Rating: 
Summary: Not a good book for those readers with prepackaged responses
Review: What Shattuck wants us to think about is this: Why do we imperfect humans assume we can handle all the information we pretend to have control over? Isn't it possible that some knowledge puts us at risk due to our own limitations?Shattuck asks us to consider moral thinking to be at least as important -- if not more important -- than rational thinking. In the end, rationality separated from morality is just as dangerous as morality separated from rationality. One of the nicest aspects of the book is that it doesn't treat our ancestors as dim older relatives who get everything wrong. A scholar like Shattuck who has read Aristotle, Montaigne, Pascal, Shakespeare, etc., certainly knows that we have a lot to learn from history. "Forbidden Knowledge" isn't a perfect book, but it's a very good one and a challenging read. Shattuck's work is best-suited for those who are humble enough to know they don't quite know it all yet but who still strive for some sort of wisdom.
Rating: 
Summary: A thinly veiled attack on the First Amendment
Review: What starts as a literature review of numerous European "classics" becomes a poorly supported argument for censorship: using superficial readings of some classic tales, and then moving to anecdotal discussions of a few modern crimes, Shattuck argues that some kinds of violent pornography depicting non-consensual sex do more damage to society than good. The problem? The argument hinges on no serious evidence beyond Shattuck's facile interpretations of some classic literature (eg, Greek myths) and some straw-men episodes drawn from the front pages of modern newspapers. But there is little wonder why he has taken this approach. There is frightfully little evidence that there is a statistically significant relationship between the materials he deems objectionable and the ugly acts he derides as these materials' progeny. In fact, the vast majority of the evidence suggests quite the contrary: Exposure to, eg, the work of de Sade is no more likely to lead to forced sodomy than exposure the stories of Greeks is likely to lead to particide and incest. Yet in the latter case, he lauds the culture's moral outlook and in the former case he calls for censorship.
Rating: 
Summary: This Book Tells You Things You Shouldn't Know
Review: What You Shouldn1t Know
Should there be any limits on knowledge? Is there anything we shouldn't know? Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography (St. Martin's Press) suggests that if there are no boundaries to knowledge, maybe there should be. Truth be told, however, the creative tension between the desire for such boundaries and the inability to hold them firm is a source of a much more valuable form of knowledge--moral consciousness. There is good reason why we must approach certain kinds of knowledge with moral integrity. Knowledge is responsibility. Sometimes the responsible choice, according to the author, Roger Shattuck of Boston University, is ignorance. He doesn't call it ignorance, but prudence. We are familiar with three contemporary quagmires where knowledge, morality, freedom, social norms and higher values are tangled almost beyond hope of resolution: atomic energy, genetic engineering, and pornography. In his attempt to create some moral consciousness from these enigmas, he reminds us that they are just the latest in an ongoing story of the unfolding of history. What if Eve, for example, had not eaten of the apple? Sometimes breaking certain taboos is essential to our development. We can see how atomic energy has found redeeming value. It is less easy to find redeeming value in pornography.
An old definition of taboo is useful: "holiness and pollution not yet differentiated." Over centuries humanity gradually has separated what is holy in sexuality from what is pollluted. Shattuck sees pornography, and he examines the writing of Marquis de Sade in depth, as an attempt to undo our development by trying to stir up fascination with the horrendous.
Shouldn't we be free to explore this domain of human nature? Some argue that Sade's work is of value in eliciting our outrage and reinforcing our moral boundaries. Perhaps so, but sometimes the effect is the opposite. Serial killers, who have become almost a fadish anti-hero in contemporary media entertainment, have often indicted pornography. Shattuck takes seriously the last words of Ted Bundy, who, prior to his execution as a sadistic serial killer, begged experts to respect the polluting power of pornography. There is such a thing as toxic knowledge. In trying to balance the virtue of freedom with the virtue of respect for humanity, Shattuck concludes that pornography should be given a warning label: "Caution, exposure to this material may be hazardous to your psyche." What about good and useful knowledge, but knowledge that is obtained without proper credentials? The issue is more serious than whether or not to print photos taken by intrusive poparazzi. Consider the Nazi experiments putting people in frigid water and studying their medical signs as they slowly froze to death. What if the knowledge so cruelly obtained in those experiments could now be used to save lives today? Some have argued that to legitimize that knowledge by using it betrays the people who involuntarily died in the immoral creation of that knowledge. Such knowledge should remain taboo. Others have argued that to save lives with that knowledge redeems the lives that were stolen. How do we know which position to take on this dilemma? The development of ethics surrounding research with human subjects--and animals, too!--reflects our understanding that the press of curiosity needs to regulated by moral sensitivity. We can not afford knowledge "at all costs." We do not accept that "the ends justify the means." It is not right to hurt people even to obtain knowledge intended to help people. Today our curiosity, expressed through explorations in both science and art, is carrying us into the future faster than society can constructively respond. What part of this curiosity is a reflection of a divine impulse seeking greater consciousness and what part is an alienated ego playing with life as if it were a toy?
Like pornography, that can pervert a vulnerable sensitivity, so can occult or spiritual knowledge, such as the Kabbalah, destroy those unprepared for transformation. When liberating spiritual awareness meets limited human understanding, the result is not always spiritual.
The gap between an all knowing Creator and the knowledgeable human is, according to Shattuck, what defines our humanity. The gap sets our bounds. The gap is narrowing. Yet it is the power of the Creator, more than the Creator's love, that we are more rapidly assimilating. Clearly, we need more of the love that creates wisdom and compassion before we can cope with the detached knowledge that lust for the power to control craves. There may be limits, in fact, to detached knowledge. Edgar Cayce was capable of passing along tremendous knowledge and wisdom because of his ability to surrender to the intelligence of supreme love. His mystical union with the creative forces still faced boundaries of knowing that God also had to respect. "Even God doesn't know how you will choose!" Our very freedom of choice exits because there is a veil of ignorance surrounding the quantum leap in our own moment of choosing. The taboo on knowing yourself may grant you the freedom to be yourself. Shall you break that taboo?
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