Beginner’s Guide to Reality
by Jim Baggott
Penguin Books, £7.99, ISBN 0-141-01930-1

Although the author does not use the word, this is an introduction to epistemology, the study of how we know, and how we can know that we know. Can we, in fact, be sure that anything is real? Three major problems are logical, psychological and physical.
The logical problem is, how can we be sure of reality unless we have some reality to test it against? Descartes proposed the most famous answer, that he was sure he existed because he was asking the question: cogito, ergo sum. But philosophers have since rejected this. The psychological problem is, that everything we ‘know’ is processed by the brain and nervous system. Not only are these fallible, we have no direct apprehension of what they represent. The physical problem is, that modern physics seems to show that at a basic level, the universe is in principle unmeasurable, that is unknowable. Baggott discusses all these, though he starts, as I think rather misleadingly, with social reality, arguing that it only exists as long as we believe it to exist. For example, money is only money as long as we believe in it. I think it is accepted as simply a means of exchange. ‘Belief ’ has nothing to do with it. The final chapter summarises the arguments, and some might like to read this first.
There is another approach to the problem, a religious one that claims direct apprehension of reality. Personally I don’t accept this, but it deserves discussion. The style is chatty and informal, with lots of references to fantasy and science fiction. Some will find it amusing and illuminating, others merely facetious and tiresome; it really is a matter of taste. The wording is sometimes imprecise, for example ‘purpose’ and ‘function’ seem to be equated, and ‘belief ’ is used in various senses, but overall it is a very readable introduction.

John Radford

Jesus Never Existed
by Kenneth Humphreys
Iconoclast Press 2005 £15 (pb), ISBN 0-906879-14-0

That the story of Jesus is almost entirely myth is no secret to readers of this journal. The near-total lack of contemporary evidence for his existence, the implausibilities and contradictions of the alleged narratives of his life, the absence of any trustworthy independent confirmation, all these combine with the blatant borrowings from earlier sources to make it clear that the Jesus venerated by millions is little more than an abstraction. But is he nothing more?
To assert that there was no individual person named Jesus is next to impossible: proving his non-existence is even more difficult than establishing his existence. The author of this latest attempt has studied his subject deeply and marshals a formidable mass of reasons why we should be sceptical. But, no more than others who have tried to do it, he cannot prove his case. Yes, we concur, the teachings and deeds attributed to Jesus can be traced to earlier sources. Yes, the silence of Paul and other early Christians is very significant. Yes, the less-than-blameless history of Christianity, the absurdly-fabricated narratives of the Virgin Mary and the lives of the saints, confirm our scepticism if not our derision. Yes, the testimony of the Dead Sea scrolls, together with countless other non-canonical documents, show that what we are asked to believe about Jesus is partial, selective, and unreliable. Yet for all that, we cannot say with total confidence that there never was a teacher named Jesus. Humphreys doesn’t help his case by presenting his material in snack-size segments, with confusing sidebars. His five hundred pages, heavy with fact, are impressive but wearing. We are overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of the material he is determined to bring to our notice.
And in the end, it doesn’t matter. Yes, it would be sort of nice to know if a historical Jesus ever existed. But the Jesus in whose name the Crusaders went to war, who inspired the Christian missionaries to impose their beliefs on colonial populations, who justifies the likes of George Bush in his divinely-approved mission, is a fabrication. It doesn’t really matter whether a Jesus actually existed or was built from scratch like a robot. As Voltaire said of Jesus’s father, if he did not exist it would be necessary to invent him. And, God help us, between us we invented Jesus.

Hilary Evans

Parallel Worlds: The Science of Alternative Universes and Our Future in the Cosmos
by Michio Kaku
Penguin Books, £8.99 (pb), ISBN 0141014636

It has become compulsory to describe any book on quantum physics as “mind-blowing”, and there’s no good reason to buck convention with this title. Authored by theoretical physicist Michio Kaku, this book covers some of the latest ideas in the search for a “theory of everything” that can unite the cosmological and quantum realms. Currently the best candidate for this over-arching theory looks to be M-theory, a form of string theory, which can unite relativity and quantum mechanics, unite the fundamental forces, and which posits the existence of multiple universes co-existing in different dimensions. It’s heady stuff, of course, and Kaku does his best to explain it all in terms familiar to the lay reader. What do the fundamental equations of string theory look like? There’s plenty of discussion of collapsing dimensions, sets of equations from one theory emerging as special cases of other theories and so on, but there’s no sign of these mysterious equations ever appearing in the text. Instead the author makes numerous references to popular fiction, particularly science fiction, and to metaphors that the average reader might easily grasp. At times these metaphors seem to be stretched a little too far, but they are clearly designed to appeal to a wider audience. There’s a fairly liberal use of religious/spiritual language, with many references to God and other mythologies. Quantum physics is already part of the tool-set of the more sophisticated mystics, charlatans and pseudo-scientists, and they will find plenty more to grab here. Given some of the implications of the latest string theories, it would be strange if the book were anything but mind-blowing. However, interesting as the subject is, the writing just doesn’t inspire, and the constant use of religious imagery is frankly distracting. It’s a shame, as there’s an interesting book buried in here; a more ruthless edit and clearer focus on the core subject would have helped immensely.

