Uncommon Sense: Understanding Nature's Truths Across Time and Culture.

UNCOMMON SENSE: Understanding Nature's Truths across Time and Culture ANTHONY AVENI

In Edvard Munch's iconic painting The Scream, we see a horrified figure against a blood-red sky. While this feature could have been dismissed as stylistic license, some intrepid NASA researchers instead investigated possible natural causes, ultimately crediting the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa as inspiring Munch's painting. What is behind our need to understand and impart meaning to art and nature in this way? People seek answers about the world around them and approach mysteries such as the star of Bethlehem or the entire cosmos via both science and religion. Aveni asserts that those two realms are thus unavoidably intertwined. In 10 essays, the author, an astronomical anthropologist, explores the similarities among the ways in which various cultures approach knowledge. For instance, all cultures have developed a numerical system of representation, clocks for marking the passage of time, maps to mark territory, and categories for things from colors to animals to people. Aveni provides a cross-cultural survey of the questions people ask about the world and the methods they use to answer them. Univ. Press of Colo., 2006, 250 p., b&w images, hardcover, $26.95.