Why read Hamlet's Mill?

Book cover of Hamlet's Mill: An Essay Investigating the Origins of Human Knowledge and Its Transmissions Through Myth

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A truly seminal and original thesis, this is a book that should be read by anyone interested in science, myth, and the interactions between the two. In this classic work of scientific and philosophical inquiry, the authors track world myths to a common origin in early man's descriptions of cosmological…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Hamlet's Mill as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Hal Johnson

Author

GdS and HvD have assembled in this book such an overwhelming superflux of fascinating tidbits about ancient history, literature, and myth that reading it you barely notice that every conclusion they come to is completely bonkers and necessarily false.

There really can’t be any connection between ancient civilizations in Polynesia, Mesoamerica, India, and Finland—but the fact that someone dug up stories about whirlpools (!) from each place and located points of convergence among them is amazing!
I feel like such a killjoy even bringing up my objections (that cloud doesn’t really look like a castle! that Rorschach blot doesn’t…

From Hal's list on The best books of irresponsible history.