Kindle
- Introduction to Critical Thinking
Hardcover
This Life by Martin Hägglund
Answering questions I have not asked myself, the book compares religious life with secular faith. Being eternally happy is not better than living in the moment. Filed under books I bought because I saw them in someone else’s library.
Greece Roderick Beaton
First time realizing that these two nations are the only ones that fought an independence war with each other within 100 years. Surprising facts I recall: there is no singular “Greece” so much as a Hellenistic heritage; Crete is badass; and I still do not know much about the Cyprus/Turkey situation—which, honestly, does not spark much interest for me.
The Experience Machine by Andy Clark
We are mostly guessing what is going to happen and adjusting based on our predictions. The brain spends a lot of time thinking about that Monday morning operations meeting, running countless micro-simulations and building reactions for each one. In a way, it pre-determines the possible outcomes. How much of this awareness is helpful? How many times can I rediscover that the brain is a cleverly rigged lottery machine?
23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism by Ha-Joon Chang
This one is on my shelf to remind me that confident claims made by latent liberalists are often unfounded. There are plenty of counterexamples around the world that prove them wrong, but since TINA is the dominant mindset, we keep returning to them.
A Line In The Sand by James Barr
The Middle East is broken because a couple of aristocrats from France and England played high-stakes monopoly over the region. You can read this as imperialist ambition and oppression, but I keep thinking: people like this still exist today, making non-sensical decisions that alter the lives of many current and future human beings. My dialectically overthinking, under-educated mind cannot comprehend such faith in one’s own thoughts or the audacity to be comfortable making those decisions. I feel bad rejecting mediocre candidates after unimpressive interviews just because I like them. Meh.
The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch
Error correction is a path to progress, and this dude is intense. I did not really get it.
Foolprof by Sander Van Der Linden
First book about privacy, how to talk to people about it, and how a community or person can meaningfully fight misinformation. There is a lot of research about how we can be manipulated, but it turns out it is neither that easy nor super hard to reverse it.
Strangers and Intimates by Riffany Jenkins
A very long journey through how the private and public have been separated, only to be blurred 1,000 years later. What is private, how it changed, why it is important to have one. The book felt like a long documentary with a not-so-strong subtext at the end.
Economics: The User’s Guide by Ha-Joon Chang
Can’t We Just Print More Money? by Rupal Patel and Jack Meaning