The Fiction of a Thinkable World argues that Western philosophy and institutions presuppose a false picture of people as autonomous thinking subjects confronting stimuli that is external to the self. In fact, our conscious thinking is not independent from, but rather continuous with, our subconscious and social actions. However, modern capitalist society depends on the myth of independent autonomous individuals –– in economics, in the voting booth, in the marketplace –– and our everyday experience therefore reinforces the illusion of an integrated self.
The author takes a different approach to denying the mind/body distinction. The question is not whether thoughts are any more than brain states, but whether abstract thought is in any way distinct from the subconscious activities of our bodies. He also shows how deeply engrained individualism is in modern society, and some of the ways it is destructive to our well-being.
Unfortunately, though, he doesn't even attempt to describe an alternative way of thinking/acting. A couple of times he says that other social models existed before Western capitalism bowled them over, but he doesn't describe them beyond some vague hand-waving in the directions of Taoism. I was left with a compelling critique but nowhere to go with it.
The author takes a different approach to denying the mind/body distinction. The question is not whether thoughts are any more than brain states, but whether abstract thought is in any way distinct from the subconscious activities of our bodies. He also shows how deeply engrained individualism is in modern society, and some of the ways it is destructive to our well-being.
Unfortunately, though, he doesn't even attempt to describe an alternative way of thinking/acting. A couple of times he says that other social models existed before Western capitalism bowled them over, but he doesn't describe them beyond some vague hand-waving in the directions of Taoism. I was left with a compelling critique but nowhere to go with it.
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