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624 reviews

From Plato to NATO: The Idea of the West and Its Opponents by David Gress

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2.0

Is This An Overview?

As Western ideas have become dominant, they have also come under attack.  There is a lot to criticize about the West, but there is also confusion about what the identity of the West is.  Confusion that seeks to share the negative consequences without reference to the values. 

 

The West’s defining feature is the contrasting evolution of liberty and power.  Liberty came from the competition of power, as liberty enables societies to be more effective competitors.  The benefits of Western ideas were thought to be universally desirable, which has totalitarian features.  Universal values that leaders wanted to apply to everyone, wanted to rule over everyone.  In response to the totalitarian imposition, people sought for liberty.  A search for power lead to liberty, individualism.  But liberty without an appropriate administration, without governance, lead to totalitarian regimes. 

 

Caveats?

This book uses nonfiction and fiction to explain the Western identity.  Uses history and mythology.  The interpretations have mixed qualities.  Misinterpreting certain information for a simplified narrative.  Creating an essence of other authors, and the West.  Various authors presented have more complex claims than a single underlying theme provided.  The same narrative of the West, can apply to other societies as well, as the same aspects exist throughout various societies.  

The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine

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1.0

Is This An Overview?

Religion has value, but has been corrupted by institutions.  Religious institutions are a human invention which creates justifications to persecute those who do not adhere to their claims, and to monopolize power.  Rituals are developed to filter those who accept the religion from those to be persecuted.  Rituals that are meant to be an expression of power. 

 

Faith is meant to be ubiquitous, but religious institutions have made faith exclusionary.  Certain groups are favored over others, and have select few individuals within the favored group who communicate with their deity. 

 

For religious institutions, only the ideas from religious texts are accepted.  Other ideas are persecuted.  Persecuting other ideas prevents improving the ideas, making society stagnant.  Religion prevents correcting limitations of ideas, which has led to many contradictions within religious texts. 

 

Caveats?

Methods of expressing ideas can be antediluvian, which can make the book difficult to read.  The focus of the book are the negative consequences of religion, specifically Christianity.  The author reflects on the contradiction found in the religious claims and their effects on society.  The book is not against religion, but against the institutions of religion.  The author declared oneself to have a faith.  Part of the antagonism for religious institution, is because the author was persecuted by the Church. 

Napoleon: A Life by Andrew Roberts

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2.0

Is This An Overview?

There was more to Napoleon than military acumen.  Napoleon’s lasting influence was on the culture, as laws became equitable to everyone, made status based on merit, improved educational quality, enabled administration to be more efficient, and secularized society while trying to be respect those who were religious.  Many lands were conquered by Napoleon’s forces, with Napoleon being courteous to the conquered.  Napoleon wanted to gain the people’s approval, which would enable control of foreign lands with the support of the population.  Through Napoleon’s efforts, the conquered lands had their infrastructure and institutions improved.  The army was to be respectful of the local communities and ways of being, to prevent creating conditions for disapproving the French.  Napoleon tried to limit the army’s pillaging after a victory.   

 

Caveats?

There is a lack of reasons and explanations for why events occurred.  The book focuses on Napoleon’s actions and decisions throughout participated events.  The details of the various conflicts are provided, without explaining the reason for the events or conflicts.  Focusing on the details of what happened can prevent potential misunderstanding of subjective reasons that people provide, but the events lack meaning without the explanations. 

 

Among the details of Napoleon’s life that are provided, military affairs are prominent.  Napoleon’s family, and love life, along with French culture, and politics are provided but are relegated to military affairs.   For an understanding of French society, and history, additional research would be needed.  

Meditations for the Humanist: Ethics for a Secular Age by A.C. Grayling

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4.0

Is This An Overview?

This book is a composition of many short essays on a diverse set of topics.  Provoking reflection on values, to consider different ways on how to be.  Some essays impart thoughts on how to treat others, how to share values, how to compromise.  Some essays impart thoughts on how to thinking, how to reason, how to be honest.  Some essays impart thoughts on how to be part of society, how conflict if created, how differences are handled.  Life is a composition of a diverse set of emotions, struggles, and interactions.  Each aspect of life has limits, complexity, and consequences.  By learning and thinking about the aspects of life, can the individual improve themselves and society. 

 

Caveats?

Essay quality is mixed, as different topics will interest different readers, and the essays are short.  There is not much on each topic.  The topics are provided a complex understanding and provide valuable content, but for topics that interest the reader, the reader would need to search for more information to understand the different aspects and perspectives on the topic.  A bias of the book is the treatment of topics related to religion, as the topics are simplified and the references to them are primarily the negative consequences.  

