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Post by bb2 on Jan 21, 2024 0:46:45 GMT
Got lost for a few days on Wikipedia reading about Middle East history. First google was "wiki Holy Land". Holy S*IT! What a violent history of constant turnover. Also in Wikipedia, read up on the UAE and the Haiti Revolution, (the latter, yet another blood bath. Made me think about how vulnerable Taiwan is without much international support.) (I use Wikipedia a lot and I do contribute.)
So I read Tom Friedman's "From Beirut to Jerusalem" long ago and might reread it. Anyone have a recommendation for something on the Middle East?
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Post by catdog on Jan 21, 2024 17:25:40 GMT
I am reading "The Force" by Don Winslow. Gritty saga of New York City special police unit.
Pros
Fast moving and almost believable. Also free from the VA lending library
Cons
You probably won't learn much and if "down and dirty" is not your thing......
Can fast moving also be relaxing? For me it is.
Catdog
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Post by richardsok on Jan 22, 2024 13:10:45 GMT
For an intense and very plausible TV series, try CALIPHATE on Netflix. MY wife and I just finished the fourth (and ominous!) episode. Something to dread in every scene. Interesting that this series was produced in Sweden. Evidently they too are undergoing a backlash against third world immigration . (Too little too late?) I also read that little Denmark is offering recent immigrants financial inducements to .... leave.
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Post by Norbert on Jan 22, 2024 17:23:59 GMT
richardsok "For an intense and very plausible TV series, try CALIPHATE on Netflix. MY wife and I just finished the fourth (and ominous!) episode. Something to dread in every scene. Interesting that this series was produced in Sweden. Evidently they too are undergoing a backlash against islamic immigration . (Too little too late?) I also read that little Denmark is offering recent immigrants financial inducements to .... leave." There! Fixed it for you. Unfortunately, yes, in the UK, France, and Germany it's too late. But, not in Greece. They know from experience (Turkish occupation) what it means. So, they are not welcome, period.
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Post by richardsok on Jan 26, 2024 21:11:56 GMT
Finished THE EXECUTIONER'S SONG. Passe now, but there was a period (1960s and early 1970s) when famous authors like Truman Capote and Norman Mailer were fascinated by the true-life celebrity thug. He's a type we first read about IN COLD BLOOD and in HELTER SKELTER, the predator felon, the ex-con criminal who kills seemingly for kicks. Robbery, casually planned and clumsily executed, is almost his afterthought.
Gary Gilmore had spent as many of his 35 years in prison as out of it. He was released into the care of his Mormon family who gave him a job, a room to sleep in, a set of new clothes and some walking around money. They thought to give him a new start, and, deep in denial, they lived to regret it.
Mailer's prose is an easy read. The pages just fly by as Gilmore begins shoplifting beer, then stealing guns, then finds a girlfriend and descends into random murder and world-wide celebrity. However at 1000+ pages, the book is much too long. Where it delves into the minutiae of Gilmore's extended family and the negotiations of his lawyers during the media storm that erupted around him on Death Row. I found at times I could skip ten or fifteen pages and not miss a thing.
Mailer distinguishes between prison inmates and the true felons. One group: “downtrodden, misshapen, simple minded, furtive or stupid. The other: looked as if they belonged to an exclusive society, lithe in appearance or downright powerful.” ... “Moved with the skill of tightrope walkers and arrogant as hell in the mocking way they looked at visitors...”
I never would have read this book if I hadn't come across it in a throwaway bin, but I'm glad I did. It was interesting to follow how one extended family could make so many stupid mistakes with their lives, and how one (the most intelligent) could out-stupid them all.
Also by Mailer: Tough Guys Don't Dance and The Naked and the Dead, and always the same – mesmerized by macho.
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Post by richardsok on Feb 3, 2024 3:00:54 GMT
The Kingdom of Speech --Tom Wolfe
Only Tom Wolfe could take the non-scientific reader through the problems and developing ideas of the early evolutionists -- who tried and gave up studying the nature of speech -- up into the modern post war interest in linguistics, with such entertainment and easy readability.
