The Age of American Unreason | Susan Jacoby | The perils, pitfalls, and causes of...

The Age of American Unreason | Susan Jacoby | Too short, and so full of evidence you'd have to purposefully try to miss it

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The Age of America...

	The Age of American Unreason Susan Jacoby Pantheon, 2008 - 384 pages average customer review:based on 100 reviews view larger image
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The perils, pitfalls, and causes of anti-intellectualism in America

Susan Jacoby's fascinating book,
"The Age Of American Unreason", explains the many causes of anti-intellectualism so prevalent in today's society. She discusses the history of rational thought in this county and why we have veered into the irrational waters of Fundamentalism and why these forces are gaining strength and power. If we are anti-science then we don't believe scientists who warn of the perils of global warming; and if we don't believe in global warming then we won't do anything to combat it.
With humor and insight Ms. Jocoby debunks the myths of the 60's, the appeal of politicians such as George Bush, the impact of television and the Internet on our perceptions and understanding of the world, and the failures of our education system.
I will read it a second time as there are so many important observations that it is impossible to absorb them all in one reading.
This book should be on the reading list of all educators, political leaders, parents, and students. In short, all Americans who care about the rise of unreason in this country should buy, read, and cherish this book.

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Too short, and so full of evidence you'd have to purposefully try to miss it

This is a stunning, if painful, look at our wonderful country. This is mandatory reading for anyone who cares about the state of our nation. It is beautifully and engagingly written. Don't miss it.

Fascinating and very readable

Susan Jacoby has created a fascinating and very readable book. The best sections are in chapters 5, Middlebrow Culture from Noon to Twilight, and 10, The Culture of Distraction. The biggest drawbacks are in her attacks on conservatism and, often unjustified, support of "progressivism", a common replacement term for socialism. One example is her repeated claims that global warming is real scattered all through the book, and especially in chapter 9 Junk Thought. (Global warming, more precisely, anthropogenic global warming may be real, the evidence is seriously inconclusive. The problem is her non-reflective assumption that it is real and only irrationality or ignorance is behind any questioning of it.) Some of her examples of Junk Thought actually are, but others, for example, her attack on Steven Milloy, strike rather wide of the mark, and like her support for global warming make me wonder about her research. As another reviewer has also noted, it is inadequately documented. I definitely recommend it. (I also recommend a collection of essays titled, Dumbing Down: Essays on the Strip Mining of American Culture. It is out of print but not very expensive used. Another good book is Steve Allen's Dumbth.)

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Good read, but flawed analysis

There is a rather easily discerned distinction between someone with standards and a snob. Ms. Jacoby clearly falls into the latter class.

I looked forward to a book detailing the dumbing down of educational standards and the media and the resultant ease in manipulating consumer tastes and public opinion by the powers that be. However, what we are given is a scattershot condemnation of right wing individuals of prominence. Left wing intellectuals receive their share of criticism, but mostly for their underestimation of just how stupid the populace is.

Again, I was prepared to agree with the thesis summarized on the cover. However, if Saturday Review, the New Yorker and Walter Lippmann are considered "middlebrow" sources whose main function is to cause the unwashed such as myself to aspire to higher intellectual attainment, I guess I belong to the class over which Ms. Jacoby despairs.

Unlike several of the other reviewers, I found the cultural history encapsulated in the first part of the book quite readable and worthwhile. However, it is interesting that uncritical acceptance of evolution is the litmus test for a rational outlook. Yet the "Social Darwinists" excoriated by the author as having distorted the valid conclusions of Darwin are themselves "rationalists." Are we not safe to live with the assumption that no one has all the answers, neither the fundamentalist preachers, nor the scientists?

I confess Ms. Jacoby lost me when she dismissed as "mainstream" Peter Paul and Mary singing "If I had a Hammer" at a civil rights demonstration addressed by Martin Luther King. If drawing a crowd automatically means that you are pandering to commercialism and have no legitimate artistic merit, I can only conclude that I have more in common with Britney Spears fans than with Ms. Jacoby. But then, who is left to buy her book?

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long and drawn out for conclusion

The idea was interesting but the book had way to much detail. should have been 200 pages shorter.

reviews: 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, page 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

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