Reviews for Emerson's Life in Science: The Culture of Truth

The average rating for Emerson's Life in Science: The Culture of Truth based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2021-01-13 00:00:00 Jmnbklnlkn Kjbkjbkjb Walls argues that "Modern America owes largely to Emerson its faith in science as a bulwark of truth against the tides of history and the storms of war." (4) To evidence this thesis, she reads literally every scientific work Emerson ever did, shows that he was immersed in the science of his day and regularly translated the concepts and metaphors from it into his writings. The science informed nature of Emerson's thought has been ignored or forgotten, mostly because: "Emerson, like most intellectuals of his day, was perfectly at ease folding scientific truth into moral truth, reading literature and science together as a part of a common intellectual culture. He took scientific literacy so much for granted that his scientific metaphors sink out of sight; worse, from his time to ours, the divorce between "the two cultures" of literature and science has made his deep debt to science virtually invisible." (3) Walls knows her stuff, writes clearly, and doesn't beat around the bush with her arguments. Thus, if you are even remotely interested in Emerson's relationship to science, this is essential reading.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-05-17 00:00:00 Eric Gregg too incoherent for me