Along the way, a demi-god of modern science, Noam Chomsky, is taken down a peg or two as he too at last throws up his hands after a half century of study to conclude, (with an entire generation of acolytes), we still know next to nothing about the nature of speech. Is it, as he first insisted, product of a biological neuro center, innate to all infants from birth? Or is it an artifact like stone tools and flint-head arrows and canoes which early humans developed during their evolutionary journey?
Did speech begin imitating bird warbling? Did it begin with mothers cooing and humming to their infants? Did it begin when man rose up on two legs, making his hands free to gesture and making mouth noises to supplement? There are few definitive answers to a host of questions.
What matters is that Wolfe has taken up one of the most arid of dry topics to give us a fascinating weekend read. I genuinely enjoyed this too short book. Evidently Wolfe knows how to leave 'em wanting to learn more.
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Post by richardsok on Feb 3, 2024 3:17:16 GMT
Got lost for a few days on Wikipedia reading about Middle East history. First google was "wiki Holy Land". Holy S*IT! What a violent history of constant turnover. Also in Wikipedia, read up on the UAE and the Haiti Revolution, (the latter, yet another blood bath. Made me think about how vulnerable Taiwan is without much international support.) (I use Wikipedia a lot and I do contribute.) So I read Tom Friedman's "From Beirut to Jerusalem" long ago and might reread it. Anyone have a recommendation for something on the Middle East? You might take a look at Roger Crowley's 1453, The Holy War for Constantinople and The Clash of Islam With the West. I picked it up because it had a lot of glowing reviews from top papers like S F Chronicle, L A Times, The Economist, etc etc. Very readable. I have to say, though, the ending (as you might well imagine) although gripping, is tragic and sad.
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Post by johntaylor on Feb 21, 2024 22:17:32 GMT
Reading Self Destruction (2023) by John Frece about Danny Brewster.
Brewster was 6'3", affluent, athletic, raised in horse country, Princeton, wounded seven times as a Marine Raider in WW II, law school, US Senator, knew JFK, career destroyed by booze.
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Post by anitya on Feb 25, 2024 21:16:31 GMT
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Post by gman57 on Feb 26, 2024 1:12:29 GMT
Hmmm, I've read several times that Buffet always suggested the average investor just buy the SP500 index but after reading a little of the above it seems like Buffet it totally against the SP500 index at this time. He's basically calling for a lost decade if I'm reading this right.
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Post by anitya on Feb 26, 2024 19:21:00 GMT
Hmmm, I've read several times that Buffet always suggested the average investor just buy the SP500 index but after reading a little of the above it seems like Buffet it totally against the SP500 index at this time. He's basically calling for a lost decade if I'm reading this right. I am reading random parts and have not yet gotten to the part you allude to. Reading the Buffett’s annual letter over the weekend might give the impression that everything is expensive right now but I would say the stuff he wants to buy is expensive per him - that should not translate into being against SPY at this time. I am not selling SPY and am happy to let it do its thing. Read the China part and helped me. I am currently reading the Magnificent stocks. There are 4 shareholder letters I like to read: Buffet, Jamie Dimon, Howard Marks, and this one.
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Post by bigseal on Mar 1, 2024 16:39:04 GMT
Currently reading “Same as Ever” by Morgan Housel. Sometimes I enjoy reading books that challenge my thinking or assist me in learning something new. Other times I enjoy reading books that reinforce my thinking. This book falls in the latter category. I enjoy Morgan Housel’s writing style and stories.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 1, 2024 17:06:27 GMT
Currently reading “Same as Ever” by Morgan Housel. Sometimes I enjoy reading books that challenge my thinking or assist me in learning something new. Other times I enjoy reading books that reinforce my thinking. This book falls in the latter category. I enjoy Morgan Housel’s writing style and stories. Agree, Housel is an admirable writer. His "Psychology of Money" is equaled only by Adam Smith's classic, "The Money Game". I have "Same as Ever" on my list, bumped up near the top. You might take a look at Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Everything" for an accessible work that meets both of your categories for reading.
