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Rating: 
Summary: An inspirational book about nature and humanity
Review: David Suzuki has written a beautiful book on life and humanity's unfortunate divergence from the natural world. The book really opens your eyes and gives life meaning beyond profit margins, stocks, and expensive cars. David Suzuki does a great job of looking at all life under one lense and stressing the importance of natures balance as well as its fragility.
A great read!
Rating: 
Summary: Ecology and analysis of environmental problems solid
Review: Dr. Suzuki is probably one of the best-known Canadian scientists living today and is one of the few who can present science to the non-specialist in an accessible fashion. Dr. Suzuki is probably best known for his long running television series, "The Nature of Things," which airs on Canada's national television network, the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation).To start with some introductory remarks, I found the Introduction, Chapter 1, and the last Chapter to be the most fascinating parts in the book. The first chapter discusses the dire state of the environment and how close we are to the point of "no return." The last chapter is a collection of several stories of how individuals (including Suzuki's 12 year old daughter!) have, on their own, started NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) to plant trees, clean harbors and other practical activates to fix some of Earth's environmental problems. The middle section, comprising little more than 1/3 of the book's content is an introduction to the "Four Elements," (i.e. Air, Water, Earth and Fire). This is the most scientific section in the book and it was somewhat difficult to maintain interest in it. There are descriptions of the composition of air, the layers of soil, the composition of water and so on. I do realize that this sort of information is necessary to properly understand the environmental problems of our day though; in the same way one must understand some biology to understand genetic engineering or cloning. There were some memorable quotes in the book. However when, Suzuki quotes others authors, he mentions titles, publishers etc but never the page numbers! It is quite annoying if one wanted to look up the context from which a quote came. Suzuki quotes from a wide variety of sources; the Romantic Poets, the Bible, ecologists, Native American spiritual texts etc... My major problem with Suzuki is that he seems to frequently advocate monism as the way to solve many of the environmental problems facing us. In addition, he stretches the idea of the inter-dependence of life (e.g. food chains or food webs) to the idea of reincarnation. In other places, he incorrectly elevates the status of the created world by saying that the world has spirits in it and is conscious etc (i.e. animism). At one point he quotes Annie Dillard, author of, "Teaching a Stone to Talk," (page 190), "We as a people have moved from pantheism to pan-atheism." It almost seems that he's saying there are only two options: Enlightenment naturalism/atheism or Eastern/Native American pantheism or animism. He devotes almost a whole chapter to the spiritual/philosophical aspect of environmental issues and doesn't give Christianity a hearing! To conclude, Suzuki gives a harsh critique of Western consumerism, materialism and other ideas that have contributed to the consumption of Earth rather than the responsible stewardship of Earth. He offers several different ways that individuals can help to reduce environmental problems (e.g. taking public transport or walking/biking when traveling a distance of less than 10 blocks). However, Suzuki is way off in his spiritual answers here!
Rating:
Summary: Sane Science
Review: Humanity is creating problems of a size and magnitude unprecedented in Earth history. We are razing the forests, causing mass extinctions, and have befouled earth, sky and water with with deadly toxins. While clinging to faith in science and progress, deserts quietly creep in on our venerated civilization. Within the human economy (community sounds too hospitable) as well, we see signs of collapse: some "800 million people go to bed hungry every night; and in wealthy industrialized nations, chronic unemployment, violence, social alienation, drug abuse, crime, unhappiness and the disparity between rich and poor appear to be rising. The sense that something is wrong is pervasive... People seem to feel helpless and pessimistic about the future." All of this, it must be added, in an era that many historians and pundits tout for "unprecedented scientific and technological progress." Suzuki believes that, although abundant with information and technique, we lack a working worldview and have utterly disconnected ourselves from the living planet. "What we need," he says, "is a new kind of science that approaches the traditional knowledge of indigenous communities." What we need is a new story, sense of place, deep connection and meaning - and that's exactly what this book provides. Suzuki's life-affirming narrative explains who we are, where we came from, and our proper place is in this complex, interdependent world. A beautiful blend of ancient wisdom and modern scientific thought, The Sacred Balance provides nothing less than the complete picture.
