Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Not at all what I thought it would be. The author goes on and on about his idea of "poetic naturalism", when it seems to me that all it is is an effort to reconcile science with religion and/or nutty new age mysticism. For goodness sake, we get enough of that from the superstitious folks. While there is a lot of good scientific information in the book, it is mixed with quite a lot of New Agey stuff, nods to spirituality and touchy-feely nonsense about "feelings" and "caring", and often the author talks down to us, saying things like "All of these isms can feel a bit overwhelming". Worse, the book often includes passages in which the author seems to be trying to convince a Christian fundamentalist. He puts forward childish fundamentalist arguments as if they're meaningful - for example, in the prologue he talks about how, despite the fact that everything in the universe is just a collection of atoms with no ultimate guiding force, we nevertheless matter - we can have a purpose. Well, I don't think that's exactly a revelation - at least not to any reasonable person, and I really don't think that religious fundamentalists are being honest when they make the accusation that "If God doesn't exist, life is meaningless". So I'm not sure why Carroll feels he has to address with respect the most blatant sophistries and straw man arguments that reactionary religious folks throw at atheists and scientists, but he does, and he does it over and over again. After a while, it just gets tiring. And let's not fool ourselves - this book is never going to be a best-seller in evangelical Christian bookstores. Not gonna happen. Yet it sometimes seems as if this is what the author is hoping for. I suspect his unwillingness to offend Christians is also why he's so careful to avoid mentioning the "G" word. For a long time in the book, he seems to dance around God, as if mentioning the word will force him to confront the issue and alienate anyone who believes in a divine creator. When he does mention it directly, in a chapter called "Abducting God", he seems at first to be defending God, as if it's an idea worth defending. He eventually comes to the conclusion that God is not real - but it seems he does so grudgingly, as if he's consoling his audience, and he hedges his bets right at the end of the chapter, saying "there are biases on both sides". All through the book, it seems he's constantly trying to walk a tightrope between faith and atheism, between science and mysticism, not wanting to alienate anyone. In doing so, he seems wishy-washy and his points are never made with any force. He's trying too hard to please everyone, and in my opinion, all he's doing is making everyone's experience of his book a frustrating one. He NEVER takes a stand - on ANYTHING. Books should not be written in this way. Even more tellingly, Carroll is very careful to avoid the "A" word. He is a "naturalist" and certainly not anything like an atheist. Okay, he does finally admit it on page 431, but for the most part, atheism is far too scary for this author (and, I assume, for his target audience). He doesn't believe in gods, but his preferred word for that is "naturalism", not atheism. Again, we don't want to alienate anyone. This book has to remain a "safe space". The book ends with a section called "Caring" and predictably, this is where the book completely falls apart, lapsing into trite chapters on ethics, morality, emotions, fulfillment, life after death and goodness. There is even a chapter that lists "Ten Considerations" which are supposed to replace the Ten Commandments. Ugh! And the book ends with a chapter called "Existential Therapy" - double-ugh! And readers of this review might think that I'm just against all forms of spirituality. I'm not. I appreciate myths and stories, I feel as uplifted by a beautiful sunset or the full Moon as anyone. I just don't respond at all well when people try to pretend that these things come from some kind of supernatural force, and when an author - especially a scientist - bends over backwards to accommodate a supernatural mindset, it just annoys and frustrates me. The author is a theoretical physicist - I think perhaps he should stick to what he knows: do the science, but leave the spiritualism and the theology alone. I think we need to get away from all that superstitious nonsense anyway. Science shows us a god-free and mysticism-free universe that is far more compelling, beautiful and meaningful than anything proposed by any of the world's religions or anything that new age mysticism puts forward. So let's stop trying to reconcile the irreconcilable.