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Post by yakers on Mar 1, 2024 17:21:27 GMT
Going to watch Dune 2 this afternoon, aat the movies!
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Post by bigseal on Mar 1, 2024 19:23:34 GMT
Currently reading “Same as Ever” by Morgan Housel. Sometimes I enjoy reading books that challenge my thinking or assist me in learning something new. Other times I enjoy reading books that reinforce my thinking. This book falls in the latter category. I enjoy Morgan Housel’s writing style and stories. Agree, Housel is an admirable writer. His "Psychology of Money" is equaled only by Adam Smith's classic, "The Money Game". I have "Same as Ever" on my list, bumped up near the top. You might take a look at Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Everything" for an accessible work that meets both of your categories for reading. Thank you so much for the book recommendation. I have not read Bill Bryson’s book which you mentioned, but it is now on my list. Agree that Housel’s earlier book was excellent.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 2, 2024 22:02:20 GMT
Bigseal said it best: A good nonfiction book should challenge my thinking, reinforce my thinking, or help me learn something new. SAPIENS by Y. HARARI passes the test in a fascinating ramble discussing the character and origins of human kind. There is far too much in this master work to review, but I'll touch on a couple of highlights.
The larger brain of early man was expensive in terms of energy. A man at rest has a brain that consumes 25% of his energy, but with the larger primates only about 8%.. The Stone Age is mis-named. Surely many early tools of the time were made from wood and have long ago rotted away – only early stone tools remain for us to study. Different species of humanoids grew simultaneously along parallel paths. We do not know to what extent there was inter-breeding among different types or to what extent one type of proto-man would wipe out another type. Hunter/Gatherer early man worked havoc on almost all the mega fauna where ever he newly settled. Plant and animal variety crashed where ever mankind settled.
Easter Island, one of the few places where early man never arrived, is famous for its unique animal variety. At one time there were many isolated Easter Islands (Tasmania, Madagascar, Iceland) – but then early men would arrive and life form diversity inevitably crashed. Mega beasts were easy to wipe out because they give birth only rarely and their young are born practically helpless and need a great deal of care. Also, many beasts never had time to develop a healthy fear of men and so were easy to hunt to extinction.
AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION. The consequence of the Ag Revolution was that more people could exist but with miserable, under-nourished, back-breaking lives. Rather than roaming and consuming wide varieties of foods, early farmers often existed on only one: such as rice, barley or wheat. Dogs were probably the earliest domesticated animals. The Ag Revolt for most people was a Faustian bargain –more food, but concentrated in one area, man had more disease, more dull and laborious lives, more children to feed and, if all went well, a greater population under tight kingly control, so there was less freedom than before. For animals, the Ag Revolt meant greater species success (more individuals spread out over wide areas) but great individual suffering as beasts are still chained, penned, crowded, worked, castrated and tightly controlled. FROM TRIBES TO NATIONS. Human societies expanded from small tribes to larger organizations with the help of mutually shared myths which were usually reinforced with the belief that our social organizations were decreed by heaven, or by a god. Two hindu strangers meeting a thousand years ago knew how to treat and address one another by the signs of hierarchical social class each one exhibited. Two modern American strangers meeting will each assume the other more or less accepts mutual equality, derived from God, and will so treat each other. But if a just god exists, he has been curiously negligent in preventing cruel tyrants over the centuries. Nor is there any evolutionary evidence that “equality” exists among homo sapiens, apes or great mammals. The rule has always been survival of the fittest and greater sexual success for the alpha males. .“Equality” derived from a Creator is a myth Americans invented to knit together a new nation from disparate colonies. The development of money as an artifact of mutual trust was key in helping organizations expand from tribes to sophisticated societies.
COGNITIVE DISSONANCE is frequently discussed as a flaw of logic in large groups of people. Actually in most modern societies it is vital that people be able to hold two or more contradictory myths at the same time. In the middle ages, love and Christian faith were held as ideals while honoring warlike castes of knights were also honored. The Knights Templar and The Hospitaliers were attempts to settle these contradictory ideals. Since 1789, western societies have tried to accommodate two opposites: Freedom and Equality. Leave people free and levels of wealth differences become extreme. Compel equality and you outlaw freedom.
