A Portrait of the Brain, Adam Zeman

I picked this one up after hearing Adam Zeman do a section in the New Scientist Live consciousness workshop. Like that event, I found it surprisingly simple. The information was mostly stuff I’d read elsewhere; even on neurology and the biology of the brain, it didn’t really touch on anything I wasn’t already aware of. Definitely a good introduction to some neurological issues and the interrelated nature of body and brain; less so if you’ve already read stuff like Sam Kean’s The Tale of the Duelling Neurosurgeons, or even taken a basic course on neurobiology (e.g. Peggy Mason’s ‘The Neurobiology of Everyday Life’ on Coursera).

I was especially puzzled, though, by the choice Zeman made to refer to psychosomatic/conversion disorders as ‘hysteria’. I checked with a psychiatrist of my acquaintance (hi Mum)… As I suspected, it’s not a word that is really used anymore by anyone credible. I think that’s pretty much because it just has all the wrong connotations, and such a bad history of dismissing mental illness — particularly, dismissing female (mental) illness. We have modern terms for it, Zeman seems tolerably aware that even when a disease has no detectable physical cause, it can be serious and in need of treatment… So this just seems like a really weird choice.

I’m well aware of the brain’s power to create symptoms out of harmless bodily sensations. There’s no doubt that that happens, to greater and lesser extents. But to call it hysteria leaves a bad taste in my mouth, because it has such a history of being linked with dismissing women, seeing women as weak and disturbed, etc, etc.

Overall, way too simplistic a book for me, alas, even though I’m still a layperson. Perhaps a good primer for people new to neurology.

Rating: 2/5

The Parthenon, Mary Beard

I enjoyed Mary Beard’s book on Pompeii, so when I spotted The Parthenon in a deal, I figured it’d be an interesting one. I actually expected it to be a bit more about the Greek context of the Parthenon, rather than going into the afterlife of the building — the use as a church and a mosque, the archaeology and tourism, even the literary responses to it, which is what it actually did. It seemed quite inconclusive about what the Parthenon actually was, though the evidence that might tell us about that is more scarce than you would think. It’s unsatisfying — it doesn’t have an altar, so it’s not a temple? But maybe it is? But?

Still, it is interesting to read about the history of the building as a church and a mosque, as well as a temple. I wasn’t even really aware of how much destruction the Parthenon went through: the iconic modern look is actually due to a lot of restoration.

It was very interesting to read the part about Lord Elgin and the issue of the British Museum’s possession of the marbles he took from Athens. On the one hand, it manifestly helped preserve the sculpture: that which remained in situ is in much worse state. But it’s also so… ugh, so imperial and condescending, to assume that Britain is the best guardian. Paternalistic. And while I like Neil MacGregor’s outlook on the British Museum (at least as expressed in A History of the World in 100 Objects), I’m still torn on the subject of the Elgin Marbles. I love the idea of a world museum, and I like the idea of it being in London — because I can conceivably take a weekend off and go there. That doesn’t mean it’s actually the best location, obviously. Just convenient to me. Not that I can think of anywhere notably better, either; I can’t think of a genuinely neutral, international space.

This book really emphasised that the problem of the Parthenon for us is one of cultural ownership, just as Pompeii can be seen as one of preservation. I wanted more about the Acropolis and the original purpose/usage of the Parthenon, but it seems we just don’t know. Which is kind of fascinating in itself…

Rating: 4/5

Genes, Peoples and Languages, Luigi Cavalli-Sforza, trans. Mark Seielstad

I’ve been meaning to read this for a while — even before coming across it in Steven Pinker’s The Language Instinct — because genes and languages are two interests of mine. I’m not much for statistics and I found it difficult to follow some of the analyses of the data in this book, but fortunately, Cavalli-Sforza and his translator managed to put the conclusions across quite clearly. I’m surprised to see opposition to the idea that the spread of genes and languages can be mapped onto each other fairly closely, with some exceptions; Darwin predicted it, and according to the data here, it’s fairly clear.

I think the book might’ve benefited from a tighter focus, all the same; it seemed like the language chapter/s went off on a tangent somewhat. Still very interesting, and no doubt out of date by now — my edition says 2001 — so I really should look for more up to date stuff.

Rating: 3/5

13 Things That Don’t Make Sense, Michael Brooks

Some of these things are sort of covered in Brooks’ other book, At the Edge of Uncertainty, while others weren’t. There’s a bunch of interesting stuff about extraterrestrial intelligence and the experiments looking for microbial life on Mars, for instance. As with the other book, Brooks gives clear explanations. In fact, reading both books illuminated more about the topics that were in both. Each topic leads to the next in a very logical way, too.

The topic selections are all interesting: life on Mars, the ‘wow’ signal, discrepancies about universal constants…  It may not all be of interest to every reader, but it’s a good selection of scientific mysteries and frontiers. It explores them quite well, without going into too much detail.

Very much a pop science book, suitable for readers of New Scientist and similar publications. Which isn’t surprising, since he was an editor for that magazine!

Rating: 3/5

The Better Angels of Our Nature, Steven Pinker

I better admit up front that I don’t have any intuitive or educated grasp on statistics, and without actually sitting down with the data sets, I haven’t the least idea of whether they’re appropriately chosen, correctly delineated, etc, etc. I do note, though, that Steven Pinker is a respected academic, Penguin are a respected publisher, and I was directed to reading this by another academic. Where he talks about history, he seems to be broadly correct, and his explanation of his graphs and statistics makes sense to me.

