Rating: 
Summary: The most comprehensive volume of Wilber's work
Review: As another reviewer suggests, this is indeed an extremely ambitious work. Wilber's life's work is exceedingly ambitious, and this volume is the most comprehensive and the most demanding single volume he has yet publishedFirst, I will say to the KW book shopper, this is not the best of his works to start with, in my opinion. Even for the serious reader, I would recommend "ramping up" to this book by reading some of his other work first. You'll get more out of this one if you do. At least read "A Brief History of Everything" first, which KW wrote as a more accessible summary of the thought presented in SES. Because KW's work draws on thinkers from so many disparate fields, the terminology alone can be daunting in SES, unless you are already conversant in the languages of developmental psychology, linguistic analysis, sociology, metaphysics, epistemology, eastern religions and so on. Reading ABHE first will at least give you a good overview of the territory before plunging into SES. I had read eight other KW works before I took on this one, and I think my understanding of SES benefitted from that. That said, this is a stunning work, and if any one volume of KW's work can be said to lay out the core of his thinking, this would be it. The book begins by outlining what KW calls the "Twenty Tenets," which are, as he calls them, "orienting generalizations" that place in context all that comes after. Here he explains his holarchical model, the "spectrum of consciousness," the basic characteristics of the evolution of consciousness, and his Four Quadrants model of wisdom traditions, or approaches to understanding the universe, which may be his most unique contribution to philosophical thought. From there he proceeds to flesh out his integral theory of knowledge, which seeks to establish a way for us to reconcile (and integrate) the valuable contributions of approaches as disparate as neuroscience and mysticism, Freudian analysis and systems theory. And he shows how this affects our approaches to, yes, sex (gender identity, roles of the sexes, feminism, the mens' movements, et al), ecology (what do various worldviews, belief systems, and perpectives along the spectrum of consciousness mean for our approach to ecological issues, and what are their prospects?) and spirituality (what place does spirituality still have in the story of humankind, and how do we make sense of the seemingly limitless and contradictory number of approaches to this oldest and most important of questions?) The most unique contribution KW has made to world thought is to begin the integration of the many wisdom traditions and modes of inquiry--to set out a methodology for doing so and to begin to do it. Am I having a mystical experience, is God speaking to me, or is it just something my brain chemistry is doing? Or is it just a culturally-conditioned response to environmental context? Or regression to a prerational state? Any one approach has its answer, but who is right? And what place does each kind of answer have have in an integrated approach to understanding? Wilber says each of the many modes of serious inquiry has part of the truth, but not all of it. He asks how we honor the valuable contributions from each such partial view to begin to develop a comprehensive view of the whole. SES is Wilber's most all-inclusive single attempt to address these questions. His work is essential to any serious thinker or seeker of the truth today. And for any remotely serious student of Ken Wilber's work, you must read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant!
Review: Emerson wrote of Shakespeare, "his mind is the horizon beyond which, at present, we do not see," and the same may be said of Ken Wilber. Wilber wrote SEX, ECOLOGY, SPIRITUALITY (hereafter, "SES") during a "three-year silent retreat"--"I lived the hermit's life; I saw exactly four people in four years," he recalls (p. xii), and in SES he lays the foundation for his integral philosophy, which he develops more fully in his subsequent books. Wilber was seeking "a world philosophy," in writing SES, he explains. "I sought an integral philosophy, one that would believably weave together the many pluralistic contexts of science, morals, aesthetics, Eastern as well as Western philosophy, and the world's great wisdom traditions. Not on the level of details--that is finitely impossible, but on the level of orienting generalizations: a way to suggest that the world really is one, undivided, whole, and related to itself in every way: a holistic philosophy for a holistic Kosmos: a world philosophy, an integral philosophy" (p. xii). In SES, Wilber unfolds "a broad orienting map of men and women's place in the larger Kosmos (of matter, life, mind, and spirit)" that "naturally touches on a great number of topics that have recently become 'hot,' from the ecological crisis to feminism, from the meaning of modernity and postmodernity to the nature of "liberation" in relation to sex, gender, race, class, creed; to the nature of techno-economic developments and their relation to various worldviews; to the various spritual and wisdom traditions the world over that have offered telling suggestions as to our place in a larger scheme of things" (p. 6). SES is a "cry of anger and anguish" (p. xxiii) against homogenized "flatland" paradigms, and is likely to alarm ecophilosophers, feminists, and fundamentalists, alike. We are on the "verge of planetary transformation" (p. 204), and Wilber is investing his hope in the "integrative power of vision-logic." He writes, "it is vision-logic with its centauric/planetary worldview that, in my opinion, holds the only hope for the integration of the biosphere and