|
|
Article: Death of the soul: from Descartes to the computer.
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- September 26, 1986
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1986 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
Death of the Soul: From Descartes to the Computer A FORMER EDITOR of Partisan Review, William Barrett is an intellectual in the best sense of the word: As opposed to the centrifugal, merely analytical, dismembering minds of so many intellectuals nowadays, he joins to his critical sense an integrating mental power that is Victorian in its scope and moral seriousness. Death of the Soul is a brief, lucid history of the development of modern consciousness and philosophy, focusing on the progressive "loss of the self in the modern world," and for Barrett this self means a soul: "How could a being without a center be really ethical?" he asks. Barrett is worried about anomie, ...