Good Enough is an endeavor in the philosophy of science. Its subtitle suggests forays into the natural sciences, particularly genetics and biology, and the social sciences, particularly sociology and anthropology. In content and argument the work pushes harder into the former than the latter, and contestation with thought from the natural sciences functions as a basis from which to offer briefer, less developed extrapolations of critique about social and cultural arrangements of human life.

The author sets out to argue that scientifically and culturally dominant Darwinian ideas of natural selection are overdrawn. This argument is made by an in-depth consideration of selected negative cases whose frequency suggests that more than just the fittest survive; that is, as a tenet, “survival of the fittest” (in nature as in society) bears little validity and belies empirical reality:

The implication is that species (on the natural science side) and human organization (on the social science side) need not be perfect or optimal, only satisfactory. Through this argument, the importance of novelty and merit are called into question. In the natural world, the author argues, novelty and merit play a relatively insignificant role, and in the sociocultural world are cast as undue sources of stress and strain, exacerbated by a fabrication of competition as an essentialized condition for quality human life. In all realms of life, competition is altogether overrated. Change, the author contends, is not a necessary condition for the production of specifically cultural products we can celebrate, such as schooling, art, or fashion. “The outcome of this alchemy is evolution for evolution's sake, innovation for innovation's sake, competition for competition's sake, optimization for optimization's sake, and excellence for excellence's sake … [N]ature does not urge excellence upon us, and we might therefore try envisioning a world in which we do not urge it upon ourselves” (228). Interestingly, nowhere in the book are mentioned Karl Marx or Friedrich Engels or John Dewey, or many others whose conceptions of materiality matter because they also critically question suppositions and offer alternatives in human value systems. In this respect, the author's argument about selection is overly selective.

Instead, the author makes an assumption, subject to a critique on its own merits, that the world is promulgated by biologists and economists, and that economists emerged (subordinate) as the biologists’ water carriers into human social organization. Biologists and economists dominate the world with two paradigms—neo-Darwinism and neoliberalism. These paradigms are so strong, the author contends, that they create an “intolerance” for mediocrity in nature and in society. Thus, “stagnation is stigmatized in modern capitalist societies suffused with evolutionary ethics. Nothing is more shameful than treading water” (29).

I suggest a consideration of two issues. First, what is the foil? On the social side, human beings and the social arrangements they set up do indeed excel at mediocrity. Why do we need the author's reassurance that it is acceptable to exist and operate in average ways? No one need look far to appreciate the mediocrity of our social organization. Look at our politics, our universities, our public school systems, our health care, or our care for human welfare, as evident in relations among varieties of demographic groups. On the natural side, insofar as the human species is concerned, our bodies provide ample testimony of their inability to excel: Alzheimer's, obesity, movement disorders, and the wildly, perhaps one could even say cruelly, volatile system of human emotion and mental health.

Second, should we be persuaded by the proposed solution that mediocrity is acceptable? That is, what is the basis on which we accept, reject, or modify a demonstrably philosophical, as opposed to, say, a formal empirical, argument? The author concedes that the case he makes is not necessarily amenable to experimental tests to ascertain some understanding of truth about its claims (18). It is good enough to be mediocre. Is it really? The author says this is true because of the frequency with which mediocrity occurs, coupled with the fact that species go on living almost all of the time. Here we would benefit from a theorization of the idea of progress, such as engagement with thought offered by those (not biologists or economists) including Robert Nisbet, Don Martindale, or Martha Nussbaum—but who, too, are out-selected, in creating a smart work but also one which is blind to developments in thought that would help it excel. And this is a smart work. In a theory of progress, excellence will appear (as, too, will mediocrity) for its functions. Why do we need this book, excellent though it is but need not be, to tell us something we can just as well get by without knowing?