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Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony
This magnificent collection of essays by scientist and National Book Award-winning writer Lewis Thomas remains startlingly relevant for today’s world. Luminous, witty, and provocative, the essays address such topics as “The Attic of the Brain,” “Falsity and Failure,” “Altruism,” and the effects the federal government’s virtual abandonment of support for basic scientific research will have on medicine and science.
Profoundly and powerfully, Thomas questions the folly of nuclear weaponry, showing that the brainpower and money spent on this endeavor are needed much more urgently for the basic science we have abandoned—and that even medicine’s most advanced procedures would be useless or insufficient in the face of the smallest nuclear detonation. And in the title essay, he addresses himself with terrifying poignancy to the question of what it is like to be young in the nuclear age.
“If Wordsworth had gone to medical school, he might have produced something very like the essays of Lewis Thomas.”— TIME
“No one better exemplifies what modern medicine can be than Lewis Thomas.”— The New York Times Book Review
Profoundly and powerfully, Thomas questions the folly of nuclear weaponry, showing that the brainpower and money spent on this endeavor are needed much more urgently for the basic science we have abandoned—and that even medicine’s most advanced procedures would be useless or insufficient in the face of the smallest nuclear detonation. And in the title essay, he addresses himself with terrifying poignancy to the question of what it is like to be young in the nuclear age.
“If Wordsworth had gone to medical school, he might have produced something very like the essays of Lewis Thomas.”— TIME
“No one better exemplifies what modern medicine can be than Lewis Thomas.”— The New York Times Book Review
168 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
56 people are currently reading
942 people want to read
About the author
Lewis Thomas
71 books218 followersLewis Thomas (November 25, 1913–December 3, 1993) was a physician, poet, etymologist, essayist, administrator, educator, policy advisor, and researcher.
Thomas was born in Flushing, New York and attended Princeton University and Harvard Medical School. He became Dean of Yale Medical School and New York University School of Medicine, and President of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Institute. His formative years as an independent medical researcher were at Tulane University School of Medicine.
He was invited to write regular essays in the New England Journal of Medicine, and won a National Book Award for the 1974 collection of those essays, The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher. He also won a Christopher Award for this book. Two other collections of essays (from NEJM and other sources) are The Medusa and the Snail and Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony. His autobiography, The Youngest Science: Notes of a Medicine Watcher is a record of a century of medicine and the changes which occurred in it. He also published a book on etymology entitled Et Cetera, Et Cetera, poems, and numerous scientific papers.
Many of his essays discuss relationships among ideas or concepts using etymology as a starting point. Others concern the cultural implications of scientific discoveries and the growing awareness of ecology. In his essay on Mahler's Ninth Symphony, Thomas addresses the anxieties produced by the development of nuclear weapons.[1] Thomas is often quoted, given his notably eclectic interests and superlative prose style.
The Lewis Thomas Prize is awarded annually by The Rockefeller University to a scientist for artistic achievement.
Thomas was born in Flushing, New York and attended Princeton University and Harvard Medical School. He became Dean of Yale Medical School and New York University School of Medicine, and President of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Institute. His formative years as an independent medical researcher were at Tulane University School of Medicine.
He was invited to write regular essays in the New England Journal of Medicine, and won a National Book Award for the 1974 collection of those essays, The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher. He also won a Christopher Award for this book. Two other collections of essays (from NEJM and other sources) are The Medusa and the Snail and Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony. His autobiography, The Youngest Science: Notes of a Medicine Watcher is a record of a century of medicine and the changes which occurred in it. He also published a book on etymology entitled Et Cetera, Et Cetera, poems, and numerous scientific papers.
Many of his essays discuss relationships among ideas or concepts using etymology as a starting point. Others concern the cultural implications of scientific discoveries and the growing awareness of ecology. In his essay on Mahler's Ninth Symphony, Thomas addresses the anxieties produced by the development of nuclear weapons.[1] Thomas is often quoted, given his notably eclectic interests and superlative prose style.
The Lewis Thomas Prize is awarded annually by The Rockefeller University to a scientist for artistic achievement.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews
April 11, 2018
This book written in 1980 in a decisive moment of cold war reflects well the climate of fear of a nuclear holocaut that could wipe out the humankind.
It is made of a series of essays mainly on the devasting effects of nuclear weapons as in the essay tittled The Unforgetable Fire on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,the absurdity of the strategic MAD doctrine,the investiment in investigating more precise and destructive weapons,a money desrving better use etc.
