In Mr. Lincoln Goes to War William Marvel makes a strenuous case against Lincoln's actions in the first year of the war. Marvel's Lincoln appears to be eager for war and quite unconcerned about basic civil liberties enshrined in the Constitution. Among the earliest and most famous violations of civil liberties came in the case of John Merryman, a prominent Maryland resident. Well-know for his sympathies for secession, Merryman was arrested in May 1861and held without access to the courts until he was released in July. Merryman's arrest occurred during the most systematic violations of the right to habeas corpus which continued through the first year of the war. During that time, Lincoln authorized the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in the region between Washington D.C. and Philadelphia and later extended the region to New York City.
While the right of habeas corpus is fundamental to a free society, Lincoln faced uncertain circumstances that threatened the federal government and potentially the rule of law throughout the country. In the early days of secession, it was not clear what path Maryland would take. Furthermore, rumors were rife within Washington D.C. that the Confederates were amassing an army to capture the city. Indeed, in early March 1861, the Confederate Congress called for 100,000 soldiers to volunteer for a one-year tour of duty. Given significant support for the southern cause within the city and in the state of Maryland, one could make a case for unprecedented police actions. As the threat to the capital subsided, Lincoln released all political prisoners (with some exceptions) on Feb. 14, 1862; however, following the imposition of a draft in the summer of 1863, Lincoln again suspended the writ of habeas corpus. It appears that Lincoln exercised this power for specific purposes at specific times.
Clearly, the Lincoln administration's record regarding civil liberties is at very least questionable, but Marvel's description of it as "arbitrary" seems too harsh under the circumstance. Marvel does little to credit these circumstances. In the case of civil war, one's mortal enemies are fellow citizens and so the protections of citizenship obviously will be strained. Indeed, the gravity of the conflict is illustrated by the violations of civil liberties on both sides, but Marvel makes no mention of the violations perpetrated by the Confederate government. The Confederate Congress authorized the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in 1862, passed the Alien Enemies Act which authorized the arrest of anyone in the Confederate states who did not acknowledge Confederate citizenship, and passed the Sequestration Act which authorized the permanent confiscation of the property of Union sympathizers. These actions, along with formation of a hostile army demonstrate the gravity of the threat posed to federal authority and the government itself.
Marvel makes much of the fact that many Union soldiers joined the army not out of a moral or nationalist impulse, but because of economic need. He furthermore notes that a draft was required to sustain the Union war effort. The conclusion Marvel is leading us to is that the war was -- from the beginning -- foisted upon the people of the country by an aggressive president. It should come as no surprise that those signing up to military service would be disproportionately poor and unemployed, but some degree of allegiance to the cause is likely to part of the decision to enlist, particularly as the horror of the war became better known. It is noteworthy that less than 20% of the Union forces were enlisted due to the draft. Marvel does not mention that southerners also joined the Confederate army for economic reasons and that a Confederate draft was required a year prior to the Union draft. Soft popular support for the Confederate cause lends credence to the view that the secession of southern states was in fact a rebellion by a privileged southern elite, not an act of northern aggression.
Marvel also describes the suppression of the press in the North, but again, the exigencies of civil war are not recognized and little mention is made of the state of the press in the South. Marvel does acknowledge that pro-union presses were closed by the Confederacy, but writes that presses in the South practiced "voluntary restraint" and that the infrequency of attacks on the press could be explained by the fact that in the South "the dominant slave culture had long repressed divergent opinion." Time and time again, Marvel provides excuses for Confederate violations of basic liberties, but excoriates the Lincoln administration for similar violations.
Lincoln is not the only object of Marvel's criticism. In a chapter entitled, "The Crimson Corse of Lyon," Marvel describes the Union campaign to control Missouri. For Marvel it is a rebellion against the authorized government of the state of Missouri. Lyon is called "an insubordinate, self-righteous psychopath" who "would not hear of peace when he saw so rare and opportunity to fulfill his apocalyptic personal destiny." It is remarkable that Marvel could diagnosis a personality disorder in Lyon one hundred and fifty years after Lyon's death, when it is difficult for qualified psychiatrists to make such diagnoses for their contemporary patients. It says more about Marvel's polemical intent than Lyon's personality. Marvel writes that Lyon's "unstable temperament" is revealed by his providing intelligence to McClellan that turned out to be incorrect. The connection is so unclear that it borders on being a non sequitur, and in fact, in one case, the "incorrect intelligence" was not really off the mark at all. Confederate forces really were assembling in Arkansas in preparation for an invasion of Missouri.
For a revealing portrait of Lyon, Marvel credits Christopher Phillips's harsh 1990 biography of Lyon, entitled Damned Yankee. I have not read Damned Yankee, but its initial paragraphs read less like history and more like an historical novel. Phillips describes dramatic details that he could not possible know took place. He does so clearly for literary effect. "Pulling pensively at his unruly red beard, forty-three-year-old Brig. Gen. Nathaniel Lyon watched the commotion in the street....His features hardened, the wrinkles at the top of his hooked nose deepened, and his small mouth clenched his cigar as tightly as his false teeth would allow." Prose of this sort hardly engenders confidence in the accuracy of Phillips's accounts.
This is not to say that Marvel's work is credulous. His bibliography reveals the serious research that lies behind his work, but it is not exceptional by professional standards. Marvel makes good use of primary sources, particularly letters and newspaper accounts. He also makes heavy use of The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, but any number of historians have done as well and have not drawn the starkly critical conclusions that Marvel draws. The scrupulous detail tends, however, to ocur in the passages which provide rather tedious accounts of troop movements. Such passages make up a substantial portion of Marvel's work.
At times Marvel's polemics clearly get the best of historical accuracy. At one point he writes of "Lincoln's expedition against Ft. Sumter." Here he is referring to a flotilla of ships that Lincoln ordered to deliver food and water to the besieged Union garrison. Marvel has turned a defensive, holding action into aggression. This may be a simple editorial oversight, but it reveals the lens through which Marvel views history and the extent to which it distorts his vision. The actions "against" Ft. Sumter in 1861 were all perpetrated by the Confederacy -- first a siege and then a potentially murderous bombardment.
Lying behind Marvel's work is the view that Lincoln's defense of federal property and willingness to engage in war was illegal, immoral, and unnecessary. The best defense of this view that I have read is in Democracy in the United States by Ransom H. Gillet, published in 1868. Prior to the war, Gillet was a member of the Democratic Party and a U.S. Representative from New York. His book attempts to resurrect the much-tarnished reputation of the Democratic Party. It is a scathing, partisan attack on the Lincoln administration. Were Marvel to comment on Gillet's work, I suspect he would find Gillet the most accurate and astute observer of the times.
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
We Have the War Upon Us: The Onset of the Civil War, November 1860-April 1861 / William J. Cooper -- N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012
The American Civil War was long in coming. As early as the founding of the country, pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces struggled over slavery. At various times in the first half of the 18th century, the political conflict threatened to lead to secession, and of course secession and war finally did come following the election of Abraham Lincoln in November 1860.
