(Part 2) Reddit mentions: The best politics & social sciences books

We found 13,880 Reddit comments discussing the best politics & social sciences books. We ran sentiment analysis on each of these comments to determine how redditors feel about different products. We found 5,963 products and ranked them based on the amount of positive reactions they received. Here are the products ranked 21-40. You can also go back to the previous section.

21. The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America is Tearing Us Apart

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22. Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?

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23. The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (Updated Edition)

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24. Black American Students in An Affluent Suburb (Sociocultural, Political, and Historical Studies in Education)

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27. Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge, 3rd Edition

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28. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism

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29. Meditations: with selected correspondence (Oxford World's Classics)

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31. Brillant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football

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32. Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction

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Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction
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33. Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich

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Release dateJuly 2016
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34. Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today's Students

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35. What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

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36. Four Views on Free Will

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37. The Fundamentals of Ethics

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38. New French With Ease (Assimil Method Books - Book and CD Edition))

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39. An Introduction to Political Philosophy

An Introduction to Political Philosophy
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40. From Socrates to Sartre: The Philosophic Quest

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From Socrates to Sartre: The Philosophic Quest
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🎓 Reddit experts on politics & social sciences books

The comments and opinions expressed on this page are written exclusively by redditors. To provide you with the most relevant data, we sourced opinions from the most knowledgeable Reddit users based the total number of upvotes and downvotes received across comments on subreddits where politics & social sciences books are discussed. For your reference and for the sake of transparency, here are the specialists whose opinions mattered the most in our ranking.
Total score: 1,092
Number of comments: 79
Relevant subreddits: 9
Total score: 1,078
Number of comments: 97
Relevant subreddits: 8
Total score: 783
Number of comments: 71
Relevant subreddits: 6
Total score: 434
Number of comments: 51
Relevant subreddits: 9
Total score: 366
Number of comments: 60
Relevant subreddits: 9
Total score: 157
Number of comments: 55
Relevant subreddits: 13
Total score: 144
Number of comments: 34
Relevant subreddits: 5
Total score: 111
Number of comments: 48
Relevant subreddits: 10
Total score: 45
Number of comments: 33
Relevant subreddits: 1
Total score: 36
Number of comments: 34
Relevant subreddits: 3
📹 Video recap
If you prefer video reviews, we made a video where we go through the best politics & social sciences books according to redditors. For more video reviews about products mentioned on Reddit, subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Politics And Social Sciences Books Buying Guide

Books on politics and social sciences are the keys to learning about early history, cultures, and even political candidates. These books are an integral part of classrooms, libraries, and anywhere people have a desire to understand the world and societies that we live in. 

Here are your best buying tips for beginners looking for politics and social sciences books. 

Consult the best books lists

Whether you want a basic understanding of political science or looking for book recommendations for major studies, the best books list can be an invaluable source of information. Credible and trustworthy sites have politics social sciences books list that have been featured in top journals and authority sites, which can be very useful.  

Check out reviews 

Thanks to the internet, politics and social sciences reviews are readily available for anyone who has an interest. Experts in the field of politics and social sciences regularly review books from various writers all over the world and share them online. 

Independent book reviews from the experts discuss the pros and cons of these books. These political and social sciences book reviews are an indispensable source where you can get information to make an informed buying decision. 

Career guide books

Politics and social sciences career guidebooks are primarily designed to help students make better career decisions. With these guidebooks, you can make a better choice to decide on a major subject for college and university. 

In addition to career options, employment resources, and practical and real-life tips, career guidebooks are a great road map for political science students. 

Buy in bundles

Students looking to buy politics and social sciences can benefit a lot from buying books in bundles. In this regard, online platforms are a fantastic option for buying textbook bundles as you can get a good deal for your money. Besides, online platforms make it possible to compare the price of books so consider your options before buying them. 

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Top Reddit comments about Politics & Social Sciences:

u/dweissglass · 2 pointsr/teachphilosophy

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you, I got hit with a pretty nasty respiratory bug which put me down for awhile.

Anyway, on to talking about a general plan for this project. I think that the best thing to do would be to start with a light touch, and see how well she takes to it.

