HOW MUMBO-JUMBO CONQUERED THE WORLD
Or a short history of delusions
By Francis Wheen
4th Estate. 312 pages. £16.99
(I picked mine up in a bargain bookshop for under a fiver.)
QUIRKOLOGY
By Dr. Richard Wiseman
Pan. £7.99
I did read a novel last month, but, as I began to write the review, I realised that I didn’t really feel able to recommend it to anyone, it was complicated and second-rate. Shame. So I’ve looked in my bookcase and found two non-fiction books which are provocative, entertaining and relevant.
Francis Wheen is a cynical left-wing columnist, whether or not you like his politics, his well-written polemic is a really stimulating review of our culture. His basic premise, that mumbo-jumbo is dominating the world of ideas, is hard to dispute, but his explanation that this has been caused by an overturning of Enlightenment values is hard to stomach. Thatcherism, Islamism and slack-brained self-help guides are all evidence of mumbo-jumbo in his view and all receive caustic criticism.
Of course, Christians, in his view, are part of the problem. I was nodding to some of his complaints and impressed by historical detail and evidence arrayed in others areas I disagreed with, saddened that he still had the naivete not to see that the outworking of the Enlightenment often results in mumbo-jumbo.
Human nature
Quirkology is another book which I found really engaging. It is a fast-paced psychological journey through many freaks and facets in human nature. Wiseman and his team have performed all manner of psychological investigations, from searching for the funniest joke of all time, to the level of altruism in different parts of the globe. They analyse the effectiveness of horoscopes (a load of rubbish, they deduce) and the significance of surnames.
Much of it is fun and thought provoking, useful for impressing your friends at a party, or even for making your congregation sit up at the beginning of a sermon (more people would rather wear an unwashed sweater that had been rolled in dog faeces, than a washed one which had previously been owned by a murderer).
Some experiments seem open to question, and, of course some provoke the response, ‘duh…my seven-year-old could have told me that’. We don’t need experiments to tell us that the human race is perverse, uncharitable and irrational, but evidence often helps. This is science for the mass market which has a much more benevolent aspect than Dawkins
Non-fiction
I love novels, but I have to balance my diet and fit in some non-fiction as well as Christian books. If you are a novel reader these titles will make you think, and especially make you think about how those outside the church see our world. We have a pressing need to engage with the cynicism so prevalent around us, and these books should help.
Sarah Allen
