The New Science of Politics by Eric Voegelin (ISBN 0-226-86114-7)Now I don't think that Eric V is one to be taken up for light reading. It is like a strong sauce that has been cooked to a heavy reduction. But this was my first exposure to E. V. whom Russell Kirk liked to cite.
And, of course, I can't add Eric without pinging his biggest proponent, betty boop. Now, betty, I hope you have some time to add a list every once in a while. With you, I am going to have to add that you need to add an asterisk to those that we mere mortals can read without our unabridged dictionary, LOL.
I'd like to add some additions to this recommended reading list, from other authors -- just two for today.
Modern Physics and Ancient Faith, Stephen M. Barr, 2003.
From Dawn to Decadence, Jacques Barzun, 2000.
Both these books are written for the general reader. Barr's is an excellent resource for understanding recent breakthroughs in physical theory. Here's a review from amazon.com:
"Often invoked as justification for unbelief, modern science here provides the basis for an unusual and provocative affirmation of religious faith. A physicist at the University of Delaware, Barr deploys his scientific expertise to challenge the dogmas of materialism and to assert his belief that nothing explains the order of the galaxies better than divine design. To be sure, Barr recognizes that Darwin's work has swept away the arguments of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century theologians, who traced the handiwork of God in birds, flowers, and seashells. But the old argument-from-design reemerges with new sophistication after Barr presses evolutionary theory for a plausible account of the origin of what quantum physics demands--that is, a conscious observer--and comes away with nothing but skepticism about the skeptics. Barr indeed relishes the irony of a skeptical logic of random chance that forces unbelievers who balk at one unobservable God to accept, on doctrinal faith, a myriad of unobservable worlds on which the matter-motion lottery has not produced the winning ticket of conscious intelligence. The absurdity grows even more palpable among astrophysicists who avoid acknowledging the human-friendly pattern in subatomic and cosmic architecture found in the observable universe only by theorizing the existence of an infinite number of unobservable universes in which sovereign randomness has dictated other and more hostile architectures. Neither religiously sectarian nor technically daunting, this is a book that invites the widest range of readers to ponder the deepest kind of questions. -- Bryce Christensen"
Barzun's is a magnificent cultural survey. And never since Dante descended into Inferno has there been a better cultural "guide" than Jacques Barzun. Its subject is nothing less than the past 500 years of Western cultural development, from the Rennaissance to modern times. It covers everything: the arts, literature, music, philosophy, science, history. If you want to understand how we got to "where we are now," you've GOT to read this book.
Thanks for writing, KC -- and for the recommendation of The New Science of Politics. I'm delighted to hear you're reading it/have read it!!! (If you want to understand the rise of Hitler and the Third Reich, you've got to read this book.)