Challenging Nature: The Clash of Science and Spirituality at the New Frontiers of Life

Book Description

Biotechnology is the oldest and most widespread of inventions, providing sustenance for humankind since the beginning of civilization. Until recently, however, its tools were crude and its implementation was opaque. Today new understanding in the life sciences brings both precision and transparency to the process. Modern inventions could alleviate human suffering, feed the world, and, at the same time, stem the tide of earth's ecological degradation. Yet ironically, biotechnology becomes evermore contentious. On the left, New Age secularists rail against genetically modified crops. On the right, religious Americans want embryo stem-cell research to be a felony. While they share seemingly little beyond mutual contempt, Silver argues that both political camps are driven -- consciously or subconsciously -- by a fundamental fear of violating a higher spiritual authority, imagined either as the creator God of the Bible, who rules from above, or a vague Mother Nature goddess here on earth.

In Challenging Nature, Silver offers a provocative look at the collision of science, religion, pseudoscience, and politics. A hands-on scientist who has actually manipulated genes, he leaves the laboratory, traveling the globe in what he calls “one scientist's journey from a cloistered community, in which life is assumed to be combinations of complex molecules and information flow between them, to a world of humanity dominated by soul and spirits, and to the intense chaos of Mother Nature at large.” The result is a fascinating book that could provide a wake-up call for the West, where the economic ramifications of pseudoscience may be enormous: a future in which Asia becomes dominant in biotechnological advances.

Customer Reviews:

Accessible and entertaining read.......2007-09-08

Mr. Silver's book was a joy to read. Very engaging and full of information. I would highly recommend this to anyone. It's been a couple of months since I've read this book now, but as I recall I blazed through it pretty quickly.

reductionalism + hubris = Science (with a capital 'S' like a deity).......2007-04-12

Silver goes about to prove that organic-environmentalist types are as 'religious' as fundamentalist Christians. That is an interesting, and perhaps, clever point. Unfortunately, that is where the clever points end.

After that, he goes on to rigorously prove that (1)souls do not weigh 21 ounces, (2)low organ music tones cause 'chills' in listeners, and (3)that robots will someday develop human personality.

This brilliantly illustrates to us that (1)if people held such ridiculous ideas about souls, the very idea of 'souls' must be hogwash! (It might be interesting to note that the aforementioned 21 ounces was not declared by a theologian, but a quack scientist who thought he could make pronouncements) (2) Religious experience is produced from clever music/physical tricks from calculating musicians and their lot (3) If robots can act funny, they now have a human personality and are intrinsically sacred 'humans'...which of course they are not, so that shows there is nothing intrinsically sacred about humans....

There are many more brilliantly logical points revealed in like manner.

Along the way, he describes plenty of gruesome human birth defects and ends with a beautiful elegant hymn to Science and technology and Reason.

Very inspirational reading to any dyed in the wool Materialist who reveres "Science" and is very convinced by the convincingness of his own point.

Worth it for the "gee whiz science" alone.......2007-01-23

Many reviewers have focused on Silver's advocacy positions, which is fine and they certainly are there. But he almost never rants, and his point of view seldom gets in the way of his superb reporting of some jaw-dropping "gee whiz science." Almost no scientific sophistication is required to understand the science he's described, although the science is not dumbed-down, and the book is well worth reading for the science reporting (and explaining) alone.

A brilliant exposition of the clash of science and spirituality.......2006-12-01

In Challenging Nature, Lee M. Silver, Professor of Molecular Biology and Public Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton Univ. and the author of the critically acclaimed Remaking Eden, has written a brilliant exposition of "the clash of science and spirituality at the new frontiers of life."

In explaining the frontiers of modern biotechnology and genetic engineering, or genetic modification (GM), Silver, a hands-on scientist who has actually manipulated genes, offers a provocative and controversial look at the collision of science, religion, pseudoscience, and politics.

The conflict between materialism and spiritualism (science vs. religion, reason vs. faith) is not new to our era, but has persisted for centuries. However, present-day proposals for projects such as embryonic stem-cell research, cloning, and genetically modified food (which may actually be safer than organically produced food) have come under vitriolic attack not only from the "right" (religious fundamentalists and ultraconservative politicians) but also, surprisingly, from the "left" (New Age, post-Christian "defenders" of Mother Nature and Mother Earth). "Nature," says Silver, "can be a bitch."

