Beyond Civilization: The World's Four Great Streams of Civilization: Their Achievements, Their Differences and Their Future

By Keith Chandler

The indispensable classic for understanding the origin and nature of civilization and why Western, Indian, Chinese and Mesoamerican societies developed such virtually incompatible worldviews. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 059520550X
• ISBN13: 9780595205509
• Release Date: December 2001
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Length: 496 Pages
• Weight: 1.64 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.5" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Beyond Civilization: A Review

Keith Chandler's book is a fascinating read. While his "Mindset Theory" is a new and refreshing look at the civilisations of the world, it is based on a lifetime of scholarly research. It is written in an easy conversational style and I especially liked not having to flip to the end of the chapter, or the back of the book for footnotes. Chandler's "Mindset Theory" opens up a whole new way of looking at various cultures, societies, and religious faiths. "Beyond Civilization" should be required reading for every student in philosophy, history, or religion. It will be a basic text in the World Religions Course I will be directing next spring. A Super Read!

New Look at Civilizations

I never thought of cultures being shaped by mindsets before I read this book. Now that we are in an anti terrorist war I can see that mind sets plays the major role of the terrorists. So deeply intrenched is their mind set that they would rather die than give it up. The world we live in today calls for us to understand civilizations as we go into the future and prepair to deal with unbeandablle mind sets.

fascinating

This is an excellent read, especially if you like highbrow ideas. Reminds me of Ken Wilber. The author presents original thinking on a grand scale and his crisp style makes a real page-turner out of what could have been a musty-dusty history lesson. I must note that my own background in history is not sufficient to dispute any of the author's findings so perhaps a historian will write a review. I don't know when I have enjoyed a book more.