Bad Craft

Robert Winston: Bad Ideas: an arresting history of our inventions

Probably an interesting supplement to Richard Sennett's book The Craftsman. Sennett wrestles (fairly lightly) with the problem of what to do when craftsmanship goes both right, and wrong (think Oppenheimer). Really interesting to hear that the Piraha come into the book too. This was the tribe that Daniel Everett wrote about in his (very well received) book Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes. (The main point about the Piraha (pronounced Pee-da-ha) is that their language shows little sign of recursion, which is how we have - since Chomsky - thought language was structured.) Described as a gentle (though directionless) wander through the orchard of our scientific past...