As a molecular biologist, Silver is a rationalist, secularist, evolutionist, and materialist, or more accurately, a physicalist, for as he points out, the term "physicalism" is preferable to "materialism," since the universe contains both material and immaterial (massless) particles, such as photons, that exert forces on one another.

As a scientist, Silver is galled by the duplicity of those who, operating from hidden spiritualist motives, oppose scientific progress by disguising their religiously motivated politics with pseudoscientific gobbledygook and subtle subterfuge.

One can almost see the steam emanating from Silver's nostrils as he excoriates hypocritical double-speak, the use of code words to be picked up by the "faithful" but calculated to deceive the unwary. He deplores such attacks on science as surreptitious, stealthy, sneaky, and sinister. For example, "Intelligent Design" is "Creation Science" in disguise, a sleight-of-hand change of nomenclature that attempts to give a religious hypothesis the appearance and weight of scientific truth.

Challenging Nature is, among other things, a scathing indictment of the contrarian world view of President George W. Bush's Council on Bioethics, a cabal heavily stacked with religious fundamentalists who, clinging to a spiritualist, literal interpretation of the Book of Genesis (in which man is given an "immortal soul") and who, having little or no training in the scientific method or should know better, seek to block research in science and technology.

Such reactionism reminds one of the story of two men who were riding a bicycle built for two when they came to a steep hill. It took a great deal of struggle for the men to reach the top of the hill, but once they got there, the man in front said, "Man, that was a hard climb!" The guy in back said, "Yes, it was. And if I hadn't kept the brakes on all the way, we would have rolled down backwards."

The villains in Silver's book, who keep their feet heavily on the brakes, are men such as Leon Kass (and most of the other members of President Bush's Council on Bioethics) and Jeremy Rifkin, who churns out volumes of pseudoscience debunking "the hubris of modern science and technology that wants to 'play God.'"

Silver's heroes are men like Charles Darwin, Gregor Mendel, James Watson and Francis Crick, and Richard Dawkins, perhaps the best-known contemporary popularizer of Darwin's theory of evolution.

In the Prologue to Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche wrote: "All beings hitherto have created something beyond themselves. . . . What is the ape to man? A laughing-stock, a thing of shame. And just the same shall man be to the Overman: a laughing-stock, a thing of shame. Man is something to be surpassed. What have you done to surpass man?"

Nietzsche expounds a world view diametrically opposed to that of religious fundamentalists. To the latter, no essential difference exists between 21st-century human beings and Adam and Eve, to whom, according to the Genesis myth, "God breathed into their nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul." According to the Genesis account, after the creation of man, God rested from his works. In other words, Adam and Eve are God's masterpieces, the crown of his creation, and, as such are "finished works" (biologically speaking).

For Nietzsche, writing in the spirit of Darwinian evolution, man is not a finished product but a work in progress. We are qualitatively different now, not only from our simian ancestors but also from Neanderthal man living in the caves of Europe. Moreover, Nietzsche envisions future humans who will have evolved into beings quite different from and superior to us.

A momentous discovery was made a little over half a century ago: "The birth of molecular biology is generally dated to February 28, 1951, the day Francis Crick burst into an English pub with James Watson in tow and exclaimed triumphantly, 'We have found the secret of life!' Undoubtedly, everyone within earshot thought he was a madman, but nearly all molecular biologists today agree with Crick's outrageous claim. The secret lies in the structure of DNA. ... The amazing thing about DNA is that to see its structure [the double helix] is to understand immediately not only how megabytes of genetic information can be encoded within a chemical, but how all living things on earth have reproduced and evolved over the last 4 billion years."

Modern biotechnology provides a marvelous opportunity for health therapies, the prevention and cure of diseases, for improving agriculture and feeding the world's population, and for helping restore the earth's ecosystems. Such felicitous developments, however, will be delayed if atavistic spiritualists keep their feet firmly pressed on the brakes of progress.

Silver points out that biotechnology presents little problem for Eastern religions that believe in reincarnation. In the words of one Buddhist scientist, therapeutic cloning "restarts the cycle of life." Challenging Nature, therefore, is a wake-up call for the West, where the economic ramifications of pseudoscience may be enormous: a future in which Asia, unhampered by the strictures and sanctions of reactionary spiritualist fears and moralistic anger, becomes dominant in biotechnological advances.

Matt Ridley, author of Genome, writes, "[Challenging Nature is] imbued with courage, suffused with humanity, and written with grace." I agree. This is an important book filled with scientific wisdom.

