Tahoe

Mixed Feelings

Revisado: 04-16-25

Racism in the United States of America has been a horror show. This book tells the story of our racism well and offers some details that you might not have been aware of. Nevertheless, it also offers an almost impenetrable literary assessment of the book "Gone With The Wind" and its subsequent iteration as a major movie. So, on the one hand, I valued its unflinching assessment of racism in America. But, on the other hand, I struggled with the baroque details of the intricate analysis of GWTW (book and movie) that it offers. If you like literary and film criticism, good for you. Go for it. For me that part was a slog.

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A Long Sermon for Atheism

Revisado: 05-13-24

Loftus delivers a convoluted and repetitive sermon (or series of sermons) here about why he is an atheist. His book is much longer than it would need to be because he repeats his arguments so often. His style of writing mixes philosophical terminology with casual emotional expressions that add nothing substantive to his ideas. In that sense he is simply not a good writer. In the end his case for atheism is hardly more compelling than the arguments for religious faith that he rejects. My guess is that he spent so much of his life rationalizing religious beliefs that he can't step outside of that framework to think clearly about atheism. Too bad. He appears to mean well but fails in the end.

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An Entertaining Book...If You Are an Unbeliever

Revisado: 04-21-24

If you enjoy hearing someone bash Christian beliefs, this book will likely entertain you. Otherwise, it's pretty light weight stuff. Lots of opinions. Not much real substance. Sometimes creative. Often snarky.

Andrew's radio-voice act is polished to perfection. That may be your cup of tea...or not.

Andrews is basically the atheistic version of what Dennis Prager is for conservative Christians: an entertaining and reassuring voice for a belief system that nobody in his audience will question.

Andrews: Stand up comedy for atheists. Prager: Stand up comedy for conservatives & Christians. Pick which side you're on and enjoy yourself.

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Worth the Effort. Less than Conclusive

Revisado: 04-19-24

There was a lot to like in this book. I enjoyed it. I admire Sapolsky's scientific credentials and humanistic values.

The topic is a tough one to tackle. Hats off to Sapolsky for taking it on.

Nevertheless, there are a couple of things that stood out for me:

1) Despite making a compelling case for the impact of physical and biological determinism, Sapolsky does not make a slam dunk case for the non-existence of "free will." What he does make is a very strong case for is that human decisions and actions are influenced profoundly by everything that precedes them. And, if anyone out there thinks that human decisions are made free of any biological, historical, cultural, or other influences, that belief is pretty well debunked by this book. So, let's put aside the notion of radical, unimpeded, uninfluenced, entirely free will. But, didn't we know that already?

2) This book does not confront head-on the problem of consciousness. Yes, there are neurobiological functions that occur before decisions become conscious. Sapolsky makes this point in a compelling way. But, once decisions reach consciousness, is that the end of the line? Does action follow "as the night the day?" Not necessarily. So, what is ultimately determined and what is not determined? That's hard to say and hard to find an answer for in this book.

3) Finally, if you accept that literally everything, (every thought, every decision, and every action) is strictly and completely determined by what has gone before, Sapolsky does not offer any realistic proposals for what we ought to do differently other than not blame the perpetrator. Basically, Sapolsky objects to the death sentence. Good. So do many people. But, his proposal for confining those who do wrong, doesn't add much. Don't we already put people in prison for variable terms depending on the degree to which their misdeeds seem to make their confinement necessary?

In the end, this book is worth your time and effort to read. It's readable despite a lot of scientific information that will go over the heads of many readers. Sapolsky is not dogmatic. He's reasonable and careful. But, until we know more about how mind and consciousness function, it seems too soon to say that every human thought and action is 100% preordained.

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Excellent

Revisado: 04-05-24

Krugman is an unabashed Liberal. The perspectives that he offers in this book reflect that. For me, that is a positive.

If you are a so-called Conservative, you may find this book infuriating.

Nevertheless, Krugman's fundamental inclination to argue that our society would be better off if we taxed the wealthy more heavily and provided a more robust social safety net for the poor, is something that I find hard to disagree with.

If you argue that "more government" will reduce economic growth, it seems to me that you have to be OK with valuing money more that human lives and human flourishing. That's a hard value choice for me to accept.

So, count me as a sympathetic "liberal" reviewer. If you see that as "socialistic" and potentially evil, I'm truly sorry. We'll just have to accept that we differ on our values and world view.

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Frustrating. Almost Incoherent.

Revisado: 04-05-24

I did not finish this book. I got about half way through it and stopped. Why? Not because I am religious and couldn't stand hearing potentially critical thoughts about religion. That was not the issue. What caused me to stop listening was that the initial chapters of this book spend an inordinate amount of time trying to justify the book itself. (If Dennett wanted to write a book that analyzes religion, why did he not just do it? Why spend three chapters on convoluted arguments for doing so?) Then he offers an analysis (if you can call it that) of religion that is an odd mix of references to other sources combined with a loosely organized collection of his own observations about the potential for religion to have evolved in a way that parallels biological evolution. I found this meandering collection of thoughts to be unhelpful, frustrating, and unconvincing. As a minor irritant, the book is peppered with footnote references to other sources that add nothing whatsoever to our understanding and interrupt the narration. There may be material in the chapters that I did not listen to that is valuable. Personally, I doubt it. But the first half of the book is an obstacle that I could not overcome.

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Good Intro to Cognitive Biases. But Flawed.

Revisado: 03-30-24

I see this book as a decent introduction to the topic of cognitive biases. There's no reason to think that this author is not well qualified to explain the most common limitations of human thinking.

Nevertheless, the book has flaws that I could no ignore.

1) The writing shifts frequently between what sounds like dry-as-dust academic prose and chatty personal reflections on the authors own life and experiences. There's no consistent tone or style here. This is unfortunate and hard to ignore.

2) The author's examples from her own life are either trite and/or betray what sounds to me like false modesty. (I don't care how hard she worked to get her Ph.d in a mere 4 years. Yes, I'm sure it was challenging. We all face challenges. Spare us the false modesty over your achievements in academia 30 years ago. Please explain things to us as adults and not as privileged, but naive, college freshmen.)

3) The narrator's style of presentation sounds as if she is a nursery school teacher reading "Bunny Hop Hop" to 4 year olds. It's just not consistent at all with the topics covered in this book. This style of narration makes the author's personal anecdotes sound even more trivial. My suggestion is that you listen to the sample audio before buying this book. If you can tolerate the narrator, good for you.

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Feynman: One of a Kind

Revisado: 03-28-24

Sharp tongued. Sharp witted. Quirky. Brilliant. Genius. Only one R.P. Feynman. And, aren't we lucky for that?

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Loved It

Revisado: 03-28-24

Swisher is edgy. I like that. The inside stories of Silicon Valley are fun. She skewers Zuckerberg and Musk. They deserve it.

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Good Questions for Christians

Revisado: 03-28-24

A blasphemous book if you are a believer. If you not, it reinforces many things that you already think. So, it's a decent debunk of Christianity. Short. To the point. But, not a witty and brilliant as Hitchens.

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