The main questions at issue were whether or not slavery would be permitted in the U.S. territories and in the states to be created out of those territories. The Republican platform ratified at the 1860 convention in Chicago called for the complete prohibition of slavery in the territories. The Democratic Party was, however, divided. Under the banner of "popular sovereignty," the northern faction supported the right of territorial governments to prohibit slavery. The southern faction held that only state constitutions could establish such prohibitions. Unable to resolve their differences, the Democratic Party split and ran two candidates: Steven A. Douglas and John C. Breckinridge.
Lincoln's election is often thought of as being a result of the split in the Democratic Party. He certainly failed to receive a majority of the popular vote nation-wide and he received virtually no votes in the southern states. His victories in the northern states, however, gave him the electoral votes necessary to win the election, but even if Democratic Party voters had not split their votes, Lincoln's majorities in the northern states would have put him in the White House. State by state popular vote totals demonstrate just how divided the country was on the issue of slavery, particularly the extension of slavery into the territories.
In the weeks following Lincoln's election, seven states seceded from the Union (South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas). These states established the Confederate States of America. Its constitution guaranteed slavery in all its states and territories. The movement toward secession was unable to reach beyond the the deep south, though, until after the fall of Ft. Sumter on April 13 and Lincoln's subsequent call for 75,000 troops to defend the Union. The prospect that federal troops would be used to occupy and "reconstruct" the seceded states led to the secession of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas. The Kentucky legislature declared Kentucky neutral in the conflict, while the federal occupation of Maryland and Missouri precluded secession in those states.
William Cooper's We Have the War Upon Us provides a close account of events between the election of Lincoln and the fall of Ft. Sumter. He especially examines the negotiations between Republicans and conditional unionists who sought to avoid the secession of the upper southern and border states. His treatment is careful and generally even-handed, relying on both primary and secondary sources. The actions (and non-actions) of William Seward and Abraham Lincoln play a central role in Cooper's account -- Seward working hard to accommodate the interests of the conditional unionists and Lincoln remaining largely silent on what his approach to the crisis would be upon his inauguration. The out-going president James Buchanan also played an important role in the unfolding events. Buchanan's view was that while states did not have the legal authority to leave the Union, the federal government did not have the authority to defend its sovereignty over the seceded states. One might argue that his inactivity to address secession forcefully at an early stage left the new Republican administration with a irremediable problem.
The greatest weakness in Cooper's account of the events leading to war is his short treatment of the actions of southern "fire-eaters," i.e., southerners dedicated to secession and the defense of slavery without compromise. By emphasizing the negotiations between the hard line Republicans and the conditional unionists, one is left with the impression that the intransigence of the hard line Republicans was more responsible for the coming of war than is justified. Cooper does not, for example, give much time to discussing the call by the Confederate Congress for 100,000 troops to serve for one year. This call was made more than a month before Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops to serve for 90 days. To keep these numbers in perspective, the federal army was composed of only 16,000 troops prior to 1861, most of whom were stationed in the South and in the territories. Many of these soldiers -- and most of the officers -- resigned from the federal army and joined the Confederate forces. Under these circumstances, the rumors of threats to Washington D.C. could not be ignored and the vulnerability of the territories to Confederate annexation was significant. In the end, it is not unreasonable to conclude that Lincoln followed the least belligerent course possible that still adhered to his responsibility to defend federal property.
Reviewing the efforts to negotiate an agreement that would prevent secession and war, leads the reader to conclude that Seward was correct in his assessment that the war was "irrepressible." Efforts by Congress as a whole, the House of Representative's Committee of Thirty-three, the Senate's Committee of Thirteen, the non-governmental Peace Convention, and the Confederate commissioners who came to Washington to negotiate a peaceful separation all appeared to be futile exercises in the face of long entrenched, partisan commitments to an uncompromising resolution to the nation's problem. In that sense, Cooper's title, We Have the War Upon Us is most certainly apt.
The main questions at issue were whether or not slavery would be permitted in the U.S. territories and in the states to be created out of those territories. The Republican platform ratified at the 1860 convention in Chicago called for the complete prohibition of slavery in the territories. The Democratic Party was, however, divided. Under the banner of "popular sovereignty," the northern faction supported the right of territorial governments to prohibit slavery. The southern faction held that only state constitutions could establish such prohibitions. Unable to resolve their differences, the Democratic Party split and ran two candidates: Steven A. Douglas and John C. Breckinridge.
Lincoln's election is often thought of as being a result of the split in the Democratic Party. He certainly failed to receive a majority of the popular vote nation-wide and he received virtually no votes in the southern states. His victories in the northern states, however, gave him the electoral votes necessary to win the election, but even if Democratic Party voters had not split their votes, Lincoln's majorities in the northern states would have put him in the White House. State by state popular vote totals demonstrate just how divided the country was on the issue of slavery, particularly the extension of slavery into the territories.
In the weeks following Lincoln's election, seven states seceded from the Union (South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas). These states established the Confederate States of America. Its constitution guaranteed slavery in all its states and territories. The movement toward secession was unable to reach beyond the the deep south, though, until after the fall of Ft. Sumter on April 13 and Lincoln's subsequent call for 75,000 troops to defend the Union. The prospect that federal troops would be used to occupy and "reconstruct" the seceded states led to the secession of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas. The Kentucky legislature declared Kentucky neutral in the conflict, while the federal occupation of Maryland and Missouri precluded secession in those states.
William Cooper's We Have the War Upon Us provides a close account of events between the election of Lincoln and the fall of Ft. Sumter. He especially examines the negotiations between Republicans and conditional unionists who sought to avoid the secession of the upper southern and border states. His treatment is careful and generally even-handed, relying on both primary and secondary sources. The actions (and non-actions) of William Seward and Abraham Lincoln play a central role in Cooper's account -- Seward working hard to accommodate the interests of the conditional unionists and Lincoln remaining largely silent on what his approach to the crisis would be upon his inauguration. The out-going president James Buchanan also played an important role in the unfolding events. Buchanan's view was that while states did not have the legal authority to leave the Union, the federal government did not have the authority to defend its sovereignty over the seceded states. One might argue that his inactivity to address secession forcefully at an early stage left the new Republican administration with a irremediable problem.
The greatest weakness in Cooper's account of the events leading to war is his short treatment of the actions of southern "fire-eaters," i.e., southerners dedicated to secession and the defense of slavery without compromise. By emphasizing the negotiations between the hard line Republicans and the conditional unionists, one is left with the impression that the intransigence of the hard line Republicans was more responsible for the coming of war than is justified. Cooper does not, for example, give much time to discussing the call by the Confederate Congress for 100,000 troops to serve for one year. This call was made more than a month before Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops to serve for 90 days. To keep these numbers in perspective, the federal army was composed of only 16,000 troops prior to 1861, most of whom were stationed in the South and in the territories. Many of these soldiers -- and most of the officers -- resigned from the federal army and joined the Confederate forces. Under these circumstances, the rumors of threats to Washington D.C. could not be ignored and the vulnerability of the territories to Confederate annexation was significant. In the end, it is not unreasonable to conclude that Lincoln followed the least belligerent course possible that still adhered to his responsibility to defend federal property.