But the book touchs in its essays many other subjects : as the utmost importance of our unique blue planet,the animal inteligence,the marvel of the olfatory sense, the essential contribution of the children to the creation or evolution of the languajes,the working of lie detector,the necessity of invest more money in fundamental research,the relation not ever understanding between science and humanities (this is my opinión : usually a person with knowledge in humanities but absolut ignorant in science is yet regarded as a educated person,but unfairly ,a person with scientific formation but poor in humanities is regarded as a poorly educated person),the limits of knowledge as for example a really deep understanding of consciousness and more.
In the final essay that gives tittle to the book the autor makes a relation between Mahlers ninth synphony,a synphony covered by the death an the inminence of a nuclear armagedon.
The book as a whole has not aged at all as the nuclear risk is as present as ever ,yet almost forgotten by the media and the people,the book only has aged in minor details as in the 1980s it was belived that the Creutfeld Jackob disease was caused by a slw virus infection,to day we know that it is caused by a deformed protein of a normal protein that is in the brain,when the deformed is put in contact with the normal the normal is deformed in a sort of autoreplicant pathologic protein resolving one of the misteries of medicine.
A interesting and recomended book with a lot of wise meditations on a wide range of issues.
It is made of a series of essays mainly on the devasting effects of nuclear weapons as in the essay tittled The Unforgetable Fire on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,the absurdity of the strategic MAD doctrine,the investiment in investigating more precise and destructive weapons,a money desrving better use etc.
But the book touchs in its essays many other subjects : as the utmost importance of our unique blue planet,the animal inteligence,the marvel of the olfatory sense, the essential contribution of the children to the creation or evolution of the languajes,the working of lie detector,the necessity of invest more money in fundamental research,the relation not ever understanding between science and humanities (this is my opinión : usually a person with knowledge in humanities but absolut ignorant in science is yet regarded as a educated person,but unfairly ,a person with scientific formation but poor in humanities is regarded as a poorly educated person),the limits of knowledge as for example a really deep understanding of consciousness and more.
In the final essay that gives tittle to the book the autor makes a relation between Mahlers ninth synphony,a synphony covered by the death an the inminence of a nuclear armagedon.
The book as a whole has not aged at all as the nuclear risk is as present as ever ,yet almost forgotten by the media and the people,the book only has aged in minor details as in the 1980s it was belived that the Creutfeld Jackob disease was caused by a slw virus infection,to day we know that it is caused by a deformed protein of a normal protein that is in the brain,when the deformed is put in contact with the normal the normal is deformed in a sort of autoreplicant pathologic protein resolving one of the misteries of medicine.
A interesting and recomended book with a lot of wise meditations on a wide range of issues.
April 11, 2020
“We are only now beginning to appreciate how strange and splendid it is, how it catches the breath, the loveliest object afloat around the sun, enclosed in its own blue bubble of atmosphere, manufacturing and breathing its own oxygen, fixing its own nitrogen from the air into its own soil, generating its own weather at the surface of its rain forests, constructing its own carapace from living parts: chalk cliffs, coral reefs, old fossils from earlier forms of life now covered by layers of new life meshed together around the globe, Troy upon Troy.
Seen from the right distance, from the corner of the eye of an extraterrestrial visitor, it must surely seem a single creature, clinging to the round warm stone, turning in the sun.”
Seen from the right distance, from the corner of the eye of an extraterrestrial visitor, it must surely seem a single creature, clinging to the round warm stone, turning in the sun.”
August 19, 2011
An enjoyable read written by a man who likes to think. And better still, he thinks at an analog speed, if you know what I mean. A refreshing phenomenon in the midst of the nanosecond internet digi-world.
December 10, 2012
"Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony" is the title and the last chapter of the book, which contains 24 short, non-fiction essays. Lewis Thomas, a scientist and a medical doctor, especially emphasizes the relationship between science and humanity as well as the destructive power of science in the invention of nuclear weapon. Throughout the book he discusses humanity from different angles, and a nuclear war, obviously linked to the Cold War because the book was published in 1980, was clearly on his mind. Time and time again he emphasizes the importance of basic science research; he also states the importance of some fields that might not be receiving so much attention, such as senile dementia and humanities. His writing is witty, clear, casual, and yet knowledgeable and inspiring.