Pan Pantziarka

The Travels and Adventures of Serendipity: A Study in Sociological Semantics and the Sociology of Science
by Robert K Merton and Elinor Barber
Princeton University Press, £12.50 (pb), ISBN 0-691-11754-3

This unusual book was written in 1958 and published in Italian in 2002 and in English, its original language, in 2004. It really falls into three parts, although the first two are not formally separated. The first seven chapters give an enormously erudite history of the word “serendipity” and of changing uses of it and attitudes to it. It was invented in 1754 by Horace Walpole, but used by him, as far as can be discovered, only once, in a letter. It languished in obscurity until the late 19th century when it was rediscovered, and gradually came into first specialized and then general use. Walpole’s meaning was: “making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they [i.e. people] were not in quest of”. His examples, however, involve drawing correct conclusions from small indications, rather like Sherlock Holmes (as the authors point out), or like the ‘abduction’ of C S Peirce (as they don’t).
The last three chapters and two long Notes discuss the implications of chance discoveries in general, and in science in particular. This is done largely by quoting scientists and others who have thought about the matter. Some think chance very important, others less so, which is interesting but inconclusive. Finally a longish (68 pp) Afterword by Robert Merton, Elinor Barber having already died, as he did soon after, explains how their interest began, and further discusses the role of chance. He explains that he has left the original text, as a kind of time capsule reflecting views of 1958. But this of course applies to any book.
I suspect that reactions will vary, not “like it or loathe it” but rather on a dimension from delight to irritation or boredom, but quite heavily skewed to the positive end. The actual writing is most enjoyable, and the impression is of immense but lightly carried humane scholarship. Perhaps no other single word has ever been explored like this.

John Radford

The Hanged Man: A Story of Miracle, Memory, and Colonialism in the Middle Ages
by Robert Bartlett
Princeton University Press, £9.95 (pb), ISBN 0 691 12604 6

It is thanks to a commission held in 1307 to examine the claim that Thomas de Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford, had fulfilled the conditions necessary for sainthood, that the strange story of William Cragh has been preserved. Cragh was hanged at Swansea in 1290 but brought back to life by, it was claimed, the intervention of the deceased bishop. As alleged miracles go, this was a well-attested one because nine witnesses – including, bizarrely, Cragh himself – gave testimony to the commission ordered by the Pope to examine Thomas’s credentials. Several of these had also viewed Cragh’s body and were certain he was dead.
Bartlett is fortunate that the spectators formed a fairly representative cross-section of the social spectrum of the time, from aristocrat to labourer, as this enables him to delve into the social relationships between high and low, English and Welsh, monarch and subjects, church and state, and men and women. We are given a peek into how they viewed their world, as well as a description of the members of the commission and the notaries who signed the records.
The decision to focus on the witnesses to Cragh’s resurrection means that we do not hear about the other miracles that formed the evidence that secured sainthood for Thomas de Cantilupe. But we are told the fates of the various individuals whose later histories were recorded, though not surprisingly this tends to favour the aristocrats and church bureaucrats because their lives were documented.
We never get to the truth of Cragh’s survival, but his fascinating story is a way in to the people and the political landscape of the period. This is micro-history at its best, taking a small-scale event and using it as a lens to examine the wider society and its interactions. It is a readable account that makes a complex period accessible to the non-specialist. Bartlett’s analytical approach would surely be applauded by the divines who interrogated the witnesses to the remarkable execution and resurrection of William Cragh.

Tom Ruffles

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
by Jared Diamond
Penguin, £9.99, ISBN 0-140-27951-2

“The monumental ruins left behind by [collapsed] societies hold a romantic fascination for all of us. We marvel at them when as children we first learn of them through pictures… We feel drawn to their often spectacular and haunting beauty, and also to the mysteries that they pose.”

We have all met people who are, one might say, over-fascinated by what we can’t know about Stonehenge, Easter Island, Chichen Itza or Brighton.

Beyond counting, even now, are the legions of followers of von Daniken or Tony Hancock’s rather less amusing cousin, Graham.

Here is one way of fighting back. Cajole, bully or trick them into reading this superb book by a writer equally at home in history and evolutionary biology. Let these bores and fantasists, perhaps for the first time, gain a shattering insight (or dim inkling) as to what intelligent reasoning about the past actually looks like.

