[U.S.] Scott Adams: *The Dilbert Principle: A Workplace Survival Guide*? No—this is actually Scott Adams: *The God Particle Residue—An Alternative Reflection on a Complex World*, translated by Gao Zimei, Xinjiang People’s Publishing House, January 2003
This is a book one can read straight through in fifteen minutes; it is entirely a throwaway diversion I picked up just to make up the numbers.
The book claims to be “the world’s best-selling E-Book in history,” which I do believe, because I myself have bought no fewer than ten copies of it! That was simply because, back then, on Dangdang, the price of this book stayed at 1 yuan for a long time! That made it very suitable for me to use it to “make up the numbers”—for example, when Dangdang was running a promotion such as free shipping or a gift voucher for purchases over 100 yuan, and I happened to have bought 98 or 99 yuan’s worth, this kind of 1-yuan book became quite meaningful~!
I bought a stack of them, but never read them. Today I happened to remember it, so I picked it up and read it through once. The book claims to “upend your existing beliefs and strongly stir up your mental powers,” and says: “Imagine you meet a septuagenarian old man who really knows everything. Imagine he unlocks for you the great mysteries of life: quantum physics, evolution, God, gravity, light, psychic phenomena, and probability. His methods are simple, unexpected, thought-provoking, comprehensive, and flawless. What would it feel like to suddenly understand all the principles of the world? In this complex world, the simplest answers often sound the most reasonable, more persuasive than other, more complicated explanations. So people usually like to use simple answers to respond to great questions. But in fact, the simplest answers are often the most wildly wrong. This highly subversive little book is the most stimulating challenge to your thinking and judgment. Some of the answers proposed by the protagonist seem strange, yet coincide with what scientists firmly believe; some are creative, yet sheer nonsense. Let’s see whether you can tell the difference.” (back cover)
To me, it is nothing much either. Some of the book’s questions about free will and God are indeed a bit interesting, but they are not fresh; reading a little history of Western philosophy will also give you some sense of these issues. Still, for a reader lacking reflection, its provocations are not without value. As for saying that the book has things “that seem strange yet align with scientists,” at most that would be things like the invariance of the “speed of light” in relativity; but the author’s reckless improvisations on relativity and quantum theory are enough to make one laugh and cry, and it would be better to say that this book is full of creativity yet all of it is sheer nonsense.
That a book like this can become a bestseller precisely reflects the poverty of modern readers’ thinking. Because they lack reflection, a way of questioning some of the reader’s existing ideas in such an affectedly mysterious manner can give people the so-called feeling of “subversion” and “stimulation.” This includes the so-called Zen books and *Book of Changes* books that have recently become popular in Xinhua Bookstore; while one cannot rule out the existence of genuinely profound works, more often they are simply mystification for its own sake!
But then again, the style this book adopts is not bad. Through a dialogue between an ordinary modern person and an inscrutable sage, it guides the reader step by step into thought, giving the reader a sense of participation as if personally present on the scene—something no philosophical work can achieve. Some time ago I was also conceiving of writing some kind of dialogue-style article featuring a nihilist or relativist and “me,” but after discovering that “I” would be at a disadvantage everywhere and yield at every step, and that only by relying on “faith” could I get a firm footing, I feared that such an article would have a bad influence if written and published. So for the time being I let it go; perhaps I too must use some mystifying, seemingly profound techniques after all……
February 9, 2006
[U.S.] Frederick Alan Wolf: *The Universe of the Spirit*, translated by Lü Jie, Commercial Press, September 2005
This is the first book this winter vacation that I did not read through to the end. I do not know why the Commercial Press’s New Knowledge Translation Series introduced this book. The author attempts, through quantum mechanics, to argue for the possibility of “the immortality of the soul.” I do not dislike this book because of that absurd conclusion; in fact, I myself have already found a surviving space for the possibility of the immortality of the soul in the interstices of quantum mechanics. However, the problem is that the author’s mode of writing is one of mystification and playing at profundity. He drags in and out ancient Greek philosophy, quantum theory, Christian theology, ancient Indian Buddhism, China’s yin-yang and taiji, ancient Egyptian religion, and so on, in a complete muddle! For someone with no knowledge whatsoever of quantum theory, it is easy to get dizzy and lost under his description; and with Buddhist terminology and philosophical jargon inserted all along the way, it becomes even harder to make head or tail of it.
I do not oppose seeking room for God and immortality in the interstices of modern science; however, I strongly dislike dragging modern science together with Eastern wisdom, religious revelation, ancient philosophy, and the like. This often amounts to forced analogizing and far-fetched connection-making. Of course, as works like *The Tao of Physics* have shown, modern science and Eastern philosophy do have many similarities, but this can only be said to be different paths leading to the same destination in certain respects; one should not, by feigning mystery and by far-fetched association, forcibly draw connections.
Of course, in keeping with my usual attitude, I do not deny the significance of this book; on the contrary, it is a book worthy of affirmation. What harm is there in allowing people to retain hope in the immortality of the soul?
February 9, 2006
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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