A MUST READ
j. william krueger
ecowilliam@yahoo.com
"Only humans beings have come to a point where they no longer know why they exist. They...have forgotten the secret knowledge of their bodies, their senses, their dreams." -Lame Dear
Rating:
Summary: Seamless, just like its subject
Review: John Muir wrote something like "if you try to isolate one thing in nature, you find that it's connected to everything else." (Sorry for the paraphrase, but I can't find the original quotation.) Suzuki's book puts us back in the natural scheme of things (where we belong) and finds the inevitable threads to physical health, mental health, spiritual wellbeing, and, by inference, a public policy agenda. I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Rating:
Summary: Educational, enlightening and frightening
Review: Not many science books have been written which are able to captivate its readers and hold their attention like "The Sacred Balance". Almost like a mystery thriller, it compels you to turn each page and keep on discovering amazing facts about the world we live in. We learn about the origin of the planet and the painstakingly slow but methodical evolution of all the life forms which inhabit it. The atmosphere, the seas, the soil, the plants, the animals and the interdependent web they form, is described in a logical manner such that you think it is so obvious. David Suzuki is clearly not just a brilliant scientist but a very good educator. His description of an ecosystem is "a complex of community of producers, consumers, decomposers and detritivores, which interact within boundaries imposed by their physical surroundings to cycle energy and material through the web of life." It is surprising to read that the ozone layer is only as thick as a sheet of newspaper. A quick independent check confirmed that it is indeed only about 2-3 mm thick. The diameter of the sun at 1.4 million kilometres wasn't surprising enough for me to rush off and check, but it is pretty awesome. Each second the sun burns 637 million tonnes of hydrogen to create 632 million tonnes of helium while releasing some 386 billion billion megawatts. The sun has been aflame for 5 billion years and is about half way through its own life cycle. "Sacred Balance" tells us that mankind's technological ability to exhaust the planet of its natural resources at an alarming rate and the associated increase in demand on food, water, trees, the land and the atmosphere threaten to modify the sacred balance to such an extent that our survival is under threat. A frightening picture is painted by conjuring up a time-lapse film taken from space over the last ten thousand years so that each millennium passes in one minute. For the first 7 minutes the movie looks like more like a still photo as nothing changes. Gradually, as time progresses, forests and greenery begin to disappear in parts of Europe, Central America, China and India. 12 seconds from the end, 2 centuries ago, the thinning spreads more intensely until with 6 seconds to go eastern north America is deforested. The action accelerates in the last 10 seconds, 5 seconds, 3 seconds and so on until in the final fractions of a second it looks as if a plague of locusts has descended on the planet. Seen this way the planet's forests are being irrevocably lost in a mere tick of the geological clock. Plotted on a chart this forest devastation leaps almost straight off the page in our own lifetime. Finally a series of "good news" stories are told which serve to give us hope that even an individual with a will can make a difference. From mangrove planters in Kuwait and Vietnam to the "Clean up Australia Day" campaign which has grown to become "Clean up the World" good things are happening. However, a lot of momentum is going to have to shift if the cycle is to be reversed and the sacred balance of our fragile and wonderful planet preserved.
Rating:
Summary: Suzuki is The Man
Review: Suzuki gives the modern world what it lacks: a story that explains where we came, where we are, and where we should be heading. A beautiful blend of ancient wisdom and modern scientific thought, The Sacred Balance does what no other book has. It gives us the complete picture. Will transform your entire worldview. A must for anybody who would understand what it means to be alive in the 21st century. Read it, and then read "From Naked Ape To Super-Species" - another Suzuki masterpiece.
Rating: 
Summary: Spiritual Environmentalism...
Review: The Sacred Balance, a book by Canadian environmentalist of note David Suzuki, explores the nature of, well, nature, and the world around us. In its own adroit way, it manages to take what we normally consider mundane natural processes and communicates it to us in a way that demands greater respect and admiration. This, then, is Suzuki's great accomplishment thus far--re-awakening the awe that most of us once felt as youngsters when we first chanced upon the hydrologic cycle, or the mysteries of our breathing, or the manner in which frogs procreate. That awe, that wonder, that may have been lost to repetition and commonality is returned to us. Suzuki explains, for instance, the remarkableness of each individual water molecule. Ever the story teller, he traces the path one molecule might take as it is exhaled as vapour from someone's lungs, how it gets converted back into liquid form and seeps into the ground, making its way to a body of water underground and is eventually taken up by someone else on the other side of the planet. There is, however, no 'eventually', as Suzuki points out. This process is seemingly infinite. Everything in nature operates in cycles, Suzuki informs us. There is, however, some trouble for our natural world. And as soon as trouble is mentioned, Suzuki delves into subject matter that is less than impressive. For instance, Suzuki is convinced that, even though we are part of nature, we are its worst enemy. Like I was told when I was twelve, human beings are only part of nature technically--sort of like parasites are part of the bowel system. We require nature, but we don't really treat it with respect. And as far as destruction goes, we are kings. Sole on the planet as the worst polluters and so on. You'll forgive me if