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For your specific question, I really like the take from Walter M. Miller Jr.'s "A Canticle for Leibowitz" (one of my favorite novels): > The closer men came to
by a_e_k 5y ago
For your specific question, I really like the take from Walter M. Miller Jr.'s "A Canticle for Leibowitz" (one of my favorite novels):
> The closer men came to perfecting for themselves a paradise, the more impatient they became with it, and with themselves as well. They made a garden of pleasure, and became progressively more miserable with it as it grew in richness and power and beauty; for then, perhaps, it was easier to see something was missing in the garden, some tree or shrub that would not grow. When the world was in darkness and wretchedness, it could believe in perfection and yearn for it. But when the world became bright with reason and riches, it began to sense the narrowness of the needle's eye, and that rankled for a world no longer willing to believe or yearn.
- vga805 5y agoHadn't heard of this book, I'll have to check it out. It vaguely reminds of something Dostoevsky's Underground Man might have said when he was railing against the utopian rationalists. edit: typo
- qohen 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz
- a_e_k 5y agoConsider yourself one of today's lucky 10,000, then (https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/). It does help if you have some knowledge of the ways of the Catholic Church when reading the novel. I don't think I could have fully appreciated the richness of "Canticle" if I'd read it at a younger age when I'd had no experience with the Church. But I'll also say that it's one of those books that I love but don't reread too often since it always leaves such an impression. But yes, I would say that the dangers of pure rationalism (without the wisdom to temper it) is something of a theme throughout "Canticle".