With that in mind, I might recommend starting with 'Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar'. Plato and a Platypus is a cheap, and reasonably instructive (though superficial) introduction to a range of philosophical questions through jokes. It is a strange approach, but one I think works quite well as a something like a philosophical appetizer that introduces lots of interesting topics. It has a sequel focused on politics ("Aristotle and an Aardvark") which is also quite good. I will warn that not all of the jokes are appropriate for all audiences, so whether you like this book might depend on how liberal you feel like being regarding jokes featuring explicit language, adult themes, etc.

I also definitely recommend anything from the Oxford Very Short Introduction series, particularly (given your interests) the Very Short Introduction to Philosophy and Ethics. In my experience, the entire VSI series is excellent, and I've used some of them to teach philosophy at the community college level. They are extremely brief (they can fit into my pockets) and accessible, and also quite cheap (usually about 10 bucks a piece). They are written by leading experts on each given topic, and there is an enormous selection if you decide that you want to explore particular topics (Ancient Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Theology, etc). They will be a bit tougher than Plato and a Platypus in that they don't typically have much fluff, but should still be generally relatively accessible. The Ethics volume is pretty solid, built around a series of major questions that ethics needs to respond to. I will offer two warnings about the VSI series:
(1) VSI formatting is largely left up to the author, so the approach varies considerably from text to text. This allows authors to structure the material however they feel is best, which usually turns out great. Just be ready for some jumps in how they deal with things (e.g., the Ethics volume is divided into sections which each review some set of related questions and possible answers, while the Logic volume is problem centered and features new tools of formal logic to address various problems presented in each chapter)
(2) Authors of VSI are almost always working scholars with particular philosophical viewpoints - and this will come across in their texts. Expect some axes to be ground, and presuppositions assumed. That said, of the one's I've read (maybe 5 or so at this point), they still presented a rather fair overview of the field.

I think for books, you will be hard pressed to do better than Plato and a Platypus/Aristotle and an Aardvark to provoke the feeling that philosophy is worthwhile, and the Very Short Introduction series to provide an actual introduction into the field.

There are also some great philosophy podcasts. The best for a non-philosopher is likely "Philosophize This", which is a largely chronological review of a fair chunk of the most significant philosophers in history (even including some non-Western thinkers). Again, the material isn't explicitly aimed at younger folk, so there may be some touchy content, but it is generally an exceptional program. They have quite a backlog now (something like 90 episodes), so there is plenty of material there.

Also, I've found a couple of course plans for philosophy in middle school. The strongest looking one to me is this one from UNC. Definitely worth looking at as a way to structure your thoughts, but I would augment it with some of the resources covered above.

I think this would yield a pretty low cost way to test if this approach will work. Assuming you were to buy all four books I've mentioned, I think it would run a total of about $40 per person, which should make this a pretty light investment in terms of money. Likewise, the books are all relatively short, so you might make it through them in as little as a month (if you were really motivated).

I think the real trick will be in deciding where to go after the initial introduction has been made and more serious texts are being considered, but this will depend a lot on how this project develops. I think the best thing to do with that is to wait and see how things turn out, then plan the next leg of the introduction. I'll be around for the foreseeable future, and would be happy to help you figure that out when the time comes.

Let me know what you think, and keep me in the loop as the project unfolds. I am very interested in this project and would be happy to lend a hand when possible.

u/PastryGood · 1 pointr/loseit

I'm very happy that I was able to help :)

And yes, a lot of people will blame everything around them for the misery of themselves. This seems to be the easy way out, but you must ask yourself what good it does in the end. There are things which are outside of your control. What people might do to you, say to you, and so on. However no matter what harsh things you go through in life it is ultimately you that decide how to respond to them. You decide what to do with it. It is as Epictetus once said:

> "Man is affected not by events, but by the view he takes of them."

Usually I do not actually like to talk openly about the philosophy I follow, for the simple reason that I just try to live by it. Use actions, not words. Also for many people it might seem that you try to push something on to them. However I felt in this case I was justified to give an explanation of what exactly helped me :-)

Anyways, if you are interested in the principles I explained, then what you seek is reading on Stoicism. The book that has especially helped me is this one:
Stoicism and the art of happiness

It has eye-opening/life-changing wisdoms and perspectives on everything that has to do with you. How to deal with emotions, what they are, and what is essential to life a good life. Another interesting fact is that many of the mental exercises and perspectives the stoics used is now today amongst some of the most scientifically well-documented practices used by cognitive behavioural therapy (also with a quick google search, you will find that even the founder of CBT was inspired by the stoic teachings), which deals with practically all kinds of mental sufferings you can imagine.

