State of Fear Response

State of Fear has been quite difficult for me to get through. To me, it lacks any real depth in character and that's where I lose interest. Michael Crichton has introduced me to at least a dozen different characters up to the 100 page mark where I am at and none of them have stuck with me. It's probably because his description of characters is done in a purely material way.

"An attractive but tough-looking woman in her late twenties, with short dark hair and blue eyes, wearing jeans and a white shirt..."

"A bearded man of forty glanced at his watch"

"The man standing in the doorway was pale complected, slender, and American-looking, with a blond crew cut. His manner was casual, his dress nondescript"

I can tell you one thing, Crichton's writing is nothing short of nondescript. It's boring, lacks variety, it just doesn't have the poetry in writing that I am personally drawn to. It's dry, and the subject matter doesn't interest me very much. I prefer character and text driven work, and Crichton doesn't give his characters a chance to develop because the plot keeps bouncing around. I understand the piece is very plot driven, so I guess I don't like that. I haven't been given a chance to cling on to anything quite yet, and it leaves me feeling disconnected.

With that said, the subject matter is engaging in that it is beginning to raise some questions for me. On page 103 John Balder asks Peter Evans, "When you have a strongly held belief, don't you think it's important to express that belief accurately?"Evans, being put on the spot, hesitates. Balder poses an important question that unsettles me as much as it unsettles Peter. What kind of value system does someone have if they aren't able to express their beliefs accurately? And HOW do you wrap your beliefs around truth when truth is so subjective? In the science world numbers are lumped together to be analyzed and then spit back out as facts. I'm not skeptical of the data presented in Crichton's book because I can only assume that he went through extensive research to present something "accurate", but should I be skeptical? Why is it important for me to be exposed to this information, what can I do? What are the real problems? Are such large scale problems even capable of being real when they're not completely tangible to me? I can only do my job as an individual. I guess I sort of feel small in the scope of things, and I know that's not uncommon.

Well, in that case I'd say Crichton is successful. I seem to be in a state of fear.

Thinking back to Valerie's comment at the beginning of semester, I get a great sense that the perversion of science through politics is ever-so-evident in the global climate crisis, and it is difficult to avoid this when there is a clear binary. But it's not clear, because no matter what there's going to be "good" science that backs up both views. It just depends on which side you buy in to more, some times literally.

This ALSO makes me wonder how different forms of information are weighed. While the media may exaggerate, glorify, or romanticize any issue, it's not as if strict scientific journals don't do the same. Numbers are sexy, they are used to entice and instill fear in anyone who believes in them. I'd say most people do, even if they hate numbers (like me).