The Sesardic book you recommended is in my university library, but when I went to look at it, I found at least a shelf-foot of books on the subject, some (I could tell just from the authors’ names) on one side, some on the other.
I can imagine the titles giving clues to the slant of a book, but how do you make such deductions from the authors’ names?
By already knowing who they are and their general views on the subject. Kamin will say environment, Pinker will say genes, Gould will say environment, and Sesardic, I have learned, will say genes. And if in doubt, the publisher’s blurb will tell me all I need to know if I’m not going to do my own extensive research.
In fact, the situation is even worse: to have a real view of my own, not only would I have to acquire expertise sufficient to write my own book, I would have to achieve substantially greater expertise than all of the people whose conclusions I ended up disagreeing with, in order to have reasonable grounds to think that I was right and they were wrong.
I can imagine the titles giving clues to the slant of a book, but how do you make such deductions from the authors’ names?
By already knowing who they are and their general views on the subject. Kamin will say environment, Pinker will say genes, Gould will say environment, and Sesardic, I have learned, will say genes. And if in doubt, the publisher’s blurb will tell me all I need to know if I’m not going to do my own extensive research.
In fact, the situation is even worse: to have a real view of my own, not only would I have to acquire expertise sufficient to write my own book, I would have to achieve substantially greater expertise than all of the people whose conclusions I ended up disagreeing with, in order to have reasonable grounds to think that I was right and they were wrong.
Who has the time?