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slichto3's review against another edition
3.0
It felt like it was split into two portions - a brief history on Americas relationship with intellectuals, knowledge, and science, and the author shaking her fist at changing American culture. The history was extremely effective, and it was illuminating to see how varied and murky life and history are and how history is so malleable in the hands of people trying to make points. The authors feelings on modern American culture were often dull and frustrating. Certainly American culture is changing rapidly, and the desirability of those changes are certainly questionable, but this book doesn't really make a case for why some of these changes are bad.
rodhilton's review against another edition
2.0
For a book that laments the decline of reason in American culture, this book sure does manage to avoid it's use when making arguments.
Essentially the book's real premise is this: Americans are increasingly anti-rational, largely due to the fact that they are reading fewer books. Considering this is coming from a book author, it's hard not to face this argument with some skepticism. Indeed, Jacoby never really provides much in the way of evidence, assuming her claims to be self-evident to the reader.
Much of what she states as unquestionably true are things that, frankly, are questionable, so the fact that she makes no attempt to truly justify her beliefs is troubling.
In the end, Jacoby comes off as an anti-technology luddite, hating technology, television, the internet, and other forms of modernity because they decrease the amount of precious time people spend reading books. She even goes so far as to whine about the decline of reading poetry and fiction, though she makes no evidence whatsoever that these styles of writing contribute in any way to intellectualism.
This book is infuriating to read because there's nothing I hate more than an extremely poor argument in favor of a position with which I agree. Much of what Jacoby says is agreeable, and some of it even intuitive. But she often shifts from the intuitive to the extremist in her belief set, never providing powerful rationale for opinions being espoused from either area.
My 'favorite' part of the book was when Jacoby rambled on about the Harvard president that supposedly claimed that the reason for few female professors could be genetic. Jacoby is infuriated by this claim, and the feminist in her takes over the chapter that discusses this matter. I found this entertaining primarily because it was also discussed in the last book I read, 'Super Crunchers', which explains that the vast majority of people didn't understand the president's real claim because people don't understand the difference between average and standard deviation. Super Crunchers discusses this issue at length, explaining what the president ACTUALLY meant and providing citations of studies which back it up. It turns out there's nothing sexist or demeaning about the statement that the president actually made, but the public's grasp of statistics (Super Cruncher's main focus) is so weak that it has been misunderstood by many.
Having just read that, reading Jacoby rant on about how offended she was by his claim, revealing that she belongs in the "bad at math" category, was nothing short of hilarious.
This book is downright embarassing, I've lost nearly all respect I gained for Jacoby while reading Freethinkers.
Essentially the book's real premise is this: Americans are increasingly anti-rational, largely due to the fact that they are reading fewer books. Considering this is coming from a book author, it's hard not to face this argument with some skepticism. Indeed, Jacoby never really provides much in the way of evidence, assuming her claims to be self-evident to the reader.
Much of what she states as unquestionably true are things that, frankly, are questionable, so the fact that she makes no attempt to truly justify her beliefs is troubling.
In the end, Jacoby comes off as an anti-technology luddite, hating technology, television, the internet, and other forms of modernity because they decrease the amount of precious time people spend reading books. She even goes so far as to whine about the decline of reading poetry and fiction, though she makes no evidence whatsoever that these styles of writing contribute in any way to intellectualism.
This book is infuriating to read because there's nothing I hate more than an extremely poor argument in favor of a position with which I agree. Much of what Jacoby says is agreeable, and some of it even intuitive. But she often shifts from the intuitive to the extremist in her belief set, never providing powerful rationale for opinions being espoused from either area.
My 'favorite' part of the book was when Jacoby rambled on about the Harvard president that supposedly claimed that the reason for few female professors could be genetic. Jacoby is infuriated by this claim, and the feminist in her takes over the chapter that discusses this matter. I found this entertaining primarily because it was also discussed in the last book I read, 'Super Crunchers', which explains that the vast majority of people didn't understand the president's real claim because people don't understand the difference between average and standard deviation. Super Crunchers discusses this issue at length, explaining what the president ACTUALLY meant and providing citations of studies which back it up. It turns out there's nothing sexist or demeaning about the statement that the president actually made, but the public's grasp of statistics (Super Cruncher's main focus) is so weak that it has been misunderstood by many.
Having just read that, reading Jacoby rant on about how offended she was by his claim, revealing that she belongs in the "bad at math" category, was nothing short of hilarious.
This book is downright embarassing, I've lost nearly all respect I gained for Jacoby while reading Freethinkers.
austinghelms's review
5.0
To say that a book chronicling America’s systematic downward spiral into willful ignorance a depressing and frustrating read is an understatement. However, author Susan Jacoby does a wonderful job tracing this unfortunate history from our founding fathers in the Age of Enlightenment to our modern day culture of science deniers and contempt for intellectuals. But I do have to wonder if a book trying to bring awareness to a country boasting less and less readers will fail to reach the audience that needs to hear it the most.
enelvee's review against another edition
3.0
So depressing. Why people don't want to be smart is a mystery.
lindy_b's review against another edition
2.0
I read The Age of American Unreason in hope that it would help me identify the cultural shifts that occurred during the Obama administration which lead to the formation of the alt-right, where adherents style themselves as intellectuals beholden to rigorous ideals of logic and reason, sneer at you about "sky fairies" and then in the same breath reproduce eugenic race science straight out of the late nineteenth century. Was the book useful in this regard? Overall, I'd say yes; Jacoby's discussion of the widespread lack of acknowledgement of the religious conservative movements of the 1960s, in particular, was not something I'd considered before.