I have grown tired and weary of this environmental party line. The lack of optimism, and the extent to which negative attention is paid to human beings is astounding. Misanthropy as a party line should restrain itself to fourteen-year-old gothic children, not a respectable 'academic' movement advancing a particular policy approach. Then again, taking a look at environmental trends and economics should be convincing enough in leading to thinking that things are getting better, not worse. A good dose of Julian Simon should be required reading for environmentalists, I think. Just as John Rawls and Will Kymlicka should be required reading for libertarians. There seems also to be a slight contradiction, or inconsistency at the least, between two Suzukian, which is to say environmentalist, views. On the one hand, Suzuki tries to diminish our sense of importance. "Look, human, how dependant, paltry, and irrelevant you are to this great thing called nature," Suzuki seems to say. "Compared to the way nature operates--its complexity, its stunning comprehensiveness--us humans have little by way of accomplishment to speak of. In essence," the Suzuki line says, "we are impotent and powerless." No one is disputing the remarkableness of nature here. But to go from that to our "paltry" accomplishments seems to go too far. One, for instance, is just the standard of judgment--nature. It's just the way it is. Remarkable or not, what have we to compare it to? Whereas our behaviour has this standard, plus past behaviour to go on. Thus our accomplishments have a standard, something to look to, look back on, making them truly accomplishments rather than just being, well, there and doing, well, its thing. But ignoring this for a moment, at a different point in time, humans turn out not to be impotent at all. In fact, we start to approach god-like status when it comes to destroying nature. All of a sudden we go from impotent narcissists to omnipotent creatures of death and destruction. Something isn't quite right. Either we are too weak to do anything--including destroy the earth--or we are not. Let us say that we are capable of destroying the earth for a moment, what solution does Suzuki draw? His response is to inculcate a religious affection for the world around us. Yes, you heard me correctly--the essence of The Sacred Balance is to view the ebb and flow of nature as something deserving our worship, or religious adoration. Hence the title of the book. Suzuki, however, did not strike me as a religious fellow. If anything, he sounds a bit like a religious skeptic. And he goes to great lengths explaining that we ought to view nature as deserving of religious interest not because nature is sacred, per se, but that this kind of belief system would result in our respecting nature more. We would pollute less if we saw our pollution as desecrating the divine. The ends, in short, justify the means. This, by the way, as the theme of the book explains the meticulous attention Suzuki places on minute, seemingly mundane, everyday natural processes. That drop of water's movement is considered miraculous. The dependence we have on nature is akin to the way we think we depend upon 'God' himself. And so on. There is such beauty in Suzuki's descriptions of these events. There is so much richness to consider, so much to look at and be impressed by. There is such a joy in remembering why some people truly pursue philosophy, or continue to wonder, here. After all, when most of us have yawned away the changes from day and night, some folks continue to be struck by its regularity and consequences. It is altogether too bad that Suzuki drops in a bit of religiousness into something that does not require it. In fact, it smacks of mendaciousness to try and convince us that nature is god in order to command our respect. We can speak plainly and still respect, adore, and take care of nature. We do not need the kind of hyperbole that would equate snails with great crawling-with-home gods.
Rating:
Summary: The Soul of Science
Review: There is a wave of change flowing through the scientific community which recognizes the spirit. To that end Dr.David Suzuki has provided us with a literary source of awakening. In the Sacred Balance the Unity of all human beings is addressed. We are made aware of the interconnectedness of man and the universe. Dr.Suzuki embraces willingly that which was long dismissed by science - the spirit and soul of man.
The Sacred Balance is a path that leads to wisdom. This is a book that challenges the mind while caressing the soul. Filled with insightful perspectives , it is a creative vision of great social import. We are given a transformative message that if followed leads one down a path of hope and optimism. This is a living document to our moral evolution.
Dr.Suzuki is a gentle revolutionary breathing new life into the mainstream mindset. With insight and imagination we traverse space and time , all the while being infused with Dr.Suzukis unique perspective. This is a life journey and nature itself is praying for our survival. The spiritual challenges are many and The Sacred Balance has opened a window that we all may see the truth.
This book is a voice of knowledge that speaks to us all. The door to enlightenment has been opened.
Rating:
Summary: Opens your eyes and your mind
Review: This is a real wake-up call. Suzuki has quite a knack for describing today's biggest problems in understandable terms and has solutions that every person can incorporate into their lives. It's time to change our ways and this is a great place to start.
Rating:
Summary: for a sacred balance...
Review: While Mr Suzuki is an interesting educator, and hopefully a concerned citizen, I do question some of his facts. If everyone here wants a true sacred balance, read from both sides of the fence...pickup eco-imperialism by paul driessen, and the skeptical enironmentalist by bjorn lomberg. I'm not saying to take their stuff as gospel, but at least read them.They are eye openers... and both are extremely referenced and researched.One of them is endorsed by the the actual founder of Greenpeace, and the other is written by a former greenpeace member.
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