noosphere, the supranational organization of planetary consciousness, the genuine recognition of ecological balance, the unrestrained and unforced forms of global discourse, the nondominating and noncoercive forms of federated states, the unrestrained flow of worldwide communicative exchange, the production of genuine world citizens, and the enculturation of female agency (i.e., the integration of male and female in both the noosphere and biosphere)--all of which, in my opinon, is nevertheless simply the platform for the truly interesting forms of higher and transpersonal states of consciousness lying yet in our collective future--if there is one" (p. 192). Wilber covers a lot of ground in SES, making it difficult to summarize. Immensely challenging at times, and drawn from "voluminous research material," at the center of Wilber's philosophy, "surfaces extend; interiors intend--it's still almost as simple as that" (p. 134) he explains. "Going within = going beyond = greater embrace" (p. 263). SES should be read and then reread as an essential, visionary handbook for the new millennium. G. Merritt
Rating: 
Summary: Feeds the soul and feeds the intellect, but not both at once
Review: For me, the modern age is characterized by some interesting excesses, and Wilber satisfyingly identifies many of them in his spiritual journey here. Three favorite targets I found were: (1) the attempt to make things simpler than they really are in order to explain them, which analytic philosopher Dan Dennett calls "greedy reductionism," (2) the "rage against reason" found in much postmodernism that rejects the notion of objective reality and confident knowledge; and (3) extreme conservative thinking unable to come to grips with the vision of a complex evolving universe. Wilber has a brilliant imagination and he is a very engaging writer, and this book (probably his best) deals with all three of those excesses in a fascinating way. His overall approach is not original of course (it is essentially a spiritual interpretation of systems and process metaphysics, but there are some very original elements sprinkled here and there. And probably the best thing about this book is that it does a competent job of presenting and integrating ideas from many diverse fields, in addressing the modern excesses, and trying to come up with a satisfying spiritual worldview for our complex age. This is beautifully ironic, since what he attempts is the very essence of reductionism (!), something Wilber rails against mightily in this book when the "reductionists" disagree with his ideas because the "reduction" is not spiritually meaningful. For comparison, the conservative religious/creationist critique of Darwinism holds that a universe composed of material elements that interact algorithmically ("machines") cannot also contain spiritual meaning. The Catholic Pope avoided that bind in support of evolution by imbuing material with living Spirit. Wilber uses the metaphysics of systems and processes rather than living Spirit, making his version, (like that of theologian Haught), noticeably more (if still imperfectly) compatible with the scientific worldview. But this attack of reductionism while using to make his point is the big flaw, to me, in an otherwise very compelling, ambitious, and scholarly synthesis of many of the most profound ideas ever recorded in human thinking. Indeed, this book seems like it would be sure to appeal to a wide variety of people who, like me, are looking for a way of making sense of our world where we don't bury our head in the sand against uncomfortable aspects of the scientific worldview, nor reject the implications of being spiritual beings who crave meaning. Technically, the main problem I found is Wilber's annoyingly spotty attention to analysis (which seems worse because he does it reasonably well when he does it), in favor of linking ideas through metaphor. It makes his ideas flow like repetitive New Age spiritual poetry, from science to theology to philosophy and back again, but it doesn't quite hold together for me. It feeds the soul in many places, and feeds the intellect in many places, but not quite both at once. If this was just a book of inspiring metaphor, the science would be distracting, and as a work of argumentation it is largely devoid of rigor. The result is arguably appropriate to the topic, since one of his targets is the dictatorship of materialist reasoning in science. However, he seems to lapse briefly into some of the excesses of postmodernism or even wishful superstition when after building a perfectly good concept from the ground up, he throws out conclusions that only fit by analogy. The usual leap of faith needed to appreciate any book of religion is then required. This contrasts with the well-reasoned argument leading up to that point. It is perhaps, as other reviewers pointed out, that he has taken on so very much. He is left, sadly, with the same problems that some populists of complexity theory have, their passion for applying their ideas goes beyond what they've actually demonstrated... they _could_ (probably ?) well be right, but they've at that point only built an illusion of scientific soundness by telling a masterful story. This encyclopedic book joins Murphy's masterpiece, "Future of the Body," as another magnificent attempt to construct a new spirituality out of scientific, humanistic, and religious traditions. I applaud his efforts, and I think this is a very worthy book that introduces in understandable form many important complex ideas that most people would otherwise not have the chance to engage. For the sake of space, I'd like to refer interested readers to many of the excellent points made in Frederick Polgardy's very fine review previously here.
