Rating: 
Summary: Excellent and thought-provoking
Review: Although I finished AvG over a month ago, and have read several books in the meantime, it is still very much on my mind.The thesis seems preposterous at first, at least to me. But Dr. Shlain has clearly done his research, and little by little you begin to think that maybe he is on to something. Clearly the invention of the alphabet had a profound impact on mankind, and probably made Western Civilization possible. But like so many inventions, did the alphabet also have unintended consequences - even consequences which we are barely aware of today? It is not difficult to accept Dr. Shlain's thesis that the alphabet caused hypertrophy of the left hemisphere of the rapidly developing human brain. From there, the remainder of the argument falls into place. How did we go from a polytheistic culture with many fertility (and other) gods and goddesses to a hyper-abstract single (male) God and religion based on The Word and The Law? Is it difficult to accept that female deities were a casualty of this process? Does it follow that human females suffered as a result of this reorientation of the dominant thinking? Fascinating questions, even if you do not accept every single piece of Dr. Shlain's panoramic re-tour of history. I have discussed the book with several people, and the principal objection seems to be that Dr. Shlain has not proved his thesis with the kind of evidence and experimentation with which you could prove, say, that a particular virus causes a particular disease. True enough, but the field does not lend itself to anything like that kind of rigor, so I don't consider that to be a fair criticism. If nothing else, the book causes the reader to think about topics never considered and possibly re-think basic assumptions, and isn't that why you read books like this in the first place?
Rating: 
Summary: Pseudoscience (Redux) in reply to Dr. Cohen
Review: I am the "galling...anonymous fellow ophthalmologist" who has provoked Dr. Cohen's review. I believe his comments warrant replies:
1)"Rods and cones. How the facts are wrong is not stated (take my word for it is the tone) and how these facts detract from the thesis is not stated."
The human retina consists of an outer cell layer of rods and cones that communicate with the ganglion cells by way of the inner cell layer of interconnected horizontal, bipolar and amacrine neural cells. The ganglion cell layer forms the optic nerves of each eye, which, after intermixing at the optic chiasm, communicate with the occipital cortex of both right and left cerebral hemispheres. Dr. Shlain's contention that rod and cone information can be divided into right and left brain information is factually inaccurate . These cells communicate with each other through (at the very least) the amacrine cells in the retina itself. That is, discreet rod and cone signals are not sent out to the brain, but rather the information is already integrated before it leaves the eyes. And this information is further mixed at the chiasm.
2)" Allowing for poetic license and metaphor I do not find any gross errors in this regard to his thesis."
After reading Chapter 3 again and discussing it with several colleagues, I can find no other ophthalmologist that agrees with Dr. Cohen that there are no "errors in this ...thesis."
3)" Because the facts in chapter three regarding these retinal receptors (referring to all of three pages) are all wrong the whole book is suspect."
In science, once a hypothesis is stated, experiments are designed to disprove it. Any one experiment that disproves the hypothesis renders it invalid. Alternately, in nonscientific debates (such as a legal arguments), multiple positive examples of support are sought to bolster the hypothesis. It is the quest for the negative that is the hallmark of true scientific study.
4)" This book was stimulated by a puzzle that occurred to an inquiring mind; "Where have all the G-ddesses gone?" Asking the experts didn't bring any satisfactory answers."
This book represents itself as nonfiction and is located in the Women's Study section of many booksellers. The question it brings up is important and has stimulated many scholars such as Reanne Eisler ("The Chalice and the Blade'') to look for historical and scientific evidence on why the Ishtars and the Ises and the Artemisis of early history have been supplanted by male dominated theology. An understanding of this change in society may help us understand the origins of wife beating, satee, female infanticide and female genital mutilation. For those of us interested in this subject, we resent the inclusion of fiction in this category. Dr. Shlain is a talented writer, but one whose works belong in the fiction section.
