Posts Tagged ‘World History’

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Summer One-liners

Wednesday, September 16th, 2009

Since I haven’t taken the time to write even brief reviews of the books I’ve read over the last several months,  here’s a list of them in roughly the order they were read.  As, or if, reviews are added, they will link from this page.

Shut Up, I’m Talking – Gregory Levey.   Very funny memoir by a Canadian writer in New York who ends up working briefly as a speech-writer for the Prime Minister of Israel.

The Age of American Unreason – Susan Jacoby.  Sobering look at anti-rationalism in America over the last four decades and its ill effects on our nation.

Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid – Jimmy Carter.  June book club selection.  President Carter’s version of the history of the Israeli-Palestine conflict.  Not widely regarded as completely accurate, disturbing nonetheless.

The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East – Sandy Tolan.  Fascinating story about two families and one house in Israel/Palestine.  Recommended by a friend at work in Tel Aviv.

Inevitable Illusions: How Mistakes of Reason Rule Our Minds – Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini.  Survey of many of the ways we fool ourselves.  Other than some confusing editing in one section, a very interesting look at cognitive science’s understanding of our mental blind spots.

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts – Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.   Mostly about confirmation bias, covering the gamut of ways we fool ourselves through self-justification.

Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time – Greg Mortensen and David Oliver Relin. July book club selection.  Poorly written, but very inspirational example of the power of a single human.

Why Evolution Is True – Jerry A. Coyne.  Lucid overview of evolution and natural selection, with very clear explanations of all the types of evidence for both.  Minimal (compared to Prothero) but strong criticisms of creationism.

Consciousness: A Very Short Introduction – Susan Blackmore.  My re-entry into trying to understand consciousness, again.  Accurately sub-titled, good overview with an intriguing nod to Buddhist meditation as a means of understanding.

Sweet Dreams: Philosophical Obstacles to a Science of Consciousness – Daniel C. Dennett.  Analysis of the main philosophical distractions keeping us from moving forward toward understanding consciousness.

Day of Empire: How Hyperpowers Rise to Global Dominance–and Why They Fall – Amy Chua.  Given, via her thesis, that tolerance supported the rise of all hyperpowers and intolerance contributed to their declines, Chua analyzes how this applies to the USA now.  Nice historical review of the power and place of previous hyperpowers too.

Infidel – Ayaan Hirsi Ali.   Amazing story of her journey, and disturbing insight into civil war in Somalia and the manifestations of Islam in eastern Africa.

Statecraft: And How to Restore America’s Standing in the World – Dennis Ross.   August book club selection.  Good review of recent examples of good and bad statecraft, prescriptive lists for successful negotiating and mediating, and analysis of what USA needs to do next in regards to foreign policy actions.

The Mind of the Market: How Biology and Psychology Shape Our Economic Lives – Michael Shermer.   Great refutation of the standard homo economicus explanation.  Goes far beyond just describing our economic behavior.  Shermer would have been better served by a grander, less marketing-driven title.

Buddhism without Beliefs – Stephen Batchelor.  Recommended by Susan Blackmore.  Sincere meditations on Buddhist meditation without religious trappings/distractions.

Zen without Zen Masters – Camden Benares.  Silly book I’ve had for years.  No content or guidance.    May re-read after another twenty years.

Buddhism Plain and Simple – Steve Hagen.  More detailed than Batchelor (but with less impact on me), also free of religious distractions, focuses on awareness.

Encountering Naturalism: A Worldview and Its Uses – Thomas W. Clark.  Nice introduction to many of the aspects of naturalism.  There is no such thing as contra-causal free will.

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The Looming Tower

Tuesday, May 5th, 2009

I picked up a copy of Lawrence Wright’s Pulitzer Prize-winning The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage) this weekend in Santa Fe.  Started reading it just to fill in a few minutes, then couldn’t stop reading it.  Apologies to all those who’s earlier recommendations of this book to me went unheeded until now.  You were all correct.  The Looming Tower is an amazing, revolting, fascinating and terrifying recounting of the life of Osama bin Laden, the history of al-Qaeda, the consequences of the broader Middle East Conflict and the tragically inefficient efforts of the U.S. intelligence community.

For me, aside from the detailed explanations of exactly how the repeated lack of inter-agency cooperation made the U.S. blind to first bin Laden, then to al-Qaeda, then to their plans, the main benefit of the book was gained from understanding part of the life of bin Laden.  To see how he started off in life, where he went, how he reacted to events in his life, who he listened to, how he changed and how he changed al-Qaeda was amazing.  The book would have been great in that sense even if it had stopped prior to 9/11.

Other than some Truthers who claim the USG destroyed the World Trade Center, the book is very favorably reviewed.   I, too, highly recommend it for anyone looking for an accessible explanation of bin Laden and al-Qaeda.