Reviewing the efforts to negotiate an agreement that would prevent secession and war, leads the reader to conclude that Seward was correct in his assessment that the war was "irrepressible." Efforts by Congress as a whole, the House of Representative's Committee of Thirty-three, the Senate's Committee of Thirteen, the non-governmental Peace Convention, and the Confederate commissioners who came to Washington to negotiate a peaceful separation all appeared to be futile exercises in the face of long entrenched, partisan commitments to an uncompromising resolution to the nation's problem. In that sense, Cooper's title, We Have the War Upon Us is most certainly apt.
Friday, November 30, 2012
Madhyamakalankara / Shantarakshita with commentary by Jamgon Mipham -- Boston: Shambhala, 2005
In the history of Buddhism two important philosophers developed competing perspectives on the teachings of the Buddha. The first, Nagarjuna, advanced the view that all speculative theories of reality were false and that the ultimate truth was only knowable through a direct intuition attained during meditation. Reality as we normally think of it was "empty." His philosophy came to be known as Madhyamaka or "the Middle Way" as he rejected what he considered the extremes of speculative theories of reality. The second, Asanga, advanced the "Mind Only" school of Buddhism which rejected the materialism of early Buddhism and asserted a form of idealism. Ultimate reality was constituted only by the mind. Everything else was its product or projection. The school came to be known as Yogachara Buddhism. Madhyamaka and Yogachara Buddhism constitute the two largest currents of Indian Mahayana Buddhism.
In the eighth century, a third philosopher, Shantarakshita, attempted to resolve the disagreement between these two traditions. Perhaps his most important work was the Madhyamakalankara, translated by the Padmakara Translation Group as The Adornment of the Middle Way. In it, Shantarakshita argued that there are two forms of truth: conventional and ultimate. By recognizing this distinction, the Madhyamaka and Yogachara tendencies can be brought together into a single, combined theory of reality in which ultimate truth is approximated by the accounts found in the Madhyamaka tradition and conventional truth is captured by the Yogachara tradition.
The Madhyamakalankara is composed of 97 stanzas of four lines each. The great bulk of the work (66 stanzas) explains the doctrine of "the two truths," i.e., that we can distinguish conventional truth from ultimate truth. Conventional truth is adequately described in language and adequately understood through observation and reason. It is what post-Kantian Western philosophers might describe as truth about the phenomenal world. Ultimate truth reaches beyond the phenomenal world and characterizes reality as it is in itself, unclouded by the limitations and delusions of human experience and cognition. Much of these first 66 stanzas employ the Madhyamaka method of refuting speculative theories about ultimate truth. Shantarkshita systematically refutes the views of all of the main schools of Buddhism of his day along with a number of non-Buddhist schools of thought. According to the Madhyamika, these views completely exhaust all possible views of ultimate reality, and so one can draw the conclusion that no discursive account of ultimate reality is correct. This conclusion is described by the Madhyamika as asserting the "emptiness" of all things.
In the later (nearly last) stanzas of the work, Shantarakshika asserts that the preceding stanza establish that things described by conventional truth have no ultimate existence, and that they are most adequately explained by the Yogachara view. This view holds that phenomenal things are not material. Phenomenal reality is "consciousness only."
Shantarakshita's view is designed, as most Buddhist philosophy is, to assist the student toward salvation from suffering. Simply adopting the Madhyamaka view that all things are empty requires the student to accept a deep and difficult concept. It requires one to reject common sense and the evidence of one's senses. On one view, meditation and reflection are adequate to reach this conclusion, but an enormous effort is required. Alternatively, and following Shantarakshita, the student might first entertain the Yogachara view. One might first recognize that the distinction between subject and object is an illusion, that all phenomenal objects exist only in relation to all other phenomenal objects, and that phenomenal experience is the product of consciousness creating experience. Having arrived at this understanding, the student is better positioned to take the Madhyamaka critique to its final conclusion about conventional truth. One can recognize that the consciousness only explanation of experience is itself a discursive account that remains within the boundaries of human experience and reason. It's object, consciousness, is just as vulnerable to the same critique that showed material objects to be illusory. Consciousness must also be empty. When one is able to do this, one is prepared to have a direct, transcendental "experience" of the ultimate through meditation.
The volume under review includes not only Shantarakshita's work, but also a commentary on the work by Jamgon Mipham, entitled A Teaching to Delight My Master Manjughosha. Mipham composed his commentary in 1877 amid a movement to establish a more open-minded approach to the various schools of Buddhism. His commentary is said to rank among the most important explanations of the Shantarakshita's masterpiece. Despite its reputation, the explanations of the Madhyamaka critiques of various speculative metaphysics are labored; however, once Mipham begins to describe the "benefits" of Shantarakshita's synthesis, the work becomes quite enjoyable and enlightening.
In the eighth century, a third philosopher, Shantarakshita, attempted to resolve the disagreement between these two traditions. Perhaps his most important work was the Madhyamakalankara, translated by the Padmakara Translation Group as The Adornment of the Middle Way. In it, Shantarakshita argued that there are two forms of truth: conventional and ultimate. By recognizing this distinction, the Madhyamaka and Yogachara tendencies can be brought together into a single, combined theory of reality in which ultimate truth is approximated by the accounts found in the Madhyamaka tradition and conventional truth is captured by the Yogachara tradition.
The Madhyamakalankara is composed of 97 stanzas of four lines each. The great bulk of the work (66 stanzas) explains the doctrine of "the two truths," i.e., that we can distinguish conventional truth from ultimate truth. Conventional truth is adequately described in language and adequately understood through observation and reason. It is what post-Kantian Western philosophers might describe as truth about the phenomenal world. Ultimate truth reaches beyond the phenomenal world and characterizes reality as it is in itself, unclouded by the limitations and delusions of human experience and cognition. Much of these first 66 stanzas employ the Madhyamaka method of refuting speculative theories about ultimate truth. Shantarkshita systematically refutes the views of all of the main schools of Buddhism of his day along with a number of non-Buddhist schools of thought. According to the Madhyamika, these views completely exhaust all possible views of ultimate reality, and so one can draw the conclusion that no discursive account of ultimate reality is correct. This conclusion is described by the Madhyamika as asserting the "emptiness" of all things.
In the later (nearly last) stanzas of the work, Shantarakshika asserts that the preceding stanza establish that things described by conventional truth have no ultimate existence, and that they are most adequately explained by the Yogachara view. This view holds that phenomenal things are not material. Phenomenal reality is "consciousness only."