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Post by bigseal on Mar 7, 2024 16:43:10 GMT
Bigseal said it best: A good nonfiction book should challenge my thinking, reinforce my thinking, or help me learn something new. SAPIENS by Y. HARARI passes the test in a fascinating ramble discussing the character and origins of human kind. There is far too much in this master work to review, but I'll touch on a couple of highlights. The larger brain of early man was expensive in terms of energy. A man at rest has a brain that consumes 25% of his energy, but with the larger primates only about 8%.. The Stone Age is mis-named. Surely many early tools of the time were made from wood and have long ago rotted away – only early stone tools remain for us to study. Different species of humanoids grew simultaneously along parallel paths. We do not know to what extent there was inter-breeding among different types or to what extent one type of proto-man would wipe out another type. Hunter/Gatherer early man worked havoc on almost all the mega fauna where ever he newly settled. Plant and animal variety crashed where ever mankind settled. Easter Island, one of the few places where early man never arrived, is famous for its unique animal variety. At one time there were many isolated Easter Islands (Tasmania, Madagascar, Iceland) – but then early men would arrive and life form diversity inevitably crashed. Mega beasts were easy to wipe out because they give birth only rarely and their young are born practically helpless and need a great deal of care. Also, many beasts never had time to develop a healthy fear of men and so were easy to hunt to extinction. AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION. The consequence of the Ag Revolution was that more people could exist but with miserable, under-nourished, back-breaking lives. Rather than roaming and consuming wide varieties of foods, early farmers often existed on only one: such as rice, barley or wheat. Dogs were probably the earliest domesticated animals. The Ag Revolt for most people was a Faustian bargain –more food, but concentrated in one area, man had more disease, more dull and laborious lives, more children to feed and, if all went well, a greater population under tight kingly control, so there was less freedom than before. For animals, the Ag Revolt meant greater species success (more individuals spread out over wide areas) but great individual suffering as beasts are still chained, penned, crowded, worked, castrated and tightly controlled. FROM TRIBES TO NATIONS. Human societies expanded from small tribes to larger organizations with the help of mutually shared myths which were usually reinforced with the belief that our social organizations were decreed by heaven, or by a god. Two hindu strangers meeting a thousand years ago knew how to treat and address one another by the signs of hierarchical social class each one exhibited. Two modern American strangers meeting will each assume the other more or less accepts mutual equality, derived from God, and will so treat each other. But if a just god exists, he has been curiously negligent in preventing cruel tyrants over the centuries. Nor is there any evolutionary evidence that “equality” exists among homo sapiens, apes or great mammals. The rule has always been survival of the fittest and greater sexual success for the alpha males. .“Equality” derived from a Creator is a myth Americans invented to knit together a new nation from disparate colonies. The development of money as an artifact of mutual trust was key in helping organizations expand from tribes to sophisticated societies. COGNITIVE DISSONANCE is frequently discussed as a flaw of logic in large groups of people. Actually in most modern societies it is vital that people be able to hold two or more contradictory myths at the same time. In the middle ages, love and Christian faith were held as ideals while honoring warlike castes of knights were also honored. The Knights Templar and The Hospitaliers were attempts to settle these contradictory ideals. Since 1789, western societies have tried to accommodate two opposites: Freedom and Equality. Leave people free and levels of wealth differences become extreme. Compel equality and you outlaw freedom. Very helpful comment! I had heard great things about this book from others too. Needs to be at the top of my list for future reading.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 10, 2024 0:08:17 GMT
A couple of weeks ago, I posted a review of The Civil War Diary of George Templeton Strong. To follow up, I happily located "A DIARY FROM DIXIE" on gutenberg.org to get another day to day perspective. Mary Chesnut was wife to a S Carolina US senator who resigned and served as advisor to Jefferson Davis and later as a lower-level general. While the Strong diary is far more detailed and extensive, Mary Chesnut was at the pinnacle of southern society and knew absolutely everyone and was particular good friends with Varina Davis. Strong wrote almost every day in his diary, while Chesnut lets a week or two pass now and then. With Strong, the reader gets the anxious lead-up before every major battle, the rumors, the fears. Chesnut concentrates more on the personal side of the war, especially when hopes start to dim around 1863 and the long, grinding slide to death, depression, poverty and ruin begins in earnest. That war (or that era) made for some curious personalities. The women all put premium on ladylike demeanor, gracious and engaging conversation and propriety in every thought and deed. Yet they truly were fire-eaters when it came to that war. Southerners really detested northerners in a way Yankees did not share.