Forget About Heaven: Don't Yell At Me, Take It Up With My Dead Mother by Kathleen Hoy Foley

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3.0

Is This An Overview?

In life, Kathleen could not reconcile with Kathleen’s mother Pat.  After Pat passed away, they could.  This is a book on how a mother and daughter are able to share their stories with each other, and through the processes of sharing, find reconciliation.  By sharing their views on events, they are able to understand how each affected the other’s life, how others experienced their actions and behaviors.  Throughout their life, they saw primarily the harm, the hardships inflicted on them by others.  Through sharing their stories, they were able to get to know each other and understand why they behaved the way they did.  Understand why there were bursts of anger, how they treated others when they were in pain, how emotional wounds affected their behavior.  Through sharing their stories, they were able to be heard, to find worth, belonging, and acceptance. 

 

Caveats?

The writing quality is mixed.  The path to reconciliation is emotional, through sharing tragic stories.  A reader should be emotionally prepared.  The conversation that occurs is with someone who passed away.  Pat’s responses and changes in thinking are based on what Kathleen thinks they would be.  Although the honestly in responses and the changes are desired, its uncertain if they would have happened while Pat lived.  Reconciliation takes immense effort to hear what another has to say. 

How America Works... and Why It Doesn't: A Brief Guide to the Us Political System by William Cooper

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5.0

Is This An Overview?

The American Constitution has mixed qualities, but has enabled an effective architecture for governance.  Meant to make sure that the people have ownership in the government, to prevent concentration of power, and accept the complexity of human behavior.  A democracy that is meant to prevent the concentration of power by spreading power and authority to the people broadly.  Meant to enable a peaceful transfer of power based on elections.  A federalist system in which state and federal governments counterbalance each other.  Protection of free speech that protects human freedom by enabling negotiation through sharing different views rather than through violence. 

 

But there are problems within the America political system that prevent effective governance.  Three problems are tribalism, social media, and the political systems’ structure.  Wanting to belong is normal for people, but tribalism effects how people process information.  Tribalism distorts thinking, and oversimplifies information.  Tribalism enables various cognitive biases that distort information in favor of one’s own political party and against the opposition.  Social media amplifies the cognitive vulnerabilities and intensifies tribal prejudice.  Social media uses tribal biases to find reaffirming views, without enough verification of the information. 

 

The American two-party political system polarizes the tribes, which enables a destructive rivalry.  A rivalry that has criminalized politics as each party mutually recriminates the legal actions against the other party with more force.  Rather than encourage bipartisan efforts to uncover the truth when there are major accusations and enable an appropriate prosecution of politicians, the criminalization of politics has negative consequences.  Consequences such as that the ideas become prosecuted no matter the guilt or innocence of a person, takes energy away from governing effectively to use towards hatred of political rivals, and deters talented people from politics.  

 

Caveats?

The book was written in a neutral manner to be acceptable by the different political parties, but infrequently the author’s biases become salient.  Infrequently utilizing the same tribal biases.  Knowledge of the biases does not prevent the biases. 

 

The political system is complex, that makes finding resolutions difficult.  There is little on ways to resolve the problems that the American political system is facing.  Some resolutions have mixed qualities, such as having more political parties to reduce the destructive tribal competition for power.  

Breaking Through Silence: A No-Nonsense Love Letter to Women by Kathleen Hoy Foley

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2.0

Is This An Overview?

There are social and personal problems of keeping silent about abuse and harassment.  Those who are socially punished into silence, do not receive the support needed to recover their physical and mental health.  Those who are dehumanized do not simply get over the trauma.  Those who had traumatic experiences become vulnerable and do not develop appropriately.  Without support, trauma can take on a language of its own, in the form of inappropriate behavior.  Tantrums, quick to become aggravated, and even lash out by physically harming others.  Traumatic wounds teach lessons that ought not be learned.

 

When a culture is blind to the victims, the culture protects the guilty.  While the harassed carry guilt and endure silent torment, the abusers can skillfully continue to inflict violence.  If society will not give the abused power, the abused need to take control, assert authority, to recognize and label what happened as abuse.  The traumatized transform themselves when they break the silence.  Speaking about what happened is a way to support oneself, to find understanding in what happened, to become empowered.

 

Caveats?

The book is poorly organized, without a systemic analysis of trauma.  Although being traumatized is tragic, the author assumes that the way people react to the situations and recover is the same for everyone.  The problem is that not all women think the same way about the tragic circumstances.  The book is against the silence of the harassed, against how society can silence the harassed, but movements and organizations have developed to provide support and give the harassed a voice. 

Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink

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5.0

Is This An Overview?
Motivating others through extrinsic rewards and punishments is more complex than just providing benefits.  The purpose of extrinsic motivation was to encouraging activities with rewards to get more of the wanted activities, while discouraging activities with punishment to get less of the activities.  The problem is that extrinsic motivation has negative effects. 

