While reading day to day on news stories I guess I gravitate to stuff that rings true to my worldview. That's close to universal. Up to a point it's fine
When seeking out nonfiction books, though, I try to get away from my opinions. Or anyone's opinions, really, in the political sense. I have interests, but want to be presented with knowledge I haven't formed an opinion on.
One book I'm currently reading is Narratives of Human Evolution by Misia Landau. It takes a look at early writings on human evolution by Darwin and his contemporaries, as well as the first generation influenced by them, through the lens of story. Vladimir Propp who identified recurring elements of Russian folk tales, is one influence. Landau's thesis is basically that Darwin, and some others, made sense of the fossil record of humanity's evolution by weaving a tale of a hero questing and overcoming obstacles. It's just one view, but an interesting one.
There's also a little on the Piltdown Man hoax, which wound up embarrassing a lot of people but was educational in its own way.
2 comments:
The enjoyment of reading news stories that fit our worldview is common enough for most of us as you say, with the proviso that keeping an open mind provides us with points of view that aren't at all universal. That's definitely been the lesson of this past year when I for one have discovered I'm more comfortable with conservative views than used to be the case.
I've long enjoyed reading books that have segments beyond my ability to really comprehend - like Richard Feynman, for instance. Reading about subjects I never actually studied in youth provides some fascinating and enlightening insights about the larger world that would otherwise be closed to me.
I enjoyed reading Vladimir Propp's analysis of the structure of wonder tales. I'm familiar with The Golden Bough and Joseph Campbell's Hero With a Thousand Faces but I'd never seen Propp's list of fixed functions in order before. Looking at it it's easy to see a number of stories we're familiar with that have followed the form.
I remember the story of the Piltdown Man being discovered as a trick pulled by an amateur archeologist. Another interesting subject in that line has been the crystal skulls of South America. We do love stories and the more mysterious the better we like them. In order to explain and understand our ancestors, we fall back on the narrative format to explain our origins. It's a pretty compelling subject, isn't it?
I've learned over the past year that I had been living in an echo chamber most of the time. It also turned out that it was someone else's echo chamber, not mine. Not sure if that's better or worse. But I do want to be well-rounded enough so that it doesn't happen again.
I haven't read much of Feynman, although he seems like someone I'd like. He said, "The theoretical broadening which comes from having many humanities subjects on the campus is offset by the general dopiness of the people who study these things." Somewhat ruefully, I'd have to note that this does seem to be true. I seem to remember Jerry discovering him.
Propp is pretty new to me as well. I mainly was interested in the idea that early scientists studying the evolution of mankind were on some level going on narrative patterns. Some of them turned out to be more accurate than others, of course, but they needed a framework underneath to make it make sense, especially to non-specialists.
Ah yes, Campbell. I know I've read at least a little of him.
Piltdown Man became popular at least in part due to a degree of British chauvinism. Scientists of the time had a really low opinion of Neanderthal Man, which of course hasn't entirely gone away. English scientists, especially, wanted an ancestor they could admire a little more. It might as well be a British specimen, and that's what they wound up getting.
The crystal skulls work way too well as parlor pieces to have really been anything else. They do have a really striking look.
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