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December 09, 2004

State of Fear

I'm listening to Crighton's latest novel on CD. Within its pages are the most devastating critique of the environmental movement you're likely to encounter. This is something of a different twist for Crighton; it feels different. There's enough swashbuckle to keep the story going, but where it really delivers is in the stunning arguments. It's precisely the kind of thing I expected from the internet, and ultimately the blogosphere - to take popular conceptions two steps deeper and reveal the fallacies and misinformation beneath them.

The plot is fairly pedestrian. Get a spectator enmeshed in a series of global events which are driven by conspiracy and throw in some characters who explain the technical details of what's actually going on. In this story, science - Crighton's usual nemisis - takes something of a backseat to pseudo-science, what I call scientific animism. This is the strong belief in scientific-sounding, professionally delivered information without the ability to understand the theory, or the proof behind it.

It's a compelling story of eco-terrorism and 'The Ecology of Thought'. Now I'm going to get back to it.

Posted by mbowen at December 9, 2004 08:26 AM

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Posted by: Jim at December 9, 2004 08:09 PM