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14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Powerful, May 14, 2011
This review is from: The Fair Society: The Science of Human Nature and the Pursuit of Social Justice (Hardcover)
This is a powerful book. It answers the critical and timely question: what should replace the shambles of pure socialism and unfettered free market capitalism? So many books that fall into the same category are utopian and myopic rather than grounded/policy driven and thus fall short on many counts. The Fair Society was obviously instructed by robust thinking on many aspects of human society and does not strive to attain some fixed and abstract ideal. Instead, Corning's ideal of fairness aims to mitigate the mundane suffering of the masses through social justice (rather than 'liberate' them). It focuses on improving what he calls the "collective survival enterprise," a kind of "we're all in this together" view of human society grounded in basic needs such as food and shelter. I agree this view is a more accurate reflection of the realities of highly interdependent post-modern societies than the "stay off my lawn" worldview of libertarianism, a favorite target throughout the book. The thing that impressed me most about the book, aside from the prolific citations and references, was Corning's thorough contemplation and rejection of both idealized capitalism and socialism: "Neither the rational, calculating, egoistic Homo economics nor the cooperative, caring, altruistic 'socialist man' can encompass the dualities and the diversity of human-kind. All the evidence suggests that a more nuanced and complex view of human nature is essential" (143). While the book treads ancient paths by looking for a political and economic philosophy to manage increasingly large and complex human communities by looking towards human nature, it treads new ground by rejecting this dichotomy (and thus the tired conclusions engendered by it). This is extremely welcome, especially in a time of hyper-partisan, historically untethered news cycle mumbo jumbo and truly incredible public ignorance about the nature of economic behavior. I could write considerably more, especially after just having finished it, but will end by wholeheartedly recommending a book that delivers in breadth, depth and sheer force of argument timely conclusions on subjects of high importance.
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19 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"We'll start the war from here.", March 9, 2011
This review is from: The Fair Society: The Science of Human Nature and the Pursuit of Social Justice (Hardcover)
This is a spectacular book, but the best aspect of this book is that Professor Corning begins his argument at exactly the right place: "We have been witnessing the emergence of a full-blown "science of human nature," a diverse effort involving many disciplines, including evolutionary biology, neurobiology, behavioral genetics, human ethology, several branches of psychology, anthropology, economics, sociology, political science, and even the study of animal behavior. This broad, multidisciplinary effort is providing us with new insights and new perspectives on some ancient questions, and (I will argue) definitive resolutions to some long-standing philosophical and ideological debates. In a nutshell, we are beginning to get a fix on the deep structure of human nature." Indeed, Corning goes on to call this new social contract a "biosocial contract" and, as he states, "To summarize this new vision very briefly, the ground-zero premise (so to speak) of the biological sciences is that survival and reproduction constitute the basic, continuing, inescapable problem for all living organisms: life is at bottom a "survival enterprise." (Darwin characterized it as the "struggle for existence.") Furthermore, the problem of survival and reproduction is multifaceted and relentless; it is a problem that can never be permanently solved. Thus an organized, interdependent society is quintessentially a "collective survival enterprise." To borrow a term from sociobiology, it's a "superorganism." This taproot assumption about the human condition is hardly news, but we very often deny it, or downgrade it, or simply lose touch with it." Despite coming in at just under two-hundred pages, Professor Corning's book reads like a veritable who's who of the scientific and economic community. The following individuals are mentioned at least once, if not more: Abraham Maslow, Stanley Milgram, Ernst Mayr, Richard Dawkins, Jared Diamond [Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies], Garrett Hardin [ Living within Limits: Ecology, Economics, and Population Taboos], Malcolm Gladwell, Steven Pinker [ The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature], Michael Gazzaniga [ Human: The Science Behind What Makes Your Brain Unique], John Tooby, Leda Cosmides, Barbara Ehrenreich [ Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America], James K. Galbraith [ The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too], and Paul Krugman [ The Return of Depression Economics and the Crisis of 2008]. Furthermore, there is a great discussion of ideas descended from Plato and Aristotle, the Harappan/ Indus civilization and ancient Athens, as well as the political beliefs of such notables as Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, and Rand. Also, there is brief mention of the multiple disciplines from which Corning draws his insights. They are Animal Behavior, Anthropology, Behavioral Genetics, The Brain Sciences, Evolutionary Psychology, Experimental and Behavioral Economics. I especially appreciated his discussion of the research conducted by Herbert Simon, Eric Beinhocker, George Akerlof, Robert Shiller, Herbert Gintis, Ernst Fehr, Robert Axelrod, Samuel Bowles and Ken Binmore. Corning certainly did a fine job of explaining the divide between Homo Economicus and Homo Reciprocans. Without a doubt, Peter Corning is one of the most well read individuals in academia; and one would need a great deal of evidence to overturn his fundamental arguments. Here are just a few of the more insightful quotes in the book: "A sense of fairness is a personality trait that is evidently not equally distributed, which is one reason there are so many fairness issues surrounding us."..."Human nature is rooted in our prehistory as a species: we were shaped in the pressure cooker of human evolution...Our ancestors, like ourselves, benefited from close cooperation with others in providing for their basic survival needs."..."All the evidence we have about human nature indicates that reordering society without regard to the competitive aspect of our evolutionary heritage is biologically unsound."..."It's also important to remember that every new generation needs to learn tolerance and civility, because the evidence shows that we are born with socially polarizing predispositions."..."The task that now lies before us, therefore, is to move beyond the clichés about capitalism and socialism and reboot the public philosophy with a better grounded vision of human nature and the underlying purpose of a human society." In conclusion, this is a great book with wide appeal and application. Most importantly, I feel like Professor Corning has made an airtight case that is empirically indisputable: "Nobody can say we haven't been warned. From Plato and Aristotle to the latest game theory models, it should be clear by now that a harmonious society depends, absolutely, on fairness and social justice." I enjoyed this book so much I am going to go back and read Corning's previous book, which he touches upon briefly, Holistic Darwinism: Synergy, Cybernetics, and the Bioeconomics of Evolution. I think another good book that really delves into the perils of extreme inequality is The Haves and the Have-Nots: A Brief and Idiosyncratic History of Global Inequality, which would help the interested reader in seeing further many of the issues the Professor Corning discusses (especially in detailing the shortcomings of capitalism and socialism).