Easter Islanders managed the twin feats of erecting 12-ton stone statues with ropes, “canoe ladders” and ramps, and then obliterating all species of trees on the island. This deforestation led to starvation and cannibalism. Extraterrestrial masons do not seem to have played a huge part in all this.

Diamond discusses the Mayans and the Vikings, Montana and Rwanda, among other communities and ecologies. In the horrendous case of Rwanda, he notes that, “any ‘explanation’ of why a genocide happened can be misconstrued as ‘excusing’ it”, and insists that, “it is important that we understand the origins of the Rwandan genocide – not so that we can exonerate the killers, but so that we can use that knowledge to decrease the risk of such things happening again.” One of the contributing factors was the Malthusian condition of population pressure exhausting resources, but Diamond is careful to avoid ecological determinism, applying his nuanced comparative method throughout.

The last hundred pages of the book are devoted to practical lessons, asking why some societies make disastrous decisions, outlining our most serious problems, and offering reasons for hope.

Paul Taylor

Evil Incarnate Rumors of Demonic Conspiracy and Satanic Abuse in History
by David Frankfurter
Princeton University Press, $29.95, ISBN 0-691-11350-5

In the 1980s, American TV ‘revealed’ a nationwide network of Satanists committing atrocities, particularly against children in day-care. The panic generated by media coverage and professionals who should have known better soon spread to the UK. Frankfurter’s book is a scholarly, readable and sometimes disturbing history of Satanic Ritual Abuse (SRA) allegations, that looks at why they happen in insecure times and shows that they are not safely confined to history or to ‘less enlightened’ parts of the world.
From earliest times, religious institutions extended their power by presenting evil as a real and potent threat that only they could combat. From an attempt to control a ‘chaotic world of misfortunes’, demonology soon became a ‘weapon of institutions’. Centralization of Church power, professionalizing of witch-hunts and the spread of printing led to widespread witchmania in the 16th and 17th centuries and to a new phenomenon: Satanic witchcraft, with its child sacrifice, transgressive rituals, conspiracy theories – and a dose of voyeuristic eroticism. Heretics, Jews and native peoples were demonized as dangerous sub-human Others, along with established community members – the threat from within.
In the last century, ideas of demonic possession revived by Deliverance Ministeries merged with concerns about child abuse to create the SRA panic. Externalizing the cause as something demonic was preferable to accepting child abuse as something wholly human. It also obscured the real issues of familial child abuse and extreme violence done to children during Christian exorcisms.
There has always been a strong theatrical element to the selfappointed ‘experts’, the perpetrators and the victims. They give the audience what they want, either willingly (exorcists and witch-hunters) or under coercion – tortured ‘witches’ or children providing over-eager therapists, social workers and congregations with appropriately lurid details, often in return for status or special attention.
Frankfurter concludes that no evidence, forensic or archeological, exists for SRA and that “historically verifiable atrocities take place not in the ceremonies of some evil realm but rather in the course of purging evil and its alleged devotees from the world”.

Tessa Kendall

The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland
by Steve Roud
Penguin, £10.99, ISBN 0140515127

Why is it that, whenever I see a single magpie, I find myself murmuring, “Good morning, Mr. Magpie. I hope you and your family are quite well”? According to this entertaining and informative book, showing respect to this bird by raising your hat or speaking politely is a traditional (well, for the last hundred years or so, anyway) means of warding off misfortune — which seems to be the purpose of the majority of superstitions.
Steve Roud has been researching British folklore for thirty years and so as well as providing a comprehensive list of superstitions, his notes attempt to provide a genuine historical and geographical context for them all, including an earliest known occurrence. His working definition of “superstition” includes a belief in luck, omens, and occult powers, and that coincidences have a deeper meaning than random accident. Given this, it is easy to see why superstition thrives in an atmosphere of fear, uncertainty and perceived lack of control over one’s fate. The carrying of lucky charms and mascots increased dramatically during the First World War, suggesting that such beliefs are not fixed references to some ancient wisdom but can be adopted and then discarded again according to circumstances. The author explicitly rejects the “ancient origins” approach (many of them are probably pure invention anyway) and points out the many common motifs that superstitions share with each other and with folk tales.
Are we as superstitious as we used to be? From the evidence Roud has gathered, along with that from other sources, the answer seems to be “No”. In a survey to find the top ten superstitions in 1998, “Unlucky to walk under a ladder” was mentioned most often — a bit feeble compared to, say, “If two men fight aboard a ship, it will sink within 24 hours.” The entries are arranged alphabetically, cross-referenced, and there is an extensive bibliography, so this is a useful reference book as well as an enjoyable read.

Mike Hutton