It's a practical book on the life philosophy of Stoicism, and it is written by a credible psychotherapist who also takes interest in the study of Stoicism (hence the book!). It's not academic in any way, it's meant to be easily approachable and easy to implement into your life. Here's a quick breakdown of it all:

Stoicism is a life philosophy that was founded by the ancient greeks around 301 BCE. It's not a religion, or any kind of weird cult. It is a collection of principles that is meant to guide you towards happiness (in greek context meaning something more along the lines of inner well-being and tranquility).

I would suggest you read the book :-) Maybe you will come to pick up on everything stoicism has to offer, maybe you will only pick up whatever principles and wisdoms that you think are right, or maybe you won't find much agreement with it at all, all which is fine. However I think you will find some wisdoms you will definitely find to your liking, as you sound intrigued by the principles. The important thing is that no matter what, it will most certainly set you out on your way to think more about yourself and how to control your life and achieve your own understanding of well-being.

If Stoicism comes to your liking (start with the above book first, though), I could recommend books by some of the most famous ancient Stoics through time. I will leave some here for future reference for you:

Meditations - Marcus Aurelius - This is one of the most famous stoic texts.

Enchiridion - Epictetus

Dialogues and Essays - Seneca

These books read as manuals, not to be read in one sitting. They are huge collections of letters, essays and short passages from these excellent people about everything that has to do with achieving inner well-being, and how to view the world around you. They are remarkable ancient works, and it is truly inspiring and motivating to open them and just read a few of the lines from time to time.

As with anything, it's a learning process to change mindset. But it slowly comes when you study it. You learn the wisdoms and principles they had, you think about them and if they make sense, you apply them and live them, revisit them and so on, until they really become a part of you. It is truly worth the time though, and I think you see that too from what I could understand in your reply.

Best of luck to you! If you have any questions feel free to PM me as well, I'd be happy to help.

u/OVdose · 1 pointr/Existentialism

If one decides to perform an action in advance, and then performs that action, was it not a self-determined action? He was determined to slap the person in advance, but it was still a choice he made given many alternative options. Furthermore, is free will simply the freedom of action, or is it also the freedom of self-determination? I would argue that free will gives us the freedom to form ourselves into the people we wish to be, not just to perform the actions we wish to perform. He may have shaped himself into the type person that would slap an opponent instead of debating. Since this sub is about existentialist philosophy, you will probably find more people here agree with the idea of shaping ourselves into the people we wish to be.

>(or as Steven Pinker puts its a ghost inside your body pushing all the buttons)

Ah, another reference to a "pop intellectual" who isn't an expert in philosophy or free will. I've seen Sam Harris, Robert Salpolski, and now Steven Pinker as the defenders of hard determinism. It tends to be neuroscientists and psychologists in the popular science community. Why hasn't anyone mentioned a professional philosopher that shares their deterministic views; one who can provide a solid philosophical foundation for such beliefs? It may be because the majority of professional philosophers either believe free will is compatible with a deterministic universe, or that there is free will and it is incompatible with determinism.

>Free will: compatibilism 59.1%; libertarianism 13.7%; no free will 12.2%; other 14.9%.

If you're interested in learning more about the justifications and challenges for free will, I recommend reading Elbow Room by Daniel Dennet and Four Views on Free Will. I can guarantee you'll learn more about free will from those two books than you will by listening to Steven Pinker.

u/libfascists · 1 pointr/politics

A couple of books that buttress these findings:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0029166500

("Progressive" regulations are a myth. Most such regulations were actually implemented at the behest of big business interests, to reduce destructive (to their profits) competition and to set up de facto cartels)

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0226243176

(The policy outcomes the political system produces are a result of special interest and business groups investing in the political system)

Why such outcomes:

Most libs focus almost exclusively on campaign financing, donations, and super-PACs. The problem is possibly even worse than that. We have an extremely sophisticated system of bribery, where political favors are rewarded later:

http://www.republicreport.org/2012/make-it-rain-revolving-door/

(This focuses exclusively on lobbyists, but there is nothing stopping something similar being done by hiring ex-politicians as consultants, corporate officers, giving them seats on corporate boards. Similar things can be done with advisers and staff members to politicians - see how Robert Rubin and Larry Summers were rewarded by Wall Street after the Clinton admin. And you can hire them first, then have them go back to politics, and back and forth - see Dick Cheney and Halliburton)

As far as campaign donations, super-PACs, etc, are concerned, my own $0.02. Note a billionaire who gives $1m to a party, or a partisan political organization, etc, is going to be rewarded with access, attention, and influence. On the other hand, if you and 30,000 "little people" friends of yours each chip in $100 to give to a campaign or a party, do you know what you will get? Spam.

The whole system is rife, shot through with asymmetries like this. Consider that just by being wealthy and successful, rich people (or their agents, like Summers, Rubin, Greenspan, etc) are rewarded with the presumption that they're experts and specially knowledgeable about their fields. Few stop to consider the way their incentive system is set up, and the systemic consequences of political action to "help" their industry thrive.

So. The study is undoubtedly right. The conclusions are supported not just by empirical observations and data, but also by careful consideration of the nitty-gritty details of how the political system works.

Implications: the real problem people are NOT the voters and the bases of the two parties. They are the rich, and the politicians themselves, who are to a man corrupt. I.e. it is not the Tea Partiers. It is people like Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, etc, whose incentive structures, after all, are wired EXACTLY like people like George Bush, Dick Cheney, John McCain, Mitch McConnell, and John Boehner's.

Despite the obvious logic of this, the two parties' bases continue to focus on each other. See e.g. the constant non-stop hate directed at Tea Partiers and conservatives by liberals. This is a product of manipulation by the two parties' propaganda systems - I repeat, if you hate Tea Partiers, and think they're the problem, not that Obama and the Democrats are venal and self-serving just like Republican politicians, and that you got stupidly scammed by Obama and the Democrats, then you're a victim of brainwashing and propaganda.

How this propaganda system works is actually excellently illustrated by r/politics. The constant stream of anti-GOP, anti-conservative, anti-Tea Party posts and articles works like "Two Minute Hate" from 1984. Remember, the best, sophisticated propaganda works not at the knowledge/information level, but at the emotional level - you can see this in how, e.g.corporate advertising has advanced from mainly information based in the late 19th/early 20th century, to more lifestyle/identity/emotional appeal and manipulation today. I repeat, the real problem with the propaganda system is not the torrent of false information being fed to Tea Party rubes (although to be sure, that is harmful and dangerous as well), it is in how your emotions, how you relate to leaders and institutions and organizations like Barack Obama, the Democratic or Republican party, liberal democracy, capitalism, the US government, the United States, the UN, etc, are shaped and manipulated.

Finally, the obvious impossibility of making a politico-economic system like ours work acceptably, democratically, in a way that produces rational responses to changing conditions (rather than corrupt rent-extraction policies to benefit whichever special interest group's turn it is at the trough) suggests that liberalism is not a legitimate, real ideology. Rather just like mainstream conservatism, an artifact of the propaganda system, a series of lies and conditioning designed to constrain people's political behavior within acceptable norms, and to shape, channel their reaction and anger at constantly deteriorating conditions and injustices in a direction that is safe and acceptable to the system, the establishment, and the ruling class.

u/cleomedes · 8 pointsr/Stoicism

The FAQ has a question (and answer) on recommended starting points from newcomers.

Summarizing the FAQ (cut-and-pasting from previous posts of mine summarizing the FAQ), there are a few approaches, depending on whether you prefer modern or ancient sources. For modern sources in the style of self-help books, some good options are:

  • Stoicism and the Art of Happiness by Donald Robertson. A practical, readable introduction to Stoicism intended for modern practice, readable independent of historical sources, in the style of modern "self-help" books.
  • A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William Irvine. Irvine's book is controversial among readers of /r/Stoicism. It is one of the most clear, easy to read, and practical accounts of Stoicism available, but critics feel it waters down and distorts many central elements of the philosophy. Additional discussion of Irvine's book can be found here, here and here.
  • The Stoics: A Guide for the Perplexed by Andrew Holowchak. Holowchak's book is a short, stand-alone account of Stoic philosophy. It quotes classical authors extensively, and provides many references for follow-up reading, but does not use the classical sources as its primary vehicle, and works as a stand-alone source. A longer review can be found here.