November 4, 2014
Por lo visto no aprendo. A pesar de que el anterior (y único hasta ahora) libro del autor no me gustó nada, como me compré dos en el VIPS tenía que leerlo.
No es que el libro sea malo. Pero trata temas que no me interesan. No son grandes logros científicos, ni puntos de vista que hagan pensar, ni asuntos que conciernan a todo el mundo. Es como pedirle a un oficinista gris que escriba su opinión sobre la tecnología y publicarla. No sería interesante.
No es que el libro sea malo. Pero trata temas que no me interesan. No son grandes logros científicos, ni puntos de vista que hagan pensar, ni asuntos que conciernan a todo el mundo. Es como pedirle a un oficinista gris que escriba su opinión sobre la tecnología y publicarla. No sería interesante.
September 21, 2025
This collection was written on the other side of the Berlin Wall, the 80s, and it shows. It's fascinating to read commentary on the state of science and the world 40 years on. Without picking this up from the Little Free Library, I probably wouldn't have. In both science and geopolitics, we prioritize contemporary perspectives. I was surprised by the extent Thomas's sentiments resonated despite their age. Half of the essays touch upon the threat of nuclear weaponry. Though I've spent a few years now dreading annihilation, atomic bombs played a relatively minor role. We've remembered that we can destroy each other perfectly well through other means. Still, his arguments – moral, political, scientific, practical, pathetic – feel familiar. How many of us consider ourselves intelligent, correct, yet have spent precious hours of our lives reasoning with the rhetoric that holds no regard for reason? Even when we turn off the stream, the debate continues mercilessly, all participants unwilling.
Thomas's antidote for this weight is wonder. I don't have the mind to practice science. I lack the discipline for repetition or the memory for data. To the extent that I care about science, I return to it to take a hit of curiosity, a high that fades all too quickly. In several essays, Thomas reiterates that the foundation of his practice is to question, and reminds us that for all our certainty, most lack definitive answers. To maintain wonder and bewilderment, to remember the question once an answer would be found. It's a credit to his writing that it reminded me of some questions I had forgotten.
His insistence reminds me how difficult it is to hold onto this state of mind, interest, the idea that you have anything to learn. If it was easy, or obvious, the message would not bear repeating. I suppose I am expressing my own opinion here, my own justification for how I spend my time: curiosity must be cultivated and maintained, the garden that can nourish us even if/when/as the bomb drops.
Thomas's antidote for this weight is wonder. I don't have the mind to practice science. I lack the discipline for repetition or the memory for data. To the extent that I care about science, I return to it to take a hit of curiosity, a high that fades all too quickly. In several essays, Thomas reiterates that the foundation of his practice is to question, and reminds us that for all our certainty, most lack definitive answers. To maintain wonder and bewilderment, to remember the question once an answer would be found. It's a credit to his writing that it reminded me of some questions I had forgotten.
His insistence reminds me how difficult it is to hold onto this state of mind, interest, the idea that you have anything to learn. If it was easy, or obvious, the message would not bear repeating. I suppose I am expressing my own opinion here, my own justification for how I spend my time: curiosity must be cultivated and maintained, the garden that can nourish us even if/when/as the bomb drops.
July 12, 2018
My eldest daughter, who knows me very, very well, gave me this book for my birthday this year. An extraordinary gift.
The essays by eminent scientist and thinker, Lewis Thomas, represent a collective meditation on human life and knowledge from the perspective of 20th century learning. He explores our existential anxiety from an informed and enlightened perspective. Lewis wants to be an optimist, but we can’t ignore that he’s also a realist, which is ultimately very sobering. His elegant essays are a delight to read and to savour. Their timeliness will, I think, make them even more relevant in the century ahead.
Thank you dear daughter!
The essays by eminent scientist and thinker, Lewis Thomas, represent a collective meditation on human life and knowledge from the perspective of 20th century learning. He explores our existential anxiety from an informed and enlightened perspective. Lewis wants to be an optimist, but we can’t ignore that he’s also a realist, which is ultimately very sobering. His elegant essays are a delight to read and to savour. Their timeliness will, I think, make them even more relevant in the century ahead.
Thank you dear daughter!
June 13, 2022
As a whole, I think Medusa and the Snail is a stronger book, but his final few essays in this book and his ones on lying and the brain’s “attic” are, in my opinion, some of his most interesting across the collection.