Rating:
Summary: 4 Stars for effort and creativity, but flawed in my eyes
Review: Hi there... now first let me say this is not usually the kind of books I read... about "spirituality" . I must say while I disagree with Mr. Wilber at least he is making an effort to use his mind to do something constructive, even if I believe it could be used for better things. My critique of him will be to question the very premise of his goals. Which is...is it necessary to bring religion or mysticism together with science to bring meaning back into life? Are we really experiencing a "flatland"? A world devoid of meaning in the flux of time? I believe we are, in some sense, but I don't believe it is necassary to bring religion or spirituality that is "other worldly" back to fill this void. I first off... think religion is not a good basis for morality. For instance... look throughout history and see what it has created, all reigion, be it Christianity or Buddhism has all taught the value of sacrifice of oneself to a higher power. Be it church or the "one". Now, look how much of social theory, from the Christian oppressive state, to Socialism, to Communnism all taught the same. Nietzsche was the first great philosopher to question the ethics of altriusm. So that is my first critique, that value should not be something devorced from this world...or an individual human being. Buddhism does not even believe in good and evil. But they refused to resist the evil of communnism, to fight for freedom. Even though they acknowledge it as evil, their method of thinking is against violence. Even self defense? After all,,,, they will be born again. The problem is if they don't believe in good and evil, why do they have any morals? The reason is... it is impossible in life to not judge or make value distinctions in ones mind. After all, this is the heart of decision itself, and the human mind needs this ( value distinction and cognition, conception) to survive. It's funny that Mr. Wilber says the bad part of post-moderism was that it focused on a horrible present, and looked to some nonexistent past for beauty. Or pre modern as he says, and that modernism is what "wiped" this blessed spirit out. First, modernity did wipe it out, but the answer is to not go back to religion to find meaning. Meaning is a human thing, truly ..the world is meaningless. But that isn't such a bad thing, it means we as individuals must give it meaning, that this is our only time here to do so. No reicarnation, because there is no proof. All of this in my opinion is escapism. People want so badly to believe that there is some great "cosmic power" watching over them, that life has meaning, when all of this is just a construction of the human mind, and it's gropping emotionalism of wanting certainty. Also...human beings never ending want of belief in themselves and their lives, and knowing how hard this is to obtain... they put their faith in the cosmic "god" or "universe". Look at all the great things science has done for this world, and also " the comodification of people" which he blames on " science" on "capitalism"... this has done more for the human race then any monk sitting meditating, or any spiritual guru, or religion. This is where meaning is... to find the beauty of the human mind, to advance our race by lifting ourselves out of the dark, embracing science, as the only thing that can help us. Also... what Mr. Wilber calls " modernity" I call freedom. It is freedom that sets the human race on fire, and allows individuals to lift one another up, with wealth, with money, with knowledge. All people working for their rational self interest not " sacrificing for the "geist" or any other universal "spirit" When I say the world is meaningless... don't take that to mean I'm a nihilist. I believe in good and evil, but it is only in relation to human beings that it has any meaning. And it is only in relation to the world that human beings will find it. All in all... I find Mr. Wilber to be a very , very bright man, and very interesting. But I do disagree with many points. I did find some of his critques to be quite well done...and I was impressed by his wide display of knowledge. But that's the problem, when writing like this about so many topics...one is bound to fall down in some areas.
Rating:
Summary: Diving Judges Take "Degree of Difficulty" into Account
Review: I believe SES is so valuable not only because Ken Wilber has taken the time to master the essential findings of a dozen different academic disciplines, but because he then combines this brilliant scholarship with the insight of a meditation master. In India these rare individuals are called "Pandits" - scholars who have fully opened the "eye of contemplation." Mystics usually do not even attempt to bring the ineffable truths they discover in transverbal states of consciousness into the world of conceptual discourse and sensory evidence. Scientists almost always assume that rationality is the highest faculty we have available to understand our world, and ignore the vast areas of human experience that cannot be easily weighed or measured. Because Wilber is attempting the extraordinarily difficult feat of integrating these two paths, I think we should keep this "degree of difficulty" in mind as we evaluate his work. He may not always keep his toes perfectly pointed as he enters the water, but how many other theoreticians currently working could include anywhere NEAR this many moves (truths) in a single dive (system of thought?) SES (and Integral Theory as a whole) is far from perfect, and Wilber himself certainly is far from perfect (whatever "perfect" might mean)- but if you care about developing a more compassionate, courageous and effective approach to the daunting challenges facing humanity in the coming decades, you will not want to ignore the tremendous intellectual goldmine he offers in SES.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant!
