Healthy Influence Blog

“What Happened at Vatican II” by John O’Malley is an excellent and interesting book I can recommend to any general reader.  While it details in strong and readable narrative, the people and activities of a specific religious group, the Catholic Church, anyone with an interest in human nature, world events, history, and faith will find this well-written book valuable.  O’Malley is a strong writer who never loses the reader in the complexities of the event, the people, and the ideas.  He also avoids grinding axes even with the incredible explosiveness of the ideas and personalities involved in Vatican II.

As a person trained in communication research, I was particularly interested and fascinated in reading about the procedures and networks of communication that drove Vatican II.  The Catholic Church is the oldest human institution on earth and is layered with hundreds of years of ritual, procedure, canon law, and tradition.  Yet within what one might easily misperceive as an ossified organization, the play of human nature and the role of communication were vital to the outcome of Vatican II.  O’Malley draws a compelling case study of how people act in a complex decision making event even with such an old, established hierarchy.

For people of any faith or ethical tradition, this book would also be valuable source for reflection upon your own theology, ethics, and values.  O’Malley provides excellent descriptions of the ideas and policies the Catholic leadership considered during Vatican II (plus you can visit the Vatican website to read the complete documents if you are that interested - I found it useful to read O’Malley’s descriptions with my computer on a good search engine).  Even if you are not a strong Catholic, you can still appreciate the questions, arguments, and decisions made at Vatican II and wonder upon them for your own growth.

This is a history book and not a polemic.  O’Malley does not preach from this pulpit, but rather provides a clear, compelling, interesting, and useful look of the people in that pulpit.  I suspect that an open minded skeptic or nihilist would find this book interesting unless you think the argument begins and ends with someone like Bill Maher and his current movie, Religulous.  You might prefer a different aisle.

Today the Journal of the American Medical Association is reporting a letter that describes a simple statistical analysis of traffic fatalities on election day.  As detailed at WebMD, the researchers found an 18% increase in the number of traffic fatalities on the Tuesday election day from 1976 through 2004 as compared to the number of traffic fatalities on the Tuesdays before and after those election Tuesdays.  On average there were 158 traffic fatalities on election Tuesday compared to 134 fatalities on the preceding and following Tuesdays.  The authors of the study advised alertness, buckling up, subsidized public transportation, voting centers within walking distances, tamper-proof remote voting, or more traffic enforcement on Election Day.

Let’s begin with the obvious.  While a real quantitative increase does exist, with databases this large a mean difference of just a few points will always be statistically significant which is enough for JAMA in this instance although reliance on mere significance is the mark of the beast in standard research methods.  It would be interesting to know, for example, what the daily standard deviation in traffic fatalities is and compare this effect size (184 / 134 or 118%) and see if it exceeds random variation.  It would also be nice if the study authors had adjusted their results for the increase in number of miles driven.  In fact, it is commonplace to adjust sheer number of fatalities against some standard like number of miles travelled.  That these authors did not make such adjustment makes the research and JAMA’s publication of it sheer nonsense.  More people are driving on election day and probably drive longer distances than on an average day.  To not adjust for this is transparently clever, biased, and deceitful.  It affords them the opportunity to look like concerned and responsible citizens warning of a danger . . . that does not exist.

You cannot always trust scientific journal publications and accept their reports at face value.

Please realize that I’m not saying to drive like an idiot on election day, Tuesdays, or any day of the week.  Things to remember:  Just don’t buy what those gypsy girls at JAMA are selling today.

“Victory of Reason” by Professor Rodney Stark is a broad survey of the scholarly literature aimed at exploring the relationship between religion and human civilization.  As such, the book is intended for the Common Reader or the beginning student and should not be taken as scholarship purposed for academic review and publication for professionals.  It is a survey, not a monograph.  As you’ll note in reading other reviews, you’ll find commentors who criticize the book for its maltreatment of details - such criticism says more about the critic than the book.  If you want to argue about who invented the horse collar, this is not your book.  However, if you want to think more broadly about changes in human societies (like inventions of horse collars by whomever) over the long sweep of time with an especial eye toward religion, this is a provocative, thoughtful, and well argued book.  This is a big theme book that reasons much the way an evolutionary scientist does with incomplete evidence.  You have to think broadly and consider the general fit of evidence to theory and let the technicians find the details.

