Biology, Sixth Edition – by: Neil A. Campbell and Jane B. Reece (2002)

   This is a large (over 1300 pages) college Biology textbook. I asked a friend to order it for me since it was one of the texts most frequently referenced as “Essential Reading” along with the DVD Biology course I signed up for (*). The course itself is dated ten years, so I knew this would be an outdated edition (the current edition is on something like nine or ten) and hence VERY affordable (this edition cost less than $15, and that includes shipping, while the newest edition probably costs hundreds of dollars).

   It’s a beautiful book, and already has made the biology course I’m taking dozens of times more interesting (and informative, which for me is practically synonymous with interesting).

   (*) The prison education department provides the DVDs (and DVD player) only, without any accompanying books or other study materials.

Note: This is another book that I have not yet read, though I certainly intend to read most of it. I list it here because it has already become an important part of my life, and I expect it to remain so for some time to come.

The Gaia Hypothesis: Science On A Pagan Planet – by: Michael Ruse (2013)

   I asked for this book and received it as a gift from a friend who bought a copy for herself to read along with me. That made me a little self-conscious as I read because I kept thinking how dull this book must seem for my friend. It’s the kind of book I actually enjoy though. Not because it’s a pleasure to read --- it’s not --- but rather, because it’s full of information and perspectives that was new to me.

   Don’t get me wrong; I knew about as much as most people about the Gaia hypothesis to begin with. I also knew that the idea of Earth as a living organism has been around for thousands of years. But, what I didn’t know, and found very interesting, was the specific socio-political forces that tugged and pulled at the very concept of a living planet in our modern age. The details were insightful, and significant to me as a wanna-be philosopher.

   No real surprises though. The information merely added to and supported my previous experiences with how ideas play out in the mind of society. I should write my own book someday about how we think collectively, and about how those collective thoughts are expressed in our individual lives.

   Maybe I will, if Gaia lets me.

Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion: Eastern and Western Thought, New and Enlarged Edition – by: William L. Reese (1996)

   I normally only list books here that I have actually read completely, but this book has proven to be such a valuable reference book for me that I feel listing it is only appropriate.

   I refer to this book almost as much as I do to my dictionary while I am reading. No doubt this is because much of what I read has a philosophical and/or religious bent. In fact, no one recommended this book, nor did I find some reference to it somewhere. Instead I just reasoned, there must be some kind of dictionary of philosophy and religion out there for someone like me who casually reads so much of it. And I asked a friend to search Amazon for any and this was the only such book she found.

   I didn’t like not having several to choose from, but upon receiving, and consequently using this book it has well earned my respect and appreciation. My education in philosophy and religion, while more extensive than most, is informal and hence full of holes. This book helps tremendously to fill in those gaps.

Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain - by David Engleman (2011)

Another prisoner here on death row lent this book to me after he found out I like reading about how the brain works. Ironically one of my attorneys had offered to order the same book for me about a year ago, but I deferred his offer at the time because I already had a stack of good books that I needed to read (and still do). So I guess this is one of those books that I was just meant to read.

I enjoyed this book thoroughly. Despite the unfair (and deceptive) criticism I read that was written by some other neurologist, Engleman does a fair job of presenting complex brain science in layman's terms. Yes, he glosses over some stuff that a scientist might think important, but the book is not written for scientists, so to critique him for this is not just unfair, it's pretty lame. For the lay person this book is informative, well written, and ingaging. Though I strongly disagree with Engleman's conclusions in regard to how neuroscience could be applied to criminal law (he almost completely ignores the sociological aspects of criminal behavior), he at least confines this discussion to one chapter; and I don't disagree with the need for more behavioral science when it comes to criminal law (as opposed to the pseudoscience that isn't science at all though it currently dominates our criminal justice philosophy). I mostly just abhor the idea of using behavioral statistics to determine how someone is treated after committing a crime (i.e. locking someone up because of what they MIGHT do instead of just what they HAVE done). The last thing we need is more people like me being brainwashed into believing what terrible people they are just because some statistics say so. The statistics themselves become self propogating data.

But overall Engleman's book was a pleasure to read. I learned a few things I didn't know, and refreshed a lot I had read before. I expect this book will influence at least a few of the things I write for this blog in the future (especially the idea that we aren't as individually "free willed" as we think, and the concept of conscious entities that exist unconscious to us in our own brains, i.e. "zombie systems").

In Defense of Chaos:The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action - by L. K. Samuels (2013)

Finally, someone has tied Chaos Theory to the human experience. I've been waiting for a book like this ever since I first read a book on Chaos Theory and saw clearly for myself that science was finally starting to break free from its cause and effect mentality and realize that even the most random events give rise to order.

This book is well researched but unfortunately poorly thought out and written. It contains a lot of information that is only roughly catagorized and dumped into several uncoordinated chapters. Then it ends without any conclusions or suggestion for further exploration. I suspect that maybe the author wanted to avoid a controversial stance. The evidence and studies in this book seem to me to point to only one conclusion: that the science of cause and effect is limited, and that any attempt by man to understand his own purpose and reason in this world by using his ability to reason and control (manipulate) his environment will - and already has - consistently result in more disorder and chaos (i.e. destruction of the very things we seek to protect). The only solution is to trust the process that somehow brings order out of chaos when we don't try to interfere; to trust the "invisible hand".

No Exit: And Three Other Plays - by Jean-Paul Sartre (1946, translations by Gilbert and Abel, Vintage Ed. 1989)

This book was recommended and purchased for me by a friend in Germany. I read not only the plays in this book, but also some other writings on Sartre's existentialism. It was extremely enlightening and well worth the read. I had not realized how complete the philosophy of existentialism was. I enjoyed it very much.

Selected quotes:

"Once freedom lights its beacon in a man's heart, the gods are powerless against him." - The Flies

"Today I have one path only, and heaven knows where it leads. But it is my path..." - The Flies

"The most cowardly of murderers is he who feels remorse." - The Flies

"... human life begins on the far side of despair."

"We shall not abolish lying by refusing to tell lies, but by using every means at hand to abolish classes." - Dirty Hands

"There is no heaven. There's work to be done, that's all." - Dirty Hands

The Gospel of Judas, 2nd Ed. - by: Kasser, Meyer and Wurst (2006, 2008)

I requested this book out of curiosity. Nothing about it really surprised me. I was glad that it presented different scholarly views and not just Christian or even secular. This allowed me to enjoy my own view, given my own prior knowledge and understanding. As I would expect, the Christian accounts for this lost "Gospel" were biased and used cherry-picked and incomplete historical references to attempt to discredit other scholar's conclusions. Christian "scholars" refer to these tactics so routinely that I strongly feel they should not even call themselves scholars at all; "theologians" would be a much better term.

Clearly, The Gospel of Judas, and other nonconical scriptures from the first few centuries tell us a lot about how Christianity formed as a religion. Christian "scholars" deny they have any merit at all in regard to their religious beliefs. Of course, they must say that, or they'd be forced to admit that what they believe is a human fabrication, and not "devine" at all.