One of the reasons that I read a lot is my enjoyment of many different types of books and topics. After decades of reading, I'm also pretty good at judging whether a book will be my kind of thing. Thus I rarely give one or two star ratings. In the case of [b:Being Ecological|34640995|Being Ecological|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519819676l/34640995._SY75_.jpg|55802013], it's especially surprising because I've already read and enjoyed another book by Timothy Morton on the same subject, [b:The Ecological Thought|7722063|The Ecological Thought|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348985833l/7722063._SY75_.jpg|10474582], as well as a book about his preferred philosophy, [b:Object-Oriented Ontology: A New Theory of Everything|34640994|Object-Oriented Ontology A New Theory of Everything|Graham Harman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1535382136l/34640994._SY75_.jpg|55802011]. Yet somehow I found [b:Being Ecological|34640995|Being Ecological|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519819676l/34640995._SY75_.jpg|55802013] so incredibly irritating that I would have left it unfinished had it not been the first nonfiction book of 2023. Abandoning it would have been such a poor omen for the year ahead that I pushed on.

It was not so much Morton's ideas that I had a problem with, although I am doubtful about many of them, but the way he explained them. The best hypothesis I can come up with about what happened here is as follows: Morton is an academic and talks about lecturing indifferent students in philosophy at one point in [b:Being Ecological|34640995|Being Ecological|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519819676l/34640995._SY75_.jpg|55802013]. So presumably he teaches, or has taught, generation Z. I've done so as well, not very competently, and can understand the urge to try and make your material more appealing to the youth. Could that be what he's attempting with this writing style?

In the beauty experience, there is some kind of mind-meld-like thing that takes place, where I can't tell whether it's me or the artwork that is causing the beauty experience: if I try to reduce it to the artwork or to me, I pretty much ruin it. This means, argues Kant, that the beauty experience is like the operating system on top of which all kinds of cool political apps are sitting, apps such as democracy. Nonviolently existing with a being that isn't you is a pretty good basis for that.

The first sentence is fine, but I cannot believe that the second is an accurate account of Kant. I also have no idea what 'cool political apps' even means. Whether such a style actually appeals to those under the age of 22 is a mystery, but I find this sort of thing pretty unbearable:

Art is a place where we get to see what it means to be human or whatever, which is why what I do is called humanities. But this isn't enough. One way this becomes obvious is when writing grant proposals that sound like pleading. Please, please don't hurt me, Mr Funding Source, I'm a sort of educated PR guy who is going to decorate this boring cupcake of scientism with these nice human-flavoured meaning-candies.

Such metaphors explain nothing. His constant use of 'retweet' is likewise tiresome and seems unlikely to age well. [b:The Ecological Thought|7722063|The Ecological Thought|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348985833l/7722063._SY75_.jpg|10474582] was not written in such a manner, indeed my review comments on how clearly the ideas in it are articulated! [b:Being Ecological|34640995|Being Ecological|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519819676l/34640995._SY75_.jpg|55802013] starts out reasonably well, with some thoughtful stuff about truth and falsity not being a simple dichotomy, then unravels around ninety pages in. I did not follow this logic:

When you draw a set of things, the circle you draw around those things is always going to be bigger than the set, physically speaking. Otherwise it wouldn't be able to encompass them. But how a drawing looks isn't the same as what it logically means. If everything exists in the same way, that means that wholes exist in the same way as their parts, which means that there are always more parts than there is a whole - which means the whole is always less than the sum of its parts. It's childishly simple when you think of it this way. So how come it's so hard to accept?