Shantarakshita's view is designed, as most Buddhist philosophy is, to assist the student toward salvation from suffering. Simply adopting the Madhyamaka view that all things are empty requires the student to accept a deep and difficult concept. It requires one to reject common sense and the evidence of one's senses. On one view, meditation and reflection are adequate to reach this conclusion, but an enormous effort is required. Alternatively, and following Shantarakshita, the student might first entertain the Yogachara view. One might first recognize that the distinction between subject and object is an illusion, that all phenomenal objects exist only in relation to all other phenomenal objects, and that phenomenal experience is the product of consciousness creating experience. Having arrived at this understanding, the student is better positioned to take the Madhyamaka critique to its final conclusion about conventional truth. One can recognize that the consciousness only explanation of experience is itself a discursive account that remains within the boundaries of human experience and reason. It's object, consciousness, is just as vulnerable to the same critique that showed material objects to be illusory. Consciousness must also be empty. When one is able to do this, one is prepared to have a direct, transcendental "experience" of the ultimate through meditation.
The volume under review includes not only Shantarakshita's work, but also a commentary on the work by Jamgon Mipham, entitled A Teaching to Delight My Master Manjughosha. Mipham composed his commentary in 1877 amid a movement to establish a more open-minded approach to the various schools of Buddhism. His commentary is said to rank among the most important explanations of the Shantarakshita's masterpiece. Despite its reputation, the explanations of the Madhyamaka critiques of various speculative metaphysics are labored; however, once Mipham begins to describe the "benefits" of Shantarakshita's synthesis, the work becomes quite enjoyable and enlightening.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Demian / Hermann Hesse -- W.J. Strachan, trans. -- London: Panther, 1971.
Nearly 40 years ago, I read Hermann Hesse's Steppenwolf. It was a profound experience. I immediately ranked it as one of the most intriguing and insightful books I had ever read. It is curious, then, that I read nothing else by him until just this month. Part of the explanation certainly must be the ocassional disparaging comments that friends have made about Hesse's novels. "Adolescent" is a frequent epithet. Still, I was curious enough about what might have attracted me to his work lo, those many years ago that I picked up Demian and read it on a transcontinental flight home.
No doubt, there is something adolescent about Demian and appropriately so as it mostly chronicles the coming of age of a young boy. Hesse masterfully depicts the anxiety of childhood moral dilemmas and the adventure of learning about the world beyond one's nuclear family. If there is a weakness in Demian it is that it seems to take its metaphysics and metaethics a little too seriously. The main character in the novel slowly enters a subculture of people who believe themselves to be the early adherents of a new religion, worshiping the god "Abraxas," who encompasses both the good of the Christian god and the evil of the Devil. Along the way, the reader is treated to a spread of vaguely Jungian psychology and Nietzschean philosophy.
For anyone sympathetic to these views, Demian must be a literary treat, but without such sympathies, it is notably dated. Setting aside what seems to be the author's own sympathies for the psychological and philosophical backdrop, the description of the protagonist's excitement over his induction into an esoteric world is brilliant. Anyone thoughtful enough to question the worldview of one's childhood and to seek a deeper understand of reality in the course of growing up will recognize the enchanting allure of entertaining and exploring mysterious, new philosophical ideas. I suspect it is exactly this that attracted me to Hesse's work so long ago.
Perhaps the most grounding aspect of the novel is the sudden intrusion of war into the lives of its characters. It is as if Hesse acknowledges that the religious and philosophical preoccupations of his characters are a small and private matter in comparison to the enormous currents at work in the world. At the same time, one is left with the impression that the great currents of history are merely unavoidable interruptions in the spiritual and progress of the individual characters. It is well worth reflecting on the contradiction.
No doubt, there is something adolescent about Demian and appropriately so as it mostly chronicles the coming of age of a young boy. Hesse masterfully depicts the anxiety of childhood moral dilemmas and the adventure of learning about the world beyond one's nuclear family. If there is a weakness in Demian it is that it seems to take its metaphysics and metaethics a little too seriously. The main character in the novel slowly enters a subculture of people who believe themselves to be the early adherents of a new religion, worshiping the god "Abraxas," who encompasses both the good of the Christian god and the evil of the Devil. Along the way, the reader is treated to a spread of vaguely Jungian psychology and Nietzschean philosophy.
For anyone sympathetic to these views, Demian must be a literary treat, but without such sympathies, it is notably dated. Setting aside what seems to be the author's own sympathies for the psychological and philosophical backdrop, the description of the protagonist's excitement over his induction into an esoteric world is brilliant. Anyone thoughtful enough to question the worldview of one's childhood and to seek a deeper understand of reality in the course of growing up will recognize the enchanting allure of entertaining and exploring mysterious, new philosophical ideas. I suspect it is exactly this that attracted me to Hesse's work so long ago.
Perhaps the most grounding aspect of the novel is the sudden intrusion of war into the lives of its characters. It is as if Hesse acknowledges that the religious and philosophical preoccupations of his characters are a small and private matter in comparison to the enormous currents at work in the world. At the same time, one is left with the impression that the great currents of history are merely unavoidable interruptions in the spiritual and progress of the individual characters. It is well worth reflecting on the contradiction.
The Bodhicaryavatara / Santideva -- Kate Crosby and Andrew Skilton, trans. -- Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press, 1995
Santideva's Bodhicaryavatara is among the most important works in the Mahayana Buddhist canon. The title translates as the Way of the Bodhisattva. As such, it provides a concise presentation of the six perfections that are characteristic of the bodhisattva: generosity, morality, forebearance, vigor, concentration, and wisdom.
The work is composed of 912 verses divide into ten chapters. Composed in the 8th century, the Bodhicaryavatara played an important role in the transmission of Buddhism to Tibet and has remained important to Tibetan Buddhism. The Dalai Lama is among its admirers and Mahayana monks continue to memorize it today.
Its verses are generally clear and direct; however, chapter nine -- it's most celebrated chapter -- is quite difficult. Chapter nine address the perfection of wisdom as it is understood in the Madhyamaka tradition. Briefly, wisdom is coming to know that ultimate reality is "empty." This is the conclusion that is reached when all other metaphysical views about reality are refuted. For the Madhyamika, ultimate reality is neither one nor many, neither static nor changing, neither conscious nor unconscious. No analytic, discursive description of it is true. Language is only able to articulate conventional truth and at most can point in the direction of the approximate ultimate truth.
Chapter nine and the work in general owe much to the most important work in the Mahayana/Madhyamaka tradition, the Prajnaparamita. While the Prajnaparamita is far longer (100,000 verses in its longest form), it communicates the difficult concept of emptiness much more effectively. The Bodhicaryavatara is certainly worth reading, but other secondary material will make understanding its central ideas much easier.
The work is composed of 912 verses divide into ten chapters. Composed in the 8th century, the Bodhicaryavatara played an important role in the transmission of Buddhism to Tibet and has remained important to Tibetan Buddhism. The Dalai Lama is among its admirers and Mahayana monks continue to memorize it today.
