The Day the Universe Changed

Rating:
Summary: A really fun story on history and connections ...
Review: July 16, 1999

I first became aware of James Burke work through the Discovery/TLC channels and when I stumbled across his audio novel Connections I had to try it out. Connections was great and so I was encouraged to try out his other audio novels, The Day The Universe Changed which were just as ingenious and entertaining.

The quality of James Burke's work set the stage for what has become a new age in bedtime stories. My new born son then 3 months was quickly introduced to the art of the audio novel as his new bedtime stories.

Its been well over a year now after several dozen audio novels the little guy has now turned 18 months old. The very creative story of The Day The Universe Changed still gets a replay every few months and he enjoys it every time.

The only sad part about the James Burke audio novels is that I haven't seen a new one in a very long time.

I highly recommend this creative story about history and the connections which brought us to where we are!

Arnold D Veness

Rating:
Summary: outstanding
Review: One of the best audio books I've listened to. Entertaining and dense with interesting facts and anecdotes.

Rating:
Summary: outstanding
Review: One of the best audio books I've listened to. Entertaining and dense with interesting facts and anecdotes.

Rating:
Summary: rambles?
Review: Others thought the book rambles when the author is trying to show how one unrelated (seemingly) discovery was begun or brought about by something entirely different invention, and the people involved intermix in unusual ways, very fascinating how the history of invention of common items came to be

Rating:
Summary: Very Informative, Well-Conceived and Wonderfully Illustrated
Review: Psychologists tell us that people often tend to see patterns and connections in situations where none really exist. At first, I had reservations about Burke's book for this very reason. But I found the book informative, intelligent, and a real pleasure to read. The author is very pesuasive in his thesis that unexpected connections and new knowledge really alter the human condition and our understanding of the universe. I learned a lot from this book and would recommend it to anyone who is interested in intellectual history, the history of technology, science, and medicine, or the relationship between political economy and the human condition.

Because the scope of Burke's book is so wide, brevity is a must. For this reason, some important connections had to be stated only in general terms, without deep explanations that may be necessary for a reader who is not already familiar with many major figures and events of the past. But no one should be intimidated. You can still enjoy the book, even if you do not already have the knowledge of technological and scientific history. Another challenge that is posed by the wide scope of this project and the subsequent terseness that it requires, is that 1) some statemets are subject to dispute because of their breif nature and generality; 2) a number of relevant causes and connections remain unexplored. I do not think there is a way around this. For example, Burke unequivocally states that John Locke supported slavery. This is debatable. True, Locke had invested in a slave-trading company, but his political philosophy rejected slavery in principle, allowing it only in the very special circumstance of prisoners of war. (Locke believed, for whatever reason, that prisoners of war could rightly be killed, and therefore if they chose to live, their captor could enslave them.) Also, Burke makes much of Locke's defense of private property, ignoring, as many authors have done before him, the fact that by "property" Locke meant to include all of these: life, liberty, and estate. And by "estate" Locke meant what we mean by private property today. But explanations of this sort, while providing a more balanced picture, would take up too much of the book, whose time span includes millenia of technological history!

I think that a greater challenge is posed by the complex nature of technological progress itself. Burke explores some connections and remains silent about others. This makes the methodology a little weak. For example, he practically argues that the weather was responsible for the industrial revolution, which began in Great Britain in the eighteenth century. I do realize that it is the unexpected and unusual connections that are the focus here. Still, I was left wondering, what about other factors?

I also have a difference of opinion on the philosophy of science. I do not think the universe really changed that much, perhaps not at all, based on the discoveries we as the human race made through the centuries. Only our understanding of the universe has undergone changes. Furthermore, not every understanding is equally valid. Some are much more scientific and accurate than others. The universe did not really change because Galileo discovered the moons of Jupiter and Newton the 'laws' of all mechanical motion. What changed is the level of our scientific sophistication in regards to the question, How does the universe work? Also, I do not think that Burke's optimism about making science a true item of public domain is altogether justified. On the last two pages of the book he seems to suggest that the general public should dictate which direction science shall take, and what in the end counts for science. This is an interesting populist move. But one should not deceive himself. Science is not that democractic. One does not establish validity of scientific theories based on a vote. As to the direction that science will take, well, that is likely to be decided by scientists, corporations, and all those unexpected connections and unintended consequence that are so important in history, as Burke himself demonstrated.

