neither overly concise, nor rambling. Unless you have some familiarity with evolutionary biology though, you may need a dictionary or Wikipedia at hand.

As the lead in to this book states, history makes little sense without prehistory, and prehistory makes little sense without biology. Knowledge of prehistory and biology is increasing rapidly, bringing into focus how humanity originated and why a species like our own exists on this planet.

In setting the tone of the book, he explains that the ordinary usage the word "meaning" implies intention, intention implies design, and design implies a designer. There is a second, broader way the word "meaning" is used though, and a very different worldview is implied. It is that the accidents of history, not the intentions of a designer, are the source of meaning. In this broader use of the word "meaning" there is no advance design, but instead overlapping networks of physical cause and effect. During organic evolution, for example, the origin of one adaptation by natural selection makes the origin of certain other adaptations more likely. This concept of meaning, insofar as it illuminates humanity and the rest of life, is the worldview of science.

The French writer Jean Bruller (pen name Vercors) was on the right track when, in his 1952 novel You Shall Know Them, he declared, "All of man’s troubles have arisen from the fact that we do not know what we are and do not agree on what we want to be." Human nature is the ensemble of hereditary regularities in mental development that bias cultural evolution in one direction as opposed to others and thus connect genes to culture in the brain of every person.

One important point I was happy to see, is his explanation of the fauna and flora of any ecosystem being far more than collections of species (which we don't know near the whole of). Ecosystems are complex systems of interactions, where the extinction of any species under certain conditions could have a profound impact on the whole, and ultimately ourselves. Extinction rates are 100 to 1,000 times higher than before the global spread of humanity, and will increase with human induced climate change.

To my amusement, in one chapter he even delves into the inanity of our imaginative science fiction, but I doubt that will change our subjective alternate reality longings. One faulty perception is that of those who believe humanity can emigrate to another planet after using up this one. Those whose imagination ignores that two living worlds, ours and another, are in all probability radically different in origin, molecular machinery, and the endless pathways of evolution that produced the life-forms thereon. Thus the ecosystems and species of an alien world would be wholly incompatible with our own and the result would be a biological train wreck. H. G. Wells was at least on the right tract back in the 1890s with The War of the Worlds.

Another chapter dissects religion, and how it fosters much of the animosity in the world. The Founding Fathers of the United States understood the risk of tribal religious conflict very well, but we have regressed since to the point of the consequences we see today.

In yet another chapter he delves into what we think of as Free Will. Did you know that half of the twenty thousand to twenty-five thousand genes of the entire human genetic code participate in one manner or other in the prescription of the brain-mind system, and this amount of commitment has resulted from one of the most rapid evolutionary changes known in any advanced organ system of the biosphere. Philosophers have labored off and on for over two thousand years to explain consciousness (their job). Innocent of biology, however, they have for the most part understandably gotten nowhere.

One thing he focuses on at various points of this writing is recombining the humanities and science, as began in the Enlightenment (17th and 18th centuries), but faltered in the 19th century Romantic transition (feelings through creative art). For the next two centuries and to the present day, science and the humanities went their own ways. This to me, the eclipsing of objective thinking in the broader populace with subjective perspectives, yet how can we have one without the other? The greatest contribution that science can make to the humanities is to demonstrate how bizarre we are as a species, and why, but understanding that as yet takes more fortitude and forthrightness than we seem to be able to muster in too many. The meaning of human existence cannot be explained until “just is” (Romanticism) is replaced with “just is, because” (Enlightenment). Only then can we begin to understand and compensate for our self-destructive proclivities. It was only after eons of time, during which millions of species had come and gone, that one of the lineages, the direct antecedents of Homo sapiens, won the grand lottery of evolution. The payout was civilization based on symbolic language, and culture, and from these a gargantuan power to extract the nonrenewable resources of the planet—while cheerfully exterminating our fellow species.

All of the points he focuses on lead to a final section and chapter entitled "A Human Future," which I found well examined. ( )

An interesting perspective on the typically philosophical idea/question of "why are we here? what does life mean? what is our purpose" by a biology scientist. Although biased (obviously) due to that, he does make a few fair points about combining the sciences and the humanities.

Ultimately though I think the book is pretty thin and there's not a whole lot "there", and its just a little meat with a lot of filler to try and beef it up. Some good points that get drowned out or kind of go nowhere and peter out. Still worth a check-out and read though for any people particularly interested in answering the age-old question of "what is our purpose?" (spoiler: there is no answer). ( )