I'll conclude with a couple of excerpts:
"Not by one word or look can we detect any change in the demeanor of these negro servants. People talk before them as if they were chairs and tables. They make no sign. Are they stolidly stupid? or wiser than we are; silent and strong, biding their time?
"Mrs C is lovely. A perfect beauty. In Circassia, think what a price would be set upon her, for there beauty sells by the pound.
"Then the English are strictly neutral like the woman who saw her husband fight the bear. It was the first fight she ever saw when she did not care who won.
"You can always find him. You know where to find him -- wherever there is a looking glass, a bottle or a woman, there will he be also.
"....the old gentleman knows no law but his own will.
".... Perfect beauty hardens the heart and as to grace, what is so graceful as a cat, a tigress or a panther?
"The only good of loving anyone with your whole heart is to give that person the power to hurt you.
"I think a general worthless who's subalterns quarrel with him. Something is wrong about the man. Good generals are adored by their soldiers. See Napoleon Caesar Stonewall Lee.
"He has a winning way of earning everybody's detestation.
"Love flies before everlasting posing and preaching . The deadly requirement of a man, always to be looked up to, a domestic tyrant, grim, formal and awfully learned. Milton was only a mere man for he could not do without women. When he tired out the first poor thing who did not fall down worship and obey him and see God in him, she ran away. He immediately arranged his creed so that he could take another wife -- for wife he must have a la Mohammedan Creed. Shakespeare was a better man. Or may I say a purer soul than self-upholding Calvinistic puritanic king-killing Milton. There is no muddling of right and wrong in Shakespeare and no pharisaical stuff of any sort.
"... saunters along, the very perfection of a lazy gentleman who cares not to move unless it be for a fight, a dance, or a fox hunt.
''''''''''' The diaries are must-reads for anyone interested in the era.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 20, 2024 7:17:39 GMT
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Post by Norbert on Mar 20, 2024 7:36:52 GMT
Being excited about my first visit to Singapore, I just read "Lee Kuan Yew: the Grand Master's insights on China, the US, and the World".
Next will read his lengthy Singapore history, "From Third World to First", as time allows.
I had known that Singapore is an interesting place, but didn't expect the garden city on the equator to be as modern, beautiful, and proud as it is.
Much is owed to Lee Quan Yew, who demonstrated unmatched wisdom and leadership for decades. I'm trying to understand exactly what enabled Singapore's remarkable success.
Sadly, by contrast I see much decadence and division in Europe and the US. Am curious if the Singapore model could work for larger, non-Asian nations elsewhere. Or, is Singapore unique?
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Post by chang on Mar 20, 2024 8:08:45 GMT
Enormous questions Norbert suitable for lengthy discourses. My view, very briefly, is that LKY’s PAP party employed strong-arm tactics that worked on a small scale (tiny country) in the ‘50s, 60s, and 70s, that could not be extrapolated to a country like the US. The PAP’s power began to falter in the last years. Singapore is lucky that LKY was the right man at the right time, frankly a brilliant and highly effective leader. But the kind of leader that fell out of fashion in the last couple of decades … but may be coming back into fashion?
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Post by richardsok on Mar 22, 2024 1:57:59 GMT
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Post by bb2 on Mar 22, 2024 17:13:33 GMT
Thanks, Richardsok, that's funny. My wife is huge Hitchens fan. I can think tons more reasons.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 24, 2024 21:38:06 GMT
Ever since Amazon Prime threw their video viewers a curve ball by inserting brief commercial messages into their movies, I've been thoroughly irritated -- for the past month too annoyed to bother to watch anything they stream. But I thought I might try to limit the disruptions by timing my bathroom / kitchen breaks to match Prime's commercial betrayals. It sorta works -- not well, but tolerably.
