No comments about Organicism As Reenchantment: Whitehead, Prigogine, and Barth (American University Studies Series V, Philosophy).

No comments about The Correspondance of William James: April 1908-August 1910 (Correspondence of William James).

No comments about Richard M. Weaver 1910-1963: A Life of the Mind.

No comments about Correspondance Generale d'Helvetius, Vol. 3: 1761-1774, Lettres 465-720.

1 comments about Life of Henry David Thoreau.

1. Widespread fame eluded Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) during his lifetime. Posthumous biographies helped to draw attention to his life in Concord and thus to his writings. These books can be shelved into four categories:

   (1) His journals themselves, in addition to his books and essays, provide the closest primary information. Chronologically though, they should be ranked third because they were made available to the public more than 40 years after his death when they were first printed in 1906.

   (2) A few friends and acquaintances released book-length biographies based on their personal relationships with the man. William Ellery Channing's _Thoreau: the poet-naturalist_ (1873) and Frank B. Sanborn's _American Men of Letters: Henry D. Thoreau_ (1882) are the classics.

   (3) Men who were inspired by Thoreau's writings began to correspond with his Concord friends in order to learn more and to write their own books. Examples include the 1890 publications of Henry S. Salt's _Life of Henry David Thoreau_ and Samuel Arthur Jones's _Thoreau: A Glimpse_.

   (4) Everyone who came afterward had to rely on interpretation of all of the writings and letters from those previous categories. The most famous remain Henry Seidel Canby (_Thoreau_, 1939) and Walter Harding (_The Days of Henry Thoreau: A Biography_, 1962).

   Englishman Henry S. Salt (1851-1939) published his first Thoreau biography in 1890, and released a revision in 1896. Neither one sold well. By 1908, he was looking for a publisher to print a third and more complete edition. While he spent the rest of his life in that search, his efforts were to no avail. But he sent a copy of all of his material to Professor Raymond Adams of the University of North Carolina, in the hopes that the professor would be able to use it for publication. Dr. Adams was too daunted when Henry Canby's book was released in 1939, and so Henry Salt's notes were archived with his own. That is, until they were found and reprinted here. The result is the best revision of Salt's meticulous research and correspondence, augmented by minor corrections made by the 20th-century compilers.

   Salt was a genuine Thoreau disciple, and so this biography paints a positive picture of the man. It's probably my second favorite, with Canby's being first. There may still be a few small errors that weren't fixed. (Thoreau's companion on the Minnesota trip was Horace Mann *Jr.*, a title needed to distinguish him from his more famous father.) Overall, though, this book is a welcome addition to the ranks, and we are lucky that the editors found the manuscript, prepared it, and shared it with the rest of us.

No comments about Nietzsche Unpublished Letters.

5 comments about A View from the Year 3000.

1. Michael H. Hart gives his unique view of what the world might be like in the year 3000. This book is well written and quite imaginative. You will enjoy reading this title.



2. An interesting read. I wouldn't agree with some of the predicted technological developements (an easy sex change? - a little too PC) but I still enjoyed the exercise. The 'real' entries were a good review of history. I actually learned a little Chinese history too - enough to make me want to learn more.



3. Educational, thought provoking and thoroughly entertaining. This is a book for all tastes. The non-fiction entries give us interesting and informative profiles of the men and women who have or are shaping our world. The other entries, speculating on the major events of the 21st century and character types behind those events, are as entertaining as they are intellectually facinating and plausible. This is a carefully thought out and well written work whose chapters can be reread and enjoyed in any order. It's a keeper that you don't want to miss.



4. Michael Hart's brilliant imagination takes the reader on a tour de force of history from the great religious, political and scientific leaders of the past to the imagined ones of the future. See how Jesus, Moses, and Mohammed compare with Hitler, Stalin and those yet to come in influence (whether good or bad, history is the judge). Or Newton, Darwin, and Einstein, with the biotechnologists of the 21st century. Fantastic entertainment and erudition. I enjoyed every moment.



5. Dr. Hart presents a unique vision of the future. However, he expects nothing wonderous from artificial intelligence (it is legally banned) and rather little from computers in general. In his world of the future, virtual reality is also banned, but sex change operations flourish--with most people undergoing multiple operations in their lifetime.

   The system of education, too, is curious. First, it must be truly important, because all of his new entries in this book (I think there are fifty five in all) have attended university for a long time. Today, highly educated people attend universities for years after high school, but in the distant days of the future fantastic described by Dr. Hart, it often takes them decades to do so--obviously this arrangement may be more appealing to academics than the population in general. This protracted schooling takes place despite the fact that direct downloading of information from computers into the brain is possible in that world of the day after tomorrow. Explanation for this paradox: downloading of information provides only the knowledge of facts, but no "understanding." One wonders how perfect brainwashing (another idea that Hart describes as almost imminent) can be real when "downloading" can do no more than supply the human brain with facts. Also, people generally work between 20 and 60 years before they retire; in fact, his most influential people after the year 2000 go to school for almost as long as they work afterwards--then they either live in perpetual retirement, or perish in some accident (although there is at least one suicide). This vision of the future of long schooling, important intellectual work, and endless retirement is the academic's utopia.

   One striking feature of Hart's predicitions is that almost everybody who is among the most influential after the twnety-first century comes either from Asia or Africa. As far as I am able to tell, nobody among the most influential people born after the twenty-first century comes from Western Europe. Few of the influential people are people are born outside the earth--mostly in sun-orbiting colonies.

   I think in some sense Dr. Hart's view of the year 3000 is too conservative. By 3000, I expect contact with other civilizations in outer space. (While Dr. Hart states very explicitly his view that life is very rare or nonexistent outside the earth, at least in our galaxy.) I also expect cyborgs, genetically engineered creatures of all kinds, virtually real worlds, and very advanced artificial intelligence, whose knowledge and understanding will surpass by far anything a human being can attain.

   Having said all that, no one can rule out the possibility that mankind will destroy itself before the fantastic world of 3000 is reached--the world is precarious place to inhabit.

2 comments about Mister Buddha.

1. I bought this book because a friend recommended it...I want my $.... back! I read it in 30 minutes...poor, poor, poor grammer and what could have been a very interesting story sadly told in a tiring way!



2. What the author must have done is get together her thoughts collected on bar napkins, paste them together and think this was a story! I agree with the other review...such potential and such a loss!

No comments about William James at the Boundaries: Philosophy, Science, and the Geography of Knowledge (Women in Culture and Society).

No comments about The Story of Philosophy, Pt. 2: The Lives & Opinions of the Greater Philosophers.