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What book should I read next?

Volpone said:
Crap, I missed the Hemingway option. I read the semi-autobiographical WWI one. What was it? "A Farewell to Arms"! Very good.

Before noticing that it was a tossup between "Atlas" and "Stranger". Both are on my list.

In fact one of my biggest regrets in life is that my Aunt, who I lived with a couple times when I was starting out after college and I loved more than anyone I can think of except possibly my Dad, had a copy of it. Because she was a lifelong Democrat with a hate of guns and I was afraid it was some liberal garbage, I never read it. By the time I found out the opportunity I'd missed I was in Portland and she was in Minneapolis, dying of lung cancer.

After the funeral it was one of about three things from her place that I'd absolutely resolved I would get, but I couldn't find it anywhere. :(
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I'm a little confused --which book are you talking about?
 
Stranger in Strange Land. To monkey someone else, hard to go wrong with Heinlein.


curiousa2z said:
Depression aside, don't be put off by its depth. Actually, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is fascinating.
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Like War and Peace, that is one of those books I've started a few times, but never finished.
 
Snowcrash. I have read it like twice...actually, I think maybe three times now that I think about it. If you like sci-fi, then you will probably love this. Considered by many to a modern "post-cyberpunk" classic, and most people agree that it is Stephenson's best book.

(Not a classic of literature like "Dune", or maybe "Hyperion", but a cult classic for sure.)

It has a lot of neat concepts in it, and there's a lot of exploration into early culture and mythology and language, and how it all connects. And how most early religions - including Judism - have a common source. Some of the ideas about how early human brains worked (in the early fertile crescent, at the dawn of civilization) may be a bit far fetched, they still make for some interesting reading and are thought provoking. (Most of the concepts about the brain and the structure of early human consiousness, the author obviously got from reading the book "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind", and I personally take them with a big grain of salt, but they are still compelling and very thought-provoking hypotheses.)

My ex-wife has read the twice ay least, and we still ocassionally find ourselves bringing up concepts from the book over tea now and then. I hope in a year or so my oldest daughter will read it too.

This is one book that you will read and think "Why hasen't anyone made this into a movie yet!?"
 
Rand was a fucking jew. Avoid if possible.

Read Heinlein next, if you haven't started already. SiaSTL is a must read for everyone.

Have you ever gotten around to reading Herbert's Dune? That's a book worth revisiting once a year or so. The sequels are inferior.
 
ctmelvital said:
:rofl:
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand

Ayn Rand was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and was the eldest of three daughters (Alisa, Natasha, and Nora) of Zinovy Zacharovich Rosenbaum and Anna Borisovna Rosenbaum, agnostic and largely non-observant ethnic Jews.
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Back on subject, the Lovecraft bio will probably be worth it as well... he was truly a strange cat IRL... a true American eccentric.
 
CoyoteUgly said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand
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Now, if you'd bothered to quote the stuff just above what you quoted, you might try and make the case that "Alisa Rosenbaum" was born to a non-observant Jewish family. Ayn Rand most certainly was anything but Jewish. She was rabidly atheistic. I'm sure you're opposed to that as well but I suggest that be the strawman you attack then.

P.S.: I'm perfectly aware that this is a troll but it's fun...for now. :rofl:
 
ctmelvital said:
Now, if you'd bothered to quote the stuff just above what you quoted, you might try and make the case that "Alisa Rosenbaum" was born to a non-observant Jewish family. Ayn Rand most certainly was anything but Jewish. She was rabidly atheistic. I'm sure you're opposed to that as well but I suggest that be the strawman you attack then.

P.S.: I'm perfectly aware that this is a troll but it's fun...for now. :rofl:
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OH, OK WAIT... I see where you're making a mistake, and it's a common mistake, so don't feel bad.

I don't really want to derail this thread too much so let's keep it to Rand, but there's jew by religion and jew by ethnicity. Jews are often both, but sometimes one or the other. You have people not ethnically jewish who convert to judaism, and you have ethnic jews who adopt other religions or go atheistic. Rand was of the latter; note the above quote that her family was "largely non-observant ethnic Jews."

A lot of people don't realize that and fall into the trap you just did, but now you know.
 
CoyoteUgly said:
OH, OK WAIT... I see where you're making a mistake, and it's a common mistake, so don't feel bad.

I don't really want to derail this thread too much so let's keep it to Rand, but there's jew by religion and jew by ethnicity. Jews are often both, but sometimes one or the other. You have people not ethnically jewish who convert to judaism, and you have ethnic jews who adopt other religions or go atheistic. Rand was of the latter; note the above quote that her family was "largely non-observant ethnic Jews."

A lot of people don't realize that and fall into the trap you just did, but now you know.
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I'm hard pressed to accept this amusing concept but at least it makes more sense than what I thought you were trying to say before. This way, it's just plain ugly before it seemed stupid. ;)
 
ctmelvital said:
I'm hard pressed to accept this amusing concept but at least it makes more sense than what I thought you were trying to say before. This way, it's just plain ugly before it seemed stupid. ;)
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I don't make this stuff up, numbnuts... but don't take my word for it:

Jew.

Ayn Rand... was a jew and it showed.

So... you read her shit at your own peril... I used to be into objectivism somewhat, but found it rather cultlike in structure... "my way or the highway" in a sense. Read her works with that caveat in mind.
 
CoyoteUgly said:
I don't make this stuff up, numbnuts... but don't take my word for it:

Jew.

Ayn Rand... was a jew and it showed.

So... you read her shit at your own peril... I used to be into objectivism somewhat, but found it rather cultlike in structure... "my way or the highway" in a sense. Read her works with that caveat in mind.
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I'm sure you're not the original author to come up with this shit. ;)

And yes, I'm perfectly aware of the cultlike nature of Objectivism. I don't consider myself an Objectivist and not even a "student of Objectivism". I'm flirting with Objectivism, at best. Besides, since she's dead there's not an awful lot she can do about people disagreeing with her, now is there?

Anyway, none of this has any effect on the quality of Atlas Shrugged whatsoever. It's a good story (albeit a long one) and it offers plenty of very interesting ideas to make it worth your time. Whether or not it was written by a "Jew" has very little influence on that and neither does the fact that her philosophy and its proponents are very hardcore once you move beyond AS and go deeper into her other stuff.
 
CoyoteUgly said:
It has every bit of influence, as you will come to understand. Hopefully.
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I doubt it. The more interesting question:
How did you go from being interested in Objectivism, a philosophy very much focussed on individualism, to being a white nationalist, something that by it's very nature is collectivist?
 
evenflow said:
Wait, Rand had little patience for views and opinions contrary to her own? Do tell...
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Go read Leonard Peikoff's Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. The answer will be apparent.

Either that, or read Rand's own treatise on her philosophy, The Virtue of Selfishness. She really was quite the logician.
 
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