Phil

Unfortunately distopian for mosty of humanity

Revisado: 09-29-20

Waited quite a long time for this book to appear on audible. Listened to on x1.4 speed.

Peter Thiel's preface did not add much value to the book other than to explain it's failure to predict things such as the rise of China. There were several other things in the book that were popular in the news at the time that turned out to be nothing, such as the Y2K millennium bug scare.

Once you can look beyond the failures of its short term predictions up to the current date, it seems to predict a certain set of possible and potentially likely outcomes in the world. The biggest prediction is the gradual decline of the nation state and the rise and dominance of the sovereign individual.

I tend to agree that these things seem likely in the major arc of human civilization, although I doubt that anyone alive today will still be around in the future where it can be said that nation states are a thing of the past. Exactly how these things may come to pass is left unclear in the book and up to the reader to imagine.

We seem well on-target for the progress of digital technology and trends that threaten the displacement of large number of people in the workforce. Despite it's age, the book still has some interesting and though-provoking sections. However talks as though these trends are undeniable and inevitable. That may turn out to be true, but I resent the description of the authors regarding huge amount of the worlds population as the "losers" and "left-behinds", not fit to work or live in such a high-tech world.

The book has no prescriptions for this unfortunate ~90% of humanity. Instead what is important is that you should focus on staying are up-to-date with all that gadgets and gizmos to ensure that you're in the ~10% of the world's population who can keep a job. It's a very Ayn Randian perspective. As if that alone is a recipe for success, when 9 out of 10 people on the street hate and resent you.

It seems that the people who praise this book fall in line with the authors to emphasize their desires to see the end of nations, while ignoring that it simultaneously seems to be a net negative to the vast majority of people in the world.

I am not very sympathetic to the attitude of the book, nor to the people who seem to celebrate it.

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Challenging, elightening and a bit depressing

Revisado: 09-29-20

Bought after hearing Robert Plomin on Sam Harris' Waking Up podcast episode #211. Listened to on x1.6 speed.

It is difficult not to have mixed emotions about this book and how it impacts all aspects of your life, from your parents, to your upbringing to raising children.

If you are not already on the slippery slope of dispelling your long-held but mostly uninformed beliefs about how people behave, what drives them, and how they change over time, then it's would be easy to dismiss the book.

It's a huge challenge to what I believed you could change and influence in your life as a child growing up, compared to life now and experience as a middle-aged adult. Robert's explanations about behavioral genetics more closely matches the reality of my personal experience and grudging acceptance as an adult to explain things about myself and others around me.

If things like interests, intelligence, behaviors and personalities are more explained by nature and less explained by nurture then the magnitude of the problem becomes more clear if you seek change any of these things in yourself or those around you.

I think that some of the best advice in the book is to try to go with the grain of genetics rather than work against it. We still have a long way to go from a technological level to identify such grains however.

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Well researched recommendations

Revisado: 08-30-20

Listened to on x1.4 speed. I tried to do some of my own research about nutrition during pregnancy and where the advice came from to avoid certain foods such as raw fish, red meats, soft cheese, shellfish and raw eggs. From what I could tell that advice stemmed from only two actual risks which are 1) food poisoning and 2) heavy metals. Those recommendations don’t say anything about what are the nutritional needs of a baby, nor was it obvious to me that those were good recommendations to mitigate the risks.

Lily’s booked helped dispel me of those concerns. Early on she warns that her advice is not in line with the recommendations of American healthy authorities. For me, that was a good sign for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because I live in Sweden and the advice here is that you can basically eat whatever you want, and secondly, what I’d learned about dietary science is that most of it has major deficiencies and questionable recommendations.

Lily has clearly done her research and her advice is pretty consistent with I’ve heard from other sources that I consider trustworthy. There are 33 pages of references which shows she has done a lot of research on the topic and she takes great care to demonstrate it. That is an important point when considering her advice which not consistent with the “conventional wisdom”.

Generally speaking she recommends reducing sugars and carbs and increasing meat protein and animal fats. Oily fish such as salmon are also on the menu because they are also high in levels of selenium which binds mercury. That is great news for my wife who loves salmon. But size counts and it’s still best to avoid large fish such as tuna and swordfish. Some reviews complain that her recommendations are not vegetarian friendly, but she does go to some lengths to explain how vegetarians can meet nutritional needs for pregnancy, but she freely admits it’s quite challenging.

The strengths of the book are discussing nutrition, but it also discusses other subjects such as exercise and other modern concerns being around certain chemicals in food packaging or shampoo or nail polish. Where the nutrition parts of the book seem empowering and satisfying, the concerns about PCBs and other chemicals that are unavoidable in every day life felt stressful and depressing. Good thing I’ve already forgotten about those parts and mostly remember the good advice in the book.

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Don’t bother unless you’re a sci-fi history buff

Revisado: 08-08-20

This was my first Isaac Asimov. It seemed to be one of his most acclaimed works which is why I wanted to hear it. Listened at 1.6x speed.

I guess that it’s generally true most sci-fi ages badly and this is a good example. Set 12000 years in the future where civilization has spread throughout the galaxy yet they are writing a book on paper and the kind of money most people care about is gold coins.

They’re supposed to be writing an encyclopedia about the entire history of mankind but they’ve forgotten the human race started on earth. They have atomic power plants that explode like atomic bombs, atomic spaceships, atomic shields and atomic ray guns. Technology has not advanced much since the 1950s.

The plot about a collapsing empire is nothing extraordinary nor even interesting in 2020, given current world events. Time in the book passes so fast that new characters appear and then die of old age a couple of chapters later. You don’t even have a chance to get emotionally attached to them.

Maybe this was the first of its kind when it first came out, but unless you have some special appreciation for this fact, there’s nothing for you in this book if you’ve read any modern sci-fi.

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Struggled to follow characters and timeline in audiobook form

Revisado: 08-01-20

Snowcrash is probably my favourite sci-fi novel of all time. This is my second Neal Stephenson, listened to on 1.6x speed.

Initially I was excited to hear the familiar style and humor of Stephenson in a new story, but I quickly began to struggle to follow the story.

The book jumps back and forth in the timeline between the past and the present and switches characters names from the parents to the children. I had to reread the book’s summary several times to remind myself who was who and try to figure out when I was in the timeline.

The story would have been easier to follow in paper form, or there needed to be more distinction during the reading when there were changes of scene or time.

As far as the actual story goes, if I take the glass half-full view, then it was a pretty good predictor of the future from when it was first publishing in 1999. If I take the glass half-empty view, then "truth is stranger than fiction" and the actual things that have happened in the world make a better story than this. I'm sad to say it doesn't reach reach my expectations of a good sci-fi book, especially after setting such a high standard with Snowcrash.

So after many hours of confusion the story ended in a way that I found lacked luster, as it had aged poorly with time.

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A great introduction to Hemingway

Revisado: 07-27-20

My first Hemingway. Listened on 1.6x speed.

I knew little of what happened in Spain during WWII. This was an insight that helped fill in some gaps in my knowledge. The story is simple but densely packed with strong character development and a detailed history that doesn’t overwhelm you. Hemingway expertly fills in enough background of all the character’s history so that you’re not left with any questions. Why is an American fighting in the Spanish civil war? How has he gone from a language teacher to such an experienced and disciplined sapper?

I enjoyed Hemingway’s style of writing, even though it was a little bit overdone sometimes like the now, now, now, part - 127 different ways to count now. Probably half that would have sufficed.

As one can expect from the title and from the introduction with John Donne’s poem, the ending is a thriller. I was left with my heart racing and I could hardly believe I’d reached the end.

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