January 12, 2024
Lewis Thomas' essays are always good, although some of these are a bit dated. On the other hand, some still hit the mark (the fear that new medical discoveries will be overused or abused, for example). The overall theme, though is thermonuclear war.
We've come a long way from 1980, so some essays aged well, while others did not. Still- you have to love the way his mind works.
We've come a long way from 1980, so some essays aged well, while others did not. Still- you have to love the way his mind works.
October 26, 2021
I enjoy these essays. The generation of the language, liberal arts versus science, the urge to be useful: companionable writing and thinking.
December 6, 2011
"This magnificent third collection of essays by Lewis Thomas will both reassure and surprise his many devoted readers. Among its luminous and witty pieces, enthusiasts will applaud 'The Attic of the Brain,' 'Falsity and Failure,' 'On Smell,' a three-page masterpiece on 'Altruism,' as well as many other 'notes of a biology watcher.'
"In further, even more provocative essays, Dr. Thomas explores the federal government's virtual abandonment of support for basic scientific research, and suggests the effects this will have on medicine and science in years to come. Then, in an unanswerable argument, he notes that unimaginably expensive research and development in nuclear weapons continues unchecked, using money, brains, and planning that we need much more urgently for the basic science we have abandoned. 'The dreamy, heavy-lidded, ivory-tower scientists at work on the weapons are also at work on nuclear defense, with all sorts of possibilities on their minds ... well, I claim this is basic research and it should be stopped. Or if it is to be continued, I want in. As a citizen and a sometime scientist, I claim rights to a grant, part of the $200 billion or whatever it is.'
"Dr. Thomas's urgency about the profound folly of nuclear weaponry does not stop there. He considers what the medical profession can and can't do about nuclear warfare -- even its most advanced procedures would be utterly useless or insufficient in the face of the smallest nuclear detonation -- and what we have to learn from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the title essay of this unforgettable book, he addresses himself with terrifying poignancy to the question of what it is like to be young in the nuclear age."
~~front & back flaps
I always feel so deficient what a book seems as if it will fit right in my world view. I share all those sentiments the author apparently illuminated so wittily that not to read this book was to deprive myself of meeting a kindred spirit, learning in depth why the arms race was and is such a detriment to the human condition, etc.
I got through the first two essays, albeit not joyfully. I couldn't stick the third -- I abandoned the book somewhere in its midst. Why? I'm not sure. Well, I was sure and then I read the above and wondered at myself: did I miss all the wittiness and illumination? Evidently I did.
The book was written in 1980, and before I looked that fact up, I could have told you it was outdated, outmoded. It didn't feel cogent, it didn't feel as though it was saying something fresh, saying anything I didn't already know or needed to know. Perhaps his time and mine have simply missed each other -- too soon, too late.
For whatever reason, I simply couldn't finish this book. Life is too short at my age to force myself to death march through a book I don't enjoy.
"In further, even more provocative essays, Dr. Thomas explores the federal government's virtual abandonment of support for basic scientific research, and suggests the effects this will have on medicine and science in years to come. Then, in an unanswerable argument, he notes that unimaginably expensive research and development in nuclear weapons continues unchecked, using money, brains, and planning that we need much more urgently for the basic science we have abandoned. 'The dreamy, heavy-lidded, ivory-tower scientists at work on the weapons are also at work on nuclear defense, with all sorts of possibilities on their minds ... well, I claim this is basic research and it should be stopped. Or if it is to be continued, I want in. As a citizen and a sometime scientist, I claim rights to a grant, part of the $200 billion or whatever it is.'
"Dr. Thomas's urgency about the profound folly of nuclear weaponry does not stop there. He considers what the medical profession can and can't do about nuclear warfare -- even its most advanced procedures would be utterly useless or insufficient in the face of the smallest nuclear detonation -- and what we have to learn from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the title essay of this unforgettable book, he addresses himself with terrifying poignancy to the question of what it is like to be young in the nuclear age."
~~front & back flaps
I always feel so deficient what a book seems as if it will fit right in my world view. I share all those sentiments the author apparently illuminated so wittily that not to read this book was to deprive myself of meeting a kindred spirit, learning in depth why the arms race was and is such a detriment to the human condition, etc.
I got through the first two essays, albeit not joyfully. I couldn't stick the third -- I abandoned the book somewhere in its midst. Why? I'm not sure. Well, I was sure and then I read the above and wondered at myself: did I miss all the wittiness and illumination? Evidently I did.