    Stoic Week's 2014 Handbook, 2013 Handbook and 2012 Living the Stoic Life booklet may also be of interest. They are free online, and much shorter.

    The FAQ also lists more theoretical, academic modern accounts, which you might prefer depending on taste.

    For ancient sources, commonly recommended starting points are:

  • The Enchiridion of Epictetus is short and easy to read. It was written as a "cheat sheet" of sorts for Epictetus's Discourses, reading the Discourses as well can be very helpful for clarifying what is being said.
  • Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, a personal journal. There are several out-of-copyright translations online, none of which are very good. Hard and Hays both have much better translations popular with readers here.
  • Selected essays and letters by Seneca the Younger, particularly De Tranquillitate (On Tranquility of Mind) and De Brevitate Vitae (On the Shortness of Life).
    Moses Hadas's The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca is a good printed source for these and other writing by Seneca.

    I think any of these can be a good starting point, and any of them can be valuable on its own, but each only offers a partial glimpse of Stoicism as a whole.

    Most of the ancient sources above are good for browsing, picking random pages and reading a little bit here and there. Each has its own distinct character. A good approach may be to find copies of the Enchiridion, Meditations, and a selections of Seneca, and spend a little time browsing through each, and then focusing on the one that appeals most. Then, pursue supporting material to help give context, unpack references, and otherwise improve interpretation. For the Enchiridion, the best source for this would be the Discourses, and Long's Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life is also helpful, in different ways. For the Meditations, Stephens' Marcus Aurelius does a good job of explaining context, references, and interpretation.
u/you_know_what_you · 0 pointsr/Catholicism

Another fair point. So, a clip here, so you don't even need to leave Reddit.

>...

>#Our Argument in Brief

>To orient readers, let me summarize the claims we defend in our book.

>Marriage is a human good with its own structure, like knowledge or friendship. The present debate is not a debate about whom to let marry, but about what marriage (the human good that the law has reasons to track) really is. Two answers compete for legal enshrinement.

>The first, driving the push for same-sex marriage, is that a certain emotional intimacy makes a marriage. But as our book shows, this answer can’t coherently distinguish marriage from companionship, an obviously broader category. So it gets marriage (the human good) wrong.

>The second view of marriage begins from basics. Any voluntary form of community involves common action; it unites people toward common ends in the context of commitment. And in these respects, what sets marital community apart is its comprehensiveness: in (1) how it unites people, (2) what it unites them with respect to, and (3) how extensive a commitment it demands.

>First, marriage unites people in their bodies as well as their minds. Just as your organs are one body by coordinating for the biological good of the whole (your survival), so a man and woman’s bodies unite by coordination (in sexual intercourse) for a biological good (reproduction) of the couple as a whole. No other activity makes of two people “one flesh.”

>Second, as the act that makes marital love also makes new life, so marriage itself is uniquely enriched and extended by the bearing and rearing of children, and the wide sharing of family life.

>Third, because of its comprehensiveness in both these senses, marriage alone requires comprehensive (permanent and exclusive) commitment, whatever the partners’ tastes.

>The stability of marriage, so understood, best ensures that children will know the committed love of those whose union brought them forth. This gives them the best shot at becoming healthy and happy people, which affects every other social good. That is why every society with the merest ambition to thrive has socially regulated male-female sexual bonds: to shore up the stabilizing norms of marriage, on which social order rests.

>If marriage is redefined (in law, and hence in public opinion and practice) as simple companionship for adult fulfillment, then, for reasons to be explained, it will be harder to live by its norms and urge them on others. And this will harm the social goods that hook society into regulating marriage in the first place.

>Besides defending these claims, my coauthors and I answer the most common objections to the historic view of marriage. And we show how society can uphold that view without ignoring the needs, undermining the social dignity, or curbing the fulfillment of same-sex attracted people.

>#Misreadings

>...