I enjoyed the book a great deal. Everybody should read the chapter on medicine as soon as they get a chance. It makes you feel grateful for what you have in an economically advanced country. Finally, "The American Internet Advantage" owes much to the spirit that is also the spirit of this book--the spirit of exploration, perseverance, and strange connections.

Michael Hart

Rating:
Summary: Excellent overview. Needs Editing
Review: This book deals with paradigm shifts and how they changed the way we have looked at the world. Burke takes a subject like "Perspective Drawing" and shows how it changed the world fo science and architecture by providing a basis for measuring.

The last chapter of the book is the best and should probably be read first. In this chapter Burke summarizes the changes in science that have happened over the past 2500 years and how the paradigms control what scientists see and study. (Interestingly enough he never uses the word "paradigm" but refers to the lens through which we view the world as a "structure.")

Unfortunatly, the book lacks the editing that would have made it a great book. Burke is too wordy, and will use three paragraphs to discuss a point that was adequately covered in the first one. This lack of concise writing dilutes the impact of Burke's ideas so that it is hard to pick out the significance of the events.

Burke also will spend great amounts of time on the buildup to a world changing idea, but then short change the big event. For example, he discusses the various views and discussions that led up to Issac Newton's work, but then simply says in a single paragraph that Newton's work was so dramatic that it stopped scientific progress for 100 years. I'd like to dig into that!

I recommend this book despite its flaws. Understanding how we reached science's position today shows that there were other ways of looking at the world that we cut off along the way.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent overview. Needs Editing
Review: This book deals with paradigm shifts and how they changed the way we have looked at the world. Burke takes a subject like "Perspective Drawing" and shows how it changed the world fo science and architecture by providing a basis for measuring.

The last chapter of the book is the best and should probably be read first. In this chapter Burke summarizes the changes in science that have happened over the past 2500 years and how the paradigms control what scientists see and study. (Interestingly enough he never uses the word "paradigm" but refers to the lens through which we view the world as a "structure.")

Unfortunatly, the book lacks the editing that would have made it a great book. Burke is too wordy, and will use three paragraphs to discuss a point that was adequately covered in the first one. This lack of concise writing dilutes the impact of Burke's ideas so that it is hard to pick out the significance of the events.

Burke also will spend great amounts of time on the buildup to a world changing idea, but then short change the big event. For example, he discusses the various views and discussions that led up to Issac Newton's work, but then simply says in a single paragraph that Newton's work was so dramatic that it stopped scientific progress for 100 years. I'd like to dig into that!

I recommend this book despite its flaws. Understanding how we reached science's position today shows that there were other ways of looking at the world that we cut off along the way.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent overview. Needs Editing
Review: This book deals with paradigm shifts and how they changed the way we have looked at the world. Burke takes a subject like "Perspective Drawing" and shows how it changed the world fo science and architecture by providing a basis for measuring.

The last chapter of the book is the best and should probably be read first. In this chapter Burke summarizes the changes in science that have happened over the past 2500 years and how the paradigms control what scientists see and study. (Interestingly enough he never uses the word "paradigm" but refers to the lens through which we view the world as a "structure.")

Unfortunatly, the book lacks the editing that would have made it a great book. Burke is too wordy, and will use three paragraphs to discuss a point that was adequately covered in the first one. This lack of concise writing dilutes the impact of Burke's ideas so that it is hard to pick out the significance of the events.

Burke also will spend great amounts of time on the buildup to a world changing idea, but then short change the big event. For example, he discusses the various views and discussions that led up to Issac Newton's work, but then simply says in a single paragraph that Newton's work was so dramatic that it stopped scientific progress for 100 years. I'd like to dig into that!

I recommend this book despite its flaws. Understanding how we reached science's position today shows that there were other ways of looking at the world that we cut off along the way.

Rating:
Summary: Burke's connectionist thought is uniquely insightful
Review: This book describes the evolution of scientific beliefs and ideas, and how they have intertwined throughout history to present day. His refreshing writing style is clever and humorous, displayed in an amazing presentation of the history of paradigm shifts in regard to invention and scientific discovery. He brilliantly ties together various scientific notions and explains them in their historic contexts, and shows the interconnectedness of scientific ideology in a way that is truly stunning to the "acolyte" connectionist thinker.

Rating:
Summary: Very disappointing, rambles all over without finding a point
Review: This book was very disappointing. Its fragmented writing style reads like a 6th graders' attempt to summarize of all of European history in 5 pages or less. Instead of coherently showing how each of the eight discoveries changed human thought, it just meanders around them at random, never seeming to find the common thread.