Rather astoundingly large-minded vision of the nature of humanity,
civilization, and science, by Borgmann (Philosophy/Univ. of Montana
at Missoula). To recap: As if climbing out of the sea and becoming
a land creature, man now climbs out of the once modern, now
postmodern era into a being that finds him thinning out as he
covers more space. The great thinkers and explorers (Bacon,
Columbus) came, shattered, and remade the past and changed us all
forever. Luther broke the bond to a central authority; Copernicus
decentralized us from the sun; Descartes gave us rational method;
Locke overthrew the rule of kings and headed us toward
individualism and democracy. Then came the rise of industrialism,
as the railroad and the corporation squeezed us into the modern era
and we split up our spiritual center into work, family, and
community, which are now fading before the flood of information
technology, TV, and our privileged classes' lack of interest in the
poor. And we have lost faith, too, while living in our "sullen"
postmodern era, with its rampant individualism and meaningless
institutions. The more we grasp, the more ghostly our lives: "The
hyperintelligent sensorium, just because it is so acute and
wide-ranging, presents the entire world to our eyes and ears and
renders the remainder of the human body immobile and irrelevant."
Borgmann finds hope in once-dying, now reviving Missoula, Montana,
where daily city life has real spaces, real people, real tasks, and
favors a "bodily vigorous, richly connected, and securely oriented
life." It is a place of charms and traditions, festivals and "the
holy game of baseball." The author ends with a ringing of church
bells in his "heavenly city" and calls for all churches to follow
Manhattan's St. John the Divine with its commitment to social
works. Not a light read - and never disingenuous. (Kirkus Reviews)
In this eloquent guide to the meanings of the postmodern era,
Albert Borgmann charts the options before us as we seek
alternatives to the joyless and artificial culture of consumption.
Borgmann connects the fundamental ideas driving his understanding
of society's ills to every sphere of contemporary social life, and
goes beyond the language of postmodern discourse to offer a
powerfully articulated vision of what this new era, at its best,
has in store. "[This] thoughtful book is the first remotely
realistic map out of the post modern labyrinth."--Joseph Coates,
The Chicago Tribune "Rather astoundingly large-minded vision of the
nature of humanity, civilization and science."--Kirkus Reviews
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