Challenging Christian and Gaian Gadflies at the New Frontiers of Life.......2006-11-01

In "Challenging Nature: The Clash of Science and Spirituality at the New Frontiers of Life" molecular biologist Lee Silver defends science and biotechnology from a perversely orthogonal cabal of retrograde fundamentalist Christians ensnared in faith-based fallacies abetted by progressive Gaia devotees saddled with equally mystical mumbo-jumbo. Silver positions these constituencies as allergic reactions to the increasing explanatory power of science and correctly notes that both viewpoints are spiritually motivated. He forcefully argues that eco-environmentalism simply swaps Mother Nature as a quasi-Goddess for the male God of Abraham. The President's Council on Bioethics - as presently constituted by the Bush administration - is properly excoriated by word and deed as little more than a dysfunctional mélange of befuddled science deniers, who with fox in the henhouse inanity circumscribe the activities of the US biotech community.

Silver succinctly deconstructs the ideological bias underlying essential concepts "like organic, natural, species, human being and life itself" and extends this reasoning to encompass why "nearly every literate person perceives natural as a synonym for good, whereas the opposite idea - unnatural, artificial and synthetic - evokes a reflexive negative reaction." That nature operates by natural selection "red in tooth and claw" (or green in root and branch) is dramatically framed in a pitiless examination of the vicious and unceasing struggles between Amazon rainforest organisms versus the human preference for pastoral Pollyannaism.

After realistically portraying nature, Silver tracks 10,000+ years of human biological manipulation exemplified by prehistoric plant selectors and animal breeders - astute biotechnologists given available means and their success in producing non-familiar crops such as maize and rice, along with animals such as sheep that are naturally implausible. To illustrate the dangers of the illusory "natural, good, safe" trinity Silver incisively contrasts the regulatory treatment and public perception of organic and conventional/biotech farming, along with dubious "vitalistic" claims fringe herbal/homeopathic medicines make against mainstream pharmaceuticals.

Many of the most sensitive topics from a Judeo-Christian perspective are similarly dissected. Silver makes a compelling case for the lack of clear boundaries within and between species, between normal and abnormal embryonic development, and between the life of whole complex organisms and their component parts. In doing so, he demolishes fraudulent fundamentalist Christian assertions on the status of embryos and the fanciful concept of ensoulment. Chimeras (the nearly complete absorption of one embryo by another) and developmental aberrations that result in human monsters with two heads are presented as questions that shatter the smug conceits of faith - not as morbid titillations that mock real suffering.

Silver astutely notes that Asian religions such as Buddhism and Hinduism present few problems for biotechnology since these belief systems don't posit a supernatural creator with a master plan. In these worldviews "scientists playing God" ceases to be a meaningful objection since each spiritual being is responsible for its own future. Should American biotech leadership stumble - and Silver eloquently shows how this would be a socioeconomic debacle with significant quality of life and environmental consequences - the soundbyte sermons of televangelists goading pliant flocks, along with Jeremy Rifkin's postmodern luddite riff-raff, will be ultimately responsible.

As Silver notes, the most responsible thing humanity can do as a species, is to use our emergent power wisely and embrace the tools that modern biotechnology offers to meet challenging problems - such as global warming and loss of species diversity - while minimizing collateral impact. In the process he acknowledges that we will continue to modify nature, just have we have done for millennia. We should be deliberate and thoughtful, but not fearful, as we enter into a new era.

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Challenging Nature : The Clash of Science and Spirituality at the New Frontiers of Life
Lee M. Silver
Manufacturer: Ecco
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OERCTY

Book Description

The study of discrete event dynamical systems (DEDS) has become rapidly popular among researchers in systems and control, in communication networks, in manufacturing, and in distributed computing. This development has created problems for researchers and potential "consumers" of the research. The first problem is the veritable Babel of languages, formalisms, and approaches, which makes it very difficult to determine the commonalities and distinctions among the competing schools of approaches. The second, related problem arises from the different traditions, paradigms, values, and experiences that scholars bring to their study of DEDS, depending on whether they come from control, communication, computer science, or mathematical logic. As a result, intellectual exchange among scholars becomes compromised by unexplicated assumptions.

Average customer rating:

Probably a good book.