Stark’s theory is that religion, particularly Christianity and most explicitly Catholism, played a crucial and positive role in the development of Western civilization.  His theory runs in opposition to the received view still taught unselfconsciously in American universities that religion in general, Christianity in particular, and Catholism explicitly has been a curse, millstone, and scourge for human civilization (see the multivolume works from Gibbons, “Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire” or the Durants’ “Story of Civilization” for the contrast).  Stark reviews not only the state of the literature available to Gibbons in the 19th century and the Durants in the 20th, but also takes advantage of modern research.  His argument sees a more positive, beneficial, and, perhaps, decisive role for religion.

His claim, however, is indirect in much the same way that evolutionary theory is indirect.  He offers no unambiguous smoking gun scene where a priest discovers the horse collar, then shares this invention across his parish in 8th century France.  Stark argues through correlation - that the Church provided structure like universities, a theology based in free will, and a rationally created world from God - and that these structures supported scientific advancement, technological invention, and social institutions like capitalism and democracy.  He also employs a comparative method, constrasting social changes in the Western, Christian world with the societies of Islam, India, and China.

I find Professor Stark’s approach interesting, provocative, and thoughtful.  He takes a strong position with his theory and musters all the supporting reason and evidence to bolster it.  He also considers contradictory arguments and evidence, but weights the supporting information more strongly than the conflicting information.

If you are convinced that the received view (God, bad; secular, good), then this book will likely outrage, annoy, or disturb you.  If you like to think and are willing to consider a competing argument from beginning to end before you evaluate, you might enjoy this 235 page (in hardback) volume.  It is well written and is a relatively quick read.

As an early adoptor, I bought Amazon’s Kindle, the wireless ebook device, in December 2007 when it was first available.  I’ve been using it now for over nine months and I’d like to offer an experienced review of it (following the first blush review published earlier).

I don’t like it nearly as much.

The first few dates went pretty well, but it’s not wearing well and I don’t think I’d do it again if I knew then, what I know now.

The Kindle possesses great features.  Wireless and web-enabled, so you can download books, “public” email (gmail, yahoo, etc.), and web pages almost anywhere anytime.  A gorgeous reading screen that views well even in direct sunlight.  Excellent hand size and feel, so it handles like a large paperback in your hand.  Some have compared to an iPhone for nerds (i.e. text based) and I agree.

But . . .

Amazon and book publishers provide books in a flat, linear file with no useful navigation features.  If you’re reading beach fiction like “I Am Charlotte Simons” by Tom Wolfe (what happened, Tom?) or other pop press fiction, that’s okay.  The Kindle automatically bookmarks your place, but so did my 1.0 ebook reader, the RocketBook.  However, if you are reading something with references or footnotes, try skipping to the note, then returning to your place.  It’s slow, awful, and thoughtless.  In other words, Amazon delivers a device at nearly $400 that works worse than a VCR for moving around.

So, the 2.0 ebook reader is wireless and web-enabled, but it stinks at book reading for “serious” text.  While I love lit and some pop fiction (Elmore Leonard anyone?), I also read serious information.  And the Kindle fails at this task.

Philip Roth is an authentic literary treasure and if you like reading difficult books, reading everything Mr. Roth writes is worthwhile. “Exit Ghost” is no exception to this claim. Read it and enjoy it.

“Exit Ghost” returns to one of Mr. Roth’s most interesting characters, Nathan Zuckerman. The past Zuckerman novels, but particularly those in the “Zuckerman Bound” collection, have delighted with their deadly irony and sardonic perspective. In “Exit Ghost” the skillful and often hilarious point of view is absent. The book feels trapped within itself as if for once, Mr. Roth might be actually and sincerely speaking through Zuckerman rather than shaping him for artistic purposes. That’s not to say that any of the physical or psychological attributes given to Zuckerman are true of Mr. Roth, but rather it is the philosophy of Zuckerman might reflect truly Mr. Roth’s ideas.