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11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Useless reccomendation based on shaky misunderstanding, August 17, 2011
This review is from: The Fair Society: The Science of Human Nature and the Pursuit of Social Justice (Hardcover)
This is a VERY dissapointing book. The author makes a series of extremely basic mistakes in his understanding of economics and Darwinian evolution. He makes the classic naturalistic fallacy (I think that's the word; sorry, my English is sometimes a bit shaky). He has no consideration for emergent charcteristics. As a result, the analysis is bland. Because of his weak logic, he has to rely on "Big shots said so" quotes, which makes the book boring. And the reccomendation is truely childish. FYI, I answered "No" to most of the questions at the end of Chapter 2. According to the author, this should mean that I have a quite accute sense of fairness, and that I should agree to everything the author says. Too bad, I didn't. The author starts with the argument that the world today is too unfair and unequal. This is true. Although he adds nothing new to the argument, his points are valid. And he says that we should go for a more fair and equal society. Great. His points are well taken. But after that, his arguments become completely unconvincing. His first argument is that people are naturally hard-wired to favor fairness and equality. So, he says that we should go for a fairer society. But this is a classic example of naturalistic fallacy. Just because people have a natural tendency to do something doesn't make it right, or desirable. Also, it begs the question; if people like equality and fairness so much, why isn't the world already so? His answers are murky. He says that in order to survive, people had to be selfish at times. Oh. so I guess the fairness instinct isn't too strong after all. He quotes game theory, like the ultimatum game, to show that poeple naturally LIKES cooperation and reciprocity. Yes, but then the question arises again. If they like it so much, why aren't we in a super fair society? He doesn't have a convincing explanation. So he tries to place the blame on theories that promote selfishness and inequality. His culprits are, Evolutionary biology and economics. This is where his complete misunderstanding shows up. Evolutionary biology doesn't promote or justify complete selfishness of the individual. On the contrary, it tells you that because of the selfishness at the gene level, the individual organism can and will show alturistic and cooperative behaviour. ANY Dawkins reader should understand that. The author doesn't. He makes the same mistake with economics. Adam Smith said that when selfish individual interact to maximize their profit, it would lead to cooperation and reciprocity. Monopoly is bad, fair competiton among equal promotes the best results. Much of modern economics deals with how to make markets work efficiently, ie, create a foundation for FAIR competition. The author insists that it promotes greed, unfairness, screw-everyone-else attitude. It doesn't. Of course, how far regulations should go is a matter of debate, as the author points out in his comparison with communism... but he doesn't have any clear idea about the optimal level of regulation. So, he doesn't have any coherent explanation about WHY the world is unfair and unequal. His argument is that when people started to save and hoard for the future, that is when unequality arose. Sound like Pol Pot. The author does point out issues about communism, but it's not really well thought out. The whole problem seems to be that there are greedy people. But according to the author, people should be naturally cooperative and fair. What gives? In order to support the argument that cooperation is good, and alturism is great, He goes on to quote a huge number of philosophers and social thinkers. However, that's really pointless. Not many social theory or movements promote COMPLETE selfishness or unfairness. So if we take out bits and pieces, ANY social idea would fit into it. As a result, the book becomes a laundry list of social thinkers and nice quotes. So, was there anything valid in his observations? Nothing much. Just a collection of nice quotes. And then, what's his recommendation? He argues that if we all try to be a little more fair to each other and try a bit more toward a more equal society, then the whole society would be better. First of all, this reccomendation is almost useless. What is more fair and equal at the individual level? Maybe I shouldn't haggle down prices too much at the market... but then that may lead to higher living costs that would hurt the poorer people. It's hard to tell the consequenses of individual actions. And when it comes to collective action, the story is even unclear. As seen in the Adam Smith and Evolutionary idea, the selfishness of the individual can create cooperation and alturism in the society. And Keynes shows that when everyone tryes to hold on to a bit more cash, the collective result is a recession where everyone gets LESS cash. The point is that the characteristics of a society is often an emergent property, that could be totally opposite of the individual tendency. So if everyone tries to be more fair, would the society become more fair? Maybe not. You really can't tell. I can't believe the author has a biology background, or that he can be a boss of some big institution. His understanding of everything in the book is so shaky, his reccomendation so unpractical and questionable, This book it totally useless. Not reccomendable.
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