Rating: 
Summary: Gould - good but bad, in a good/bad kind of way --
Review: -- But mostly good. I agree 100% with the person who wrote "I love Gould's essays. I hate Gould's self-indulgence. Gould always has something interesting to say, and this book is no exception. But he needs an editor who isn't overawed."Gould ironically has a tendency to be arrogant about his assertion that humans are too arrogantly "human-centered" in how they approach things. However, his message is still important. Here he examines the arbitrary nature of the "millennium" concept and shows people how silly they can be. We don't really understand everything -- that's his message. And I think part of the reason people feel uncomfortable with Gould is that *anybody* who tells you people are ultimately silly and arrogant *naturally* seems arrogant themselves. So it's not 100% his fault. Try the book and decide for yourself -- you'll definitely learn something along the way anyway!
Rating:
Summary: Gould - good but bad, in a good/bad kind of way --
Review: -- But mostly good. I agree 100% with the person who wrote "I love Gould's essays. I hate Gould's self-indulgence. Gould always has something interesting to say, and this book is no exception. But he needs an editor who isn't overawed." Gould ironically has a tendency to be arrogant about his assertion that humans are too arrogantly "human-centered" in how they approach things. However, his message is still important. Here he examines the arbitrary nature of the "millennium" concept and shows people how silly they can be. We don't really understand everything -- that's his message. And I think part of the reason people feel uncomfortable with Gould is that *anybody* who tells you people are ultimately silly and arrogant *naturally* seems arrogant themselves. So it's not 100% his fault. Try the book and decide for yourself -- you'll definitely learn something along the way anyway!
Rating:
Summary: A serious read on the future...
Review: ...Maybe TOO serious. For a lighter look at the shape of things to come, I'd also recommend "The Optimist's/Pessimist's Guide to the Millennium" (Putnam-Berkley).
Rating: 
Summary: A joy to read
Review: A joy to read. Gould makes a normally dry and tastless topic, humourous, and enjoyable. I loved the book, and everthing else by Gould I've ever read.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting Commentary and Trivia on the Millennium
Review: A rather interesting commentary on the history and controversy surrounding the turn of centuries and millenniums. Gould has a splendid way of disarming emotions and adding humor to an unnecessarily serious subject. In short, Nature doesn't give a hoot about the human concept of calendrics!
Rating:
Summary: The Millennnium: Just a Thousand Years
Review: As the year 2000 approached us, millennial worries proved quite the cash crop for pop culture. Although Gould goes into a lot of detail, providing more than most of us ever cared to know about the millennium, his book is a valuable and very necessary addition to an aspect of our culture that generally seems to promote fear in its beholders. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Gould encourages us to plunge onward, forward into the twenty-first century, eyes wide open.
Rating:
Summary: Thank you, Mr. Gould!
Review: Gould does an excellent job of showing how silly and arbritrary it is to attach importance to the year 2000 (2001?). Night will fall and day will break the same as always on the last night and first day of whichever of those years you've chosen to celebrate. (Of course, many computer systems will never be the same again!) Gould supplies many interesting facts and tidbits along the way. Although he gets a bit windy at times, I think everyone should read this short book.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating Time and Time Again
Review: Gould is always an interesting author, whether you agree with him or not. (Not that I found anything to disagree with in this case.) If you love the idiosyncracies of human history, then you'll be intrigued by all the tidbits Gould pulls together regarding how our calendar was created (as well as how other calendars were created). His approach is light-hearted, which keeps the book from becoming a compendium of obtuse facts. If you're interested in the interplay between humans and millennial changes, also try James Reston's THE LAST APOCALYPSE and END-TIME PROPHECIES OF THE BIBLE (a shameless plug).
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Information about the History of Calendars
Review: Gould presents a lot of interesting facts about the history of the calendar that much of the world uses. And he interweaves the story of the Christian church's "millennium" and interprets how this story has affected many people's interpretation of the calendar...and, specifically, dates such as 2000 A.D. All of this with a witty, readable style. While Gould does a nice job with history, I found his logic to contain basic flaws. He has no argument at all with those who say the first decade A.D. contained only nine years, that the first century A.D. consisted of only 999 years, or than the first millennium A.D. contained only 999 years. This violates the very definitions of the words "decade," "century," and "millennium." Gould also says that the argument for the second millennium A.D.'s ending on December 31, 1999, makes as much sense as that for December 31, 2000--because our calendar could have started with year 0 (zero) A.D. instead of 1 A.D. But it didn't. So Gould never gets around to using simple logic based on the calendar that we do use. Overall, an enjoyable and easy read. Great history and some faulty basic logic.
Rating:
Summary: Meets his usual standard: windy and self-indulgent
Review: Gould's latest book is as interesting as it is lengthy, which is to say "not very".
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