Kirk Susong

1 year ago

Even on Unherd there is a herd and I am always concerned when I find myself outside of it... but unlike most of the comments here, I actually did not find this to be an enlightening or insightful interview.

On the contrary, Dr. McGilchrist’s comments seem to me to be too vague and abstracted to mean much, irrefutable in their generality. Regardless of the physical connection between the hemispheres inside the cranium, hasn’t it always been obvious that there are different ways of thinking and seeing, and that successful societies benefit from all of them? This does not seem like a very interesting or controversial observation. We can slice those differences variously – instrumental vs. abstract, particular vs. general, rational vs. creative, immanent vs. transcendent, masculine vs. feminine, pragmatic vs. inspired, protective vs. nurturing, etc. None of these categories are adequate and neither is his – because none could be. We’re talking about the entirety of the human experience here! Put it this way: was John Stuart Mill (to pick a totally random example!) a right- or left-brain thinker? Whatever the answer might be, it would tell us little about John Stuart Mill and much about ourselves via the categories we prefer.

And is the predominance of one particular way of thinking about to ruin everything? Perhaps... but the vague generality of the conclusion is revealed when you realize that on this analysis the interview could just as easily have been titled “left brain thinking built civilization.” Left-brain thinking dominates today – and so we have penicillin? And electrical appliances? And the Bill of Rights? So maybe the pendulum just needs to swing back a little bit the other way; “all things in moderation.” Yes, of course, who could disagree? But this is the wisdom of the ages, nothing more, nothing less.

And then I began to think that Dr. McGilchrist’s comments are themselves expressions of a certain over-dominance of left-brain thinking – reductive, instrumentalist, etc. Granted this was a casual interview, but still he jumps and leaps among historical tidbits-turned-cliches that I found misleading and frustrating. I mean, blaming the Puritans for their conformity is a bit much – they were Non-Conformists! Every society everywhere has always believed that *some* things are vital to the integrity and health of that society and must be believed or else you face ostracism or worse. The question is always and only “What are *our* society’s central lodestar values going to be?” And his answer to that question is something vague about universal spirituality – an answer which has never actually satisfied anyone anywhere, much less brought harmony to societies or peace to mankind. It is, in the end, a kind of intellectual cowardice masquerading as humility.

Anyhow, I am sure, as others have mentioned, that his book is much more persuasive. But I’m sorry to say that the interview did not inspire me to read it.

from Left-brain thinking will destroy civilisation by Iain McGilchrist