Finally, I should address why all this matters to me. I am not a prolific reader, nor have I written other reviews. But being the father of an adult daughter who sees the misogyny of present day society, and believing that a physician's teachings must be of the highest standards, I find Dr. Shlain's anti intellectual book offensive. Whether my opinion is of any interest or even belongs on such a public forum as the Amazon Review pages is not for me, but for others to decide.
Stephen Prepas MD
Rating:
Summary: Regarding Expert Opinions
Review: I don't normally write critiques of previous reviews; after all opinions are personal. But there have been a number of recent postings for this book that are disconcerting. The tone is "I am an expert in this field and Dr. Shlain has distorted the facts, therefore the book is worthless." One that is really galling was written by an anonymous fellow ophthalmologist who is an expert on rods and cones. Because the facts in chapter three regarding these retinal receptors (referring to all of three pages) are all wrong the whole book is suspect. How the facts are wrong is not stated (take my word for it is the tone) and how these facts detract from the thesis is not stated. Allowing for poetic license and metaphor I do not find any gross errors in this regard to his thesis. One must understand that although Dr. Shlain is broadly read and many of his sources are well documented this is not a TEXTBOOK and doesn't pretend to be. Dr. Shlain doesn't claim to be a linguist or an anthropologist; he is quite open in presenting his background as a vascular surgeon. This book was stimulated by a puzzle that occurred to an inquiring mind; "Where have all the G-ddesses gone?" Asking the experts didn't bring any satisfactory answers. And so the idea for a thesis, which became this book was born. Its purpose was to stimulate ideas and promote controversy. And by the majority of reviews it has done this well. It is by no means a dry textbook. And it may just stimulate someone to write another book challenging his thesis - which I'm sure Dr. Shain would love. He only asks that his book be read with an open mind.
Rating: 
Summary: Alphabet 1, Goddess 0
Review: This book is impossible to take seriously as science but is a marvelously entertaining read. The thesis of the book is that the act of reading text that represents words phonetically alters the structure of the brain adversely. Leonard Schlain, a vascular surgeon striving to be the Camille Paglia of cultural anthropology, has built a very detailed polemic from a series of post hoc fallacies. That is, he asks us to believe over and over again that an event happening after an earlier event was *caused by* the earlier event. In this case, he associates the rise of alphabetic literacy with not only with the rise of patriarchal monotheism but with violence and a decline in culture. Now, as much as I might like to believe Woman Good, Man Bad, this book just doesn't offer the empirical support to this position that it would like to. Aside from the post hoc fallacies, the author makes false generalizations that I could discern in areas of history in which I am competent. For example, the statements that "Prior to the nineteenth century, there had never been a purely religious war fought on Russian soil" and that "[t]hose that involved religioun were more about territoral conquest than ideology" could only be made by one who has not looked deeply enough at what happened to the Old Believers. Finally, it irked me that Shlain bases his views on assumptions about the right and left brain functions that even he acknowledges may not be true for left-handed people, or women, and even less so (I extrapolate) for left-handed women. As a left-handed woman, therefore, who loves alphabetic literacy, does that make me a gender traitor? An anomaly that does not fit into his elegant theory? In any event, what his theory cannot accomodate, it simply ignores. Ten percent of the population, however, is a pretty big chunk to ignore. Shlain writes entertainingly and obviously has done research in many areas. In the final analysis, however, he has written a highbrow beach book.
Rating:
Summary: Bound to be controversial - but fascinating.
Review: As with all books that break new ground, The Alphabet Versus the Goddess, provides both astonishing insights as well as creating a new context in which ongoing dialogue will take place for a long time. The book is controversial. By its nature, challenging assumptions in a myriad of academic disciplines, it could not be otherwise. The roles which women assumed; the innovations and insights which were uniquely feminine, are but one part of the larger question which this book gives place to be reconsidered. Along with this, enough in itself for a book, the author presents a biologically based approach to the question of what mechanism might have affected the balance of power between the genders. He postulates that this mechanism was the introduction of widespread literacy which caused a shift in the balance between the right and left sides of the human brain. Dr. Shlain provides anecdotal documentation for his thesis, taking the reader through a broad and sweeping survey of known historical changes during which women lost rights previously assured to them by custom, law, and practice. The reader is carried along, fascinated and intrigued, not only by the hypothesis but by the powerfully evocative language with which Dr. Shlain paints the broad strokes of a new perspective on human action from the earliest known prehistory to present day.