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The Post-American World

Thursday, February 5th, 2009

Prior to last month’s discussion of The World is Flat, I was trying to finish Fareed Zakaria‘s The Post-American World.   Oh well, better late than never.  Zakaria starts off the book discussing the “rise of the rest” and how many parts of the rest of the world (states and non-states) are doing much better these days.  America pushed for globalization, got globalization and now doesn’t know what to do with it.  In his chapter titled A Non-Western World? he ponders the connections between culture and destiny and reviews the rise and fall of other great civilizations and cultures.  The next two chapters cover China and India (the Challenger and the Ally respectively) and their roles in the post-American world.  The chapter on China covers its history, relations with the rest of Asia, relations with America and the asymmetrical aspects of its current power.  India’s self-identification as a geography more than a country and the relative effects of Hinduism were two of the next chapter’s more interesting side topics.  The penultimate chapter reviews the political gridlock that cripples America now and has a fascinating comparison of current-day America with late nineteenth century Britain.  Their Boer War is not our Iraq War, since they were a political power with a crippled economy and we are, in broad strokes, the opposite (here’s a related article from Foreign Affairs by Zakaria, adapted from the book).

Zakaria closes the book with a call for a renewal of American Purpose.  He proposes six New Rules for a New Age:  Choose, build broad rules instead of narrow interest, be Bismarck not Britain, order a la carte, think asymmetrically, and legitimacy is power.  The book ends with his call for us to lose our fear, regain our confidence and return to the great, open America we once were.

For more opinions, here’s a more in-depth review by one of Zakaria’s colleagues, a less-enthusiastic one from Britain, a friendly chat between Zakaria and Thomas Friedman, and an anti-Zakaria column.

This was a very “glass-half-full” type of read.  It motivated me much more than TWIF and it had less fluff.  I hope Zakaria is right about our current status and our ability to regain the best parts of our past successes.  Work-wise, I particularly appreciated his pages on the changes that need to take place in Washington.  People  from both/all sides could benefit from his approach to government problem-solving and policy-making.

Note to his editors:  check the multiple improper uses of  “further” in place of the correct “farther.”

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The World Is Flat

Sunday, January 4th, 2009

Our book club is discussing Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century (TWIF) this month.  I read the 2005 edition of the book, so I’m not sure about the contents of the 2.0 and 3.0 updates.  The first half of the book describes ten “flatteners” that have caused this flattened world and defines the effects of the convergence of the most important flatteners.  By the way, the whole flat earth metaphor is derived from the image of a leveled playing field, not from our old understanding of geography.  The third quarter of the book covers the consequences that affect America, the risks that face America, and suggestions on what America can do to thrive in the flattened world.  As energizing as the first half of the book was, this part was terrifying.  The last part of the book covers the responses and challenges of the rest of the world to a flattened world, reviews general business approaches to a flattened world, warns of the danger of the presence of unflattened parts of the world, and closes with recommendations on how to keep peace in a flattening world.

This book and its author are very popular, and there are lots and lots of web resources about them both.  The TWIF‘s Wikipedia page is a nice place to start if you’d like to learn more about the contents and read Friedman’s critics too.  Friedman’s website includes product plugs and links to many NY Times articles.  To jump right into the world of those not enamored with Friedman, see this review of the first edition.   Meanwhile, Fareed  Zakaria’s review is probably much easier to swallow for Flatheads.

It’s nice to finely get around to TWIF, after the digs taken at it and at Friedman by Amy Chua in her World on Fire.   Considering last fall’s discussion of Chua, the enthusiasm of Friedman’s Fan Club, the critical responses to TWIF and the importance of the core issues, we should have a very interesting discussion this month.  My general response to TWIF is similar to my response to Nye’s Soft Power:  I learned something from it, but the greater value probably lies in knowing more about what everyone is talking about and the potential mental stimulation that comes with that.

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The Dust of Empire

Wednesday, November 19th, 2008

For months, I have been scavanging the shelves of my area’s largest used book store, trying to find a copy of Peter Hopkirk’s The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia.  I finally broke down and ordered a new copy (pre-reading thanks to Dan C. and Meghan B. for the ringing endorsements).  During my last search though, I found Karl E. Meyer’s The Dust of Empire: The Race for Mastery in The Asian Heartland.  Turns out, this was a great book to read right after the Genghis Khan title (see previous entry).  Meyer and his wife Shareen Blair Brysac  also authored the larger, more detailed Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia (which I’ll eventually read, to complement The Great Game), but Dust was written to provide an introductory survey of the histories of the five Central Asian republics, the Caspian and the Caucasus, Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and Russia.

Meyer begins with a review of the British Empire’s method of rule, contrasted against American foreign policy trends.  In the prologue, he states that “the thesis of this book is that the moral and diplomatic dilemmas confronting Washington today differ in degree but not in kind from those that confronted Britain before World War I (emphasis added).“  He then spends a chapter on each of the countries/regions listed above, beginning though with Russia and the “long talons of memory.”  Meyer closes the book (in the winter of 2002 I think), with his thoughts on the direction that America should take, post 9/11.  He is a big fan of NATO and consensus-building, and makes a fairly strong argument (that looks much stronger in retrospect) regarding the American responsibility to take actions with consideration of other countries.

Whether or not one agrees with Meyer’s conclusions, I think he meets his objective of introducing the unconcerned American reader to the historical drama, tragedy and importance of these countries.  Also, his references to other works on the countries, regions and issues are extensive and useful.  If I was re-ordering the reading sequence of my books, I would place this one a little earlier in the program.

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