Book review: “The Demon-Haunted World” by Carl Sagan
The full title is “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark” and it’s about the differences between science and superstition.
This is one of the best philosophy books I’ve ever read, and I highly recommend reading it. In fact, I like it so much I picked up a second copy to loan to people because I think it’s an important book to read.
Sagan covers such seemingly diverse topics as witch hunts, UFO madness, hallucinations and prophecy and demonstrates in an engaging way how powerfully they can sway people, yet how easily they crumble before healthy skepticism armed with understanding of the scientific method.
There is a nice variety of topics with enlightening discussion of all, but the overall theme is the importance of the general populace understanding the scientific method and of being skeptical of the claims of those who would have them believe something. Later on he (and co-author Ann Druyan) talk for a few chapters about the decline of science education in the USA, the incorrect but damaging popular perception of science following WWII, the way politics in the USA is trending toward the opposite of that nation’s own core values, and how those things bode ill for the future.
This book is definitely one of my top recommendations for non-fiction reading.
Book review: “Matter” by Iain M. Banks
I look forward to a new Banks novel with more anticipation than any other reading material. His Culture stories are good adventures set in an interesting background full of big ideas. This one is no exception.
That said, I do have a few small criticisms. The biggest one is that the ending is disappointing. I didn’t have enough empathy with what the protagonist characters were feeling during the final showdown, and I felt the question of whether or not they were on the right side needed at least a cursory refresh towards the end. And even with the epilogue, the ending was far too sudden – the climax is identical with the ending here.
The build-up was also pretty slow. It was all interesting and not boring, but things didn’t really start to happen until the last third of the book, and then they happened too fast. The final third felt rushed, as if Banks suddenly realized he’d have to wrap up the story somehow sometime soon but didn’t want to cut any of the earlier material.
I’m also sensing a couple of common themes in the Culture stories: One, Banks loves taking medieval intrigue stories and dropping them into a science fiction background, and two, I get the feeling he works by writing the main threads that lead to the resolution independently and then interleaving them linearly to create the pacing of the build-up part of the story. Maybe that’s a common thing to do and I’m just noticing it now; it’s not a bad thing, just a pattern I observe.
Anyway, rollicking good fun with a couple of nice new megastructures and a strong emphasis on a rarely-seen one. Definitely recommended if you like Banks, but if you like Banks nothing I could say would stop you from reading it anyway.
Book review: “Spaceships of the Mind” by Nigel Calder
Picked this up on impulse during a recent used bookstore crawl. Turns out it’s actually the companion book to a Beeb TV special that I haven’t seen, but it stands on its own just fine.
The material is a little dated but not too much. The author relates the results of interviewing a selection of space travel visionaries and comparing their statements against known science. The general theme seems to be cautious optimism: space travel is really expensive (but dirt cheap compared to, say, any small war) and really difficult, but there is hope in the future, at least for interplanetary travel.
The point is repeatedly made that space is actually abundantly rich with the energy and materials needed to support us; we just need a minimum level of life support and automation to get us to the point where we can capitalize on them. He mentions how a simple solar-powered or nuclear-powered machine can separate raw ore from the moon or any asteroid into its component elements, which a suitably advanced robot factory could then assemble into habitats and spacecraft for us. That part still needs some work, but we’re on it. Materials and manufacturing have come a long way in the last few decades.
He also covers a variety of propulsion methods that can be used to toss canned monkeys around in space. Heavy bias away from chemical reaction engines and towards solar sails, laser launchers, ion engines and fission and fusion explosion drives, which is all good. Even so the conclusion is that moving canned monkeys around even within the solar system is very hard because of our ridiculous life support needs, and interstellar travel is out of the question until we can fabricate habitats large enough to support life self-sufficiently for decades in interstellar space and figure out how to maintain a balanced, closed ecosystem for that length of time.
He also touches on the politics of moving into space, and while he doesn’t dig into it much this is where things get really pessimistic; he hints towards making a case that we have political motivations not to go into space. While establishing industry in space would be good for bringing material and energy resources to Earth, conditions will likely be harsh with Earth-based corporations and governments pulling the strings; there will be a strong motivation for any humans working in space to secede and form their own government. That’s a loss for Earth in terms of trade, capital investment and military safety that will tend to override any initial desire to invest in space industry, or at least will prevent space industry from reaching the necessary population and self-sufficiency levels to become independent. So we need to figure out an inarguable way to motivate ourselves to do this thing, or else we’ll never get off this rock.
So while the book is a little dated, it does still constitute a good discussion of the practical challenges still facing us in our attempt to move outward.