The book was written in 1980, and before I looked that fact up, I could have told you it was outdated, outmoded. It didn't feel cogent, it didn't feel as though it was saying something fresh, saying anything I didn't already know or needed to know. Perhaps his time and mine have simply missed each other -- too soon, too late.
For whatever reason, I simply couldn't finish this book. Life is too short at my age to force myself to death march through a book I don't enjoy.
June 24, 2021
Equal parts hopeful and dreadfully sad. Sad because the state of the world has largely remained the same or gotten markedly worse since this was written in the 80's. Hopeful because, if these topics were pondered before - before the internet, before cell phones, before social media - they will be (and are) pondered again and amplified (I hope) to a newer generation of people who give a shit.
December 26, 2017
I have owned this book for two decades, and its essays certainly touch upon several of the key insights that I have championed through most of my professional life. 1) Thomas argues strenuously and earnestly that nuclear weapons research and development was/is a fool's errand - with every dollar thus invested in enhancing "national security," our actual state of insecurity is the only thing that increases. 2) He rails against the hegemony of quantification as the too-fashionable signifier of "understanding." 3) He calls for an end to the false debate between the two cultures (science and humanities), and instead demands that scientists and humanists once again collectively embrace the central truth of human ignorance - we have barely scratched the surfaces of what there is to know, and that reality should be far more celebrated as an inducement to the adventure of inquiry than anyone's standard training in any of the disciplines tends to emphasize.
Despite all the consonance between my personal convictions about politics, history, science, technology, and the views that Lewis Thomas promotes, I find the experience of reading his essays now (all of them were composed in the early years of the Reagan presidency) to be a little dispiriting. These mostly timeless insights feel somehow "dated," and even come across as clumsy when delivered through his righteous tone and didactic prose style.
Despite all the consonance between my personal convictions about politics, history, science, technology, and the views that Lewis Thomas promotes, I find the experience of reading his essays now (all of them were composed in the early years of the Reagan presidency) to be a little dispiriting. These mostly timeless insights feel somehow "dated," and even come across as clumsy when delivered through his righteous tone and didactic prose style.
April 17, 2023
This collection of essays by a deceased scientist-philosopher (former head of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Institute) is not only charming but at the same time terrifying. The threat of a "tactical" nuclear war that becomes global is still with us, perhaps more so than in 1983, when the late Lewis Thomas first sounded this warning. He sums up the doomsday scenario most vividly in his opening essay, "The Unforgettable Fire" and in the closing chapter. Some 30 years after his death, the warmongers are still at it. It's anyone's guess as to which generals in the U.S. or Russia or elsewhere may still be lobbying for a first strike, and against whom. Calls for disarmament or arms limitation have all but disappeared.
Some may say why worry if we are powerless to control suicidal nationalism. Others may still nurse hope of saving the planet for future generations. Those put off by Thomas's overriding pessimism about war can find respite in some of his gentler essays. They deal with such topics as altruism, dementia, ecology, organ transplants, computers, and the history of language. Those of a religious bent may console themselves with prayers that a merciful Creator will save us from ourselves.
Some may say why worry if we are powerless to control suicidal nationalism. Others may still nurse hope of saving the planet for future generations. Those put off by Thomas's overriding pessimism about war can find respite in some of his gentler essays. They deal with such topics as altruism, dementia, ecology, organ transplants, computers, and the history of language. Those of a religious bent may console themselves with prayers that a merciful Creator will save us from ourselves.
June 2, 2012
I first read Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony in high school. Thomas was a medical doctor, cancer researcher, and contributor of short essays about medicine and science to the New England Journal of Medicine and other publications. This included some of those, but also had other essays about nuclear war and the arts and humanities.
It is in some ways a period peace as during the mid 1980s Thomas was seriously worried about the prospect of nuclear annihilation at the hands of Ronald Raygun or the evil Soviet Empire that only lasted for about 5 years after this book was published. The title essay refers to Thomas no longer being able to listen to this symphony without imagining the end of life on earth. It seems quaint to have that belief now, but it was a real fear 25 years ago. Late Night Thoughts is a beautifully written book. Thomas' work is one of the reasons I enjoy the essay so much as a literary genre.