Its verses are generally clear and direct; however, chapter nine -- it's most celebrated chapter -- is quite difficult. Chapter nine address the perfection of wisdom as it is understood in the Madhyamaka tradition. Briefly, wisdom is coming to know that ultimate reality is "empty." This is the conclusion that is reached when all other metaphysical views about reality are refuted. For the Madhyamika, ultimate reality is neither one nor many, neither static nor changing, neither conscious nor unconscious. No analytic, discursive description of it is true. Language is only able to articulate conventional truth and at most can point in the direction of the approximate ultimate truth.
Chapter nine and the work in general owe much to the most important work in the Mahayana/Madhyamaka tradition, the Prajnaparamita. While the Prajnaparamita is far longer (100,000 verses in its longest form), it communicates the difficult concept of emptiness much more effectively. The Bodhicaryavatara is certainly worth reading, but other secondary material will make understanding its central ideas much easier.
Friday, September 28, 2012
Nagarjuna's Letter to a Friend with Commentary by Kangyur Rinpoche / Nagarjuna and Kangyur Rinpoche -- Padmakara Translation Group, trans. -- Ithaca, N.Y.: Snow Lion Pulblications, 2005
Around the beginning of the second century of the common era, Arya Nagarjuna, a brilliant Indian philosopher, wrote a short treatise entitled Suhrillekha in Sanskrit or Letter to a Friend in English. It has become one of the most important texts in Buddhism's Mahayana tradition. Composed of just 123 verses, each of four lines, Letter to a Friend provides a lucid exposition of the "six perfections" or paramitas: generosity, discipline, patience, diligence, concentration, and wisdom. These are the virtues of the bodhisattva, i.e., the Mahayana saint. A fuller treatment of these virtues and their significance can be found in another work, The Perfection of Wisdom in 100,000 Verses or the Prajnaparamita. Nagarjuna is said to have retrieved the Perfection of Wisdom from the realm of the nagas -- serpent-like beings-- and brought it to the world.
The most significant aspect of both Letter to a Friend and The Perfection of Wisdom is its treatment of wisdom. Perfecting wisdom amounts to coming to understand the "emptiness" of all things. This is the most important contribution made by the Madhyamaka tradition of Buddhism to Buddhism's philosophical development. Earlier Buddhist held that there was no self or subject. Instead, all things were composed of a multiplicity of dharmas, essentially infinitesimal atoms of reality that were in constant flux. In contrast, the Upanishadic tradition in India held that the fundamental reality was a universal self or, understood from another perspective, the unitary divine ground of being that had a permanent existence. The Madhyamaka tradition advanced arguments against both of these views. The argumentative technique was essentially critical: reality was not one, it was not many, it was not neither one nor many, and it was not both one and many. Furthermore, what did exist, existed conditionally or only in relation to all other things. Reality is "emptiness." This should not be confused with nothingess. The Madhyamaka view is not nihilistic. Reflecting on these metaphysical views establishes, for the Madhyamika, a frame of mind that leads one to be able to develop the other five perfections and thereby achieve enlightenment. Madhyamaka metaphysics is perhaps the highest development of metaphysics within the Buddhist tradition.
Letter to a Friend is short enough that it often has been memorized by the Buddhist faithful. At the same time, it does an excellent job of bringing to mind the full scope of the path of the bodhisattva. Its brevity, however, make a commentary useful. In the edition under review here, Kangyur Rinpoche provides an admirable but not terribly extensive or detailed commentary. Too often Kangyur Rinpoche merely re-expressed the concise poetic formulations of Nagarjuna in a wordier prose form, but in other instances, Kangyur Rinpoche makes illuminating comments.
Reading the edition cover to cover amounts, essentially, to reading the Letter three times. First, it is presented in its translated form without commentary. Second, it is presented, verse by verse, in the commentary, which -- as noted -- often provides a re-phrasing of the verses. This is by no means a drawback. The Letter is well worth multiple readings. Finally, there is a useful introduction by the translators, a glossary of terms, notes on the commentary, and the entire text in Sanskrit and Tibetan. It is an edition well worth owning.
The most significant aspect of both Letter to a Friend and The Perfection of Wisdom is its treatment of wisdom. Perfecting wisdom amounts to coming to understand the "emptiness" of all things. This is the most important contribution made by the Madhyamaka tradition of Buddhism to Buddhism's philosophical development. Earlier Buddhist held that there was no self or subject. Instead, all things were composed of a multiplicity of dharmas, essentially infinitesimal atoms of reality that were in constant flux. In contrast, the Upanishadic tradition in India held that the fundamental reality was a universal self or, understood from another perspective, the unitary divine ground of being that had a permanent existence. The Madhyamaka tradition advanced arguments against both of these views. The argumentative technique was essentially critical: reality was not one, it was not many, it was not neither one nor many, and it was not both one and many. Furthermore, what did exist, existed conditionally or only in relation to all other things. Reality is "emptiness." This should not be confused with nothingess. The Madhyamaka view is not nihilistic. Reflecting on these metaphysical views establishes, for the Madhyamika, a frame of mind that leads one to be able to develop the other five perfections and thereby achieve enlightenment. Madhyamaka metaphysics is perhaps the highest development of metaphysics within the Buddhist tradition.
Letter to a Friend is short enough that it often has been memorized by the Buddhist faithful. At the same time, it does an excellent job of bringing to mind the full scope of the path of the bodhisattva. Its brevity, however, make a commentary useful. In the edition under review here, Kangyur Rinpoche provides an admirable but not terribly extensive or detailed commentary. Too often Kangyur Rinpoche merely re-expressed the concise poetic formulations of Nagarjuna in a wordier prose form, but in other instances, Kangyur Rinpoche makes illuminating comments.
Reading the edition cover to cover amounts, essentially, to reading the Letter three times. First, it is presented in its translated form without commentary. Second, it is presented, verse by verse, in the commentary, which -- as noted -- often provides a re-phrasing of the verses. This is by no means a drawback. The Letter is well worth multiple readings. Finally, there is a useful introduction by the translators, a glossary of terms, notes on the commentary, and the entire text in Sanskrit and Tibetan. It is an edition well worth owning.
Monday, September 24, 2012
The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media / Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld, illustrator -- N.Y.: Norton, 2012
Since 1993, the University of Maryland has annually selected a "First Year Book," which is made freely available to the campus community. Faculty members are encouraged to include a discussion of the book into their syllabi. Given all the books from which to choose, one would expect that the First Year Book would be something quite special, and it usually is. This year's book is The Influencing Machine by Brooke Gladstone. It is a "graphic nonfiction" work, illustrated by Josh Neufeld. This alone is certainly not a reason to dismiss the work. There are many graphic nonfiction works that are well worth reading; see particularly many excellent monographs in the "For Beginners" series published by the Writers and Readers Publishing Cooperative. What makes these books worthwhile is the ability to provide more than a superficial treatment of their subjects in a readable and entertaining style. Cleverly chosen or executed illustrations can be a significant asset. Unfortunately, The Influencing Machine provides neither depth nor entertainment.