Rating:
Summary: Seeking Balance
Review: This book was written by someone who questions: asking and ansering a question for himself, and sharing that answer with others. Schlain's basic question was: what causes cultures and religious movements to go so out of balance that half their population becomes oppressed, degraded, and subjugated by the other. He notes that opposing lobes of the brain are stimlated by either images or alphabet, resulting in oppositional value systems whcih fuel actions. When the stimulation is sudden, it can cause an overreaction, upsetting the balance it might otherwise provide. In that case, one value is held in greater esteem, the opposing value becomes repressed, burdened with negative projections, resulting in the demise of balance. As a right brained, introverted intuitive woman, my explorations into left brain areas have been a journey towards fullness. Along the way, I've always found lots of time for and interest in the things that foster my right brain preference. I continue to seek the inner balance that Dr. Shlain predicts for worldwide equilibrium. I understand from reading this book, the positive as well as negative contribution each individual as well as societies, and religious movemements make, and the tragedy that may await if not enough choose the path of balance. This book is a great read. It will be understood best by those who like to question, to intuit, to see patterns; to look at the big picture. It reads like a novel. You won't want to put it down.
Rating:
Summary: Pseudoscience
Review: Very disappointing. Expecting a book like Pinker's, discussing the relationship of language to thought, I found nothing of the sort. As an ophthalmologist, I found the discussion of rods and cones in Chapter 3 to be completely inaccurate. The author is a physician, but apparently ophthalmology was not in his curriculum. Once I found such blatant errors in a subject I do know, I lost faith in the accuracy of any claims.
Rating:
Summary: Not just junk: factual ignorance run rampant
Review: Shlain has written a really entertaining book that covers a lot of ground, and synthesizes several disciplines. But the basic problem is that very very many of the "facts" cited in support of his arguments are demonstrably false, and that he doesn't bother noting or dealing with the many counterexamples and counterarguments that spring to mind. The author demonstrates profound ignorance of evolution (espousing Lamarckian principles that were discredited a century ago by Darwin), biology (arguing that a "metaphorical" equivalence for which even he must admit that there is no evidence is somehow relevant), history and linguistics. Things are pretty bad when somebody can take apart a page and demonstrate that every single sentence is factually untrue! Note that I write this as someone who is pretty staunchly pro-feminist. It saddens me to see my own political views associated with such junk. Too see a *real* expert's critique of this book, do a Web search for the text of William Bright's keynote speech to the 1998 Unicode conference here. William Bright is the co-editor of "The World's Writing Systems," and one of the founders of whole domain of sociolinguistics.
Rating:
Summary: Sexist beyond belief
Review: I've read some silly books in my time, but this has to be one of the silliest. Reading and writing, apparently are masculine activities, and somehow in opposition to feminine intuition etc. What a load of rot. How did a book as daft as this ever get published? It's a wonder the author doesn't recommend that wsomen shouldn't learn to read and write at all. How does the author explain the fact that women's status invariably rises in cultures where they do become literate. And how does he know reading and writing were masculine inventions anyway? This book really is pernicious. If you are gullible enough to believe all that stuff about women being intuitive, men being logical etc (i.e. women can only feel, not think) you will probably like this book.
Rating:
Summary: Theory, Sophistry, and Beyond
Review: Is this book great theory or great sophistry? Who knows, who cares. Leonard Shlain's book makes one think differently about the history of civilization. It is bold and provacative. And by reading other reviews, I have found that it not only has stirred people's thoughts, but threatened their beliefs.
The book is a rather dry read and far too wordy. It is not until 2/3rd's the way through that the implications of his theory become truly interesting. But stay with it.
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