When extrinsic rewards are introduced, people lose their intrinsic interest in the activity.  Rewards transform interesting tasks into drudgery, play transforms into work.  Rewards diminish intrinsic motivation which harms performance, creativity, and appropriate behavior.  Rewards provide a temporary productivity boost, at the cost of productivity after the boost.

Extrinsic rewards behave like an addiction, as they provide temporary happiness while needing larger rewards later to have the same effect.  When rewarded, people do not do more than what gives them the reward.  Rather than encourage wanted behavior, extrinsic motivation can encourage unwanted behavior.  When rewarded for satisfying short term goals, goals imposed by others, extrinsic motivation can induce unethical behavior as people will seek to satisfy the goal with less regard to the consequences of the methods chosen. 

Extrinsic motivation, such as money, is useful as a baseline reward.  To pay people enough for money not to be part of their list of problems.  Rewards can make algorithmic, routine tasks more productive, but hurt creative tasks.  Rather than extrinsic motivation, people can be intrinsically motivated to find joy in what they do.  Rather than restrict behavior, people can be intrinsically motived through their own autonomy.

Caveats?
A use for extrinsic motivation is to provide enough baseline rewards, but there is not enough information about baseline rewards.  There is uncertainty about when baseline rewards become enough.  There is also a social aspect to baseline rewards, as people can be affected by the rewards of others.  The alternative methods to motivation have mixed qualities.  

Woman In Hiding: A True Tale Of Backdoor Abuse, Dark Secrets &Amp; Other Evil Deeds by Kathleen Hoy Foley

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3.0

Is This An Overview?

Silencing the past, silencing the tragedy, silencing the emotional wounds does not lead to healing.  Pretending that traumatic events did not happen, does not change the fact of what happened.  This is a story about a lifetime of silence, of being a secret keeper.  This is a story about sharing those secrets.  Secrets of physical harassment, emotional harassment, sexually harassment.  Harassment of the vulnerable paves the way for trauma, to misery.  In response to the pain caused to them, to escape their pain, they develop behaviors that lead to more misery.  Behaviors such as taking out their rage on those even more vulnerable than them.  Situational awareness changes for the traumatized, as they see danger everywhere.  The support for victims of harassment is often denied by society, which does not recognize the harassment, which allows the perpetrators to continue their inappropriate behavior.

 

Caveats?

This is a story about tragic events, that the reader needs to be emotionally prepared to engage with.  As an autobiography, there is always a concern for how the events are remembered.  Tragic as the events were, there is uncertainty about the actual thoughts the author had as a child or later.  As the book is consistent of personal thoughts, they sometimes read like poetry, sometimes poorly written comments in need of organization.  The perspective on events is singular.  An understanding of the events would have been enhanced by what others thought of the situations.  Representing a lifetime of events means that many 

The Status Game: On Social Position and How We Use It by Will Storr

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5.0

Is This An Overview?

Status is a social resource.  People seek to obtain status, and fear the loss of status.  Status is made through social interaction, by being superior to others.  Status is a source of meaning, and can be found in any system that has people interacting with each other.  Gaining status brings joy, while losing status feels dreadful.  Status can inspire people to attain skills, and knowledge, and develop inventions and create wealth that improves society.  Status can cause people to lie, cheat, and commit atrocious acts.  For status, each individual becomes the protagonist of the story, that they are a better person, no matter their behavior.  The flaw with status is that status is insatiable.  The expected happiness after an achievement, is transient.  Causing people to keep playing the status games.  The want for sustained happiness cannot be earned by playing the status game. 

 

The way to earn status depends on the game being played.  There are three types of games.  A single type might be prominent in an interaction, but status games are usually a mix of the types.  The three types of games are dominance games, virtue games, and success games.  Dominance games are about coercion and fear.  Virtue games are about being conspicuously dutiful, obedient, and moralistic.  Success games are about achievement of outcomes.  Different cultures have different ways to attain status or lose it.  Status in one game, does not necessarily transfer to having status in another game.

 

Humans are social animals, and have a desire to belong.  While belonging in a group can be mentally and physically rewarding, isolation can make people unhealthy.  Being part of a group changes how people think, deferring to the group and accepting the groups’ values as their own.  People will even believe very wrong ideas to be part of the group.  To be part of a status game, the brain filters and distorts information received, interprets information in a self-serving way.  Simplifying reality to make the individual and their group appear better than others. 

 

Caveats?

Diverse examples on the effects of status are provided, but they are explained in a similar manner.  There is a systematic analysis of status, but the information can become repetitive.