However, the whole experience of getting to the good stuff in this book was an exercise in patience with eyebrows permanently raised. In fact, I'm not sure who is the intended audience of this book, because I cannot think of a demographic where it would be safe to assume knowledge of Ned Rorem but would need the concept of a Beatles cover band explained to them. In the introduction, Jacoby praises Hofstadter's [b:Anti-Intellectualism in American Life|582067|Anti-Intellectualism in American Life|Richard Hofstadter|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327787785s/582067.jpg|233538] for the "fairness of his scholarship... [with] a serious attempt to engage the arguments of the opponents and to acknowledge evidence that runs counter to one's own biases" (xvi). Jacoby then proceeds to write a polemic, employing frequent enormous assumptions about How The World And Humanity Work in the past or in the present that are occasionally just weird and without justification but there are a select few which are cringe-inducing from the vantage point of ten years in the future. The most frustrating problem for me though, was the framing of "junk science/thought" and "pseudoscience." She doesn't directly position them as diametric opposites of "real science/thought" until the conclusion, but the implications of essential purity of a scientific/intellectual culture are clear throughout. Jacoby dismisses Sandra Harding's work on the basis that it "attack[s] some of the most monumental fields of human endeavor as hopelessly tainted by the male lust for violence and domination," (230-231) which I am supposed to recognize as inherently ridiculous even though it is, in fact, a egregious misreading; Jacoby would do well to revisit strong objectivity. Likewise, Jacoby pooh-poohs the entire field of fat studies by pointing to a few books/articles/panels that appear to be messes, but we all know you can do that with every academic field under the sun, and I would argue that fat studies have been instrumental in working towards a more science-based approach to understanding (the inefficacy of and social preoccupation with) dieting and weight loss.
(In case you were curious, the word "Foucault" or any derivatives or associated concepts do not appear in the text; this is kind of cowardly on the part of the author. Jacoby doesn't mention social history either, but I think it's fair to assume she thinks it's debasing.)
Anyway I'm going to go read a book about the history of disco music now.
However, the whole experience of getting to the good stuff in this book was an exercise in patience with eyebrows permanently raised. In fact, I'm not sure who is the intended audience of this book, because I cannot think of a demographic where it would be safe to assume knowledge of Ned Rorem but would need the concept of a Beatles cover band explained to them. In the introduction, Jacoby praises Hofstadter's [b:Anti-Intellectualism in American Life|582067|Anti-Intellectualism in American Life|Richard Hofstadter|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327787785s/582067.jpg|233538] for the "fairness of his scholarship... [with] a serious attempt to engage the arguments of the opponents and to acknowledge evidence that runs counter to one's own biases" (xvi). Jacoby then proceeds to write a polemic, employing frequent enormous assumptions about How The World And Humanity Work in the past or in the present that are occasionally just weird and without justification but there are a select few which are cringe-inducing from the vantage point of ten years in the future. The most frustrating problem for me though, was the framing of "junk science/thought" and "pseudoscience." She doesn't directly position them as diametric opposites of "real science/thought" until the conclusion, but the implications of essential purity of a scientific/intellectual culture are clear throughout. Jacoby dismisses Sandra Harding's work on the basis that it "attack[s] some of the most monumental fields of human endeavor as hopelessly tainted by the male lust for violence and domination," (230-231) which I am supposed to recognize as inherently ridiculous even though it is, in fact, a egregious misreading; Jacoby would do well to revisit strong objectivity. Likewise, Jacoby pooh-poohs the entire field of fat studies by pointing to a few books/articles/panels that appear to be messes, but we all know you can do that with every academic field under the sun, and I would argue that fat studies have been instrumental in working towards a more science-based approach to understanding (the inefficacy of and social preoccupation with) dieting and weight loss.
(In case you were curious, the word "Foucault" or any derivatives or associated concepts do not appear in the text; this is kind of cowardly on the part of the author. Jacoby doesn't mention social history either, but I think it's fair to assume she thinks it's debasing.)
Anyway I'm going to go read a book about the history of disco music now.
leannaaker's review against another edition
4.0
I enjoyed this book, which takes a detailed look at the dumbing down of America and how our society has come to devalue intellectualism. Jacoby looks at religion, distractionism, the nature of politics, TV culture, etc. I found the book a fascinating account of the historical changes that have lead us to this point, though I found myself wishing for a tighter tie-in to her thesis. Just felt like the individual chapters could have been woven better into the whole. I would recommend this for any discerning reader who might be looking for a historical take on why society is in the disturbing predicament it is.