• Heidegger in Ruins: Between Philisophy and Ideology, Richard Wolin

• Nihilism: A Philosophical Essay, Stanley Rosen

Thanks, @Fooloso4 :up:

The Secret Life of Minerals, David Attenborough

The Adventures of Transcendental Philosophy: Karl-Otto Apel's Semiotics and Discourse Ethics
by Eduardo Mendieta

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I'm reading a new translation of the Tao Te Ching by Lin Yutang. Written in 1948, but new to me. I'm going to recommend this version to anyone who asks for my favorite translation. For each verse, it includes Yutang's translation, but also excerpts from the Chuang Tzu which are relevant. Chuang Tzu is the second founder of Taoism after Lao Tzu. He wrote a couple of hundred years after Lao Tzu. You should be able to find a free PDF version online.

Are you familiar with Dao De Jing: A Philosophical Translation by Roger Ames & David Hall? If so, what do you think of it? I've found it a much more insightful reading (between the lines) than any other version of Laozi's text. I've been meaning to reread it for quite some time ...

The Snail On The Slope - Arkady and Boris Strugatsky

Are you familiar with Dao De Jing: A Philosophical Translation by Roger Ames & David Hall? If so, what do you think of it? I've found it a much more insightful reading (between the lines) than any other version of Laozi's text. I've been meaning to reread it for quite some time ... — 180 Proof

Thanks for the reference. I hadn't heard of it. Went on Amazon. Bought it in Kindle.

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One Damn Thing After Another, Jodi Taylor, very light time travel sci-fi I'm listening to with my wife.

Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, Diarmaid MacCollouch, a very dense survey of the history of the faith begining with ancient Greek and Hebrew culture. Also listening to this with my wife. Actually read this years ago but it's such a wide ranging history that you can't get it all in one go.

Element of the Philosophy of Right - Hegel - suprisingly accessible after the section of abstract right... for a Hegel Book.

Causation: A User's Guide, Hall and Paul. I really wanted to get into this but it is very dry. Might have to return later.

Emma, Austin. Never read it before. Austin brings the delightful dialogue as always. I always like Clueless.

Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, Diarmaid MacCollouch — Count Timothy von Icarus

IIRC, quite good. :up:

1848: Year of Revolution by Michael Rapport

1848: Year of Revolution by Michael Rapport — Maw

A good read. Enjoy.

Preparation for Kazakhstan:

Alma-Ata: A Guide to Soviet Modernist Architecture 1955-1991 by Anna Bronovitskaya and Nikolay Malinin.

Preparation for Kazakhstan: — Jamal

Eat some apples, ride a horse. That's where they came from. In a world, or at least a country, full of geographical ignorance, I think Central Asia is the geography we're most ignorant of.

Eat some apples, ride a horse. That's where they came from. — T Clark

This information will stand me in good stead, so thanks. But while I do like apples, I'm more of a donkey guy.

I think Central Asia is the geography we're most ignorant of. — T Clark

Indeed, things have changed since the heyday of the Silk Route. Even my recently increased familiarity with the culture and food of the region has just been about Uzbekistan. Kazakhstan in my mind conjures up vague images of hunters on horseback with eagles, and then I think "wait, maybe that's Kyrgyzstan. Or Mongolia".

Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness, Kenzaburō Ōe

Life for Sale; The School of Flesh, Yukio Mishima.

@Maw

Just finished The Melancholy of Resistance - it took longer than I would have liked, I lost a bit of focus towards the last 3rd of the book, with the exception of the concluding chapter.

I can only compare it to Satantango, his only other novel I've read. It's hard to pick one, without spoilers, it seems to me that Melancholy is richer in general content than Satantango, and yet, and yet, the way the ending of Satantango went, tuned it from a decent book to a complete masterpiece, essentially focusing on a simple, yet very powerful philosophical idea/literary trick.

I struggled less with Satantango, and I felt it was somewhat more coherent, but again, Melancholy was richer in plurality of ideas... I suppose that Satantango's execution was just too good, so I'd give it the edge.

How does Baron Wenckheim's Homecoming compare with these two works?

I'll probably read one or two easy novels, then go back to a challenging one, then on to Baron - it requires some effort.

Any general thoughts?

On Physics and Philosophy by Bernard D'Espagnat — Manuel

How did that strike you? As I mentioned I took it out of the library but didn't make a lot of headway. But he seems to be one of the 'idealist physicist' genre, so I'm pre-disposed in his favour.

It was very good and interesting. True, it became difficult and heavy-going in several places, particularly when he becomes repetitive. So, some parts I just skimmed over.

I also sensed that the translation, or maybe even his way of writing instead, did not contribute to ease of understanding.

As to the content itself, in so far as I could see, it was rather persuasive, but didn't do a good enough job at explaining why his account of a veiled reality should apply beyond QM to larger objects.

But quibbles aside, it was nice to see someone trying to develop a philosophical system based on QM, by a person who made important contributions to experiments on non-locality.

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Theory of Society, Volume 1
by Niklas Luhmann

Mendiata's book on Apel's discourse ethics is really excellent.

While working through Leibniz New Essays on Human Understanding, I randomly decided I needed a bit of a break from the classical tradition, so am re-reading, after a decade:

Being and Time by Martin Heidegger

As for a novel:

Death Within the Evil Eye by Masahiro Imamura

Death Within the Evil Eye by Masahiro Imamura — Manuel

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Does anyone have a good recommendation on CS Pierce? On the one hand, his collected works are free in many places. On the other, they aren't particularly well organized and it's a 5,092 page PDF.

Is there a good "guided" tour that mixes the original writing with a solid framework for studying such a large body of work?

Perhaps looking at several of Susan Haack's articles - many of them freely available on academia.edu, could offer some help.

Alternatively, you can try to look at Peirce: A Guide for the Perplexed.

I have not found exactly that, there are several versions, some take articles from different periods of his life and arrange on a topical basis: the introduction to some of these books can offer some framework. So too could Peirce's correspondence with Lady Welby.

Thing is, his writings in a single volume can be erratic, as he wrote on everything. Editors have tried to correct this.

Good luck.

Does anyone have a good recommendation on CS Pierce? On the one hand, his collected works are free in many places. On the other, they aren't particularly well organized and it's a 5,092 page PDF.

Is there a good "guided" tour that mixes the original writing with a solid framework for studying such a large body of work? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes. This would be helpful for me too.

Good luck. — Manuel

Thanks for the recommendations.

The Sane Society by Erich Fromm
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford
The Castle by Kafka
On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason by Schopenhauer
The Psychopathology of Everyday Life by Freud
Ubik by Phillip K. Dick

Just finished:

Death in Venice by Thomas Mann 5/5
Notes from the Underground by Dostoevsky 5/5
Antigone by Sophocles (reread) 6/5

Ubik by Phillip K. Dick — Baden

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Thoughts?