Maybe because that explanation isn't very coherent? Surely the childishly simple implication is that a whole is equal to the sum of its parts, not less? This section is titled 'Not Your Grandaddy's Holism' which is cringeworthy. On pages 186 and 187, by which point I was really annoyed, Morton summarises his argument as 'it's fine not to give a shit and to leave your ways of thinking unchanged because you're already an ecological being'. I paraphrase, as it's articulated in a much more tiresomely whimsical way. The point is that Morton critiques the ways we talk about ecology in a straw-man fashion without providing anything useful to replace them with. This is all the more frustrating because he periodically makes a promising point like:

For example, the idea of sustainability implies that the system we have now is worth sustaining. It implies furthermore that 'continuing for a longer time' is a hallmark of success, which in turn implies a model of existing having to do with persisting, going on, being constantly present. But we've established that things aren't like that. So in the end the style of efficiency is going to be stifling and uncreative, not allowing for malfunctions and accidents, which are ironically more likely the way things actually are. It's not the case that things are just functioning smoothly until they don't. Smooth functioning is always a myth.

That is all very well, but I've read it before elsewhere actually used effectively in an argument. I'm really disappointed with [b:Being Ecological|34640995|Being Ecological|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519819676l/34640995._SY75_.jpg|55802013]. It provided me with no useful new ways of thinking about the environment, the style was deeply irritating, and I know Morton can do much better. I strongly recommend reading something else about ecological philosophy instead, such as [b:The Nutmeg's Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis|57331880|The Nutmeg's Curse Parables for a Planet in Crisis|Amitav Ghosh|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1623551679l/57331880._SX50_.jpg|89724924], [b:The Progress of This Storm: Nature and Society in a Warming World|38503119|The Progress of This Storm Nature and Society in a Warming World|Andreas Malm|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1518498725l/38503119._SX50_.jpg|55011806], [b:The Shock of the Anthropocene: The Earth, History and Us|25387295|The Shock of the Anthropocene The Earth, History and Us|Christophe Bonneuil|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1443545959l/25387295._SY75_.jpg|45137920], or indeed Morton's [b:The Ecological Thought|7722063|The Ecological Thought|Timothy Morton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348985833l/7722063._SY75_.jpg|10474582]. ( )

Timothy Morten makes an inspired, impassioned case that we all tend to think about ecology the wrong way. We pay too much attention to "factoids," formulations prepared via collective thinking to sound "truthily" in the know. So far so good. But when he tries to tackle how we should think about ecology, he lapses into literal incoherence. He runs riot with relativity and categorical inclusiveness. He wants to honor the infinity of perspectives and contexts any object may have; but beyond that, leaves little or no purchase on what he's actually arguing for. Can he be saying that the only way to think (and talk) about ecology is not to make sense at all? ( )

A really lovely book that somehow manages to make Kant sound appealing. Morton unpacks the history of "ecological thought", the various difficulties with undertaking it and the styles of it that don't do what they claim. He also indicates how to attune to various aspects of your life - just as you're loving it - that are already 'ecological'.

I've really enjoyed the experience of what felt like being in the flow of Tim's teaching. I'm tempted to go back and take notes so I've got some hope of thinking more like Tim seems to think.

Strongly recommended. ( )

Frequently headspinning but definitely opened to my mind to alternative ways of looking at the world. Morton writes in a very engaging, readable style (even when digging into some pretty heavy philosophy) and his mind zaps around different ideas, references and thoughts almost constantly - if the book was any longer it'd be utterly exhausting but the small size works well. ( )

Less a green self-help book and more a philisophical rehabilitation of Nazi-loving Heidegger. Good to read now, before the oh-so-achingly-of-their-time references become unintelligible. A possible recommended read?

That's unfair.

I raced through the first hundred pages enjoying the philosophy tour. Then I saw some reviews about the wearying prose which I let get to me. And now I can't review this book cleanly. Which, given its ecological moral feels apt.

Didn't get much out of this, unfortunately. ( )

First exploration of Timothy Morton. Hyperobjects and dark ecology and object oriented ontology are concepts just outside of what I wish to explore, but I may give it a go after reading this one. Hard to define this book, for good reason (his intent is to remain outside of definition, it seems) and left me with a sense or direction that parallels with recent personal ecological explorations. Hints of second-order thinking, Bateson, William Connolly, Richard Kearney and many other "ecological" explorers. I like this book because it does not feel the need to name drop. The snarkiness is frequent which both adds and subtracts to the content. ( )