It is in some ways a period peace as during the mid 1980s Thomas was seriously worried about the prospect of nuclear annihilation at the hands of Ronald Raygun or the evil Soviet Empire that only lasted for about 5 years after this book was published. The title essay refers to Thomas no longer being able to listen to this symphony without imagining the end of life on earth. It seems quaint to have that belief now, but it was a real fear 25 years ago. Late Night Thoughts is a beautifully written book. Thomas' work is one of the reasons I enjoy the essay so much as a literary genre.
November 11, 2008
I recently read this collection of essays while listening to David Sedaris's newest essay collection, When You are Engulfed in Flames. While the two books are nothing alike, I enjoyed them both. Thomas obviously loves language and science. His love of science can actually make a reader lament not pursuing science. I am making it a poing to pick up more of Thomas's work. I originally, like my Goodreads friends LeAnn and Chris, read this book for a high school class. It remains a good read today.
January 11, 2009
I read this in high school. Thomas was a medical doctor, cancer researcher, and contributor of short essays about medicine and science to the New England Journal of Medicine and other publications. This included some of those, but also had other essays about nuclear war and the arts and humanities. An beautifully written book. Thomas' work is one of the reasons I enjoy the essay so much as a literary genre.
January 23, 2014
This is an insightful series of essays ranging from the deadly serious opener, "The Unforgettable Fire", to the tongue-in-cheek "On Smell", to the exhortative "The Problem of Dementia". Thomas discusses biomedical science, thermonuclear weapons, the evolution of language, and much in between. While some of his essays feel dated, the issues and ideas are still largely relevant in 2014.
October 26, 2014
This book of essays published in 1983 is a series of meditations on science, philosophy, and art and is surprisingly prescient. so much of what he discussed is relevant to today. I was very happy to have read this. Actually I picked it out of my shelves because the 9th is special to me (The Resurrection Symphony).
April 1, 2012
I read this book in my early 20's, and it created quite an impression, because I'm almost 50 and still it comes to mind when I list, in my head, books I've read. I'd like to find a copy and re read it.
December 31, 2013
I read this first in the early 80's and just re-read it. While a few essays are out-dated, others have one wondering how he could read the future as clearly as he did, and seem more urgent now than ever.
September 2, 2007
Well -- that didn't work -- read this one as it was a reading list selection for CR -- as usual a good experience.
Want to read
March 4, 2012I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/10488589
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/10488589
April 14, 2012
The essay on "Altruism" was my first real introduction to sociobiology. It was a personal moment of epiphany for which I will always be grateful.
October 15, 2024
Lewis Thomas first copyrighted this book of short essays in 1980. Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as POTUS, the cold war was full on, and many people were feverish about the ramp up of nuclear weapons as a deterrent to war. Thus, Lewis Thomas a scientist in the field of medicine used this medium to vent his frustration with the distorted priorities of geopolitics. He expresses all the ways the billions of dollars could be better spent and some wacky but much cheaper alternatives to building the military industrial complex of the time.
He also explores some fascinating biological phenomena involving certain species such as bees and ants and how they coordinate a peaceful and productive existence. Today, we'd call it a classist society but it's fascinating just the same.
Thomas's treatises are not all downer on humanity though. In the chapter entitled "On Matters of Doubt" he he describes:
Unfortunately, he sways back into discouragement and fear in the last chapter that shares the title of the book and revisits the specter of nuclear holocaust. I'm sure that shocking readers into anti-war action is part of his mission but he missed an opportunity to end on a high note of optimism.
-jgp
He also explores some fascinating biological phenomena involving certain species such as bees and ants and how they coordinate a peaceful and productive existence. Today, we'd call it a classist society but it's fascinating just the same.
Thomas's treatises are not all downer on humanity though. In the chapter entitled "On Matters of Doubt" he he describes:
"...one central, universal aspect of human behavior, genetically set by our very nature, biologically governed, driving each of us along...it can be defined as the urge to be useful. This urge drives society along, sets our behavior as individuals and in groups, invents all our myths, writes our poetry, composes our music."
Unfortunately, he sways back into discouragement and fear in the last chapter that shares the title of the book and revisits the specter of nuclear holocaust. I'm sure that shocking readers into anti-war action is part of his mission but he missed an opportunity to end on a high note of optimism.
-jgp
February 10, 2019
Doctor Lewis Thomas’ scientific credentials are significant, but his greatest skill is in writing about the humanistic aspects of science and medicine. In this book, he once again demonstrates that fact. When I came to a chemistry class one day with one of his books, after looking at it the professor said, “That man is a poet.” The reason why I had the book was because a biology professor recommended it. They were both right and in fact understated Thomas’ skills.