Review: Ken Wilber is probably one of the most brilliant modern thinkers of our time. Among all of the books he has written, this one is "The One" that really explains it all. What an inspiring piece of work! He brings together work in philosophy, spirituality, psychology, sociology, biology, physics and all other fields of study and convincingly explains that it all fits together if we look at it through this framework that he has developed. If there is a philosophical book you should read, this is the one to pick up. If you are not ready for such a comprehensive detailed discussion, read the other absolutely incredible book called "The Ever-transcending Spirit" by Toru Sato. The content is very similar but everything is explained in a much simpler (and shorter) way. Both of these books really deserve some mega-awards!
Rating:
Summary: It will blow your paradigm- over and over again...
Review: Ken Wilber's "Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution", is my favorite book. And that isn't a title I award lightly. SES is quite possibly the first attempt at putting together a syncretic, evolutionary worldview since Hegel's "Phenomenology". In an age when truth has been declared dead and multiple perspectives rule the roost, where philosophy lives in the shadow of Nietzsche's madman, Wilber, in this striking volume, challenges post-modernity. Unlike other challengers, arguing for a retreat to conservatism and cynical (or mythic-literal) traditionalism, Ken proposes a different idea- we need to integrate the strengths of Post-modernity (a recognition of the other, a bird's eye view of ideology, and a profound social and ecological awareness), Modernity (scientific rationality, empiricism, democracy), and Pre-modernity (religious wisdom and cultural bounty) into one complete, "integral" package. Sounds like a tough mission for any thinker to take on. Of course, Wilber- living outside the academia, blending his scholastic persuits with Zen practice, and doing his best to live his own philosophy- is no ordinary thinker. In the 551 pages of text (not including extensive endnotes and bibliography), Wilber essentially lays out his "theory of everything". Based in the psychological work of Freud, Piaget, Kohlberg, Maslow, Jung, Gebser, and other thinkers, Wilber first constructs a socio-psychological map of civilization's evolution to date, and shows how it integrates with hard scientific data. Dividing the world into subject and object, Wilber shows how modern empiricism has attempted to colonize the subjective sphere by trying to render it irrelevant- a condition he refers to as "flatland". After providing this analysis, Wilber takes a gander at the cognitive structures still lying in our future, through several examples of such advanced minds- Emerson, St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, Ramana Maharshi, and Meister Eckhart. After that, Wilber takes on the disease of the Post-modern world and it's primary culprits- a dissociation between what he refers to as the "Eco" camps (romantic, back-to-nature, web-of-life, holistic) and the "Ego" camps (rationalistic, modernistic, atomistic, disassociating the mind and body), and how these two contradictory (and self-contradictory) worldviews are becoming extremely destructive- in political discourse, academia, and the world in general. Of course, as has been said before about SES, it's very hard to sum up in a simple outline- the book itself is practically a 500+ page outline. The main thrust of the work is to construct a coherent philosophy for the 21st century, and thus Wilber spends little time on details (which will be covered further in the next two volumes, Kosmic Karma and Creativity and The Spirit of Post-Modernity). But, that weakness aside, Wilber has proven himself the finest philosophical mind of the early 21st century, and the first great step beyond Foucault, Derrida, and the rest of the post-modern mess. Although SES is an excellent book, it's not light reading, and readers without a background in philsophy, psychology, or cultural studies should take a look at a simpler introduction to Wilber's work, such as A Brief History of Everything- the condensed, more conversational version of SES.
Rating:
Summary: It will blow your paradigm- over and over again...
