The Assault on Reason by Al Gore
-- Publishers Weekly, 5/21/2007 1:43:00 PM
The Assault on Reason
Al Gore. Penguin Press, $25.95 (320p) ISBN 978-1-59420-122-6
A heady mix of passion and intellect, Gore’s follow-up to An Inconvenient Truth discusses global warming, but in the context of the Bush administration’s "instinct for deception." The book is a scathing exposé of what Gore calls the White House’s "unprecedented and sustained campaign of mass deception," but goes beyond partisan bickering to ask, "Why do reason, logic, and truth seem to play a sharply diminished role in the way America now makes important decisions?" Gore begins by positing that our Founders’ revolutionary trust in "the rule of reason" (rather than in a monarch) can be "traced straight back to Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press." But, he argues, the "open and free public discussion and debate… central to the operation of our democracy" that has always been supported by a free and accessible press is now threatened by television, with its one-way, entertainment-oriented communication and concentrated ownership, coupled with political exploitation of the mass media to instill a "politics of fear." Drawing from diverse disciplines, including history, neuroscience, and immune system research, and philosophers ranging from Aristotle, Adam Smith, Thomas Paine, Frederick Douglass and Hannah Arendt, Gore argues that the decentralized, text-oriented internet, which empowers individuals to form communities and publish their own video clips, is "perhaps the greatest source of hope for reestablishing an open communications environment in which the conversation of democracy can flourish." But he also warns that protecting the free market and free speech online while "making allowances for adequate investment incentives" is essential. The book may not convince detractors, but those sympathetic to Gore's view of democracy will likely be challenged and inspired. (May 22)
