I will state first that I think Graham Harman’s ‘Object-Oriented Ontology: A New Theory of Everything’ is worth reading, especially if you want to understand this recent philosophical movement. The book is well-written and (mostly) clearly explains the theoretical perspective of Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO). Regardless of whether it was convincing, I came away with a good sense of what OOO is. This is helpful, given that I have seen more and more references to it.

My major qualm with the book is that it spends so much time defending OOO from criticism and critiquing other schools of thought. I’m not knowledgeable enough to comment about how fair these criticisms are. I’ve read a decent amount philosophy from the 19th century and earlier, but, except for the philosophy of science I am much less familiar with philosophy of the 20th and 21st. I read this as part of an effort to familiarize myself with this period. And, I felt this book was worthwhile in that respect. But, the amount of defensiveness was a little off-putting. I resonated much more with Timothy Morton’s ‘Hyperobjects’, which was much less defensive.

As a non-expert, my reaction to OOO, as portrayed here, was one of distanced interest. Some of the ideas resonated, especially the section on politics. Though I remain skeptical of OOO’s general usefulness. It’s an interesting perspective, and seems like it may correct for some of the excesses of “postmodernism”, but it also felt mostly like a retreat from knowledge (and maybe that’s the point). I certainly did not see how it is a theory of everything. Maybe it’s a theory on how little we know, or ever can know?

In any case, I found the book readable and worth my time. It sparked some thought and added a point on the map of my philosophical explorations.