Mr. Roth has always rejected such autobiographical interpretations of his fictional work and might categorize such thinking as droppings from the “lice of literature.” But, “Exit Ghost” lacks that sarcastic irony evident in the prior Zuckerman novels (again, especially the Zuckerman Bound collection). And, it also lacks the energy, the drive, the mania even with a maniac character, Kliman (certainly a swerve on “clinamen” just as Amy Bellette swerves on belle lettres) so dominant in the Zuckerman Unbound collection. Instead the Zuckerman of “Exit Ghost” seems to be the most literal and the most drained of men. He should be wearing a gray flannel suit, a strap-hanger on a Manhattan subway. There’s no vitality, verve, pop, anger, mordant wit, irony, self deprecation. Zuckerman seems to be an old man trapped in an old man’s body.

So, has Mr. Roth lost his wit?

Perhaps, if you stay within the story and interpret everything in a straightforward fashion.

However, this could be a mordant takedown of the modern (or postmodern?) literary world. We have many “types” from the literary scene: the dead, beloved, but forgotten great writer (Lonoff); the nearly dead unloved and almost unremembered great writer (Zuckerman); the adoring starstruck girl with a past (Amy Bellette); the young liberal literary wannabes hating George Bush, but living on oil money inheritance (Jamie and Billy); the angry critic who lacks all literary credential except ambition (Kliman).

No one gets out of the novel “alive.” The characters are either dead, dying, or trapped in their own literary foolishness. Lonoff got killed by the novel he couldn’t complete because writing really is hard work. Kliman aspires to write a tell all biography of the dead Lonoff that tells all about a wildly surmised sexual deviance, thus seeking the Warhol 15 minutes of fame. Jamie Logan has written one short story published five years earlier in the New Yorker and hasn’t written a good word since. Her husband, Billy, wants to write only to be with Jamie (and probably her trust fund). Amy Bellette flew too close to the literary flame as a young girl and ended up giving her life to the memory of a writer dead for 30 years. And Zuckerman, due to prostate cancer surgery, is both impotent and incontinent, and between books.

No one is admirable, lovable, wise, or even interesting. Lonoff wrote great short stories, but what writer would want that on the tombstone? Zuckerman may be great although he’s attracted more controversy and sales leaving the reader to doubt any lasting legacy of greatness in his work. Jamie and Billy represent the new generation of writers. Billy doesn’t and probably can’t write, but through his marriage has the economic wherewithal to hang out in the literary scene. Jamie despises her parents and their traditional values, but sees absolutely no irony in taking their trust fund money while she plays at being a writer with a five year old publication. Billy and Jamie think they need to get out of New York City and live in the mountains to avoid Osama Bin Laden and get the time and quiet they need to produce. And Zuckerman is a prisoner to his penis even though the only thing that comes out of it is urine and just like an orgasm, he can’t control the flow.

If this interpretation of “Exit Ghost” is wildly incorrect, then we’re left with a rather boring story of an old man struggling with age (gee, it’s not as much fun as you expected?!?) who seems to have learned nothing substantial about life, work, and women.

I’ll take ironic Roth and sardonic Zuckerman.

Philip Roth is one of the strongest contemporary writers of fiction and has released his latest novel, “Indignation.”  It is a confused, weak, and bleating work that is unfortunately consistent with his last few efforts rather than with the excellence of his earlier work.  While much of his work deals explicitly or implicitly with political themes, he loses his creative power when it appears that he is personally struggling with some political point rather than trying to write a novel.  For example, “The Plot Against America,” was initially a wildly praised and awarded book, but now receives middling comment from following reviewers after the “obvious” connection to the war on terror metaphor seems to have faded away.  Read simply as a novel, “The Plot” is rather weak.

And so is “Indignation.”  The book has no irony, perspective, or distance but rather is just what the title implies, an emotional, value-laden reaction.  It is closer to what one might read in a New York Times column where the author seeks to expresss her political outrage in a more artistic form.  Thus instead of writing another piece with historical reference and statistical counting, the angry columnist produces a piece of fiction to express the emotion.

Interestingly, Mr. Roth introduces a life-after-death concept I don’t believe I’ve encountered before:  When you die, only your memory remains so that eternity is spent in contemplation of your past.  Roth thus subsititutes one supernatural concept - memory - for another supernatural concept - God - and offers this bauble for atheists consideration and perhaps consolation.  However, he does not employ this interesting idea to useful effect in the novel.  It might bear further elaboration in yet another book.

