The Book Of Beautiful Questions, by Warren Berger

I get the distinct feeling in reading this book that the author thinks his questions are a lot more beautiful than I do.  That is not to say that there is a lot to appreciate and enjoy about the book, because there is, but there is a certain smarminess and mendacity about this book that just reeks of someone who thinks that they are impartial and fair-minded when they are not.  Of course, the author is a frequent writer for the New York Times, which suggests that his problematic tone was formed with that overrated example of fake news that the author talks about (without perhaps realizing that it applied to his own journalistic efforts).  This is not a book that is well-crafted to appeal to those who do not drink the same kool-aid brand that the author does, but even so there is value to be gained from this book even if its subject matter would have been far better approached by someone who did not equate sound critical thinking with complacent contemporary mainstream leftist thought.  If you agree with this author, you will likely find the book and its approach far better, which sort of defeats the point of what he was trying to write to support, which is a fair-minded approach to questioning that strengthens one’s own views by questioning one’s own assumptions and worldview, hopefully better than the author does here.

This volume of a bit more than 200 pages is divided into four parts.  The author begins with a justification of questioning, and how we can cultivate this habit, even expressing the hope that asking questions can bridge the gaps between people, showing his blind faith in communication as the solution to worldview disagreements.  The author then discusses some questions that allow better decision-making, through examining the likelihood that our critical thinking has an agenda (because it usually does), dealing with fear, and making decisions to “evolve (1).”  After that the author seeks to ask questions to inspire creativity, subtly trying to coerce people into becoming morning people rather than night owls, and asking questions about killing butterflies and going public (2).  After this the author deals with questions that help us connect with others (3), dealing with making peace as opposed to being right, owning one’s biases, dealing with hypocrisy (something the author should be pretty familiar with), and so on.  Finally, the author ends by asking questions to develop stronger leadership, including building an institutional culture of curiosity that overcomes traditional command and control models (4), after which there is a conclusion that deals with living the inquiring life.

Where this particular book has value is in the way that the author asks a lot of questions and encourages the reader not only to ask questions of others but also of ourselves, as to our own motives.  To be sure, this would have been even more present and more important had the author presented this attitude of self-reflection and questioning as part of a larger moral approach that approaches the asking of questions as an aspect of humility in the facing of our Creator and Judge.  If the author’s questions are not quite as beautiful as the author thinks they are, and if the author is but a very imperfect model of the fair-mindedness he preaches, there is still a lot of worth here, namely because we all have our own biases/perspectives and we cannot judge others justly until we at least recognize and own them.  As it happens, I happen to own different ones than the author has, and found this book somewhat off-putting because the author thinks himself to be more just and fair-minded than he in fact is.  And that sense of hypocrisy and sanctimoniousness makes this book a lot less easier to enjoy than it would have had I been able to appreciate the shared attitude of questioning that the author and I possess in common.