With that in mind, last night I watched Sean Penn's latest directorial effort in THE PLEDGE, starring Jack Nicholson as a newly retired cop haunted by his last unsolved case. And WHAT a dark and creepy mystery film it is -- classic crime noir at its best, aided and abetted with cameo roles by Mickey Rourke, Sam Shepard, Vanessa Redgrave and Helen Mirren who move us along to the twisty, ironic end -- tragic and uncertain in ambiguities. Nicholson is superb; first depressed, then determined, then hopeful and, at last, psychologically destroyed . A+, but not for the faint of heart.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 29, 2024 19:29:26 GMT
This forum is no place for discussing classic French literature, so I'll just allot a few words on reading Revolt Of The Angels by Anatole France. One sees how this novel got on the Catholic Church Index of forbidden books. Even today, a century after publication, it is scandalous. Young Maurice, pleasant but idle heir to a family with a vast and priceless library of ancient books is stunned one day when his guardian angel, Arcade, appears to announce he's retiring from spiritual guard duty to help foment a second angel revolt against God. Arcade had spent idle hours studying among the library's old manuscripts and texts and concluded that God, ever greedy for praise and worship, is, in fact, an ignorant and cruel old tyrant. Feeling empty after Arcade leaves him, Maurice goes in search of his guardian angel – and isn't happy with what he finds. At the Creation, after Lucifer and his minions fell from heaven, they were concerned with weak mankind. They promoted the earliest gods; Greek & Egyptian divinities of nature; the sun, fermenting wine, dance, sexual ecstasy, music. But God brought in other religions exalting sacrifice and rejecting natural impulses, full of dark and somber edicts to stifle and repress.... all anti nature and anti science. If Lucifer's first revolt was driven by pride, the second angel revolt will be in defense of science and nature and mankind's happiness. Yes; the book is VERY shocking; sacrilegious to anyone brought up Christian.
A couple of quotes for a glimpse:
He had no knowledge and no desire to acquire any, his instinct ... telling him that it was better to understand little than to misunderstand a lot.
Like the majority of Frenchmen, he disliked parting with his money.
Only the primitives caught a glimpse of heaven. All the artists of the Renaissance were swine, including Michelangelo.
The moral can be expressed with: Thought, whither dost thou lead me? For it is a universally admitted truth that it is unhealthy to think and that true wisdom lies in not thinking at all.
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Post by richardsok on Mar 31, 2024 14:57:31 GMT
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Post by roi2020 on Mar 31, 2024 21:03:53 GMT
Good article - thanks for sharing! RIP Mr. Kahneman.
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Post by johntaylor on Apr 2, 2024 1:08:43 GMT
Sure, Kahneman made contributions, but the article indicated that previous economists had "...assumed that people were 'rational,' meaning we are self-interested, use all available information to make unbiased decisions, and our preferences are consistent."
One was Mill who was criticized for noting that political economy did not consider all of man's nature, but was concerned solely with a wealth-seeking person capable of rationally assessing the comparative ways to attain wealth.
But Mill cautioned that he was proposing an "arbitrary definition of man, as a being who inevitably does that by which he may obtain the greatest amount" of necessary things/wanted things with the least effort.
Was Mill so naive as to believe the average guy was capable of reading all available info and rationally evaluating economic decisions?
Even though he came before Freud and others who discussed the swirling subcurrents, Mill said that, without intellectual elites, society would be a "stagnant pool."
In On Liberty, he said democracy could only rise above mediocrity if "the sovereign Many have let themselves be guided by...a more highly gifted or instructed One or Few."
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Post by yogibearbull on Apr 4, 2024 12:17:39 GMT
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Post by bb2 on Apr 4, 2024 18:18:42 GMT
Just started richardsok's "Simple but not Easy" and am wondering if he ever met Bill Browder. "Red Notice", Browder's book, is one I couldn't put down.
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