The work is certainly readable, but this has less to do with the writing style than with the superficiality of the ideas it expresses. It is a fast paced tour across the surface of the history of journalism, free expression, government control, and the influence of audiences on media content. Gladstone seems to have assimilated too many of the self-validating assumptions current among mainstream journalists regarding the above issues. Most of all, she concludes that the media and its contents are a product of the demands of news consumers. "We get the media we deserve" is her final word. For a more insightful analysis of the U.S. media, one would do well to read the works of Ben Bagdikian, Noam Chomsky, Edward Herman, Michael Parenti, or Herbert Schiller to name just a few more thoughtful authors.
Gladstone says virtually nothing about the systemic biases that appear in the privately controlled U.S. media, except to note that "the American media are not afraid of the government. They are afraid of their audiences and advertisers. The media do not control you. They pander to you." While there may be a modicum of truth here, Gladstone provides no serious examination of the political economy of the media. In Gladstone's view, media consumers appear all to be equal. This would imply that the consequences for media content would be democratic and would reflect the impulses of ordinary people (for good or ill); however, media consumers are not all equal. Different potential audiences have different purchasing power. This means that the media content will be skewed to attract an audience with the greatest aggregate wealth, and in this formula, the rich have a much greater say over what appears in the media than the poor. We don't get the media we deserve, we get the media that money prefers. This is reinforced especially in the national media by the cost of advertising. Only large corporations are able to purchase advertising on national broadcasts, and so media content reflects the interests of (1) large media corporations, (2) well-to-do audiences, and (3) large corporations seeking to advertise their products.
There are a number of other features of the U.S. media as significant as its political economy. They make no appearance in The Influencing Machine. What does appear is a superficial and choppy presentation of mostly trite observations and journalistic mythologies. One would hope that the artistry in the work would be a saving grace, but it is mostly unimpressive.
The work is certainly readable, but this has less to do with the writing style than with the superficiality of the ideas it expresses. It is a fast paced tour across the surface of the history of journalism, free expression, government control, and the influence of audiences on media content. Gladstone seems to have assimilated too many of the self-validating assumptions current among mainstream journalists regarding the above issues. Most of all, she concludes that the media and its contents are a product of the demands of news consumers. "We get the media we deserve" is her final word. For a more insightful analysis of the U.S. media, one would do well to read the works of Ben Bagdikian, Noam Chomsky, Edward Herman, Michael Parenti, or Herbert Schiller to name just a few more thoughtful authors.
Gladstone says virtually nothing about the systemic biases that appear in the privately controlled U.S. media, except to note that "the American media are not afraid of the government. They are afraid of their audiences and advertisers. The media do not control you. They pander to you." While there may be a modicum of truth here, Gladstone provides no serious examination of the political economy of the media. In Gladstone's view, media consumers appear all to be equal. This would imply that the consequences for media content would be democratic and would reflect the impulses of ordinary people (for good or ill); however, media consumers are not all equal. Different potential audiences have different purchasing power. This means that the media content will be skewed to attract an audience with the greatest aggregate wealth, and in this formula, the rich have a much greater say over what appears in the media than the poor. We don't get the media we deserve, we get the media that money prefers. This is reinforced especially in the national media by the cost of advertising. Only large corporations are able to purchase advertising on national broadcasts, and so media content reflects the interests of (1) large media corporations, (2) well-to-do audiences, and (3) large corporations seeking to advertise their products.
There are a number of other features of the U.S. media as significant as its political economy. They make no appearance in The Influencing Machine. What does appear is a superficial and choppy presentation of mostly trite observations and journalistic mythologies. One would hope that the artistry in the work would be a saving grace, but it is mostly unimpressive.
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Being and Time / Martin Heidegger -- John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson, trans., N.Y.: Harper and Row, 1962
Once again, I am faced with the humbling task of reviewing one of the most significant works in the history of Western philosophy. Any reader would do well to search the literature for commentary by philosophers with far greater expertise than my meager credentials, particularly regarding Heidegger's Being and Time. I will content myself, however, with recording my reactions to and impressions of this amazing work. I'm astonished that it has taken me nearly four decades of studying philosophy to read it.
Heidegger claimed to be making a radical break from everything that had preceded him in the history of philosophy, and while his work is certainly novel and quite original, one can usefully connect him to previous philosophical currents. Roughly speaking, Heidegger seems to stand to Husserl as Kant stands to Descartes. Descartes project was to establish how and what we can know about ourselves, God, and especially the external world. Through a process of introspection and rational examination of our ideas, one can be sure both that God exists and that we can have knowledge of an external world if we simply employ a careful epistemological method. Kant was dissatisfied with these conclusions and with all of the conclusions of the speculative philosophy of his time and inaugurated what he called a "Copernican revolution" in philosophy. This involved recognizing that our understanding of the world is constrained or structured by our own cognitive nature. The world as we experience it is as we must experience it, because we intuit it in the forms space and time. We furthermore, understand it according to specific "categories of understanding" which establish the form of our experience.
Fast forwarding to the twentieth century, Husserl picked up the Cartesian project. Husserl sought to establish a foundation for all human knowledge. His approach to this changed over time, but an important period of his work involved advocating for the method of the "transcendental-phenomenological reduction" by which one reflects on the world in a manner that goes beyond our ordinary apprehension of it. Through a processes or faculty he calls "eidetic intuition," one comes to understand the world as it truly is.
Heidegger dedicated Being and Time "in friendship and admiration" to Husserl, so we should think seriously about how this work compares with Husserl's philosophy. This is where the analogy between Descartes and Kant on the one hand and Husserl and Heidegger on the other is illuminating. As Kant recognizes that philosophical speculation about a transcendent reality must be limited by our capacities for experience, Heidegger recognizes that penetrating to the essences of things in the world steps beyond our experience. The central idea in Heidegger's thought is "Dasein" or human existence. It is the object and constraint of Heidegger's phenomenological investigations in Being and Time. Directly translated into English, "Dasein" might be understood as "being-there." Dasein involves being thrown into a world of experience which is in large part constituted by our capacity to care. Our world is one of our particular projects and goals. The things in this world are "ready-to-hand" as tools are to workers. In this respect, Heidegger is truly a philosopher for the industrial age. Human experience largely is fashioned out of our interaction with our technology. At the same time, Heidegger explores "being-with-others," "being-towards-the-end," and "being-towards-death."
Along the way, Heidegger discusses a variety of psychological states as modes of experience, including fear, anxiety, and curiosity. These reveal the nature of our being in the world. He is most interested in discovering the fundamental nature of being. This is not revealed in language nor in everyday being, though they are not irrelevant to a full understanding of being, but through attention to the ontic structure being. The ontic structure of being must be distinguished from the ontological structure of being in that the latter pertains to entities, while the former pertains to being itself. To plumb these depths, Heidegger emphasizes the role of care in our being and its foundation in temporality. Ultimately, understanding temporality plays the most significant role in understanding the nature of Dasein.