Nominally, the plot of “Indignation” follows the brief life of a Jewish atheist teenager growing up in Newark, New Jersey during the Korean War.  Marcus Messner is turning from boy to man with a protective father facing his own mortality concerns and the loss of his beloved son.  Marcus does not want to continue the family business of kosher butchering and has set his sights on the law.  Marcus also worries about girls, getting drafted, and his family.  In other words, Marcus is normal and living a normal life, but is filled with indignation at the traps and bonds of normal life as if all around him are barriers to his fulfillment.

Mr. Roth often places his novels firmly within the bounds and bonds of normal life, but usually manages to provide an ironic, energetic, and often crazed perspective and pace.  (See “Zuckerman Bound” for a great illustration.)  Here, Mr. Roth is the one who seems trapped in normal life unable to respond with anything remotely approaching wit, imagination, zest, humor, insight, or wisdom.  Just indignation.  That’s not art.  It’s bad politics.

With “Indignation” and unlike most of the work Mr. Roth has produced to earn his great reputation, what you see is what you get.  Nothing more than what is plainly on the page.

This is a disappointment.  But, it seems to be the way Mr. Roth is writing the past few years (with the exception of “Exit Ghost,” perhaps).

If you’ve not read Mr. Roth before “Indignation,” please consider also “Goodbye, Columbus,” “Portnoy’s Complaint,” the Zuckerman collection in “Zuckerman Bound,” “The Dying Animal,” or “American Pastoral” among others.  Mr. Roth is a great writer.

Michelle Obama’s thesis is now available on the web.  And, if you scan the political web sites, folks are talking about it.  I’ll weigh in as a professor reading this as if it was my student submitting it.

I’ve spent 30 years as a counselor, researcher, and professor at a variety of colleges and worked with literally hundreds of other people (teachers and students) from other colleges.  I’ve directed thesis projects like this one with students who seem similar to Mrs. Obama at her college years.  I’ve also read her thesis.

Mrs. Obama is an extremely bright and conscientious undergrad as evidenced by her project and the writing.  From my 30 year experience I’d place this thesis in the top 5% of work I’ve encountered.  The thesis demonstrates superior analytical skill in conceptualizing her hypotheses and developing a research plan.  She develops her ideas both rationally (from argument) and empirical (from evidence) without over- or under-claiming.  For an undergrad she demonstrates superior conceptual thinking and would be an excellent candidate for graduate school.  She knows how to think and reason and plan.  I would value her presence in seminar or as a research associate.

Her research plan is weak in that she did not use randomization even though she had access to an extremely well defined population.  Further the 22% response rate to the survey request, is very low and opens the door for obvious methodological confounds.  The absence of statistical analysis also points to a methodological weakness in Obama’s work.  These problems, however, are easily handled in future coursework and experience.

Her results seem well argued and extremely consistent with a wide variety of past research sources that she discusses and cites.  She also manages to walk the tightrope between objectivity and subjectivity.  That is, she can discuss her personal reactions to the hypothesis while also fairly analyzing the results from her sample.

I would give this thesis a highly positive evaluation (an “A” or “honors designation” or whatever the label - it’s excellent work).

If you read this as a “get whitey” thesis, you are as dumb as those folks who think that Governor Palin is a guns ‘n God bimbo with a funny accent.  In this thesis, Michelle Obama shows a formidable cognitive skill.

I’ll go farther.  One primary point of this thesis is how people who are different from the majority handle that experience, especially when that minority is talented, hard working, and motivated.  If you’ve ever been “good enough” to belong to a group, but had been a minority (sex, age, race, religion, or any other quality), this thesis has implications for how you felt about being the odd one.  To make this only about growing up black in 20th century America, it is to miss a much larger point.

I’m afraid that a really good undergrad paper is going to be wildly misconstrued by both people of the Left (defending) and Right (attacking) in an excellent demonstration of their biased processing, rather than a careful and relatively objective consideration of the work on its merits.

Stated another way, on the basis of this thesis, I would definitely want to interview this person and if the interview proved the person, I would definitely want this person on my work group.

The politics Mrs. Obama prefers are a different matter.