The book contains a series of short essays about science, medicine, and the role of biological processes in the world. Thomas demonstrates his sheer wonder at some of what has been discovered about life. From animal behaviors that seem inexplicable regarding how they could possibly have emerged, to how a few termites together are clueless and lack direction, yet beyond a threshold they become intelligent enough to create a hive, to bacteria living in thermal vents deep in the ocean that are killed when the water temperature is lowered to that of boiling water. The potential warming of the planet due to human carbon dioxide emissions is also mentioned several times.
If the situation were ever to occur where I was given the opportunity to teach a course in humanistic science, it would be based on the writings of Lewis Thomas. I encourage everyone to read his works. He is so good that you don’t have to understand the science to know what he is talking about when he is talking about science.
The book contains a series of short essays about science, medicine, and the role of biological processes in the world. Thomas demonstrates his sheer wonder at some of what has been discovered about life. From animal behaviors that seem inexplicable regarding how they could possibly have emerged, to how a few termites together are clueless and lack direction, yet beyond a threshold they become intelligent enough to create a hive, to bacteria living in thermal vents deep in the ocean that are killed when the water temperature is lowered to that of boiling water. The potential warming of the planet due to human carbon dioxide emissions is also mentioned several times.
If the situation were ever to occur where I was given the opportunity to teach a course in humanistic science, it would be based on the writings of Lewis Thomas. I encourage everyone to read his works. He is so good that you don’t have to understand the science to know what he is talking about when he is talking about science.
July 2, 2017
This collection is notable for its repeated laments of the insanity of nuclear arsenals--and the Cold War, though I agree with the book's cover that Thomas's essays remain relevant now. This adds a note of righteous rage. But the overall emphasis is still on embracing ambiguity, accepting bewilderment, and even on starting the teaching of science by showing what we are most ignorant of. But still, there is also the defense of the scientific method, or at least the quest for good answers, and new questions. Although in fact he questions the wisdom and utility of separating humanism from science and social science, and laments the tendency of any and all subjects to find the (in some areas) settled quantitative ground of physics.
October 19, 2024
This was a really interesting read. Published in 1995, the nuclear arms race was still incredibly relevant and fresh in everyone’s mind. I would say about half of the essays were about nuclear weapons. I liked reading it 30 years later and getting a glimpse into the anxiety, anger, intrigue, frustration, and fear of the scientific community during this time.
He ended with an essay exploring how he would feel if he were 16 or 17 at this time in human history. He said he would likely lose hope. It felt applicable to being a teen during the golden age of climate change, feeling all of those emotions about how the most powerful people in the world were treating the most pressing global issue.
It was also just beautiful prose. I like books that feel a bit like you’re reading poetry.
He ended with an essay exploring how he would feel if he were 16 or 17 at this time in human history. He said he would likely lose hope. It felt applicable to being a teen during the golden age of climate change, feeling all of those emotions about how the most powerful people in the world were treating the most pressing global issue.
It was also just beautiful prose. I like books that feel a bit like you’re reading poetry.
April 19, 2020
What a book! The only thing slightly outdated is the immediacy of Cold War nuclear annihilation in 1980, but his concerns with nuclear arms are still relevant today... as are all his wonder-filled musings on music, consciousness, altruism, collective collaboration, and the interconnectedness of nature.
He is well aware of the shortcomings of science to explain any of it completely and warns against the hubris that often accompanies scientific discovery... Which in his view is only supplanted a year or decade later by something totally new (quantum physics, for one). Delightful and ever so readable. He reinforces that science is about the quest instead of conquest!
He is well aware of the shortcomings of science to explain any of it completely and warns against the hubris that often accompanies scientific discovery... Which in his view is only supplanted a year or decade later by something totally new (quantum physics, for one). Delightful and ever so readable. He reinforces that science is about the quest instead of conquest!
September 11, 2022
Some of these essays felt outdated (which is to be expected from a book discussing “contemporary issues” published 40 years ago). But some things are timeless and there was some good food for thought nevertheless. I loved when, admitting what biology doesn’t know, Lewis inadvertently lent strength to the creationist perspective. And though he sometimes seems a little contradictory (“Science doesn’t know everything,...but probably will soon enough”), I appreciated his willingness to even admit there’s more to learn, which to me often seems lacking in the scientific community. Overall, I’m glad I took the time/put forth the effort to read these essays.
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