A humble warning: I doubt my own understanding of Heidegger. In any case, Heidegger is a notoriously difficult philosopher to understand; largely, because of how ambitious his project is, but also because of his desire to explain what he believes cannot be explained by the language as it had thus far been developed. Consequently, he employs a unique jargon which is an obstacle to understanding. Many philosophers have suggested that he is intentionally obscure to hide a paucity of arguments. I suspect this is too cynical. Instead, Heidegger seems to me to be making a conscientious attempt to describe a vision of being that goes well beyond the analytical approach that Kant employed in his metaphysics of human experience. Heidegger not only describes the basic structure of appearances, but he attempts to set human experience in motion and describe it in much richer detail than what we see in Kant's critical philosophy. Whether or not Heidegger is successful does not detract from his success in prompting many philosophers, myself included, to think about human existence in a deeper way -- in a way that connects psychology and ontology. His reputation as possibly the greatest twentieth century philosophy is not undeserved.
Heidegger claimed to be making a radical break from everything that had preceded him in the history of philosophy, and while his work is certainly novel and quite original, one can usefully connect him to previous philosophical currents. Roughly speaking, Heidegger seems to stand to Husserl as Kant stands to Descartes. Descartes project was to establish how and what we can know about ourselves, God, and especially the external world. Through a process of introspection and rational examination of our ideas, one can be sure both that God exists and that we can have knowledge of an external world if we simply employ a careful epistemological method. Kant was dissatisfied with these conclusions and with all of the conclusions of the speculative philosophy of his time and inaugurated what he called a "Copernican revolution" in philosophy. This involved recognizing that our understanding of the world is constrained or structured by our own cognitive nature. The world as we experience it is as we must experience it, because we intuit it in the forms space and time. We furthermore, understand it according to specific "categories of understanding" which establish the form of our experience.
Fast forwarding to the twentieth century, Husserl picked up the Cartesian project. Husserl sought to establish a foundation for all human knowledge. His approach to this changed over time, but an important period of his work involved advocating for the method of the "transcendental-phenomenological reduction" by which one reflects on the world in a manner that goes beyond our ordinary apprehension of it. Through a processes or faculty he calls "eidetic intuition," one comes to understand the world as it truly is.
Heidegger dedicated Being and Time "in friendship and admiration" to Husserl, so we should think seriously about how this work compares with Husserl's philosophy. This is where the analogy between Descartes and Kant on the one hand and Husserl and Heidegger on the other is illuminating. As Kant recognizes that philosophical speculation about a transcendent reality must be limited by our capacities for experience, Heidegger recognizes that penetrating to the essences of things in the world steps beyond our experience. The central idea in Heidegger's thought is "Dasein" or human existence. It is the object and constraint of Heidegger's phenomenological investigations in Being and Time. Directly translated into English, "Dasein" might be understood as "being-there." Dasein involves being thrown into a world of experience which is in large part constituted by our capacity to care. Our world is one of our particular projects and goals. The things in this world are "ready-to-hand" as tools are to workers. In this respect, Heidegger is truly a philosopher for the industrial age. Human experience largely is fashioned out of our interaction with our technology. At the same time, Heidegger explores "being-with-others," "being-towards-the-end," and "being-towards-death."
Along the way, Heidegger discusses a variety of psychological states as modes of experience, including fear, anxiety, and curiosity. These reveal the nature of our being in the world. He is most interested in discovering the fundamental nature of being. This is not revealed in language nor in everyday being, though they are not irrelevant to a full understanding of being, but through attention to the ontic structure being. The ontic structure of being must be distinguished from the ontological structure of being in that the latter pertains to entities, while the former pertains to being itself. To plumb these depths, Heidegger emphasizes the role of care in our being and its foundation in temporality. Ultimately, understanding temporality plays the most significant role in understanding the nature of Dasein.
A humble warning: I doubt my own understanding of Heidegger. In any case, Heidegger is a notoriously difficult philosopher to understand; largely, because of how ambitious his project is, but also because of his desire to explain what he believes cannot be explained by the language as it had thus far been developed. Consequently, he employs a unique jargon which is an obstacle to understanding. Many philosophers have suggested that he is intentionally obscure to hide a paucity of arguments. I suspect this is too cynical. Instead, Heidegger seems to me to be making a conscientious attempt to describe a vision of being that goes well beyond the analytical approach that Kant employed in his metaphysics of human experience. Heidegger not only describes the basic structure of appearances, but he attempts to set human experience in motion and describe it in much richer detail than what we see in Kant's critical philosophy. Whether or not Heidegger is successful does not detract from his success in prompting many philosophers, myself included, to think about human existence in a deeper way -- in a way that connects psychology and ontology. His reputation as possibly the greatest twentieth century philosophy is not undeserved.
Sunday, August 26, 2012
The Consolations of Philosophy / Alain De Botton -- N.Y.: Pantheon Books, 2000
The Consolations of Philosophy is a curious introduction to philosophy, if that is what it is intended to be. The subject matter is at least ostensibly philosophy and the writing style is certainly introductory, but it is certainly not a good choice for an introductory philosophy course, unless one would like to assign a chapter or two as "recommended reading" left on reserve at the library.
The title is, of course, derived from Boethius's great work The Consolation of Philosophy. The Consolation of Philosophy was written while Boethius was in prison, waiting to be executed. It remains perhaps the greatest piece of death row literature of all time. Its literary form is a dialog between Boethius and a lady figure personifying philosophy. Philosophy makes the case that Boethius's condition does not justify complaint and that nothing has been taken from him that is the basis for true happiness. It is through the thoughtful examination of one's circumstances (through philosophy) that one can come to this realization and be consoled in the face of misfortune.
De Botton's Consolations of Philosophy, broadly speaking, attempts to make roughly this case, but it does so through the examination of the thought and works of six philosophers: Socrates, Epicurus, Seneca, Montaigne, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche. De Botton attempts to show how the thought of these philosophers can help us overcome (respectively) unpopularity, poverty, frustration, inadequacy, a broken heart, and difficulties in general. The structure of the work and the selection of the philosophers has some reason behind it, but at times it appears that de Botton has cobbled together a string of mostly lesser philosophers and mined their works for passages that fit his purposes. This is not to say that he has misread these philosophers, but that his project was mostly to write a book -- not to explore an important theme or thesis among philosophical debates. By the end of the book one is left wondering, "so what?" Certainly there were a number of interesting anecdotes (along with some clever illustrations), but was it really worth the time?
The Consolations of Philosophy is less an examination of the philosophy of six (mostly minor) philosophers and more a curio cabinet of objects collected from their biographies.
The title is, of course, derived from Boethius's great work The Consolation of Philosophy. The Consolation of Philosophy was written while Boethius was in prison, waiting to be executed. It remains perhaps the greatest piece of death row literature of all time. Its literary form is a dialog between Boethius and a lady figure personifying philosophy. Philosophy makes the case that Boethius's condition does not justify complaint and that nothing has been taken from him that is the basis for true happiness. It is through the thoughtful examination of one's circumstances (through philosophy) that one can come to this realization and be consoled in the face of misfortune.