Some aspects gave me serious pause, though, equally. The fact that somehow he manages to endorse all his own views and the views of contemporary Western society as the civilising effect, for example. The fact that he dismisses the issues of hate crimes as decreasing, without much examination. (For example, could the fact that trans* people can now pass much better, due to improved medical procedures for transition, be part of the reduction in transphobic violence?) Colonialism gets a pass because it reduced violence, without looking at the economic problems it can cause, etc, etc. I think sometimes Pinker dismisses serious areas of violence based on fairly spurious data like police reports.

I’m not sure if this is a kneejerk feeling in myself — “colonialism can’t be an unalloyed good!” — or whether it’s an actual issue in the data. The problem with reading pop psychology is that you just have to take the author’s word for it, at times. I did laugh at his overly optimistic depiction of the fall of homophobia, though. Apparently queer people no longer have anything to fear, and there’s no difficulty in coming out! Um. I need to have a word with you, Mr Pinker.

The overall thesis that violence is declining, I’m inclined to accept, on balance. When people immediately cry, “look at the events in Paris recently!”, Pinker would have an answer for them about the origin of that violence (it might’ve taken place in Western Europe, but where does the motivating ideology stem from?), and when people say that crime is clearly on the rise based on reportage, that’s definitely an example of the availability heuristic at work. Also, he is talking specifically about violence, not about crime in general — which surely means that non-violent thefts, white collar crime, etc, are not included in his dataset.

While I’m not ultimately sure how much to believe this, I enjoyed Pinker’s discussion of the issues, his potential explanations of the data, and his deconstruction of the violent bases of things like the Bible and the code of chivalry. It’s a heck of a tome, but fascinating, even if you disagree. There’s a lot of criticism out there, but again, because it’s not my field I’d be taking that as much on faith as I have to take this book, so I’m not heading down that rabbit hole.

Rating: 3/5

At the Edge of Uncertainty, Michael Brooks

I picked this up after attending the New Scientist “instant expert” workshop on consciousness. Michael Brooks introduced the lecturers and such, and chaired the Q&A session, and it was mentioned one of his books mentions epigenetics. Well, that’s possibly even more my thing than a workshop on consciousness, so of course I picked it up.

It’s an overview of the parts of science where we don’t quite know what’s happening. Where the story becomes blurred and you definitely don’t teach it in GCSE Physics, because even eminent scientists aren’t sure what to believe. It makes things we take for granted — the Big Bang, hereditary diseases mostly through DNA itself — a little shakier. So Brooks’ account is understandably speculative, just giving us a look at current thought in the field — the big ideas which could change the way we look at the world.

It’s reasonably easy to read, despite the big concepts, and I quite enjoyed it. If New Scientist works for you, then this is about the same level, to my mind. It covers a lot of areas of science and goes in-depth on none, so you certainly don’t need to be an expert. If you are finding the concepts a little difficult, I would suggest reading one chapter at a time and giving yourself time to digest the ideas — I did that with a couple of chapters.

Rating: 4/5

Badgerlands, Patrick Barkham

A mostly interesting, mostly charming look at the twilight world of one of Britain’s iconic animals. It does a good job of going into the history of badgers and discussing why they’re seen as pests, when they started to be rehabilitated, even a little about one of Britain’s more famous badgers (the one from The Wind in the Willows, of course) and his author. It’s part natural history, part social history, and then veers into the modern problem of badger culling, etc.

Quite interesting, but I skipped some chapters because they didn’t interest me, and there was a slight tinge of superiority in Barkham’s attitude in some places.

Rating: 3/5

Catastrophes and Lesser Calamities, Tony Hallam

Cheerful title, I know. It’s about mass extinctions, in theory: not just the really iconic one at the K-T boundary (that’s the dinosaurs), but the end-Permian, and others that have been defined as extinctions, some in more detail than others. I was hoping it would focus on the causes of mass extinctions and the immediate effects on animals, but actually it included a lot of geology and didn’t spend that much time discussing specific extinctions — more like ways we can find those extinctions in the fossil record, and even to what extent we can call these events mass extinctions. (For example, by the time you reach the K-T boundary in the record, most dinosaurs were already extinct and the diversity of species was tailing off.)

It’s a little dry, but not a bad guide; I only really skimmed parts of it, because I know a lot of this info about geology. It is interesting to see some things that people think they know being examined and the foundations weakened, though.

Rating: 3/5

Freaks of Nature, Mark S. Blumberg

The title put me off this right away, the opening chapter helped somewhat because it promised to be more than a parade of curiosities, showing some sympathy and understanding, but ultimately I didn’t feel it did really manage to rise above that. There was a lot of reiteration about ‘circus freaks’, etc, and I don’t think it got past the novelty factor of such cases. There were some rather odd assertions — that the figure of Atlas could’ve been inspired by people with a developmental issue who ended up with a globe of brain matter sticking out from their shoulders, for example; it seems a rather ridiculous idea to me, and I couldn’t find anyone else saying the same thing. And saying Janus could’ve been inspired by cases where faces appear on both sides of the skull — maybe, but I think it more likely it’s a metaphorical depiction arising from what the god was said to do.

The science wasn’t particularly in depth or surprising. I don’t think anyone denies that developmental factors can be as important as genetics during gestation.

Rating: 1/5