Scheduling Theory and Its Applications

Manufacturer: Wiley
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0471940593

Book Description

Covering deterministic scheduling, stochastic scheduling, and the probabilistic analysis of algorithms, this unusually broad view of the subject brings together tutorials, surveys and articles with original results from foremost international experts. The contributions reflect the great diversity in scheduling theory in terms of academic disciplines, applications areas, fundamental approaches and mathematical skills. This book will help researchers to be aware of the progress in the various areas of specialization and the possible influences that this progress may have on their own specialities. Few disciplines are driven so much by continually changing and expanding technology, a fact that gives scheduling a permanence while adding to the excitement of designing and analyzing new systems. The book will be a vital resource for researchers and graduate students of computer science, applied mathematics and operational research who wish to remain up-to-date on the scheduling models and problems of many of the newest technologies in industry, commerce, and the computer and communications sciences.

Customer Reviews:

Probably a good book........1995-12-17

The book is slated for release in January 96, actually. The two co-authors, Coffman and Lenstra, are AT&T Bell Labs heavy-hitters.

Scheduling Theory Single-Stage Systems (Mathematics and Its Applications)

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Scheduling Theory Single-Stage Systems (Mathematics and Its Applications)
V. Tanaev , W. Gordon , and Yakov M. Shafransky
Manufacturer: Springer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Scheduling & E-mail | Microsoft | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0792328531

Book Description

This is one of two volumes devoted to single and multistage systems in scheduling theory respectively. The main emphasis throughout is on the analysis of the computational complexity of scheduling problems. This volume is devoted to the problems of determining optimal schedules for systems consisting of either a single machine or several parallel machines. The most important statements and algorithms which relate to scheduling are described and discussed in detail. The book has an introduction followed by four chapters dealing with the elements of graph theory and the computational complexity of algorithms, polynomially solvable problems, priority-generating functions, and NP-Hard problems, respectively. Each chapter concludes with a comprehensive biobliography and review. The volume also includes an appendix devoted to approximation algorithms and extensive reference sections. For researchers and graduate students of management science and operations research interested in production planning and flexible manufacturing.

Scheduling Theory.Multi-Stage Systems (Mathematics and Its Applications)

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Scheduling Theory.Multi-Stage Systems (Mathematics and Its Applications)
V. Tanaev , Y.N. Sotskov , and V.A. Strusevich
Manufacturer: Springer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Scheduling & E-mail | Microsoft | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 079232854X

Book Description

This is one of two volumes devoted to single and multistage systems in scheduling theory respectively. The main emphasis throughout is on the analysis of the computational complexity of scheduling problems This volume is concerned with the problems of finding optimal schedules for systems comprising several sequential machines. More specifically, attention is largely given in separate chapters to three classical processing systems: the flow shop, the job shop, and the open shop. A final chapter deals with mixed graph problems. Each of the four chapters concludes with a comprehensive bibliography and review. The volume also has an introduction and finishes with an extensive reference section. For researchers and graduate students of management science and operations research interested in production planning and flexible manufacturing.

Symposium on the Theory of Scheduling and Its Applications (Lecture notes in economics and mathematical systems)

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Symposium on the Theory of Scheduling and Its Applications (Lecture notes in economics and mathematical systems)

Manufacturer: Springer-Verlag
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

The principles of project management: Project scheduling, time, cost and resource analysis : theory and its application

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The principles of project management: Project scheduling, time, cost and resource analysis : theory and its application
Andrew Sipos
Manufacturer: ASA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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ASIN: B0006QWLFA

SYMPOSIUM ON THE THEORY OF SCHEDULING AND ITS APPLICATIONS

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SYMPOSIUM ON THE THEORY OF SCHEDULING AND ITS APPLICATIONS

Manufacturer: Springer-Verlag Berlin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000I9YVIK

Book Description

For centuries, classical scholars have intensely debated the "position of women" in classical Athens. Did women have a vast but informal power, or were they little better than slaves? Using methods developed from feminist anthropology, Winkler steps back from this narrowly framed question and puts it in the larger context of how sex and gender in ancient Greece were culturally constructed. His innovative approach uncovers the very real possibilities for female autonomy that existed in Greek society.

Customer Reviews:

very interesting book.......2001-07-29

It's a very readable and well researched book about the sex and gender in ancient Greece.

I recommend it for everybody who is interested in the Greek history, gynaikologia, sexologia, and anthoropologia.

The most interesting thesis for me is the Chapter 2. of Part One ; "Laying Down the Law : The Oversight of Men's Sexual Behavior in Classical Athens",in which Mr. Winkler investigates the meanings of "kinaidos", "katapygon", "pornos" kai "kalos".

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Constraints of Desire: The Anthropology of Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece (New Ancient World Series)
John J. Winkler
Manufacturer: NY
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000MUA238

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