De Botton's Consolations of Philosophy, broadly speaking, attempts to make roughly this case, but it does so through the examination of the thought and works of six philosophers: Socrates, Epicurus, Seneca, Montaigne, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche. De Botton attempts to show how the thought of these philosophers can help us overcome (respectively) unpopularity, poverty, frustration, inadequacy, a broken heart, and difficulties in general. The structure of the work and the selection of the philosophers has some reason behind it, but at times it appears that de Botton has cobbled together a string of mostly lesser philosophers and mined their works for passages that fit his purposes. This is not to say that he has misread these philosophers, but that his project was mostly to write a book -- not to explore an important theme or thesis among philosophical debates. By the end of the book one is left wondering, "so what?" Certainly there were a number of interesting anecdotes (along with some clever illustrations), but was it really worth the time?
The Consolations of Philosophy is less an examination of the philosophy of six (mostly minor) philosophers and more a curio cabinet of objects collected from their biographies.
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Our Dying Planet: An Ecologist's View of the Crisis We Face / Peter F. Sale -- Berkeley, Cal.: University of California Press, 2011
When one reads the title of Peter Sale's book -- Our Dying Planet -- one immediately thinks of the paramount environmental problem of the day: global warming, but the subject is much broader than this. Sale admirably connects a host of environmental problems to provide a stark picture of the planet's peril. The title is, in all likelihood, an overstatement. Our Declining Planet might be a better title, but given the gravity of our situation, Sale's hyperbole is excusable.
Sale is first of all a marine biologist, specializing in coral reefs. So global warming certainly plays an important part in his analysis of our environmental plight; but more than anything, Sale emphasizes the striking loss of biodiversity that is being caused by more than just climate change. His first chapter is an account of the collapse of fisheries, due mainly to overfishing. Much of this is rather well known, but the extent of the collapse would, perhaps, surprise many. Industrial fishing techniques used in the Northwest Atlantic have decimated the cod population there. In 1968, 1.9 million metric tons of cod were caught, but just 22 years later, in 1990, only 80,000 metric tons of cod were caught. This led the Canadian government to close the northern cod fishery in 1992.
One might expect that with a ban on fishing, the cod population would recover, but it has not. This is perhaps the most sobering message that Sale delivers. During the first 100 years of research into ecosystems, the paradigm of a "balance of nature" was dominant. Populations were seen to be regulated naturally by homeostatic mechanisms. When a population declined, its predators declined and its food sources thrived, creating the conditions for recovery; however, by the later half of the twentieth century, ecologists began to recognize the "patchiness" of nature. Species inhabit a constantly changing patchwork of habitats that are tenuously connected to create metapopulations. Inside these patches, the success of individual organisms in surviving and reproducing is more significant than was previously appreciated. The result is that populations are not "resilient" due to homeostatic mechanisms, but instead, exhibit a kind of "inertia." Large populations will continue until a powerful external force depletes them and once depleted, they will tend to remain in their depleted state. The consequence of this dynamic is that the numerous assaults that we have committed against populations are causing damages that are not repairing themselves, leading to an unprecedented rate of species extinctions. The North Atlantic cod, while not extinct, is but one of many examples of the loss of biodiversity that is occurring around the planet; hence, the "dying planet."
As dire as our circumstances are, Sale provides a few chapters that hold out hope or at least suggest ways to confront the problem. The two primary responses he recommends are to reduce our use of fossil fuels and to slow the growth of the human population. Though his chapter on slowing the growth of the human population is brief, it is clearly his most important concern. Sale writes, "Unchecked population growth presents substantial (I am tempted to say insurmountable) impediments to our need to achieve sustainable use of the earth's goods and services. If those of us who understand this do not speak up concerning our population problem, who else will? I fear we have been complacent for far too long." Given that we are already pressing up against the limits of the world's resources, it is hard to believe that we will be able to support the 9.2 billion people expected to be inhabiting the planet by 2050 and so, it is hard to disagree with Sale.
At a time when climate change is the focus of so much attention, it is useful to look at other ecological problems that we face, though certainly a changing climate will exacerbate whatever harms we are doing to the world's biodiversity. The obvious conclusion is that all of these concerns are interrelated and that we must address them all at once. There is no single policy or approach that will mitigate the coming disasters.
Sale is first of all a marine biologist, specializing in coral reefs. So global warming certainly plays an important part in his analysis of our environmental plight; but more than anything, Sale emphasizes the striking loss of biodiversity that is being caused by more than just climate change. His first chapter is an account of the collapse of fisheries, due mainly to overfishing. Much of this is rather well known, but the extent of the collapse would, perhaps, surprise many. Industrial fishing techniques used in the Northwest Atlantic have decimated the cod population there. In 1968, 1.9 million metric tons of cod were caught, but just 22 years later, in 1990, only 80,000 metric tons of cod were caught. This led the Canadian government to close the northern cod fishery in 1992.
One might expect that with a ban on fishing, the cod population would recover, but it has not. This is perhaps the most sobering message that Sale delivers. During the first 100 years of research into ecosystems, the paradigm of a "balance of nature" was dominant. Populations were seen to be regulated naturally by homeostatic mechanisms. When a population declined, its predators declined and its food sources thrived, creating the conditions for recovery; however, by the later half of the twentieth century, ecologists began to recognize the "patchiness" of nature. Species inhabit a constantly changing patchwork of habitats that are tenuously connected to create metapopulations. Inside these patches, the success of individual organisms in surviving and reproducing is more significant than was previously appreciated. The result is that populations are not "resilient" due to homeostatic mechanisms, but instead, exhibit a kind of "inertia." Large populations will continue until a powerful external force depletes them and once depleted, they will tend to remain in their depleted state. The consequence of this dynamic is that the numerous assaults that we have committed against populations are causing damages that are not repairing themselves, leading to an unprecedented rate of species extinctions. The North Atlantic cod, while not extinct, is but one of many examples of the loss of biodiversity that is occurring around the planet; hence, the "dying planet."
As dire as our circumstances are, Sale provides a few chapters that hold out hope or at least suggest ways to confront the problem. The two primary responses he recommends are to reduce our use of fossil fuels and to slow the growth of the human population. Though his chapter on slowing the growth of the human population is brief, it is clearly his most important concern. Sale writes, "Unchecked population growth presents substantial (I am tempted to say insurmountable) impediments to our need to achieve sustainable use of the earth's goods and services. If those of us who understand this do not speak up concerning our population problem, who else will? I fear we have been complacent for far too long." Given that we are already pressing up against the limits of the world's resources, it is hard to believe that we will be able to support the 9.2 billion people expected to be inhabiting the planet by 2050 and so, it is hard to disagree with Sale.
At a time when climate change is the focus of so much attention, it is useful to look at other ecological problems that we face, though certainly a changing climate will exacerbate whatever harms we are doing to the world's biodiversity. The obvious conclusion is that all of these concerns are interrelated and that we must address them all at once. There is no single policy or approach that will mitigate the coming disasters.
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