Review: Ken Wilber's "Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution", is my favorite book. And that isn't a title I award lightly. SES is quite possibly the first attempt at putting together a syncretic, evolutionary worldview since Hegel's "Phenomenology". In an age when truth has been declared dead and multiple perspectives rule the roost, where philosophy lives in the shadow of Nietzsche's madman, Wilber, in this striking volume, challenges post-modernity. Unlike other challengers, arguing for a retreat to conservatism and cynical (or mythic-literal) traditionalism, Ken proposes a different idea- we need to integrate the strengths of Post-modernity (a recognition of the other, a bird's eye view of ideology, and a profound social and ecological awareness), Modernity (scientific rationality, empiricism, democracy), and Pre-modernity (religious wisdom and cultural bounty) into one complete, "integral" package. Sounds like a tough mission for any thinker to take on. Of course, Wilber- living outside the academia, blending his scholastic persuits with Zen practice, and doing his best to live his own philosophy- is no ordinary thinker. In the 551 pages of text (not including extensive endnotes and bibliography), Wilber essentially lays out his "theory of everything". Based in the psychological work of Freud, Piaget, Kohlberg, Maslow, Jung, Gebser, and other thinkers, Wilber first constructs a socio-psychological map of civilization's evolution to date, and shows how it integrates with hard scientific data. Dividing the world into subject and object, Wilber shows how modern empiricism has attempted to colonize the subjective sphere by trying to render it irrelevant- a condition he refers to as "flatland". After providing this analysis, Wilber takes a gander at the cognitive structures still lying in our future, through several examples of such advanced minds- Emerson, St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, Ramana Maharshi, and Meister Eckhart. After that, Wilber takes on the disease of the Post-modern world and it's primary culprits- a dissociation between what he refers to as the "Eco" camps (romantic, back-to-nature, web-of-life, holistic) and the "Ego" camps (rationalistic, modernistic, atomistic, disassociating the mind and body), and how these two contradictory (and self-contradictory) worldviews are becoming extremely destructive- in political discourse, academia, and the world in general. Of course, as has been said before about SES, it's very hard to sum up in a simple outline- the book itself is practically a 500+ page outline. The main thrust of the work is to construct a coherent philosophy for the 21st century, and thus Wilber spends little time on details (which will be covered further in the next two volumes, Kosmic Karma and Creativity and The Spirit of Post-Modernity). But, that weakness aside, Wilber has proven himself the finest philosophical mind of the early 21st century, and the first great step beyond Foucault, Derrida, and the rest of the post-modern mess. Although SES is an excellent book, it's not light reading, and readers without a background in philsophy, psychology, or cultural studies should take a look at a simpler introduction to Wilber's work, such as A Brief History of Everything- the condensed, more conversational version of SES.
Rating:
Summary: Wilber's Best
Review: Out of the cottage industry of new and recycled Wilber works, this book comes as the best representation of his thinking. In it, he is schematic and has tried to develop a theoretical framework on which to hang his ideas about what makes the universe run, in general, and human culture progress, in particular. It is a better exposition than his somewhat egotistical "Brief Explanation of Everything" and provides more of the sources from which he derived his concept. This is the type of book that will intrigue students, fuel New Age adherents, alert science followers, and probably anger traditionalists in the religious and scientism fields. It is an interesting project. I am always skeptical of works that purport to explain in relatively simple ways the complexity of the universe or of the human mind (let alone both), but welcome any systematic attempts at exploring these. I bet there is a rising cult of Wilber followers, people who bring to the book various hopes or vaguenesses of discrimination that incline them to raise up a new prophet. But taken for the methodical thinking and consideration of philosophical ideas that it represents, the book deserves to be honestly read and considered. It would be interesting to see where Wilber would go with rigorous application of philosophical consideration or what serious commentators might add to the discussion.
Rating:
Summary: Wilber's Best
Review: Out of the cottage industry of new and recycled Wilber works, this book comes as the best representation of his thinking. In it, he is schematic and has tried to develop a theoretical framework on which to hang his ideas about what makes the universe run, in general, and human culture progress, in particular. It is a better exposition than his somewhat egotistical "Brief Explanation of Everything" and provides more of the sources from which he derived his concept. This is the type of book that will intrigue students, fuel New Age adherents, alert science followers, and probably anger traditionalists in the religious and scientism fields. It is an interesting project. I am always skeptical of works that purport to explain in relatively simple ways the complexity of the universe or of the human mind (let alone both), but welcome any systematic attempts at exploring these. I bet there is a rising cult of Wilber followers, people who bring to the book various hopes or vaguenesses of discrimination that incline them to raise up a new prophet. But taken for the methodical thinking and consideration of philosophical ideas that it represents, the book deserves to be honestly read and considered. It would be interesting to see where Wilber would go with rigorous application of philosophical consideration or what serious commentators might add to the discussion.
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