I end the clip at that point from this article as this is a succinct presentation of their book, What Is Marriage?

u/Happy_Pizza_ · 1 pointr/Catholicism

I actually deconverted from Catholicism in college. I'm a revert.

I never got into into the party culture. I'm really against drinking and doing drugs, and I've always been skeptical of sex outside of a committed relationship and those morals stuck with me even after I deconverted from Christianity. What I did encounter was a lot of intellectual arguments against religion that I couldn't answer. However, what I also eventually discovered was that most of those objections had been heard before and responded to, at least in some manner.

So, here's my semi-comprehensive list of apologetics apologetics resources that I've accumulated over the years.

IMHO, the following books cover all the essentials very well and are probably must reads. You can buy used or online copies of them relatively cheaply, under 20 dollars if you're in the US. Check out Trent Horn's Answering Atheism, How the Catholic Church Built Western Civ, Mere Christianity by CS Lewis (you can probably get Mere Christianity at your at public library), and What is Marriage? Man and Woman a Defense for defending the concept of natural marriage. You should also read How to Argue which is a free pdf. I haven't researched abortion apologetics as extensively as other areas but I know Trent Horn has some books on those.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm not going to say you should read all of my remaining recommendations but I'm putting the rest out there for you so you know they exist.

Now, no list of apologtics is going to cover every argument about Christianity so I would also recommend some online resources. www.reddit.com/r/Catholicism is an amazing forum. It has tons of Catholics who are way more knowledgable and experienced that me who can answer questions and stuff. You may or may not have heard of it ;). I also recommend William Lane Craig's site: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/question-answer. Again, Craig is a protestant so don't look to him for a defense of Catholicism. However, he's good when it comes to defending the basics of Christianity from atheism. Catholic Answers is good. Fr Barron is good. Strange Notions can be good, I link to it in my last paragraph.

The exact relationship between faith and reason was my biggest stumbling block on the road back to Catholicism, so I have some good recommendations on that topic. I recommend the papal encycle Fides et Ratio and How the Catholic Church Built Western Civ. Plantinga's book Where the Conflict Really Lies is also popular and uses evolution to make an interesting argument against materialism. Plantinga's not a Catholic so I don't know how well they would square with Catholic philosophies like Thomism, but, yeah, he exists. He also wrote this giant essay on faith and science, which was helpful. The book God and the Philosophers is pretty good too, it's an anthology of different Christian philosophers and talks about how they converted to Christianity.

Some comprehensive (but expensive) books by non-Catholics include The Blackwell Companion to natural theology by William Lane Craig (not a Catholic). I've heard good things about Richard Swinburne's apologetics trilogy The Coherence of Theism, The Existence of God, and Faith and Reason. Swinburne is Eastern Orthodox, just for the record.

I want to give a special shoutout to Edward Fesser. He's a secular atheist philosopher who converted to Catholicism. You can read his conversion story here. He also has a blog that you can google. Fesser also wrote a bunch of books that are highly recommended by people on this sub, although I haven't read them.

u/poli_ticks · 1 pointr/politics

Sorry, nope. On the major policies that have brought us to this pass (imperialism, neoliberalism) there is simply no significant difference between the two parties. Every single democratic president in the 20th century was an imperialist (i.e., even those who weren't expansionists, actually held on to the Philippines and Cuba, pre-WWII. After WWII that they were all imperialists is crystal clear). The first president who adopted neoliberal policies? Carter.

This GOP vs Dems "ideological" fight is basically a sham for the benefit of the proles. The two parties, which are identical (top down led, hierarchical, filled with the same sorts of ambitious climbers) in their most important, significant characteristics must, after all, differentiate themselves somehow. So they do something very similar to what Coke and Pepsi do. It's mostly an exercise in branding and pandering to different demographics, which creates a very convenient divide-and-rule dynamic.

So if ideology isn't what gives us actual outcomes, then what is? One strong candidate: money.

http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Rule-Investment-Competition-Money-Driven/dp/0226243176

And of course, dems have always been willing to accept corporate money, and money from wealthy businessmen.

Another indication that the dems have been feeding you a false narrative? You know all those "progressive era" legislation that were passed, ostensibly to curb the power & excesses of the Robber Barons, by progressive reformers? Sorry, nope. Actually, money drove the process back then too. So those legislation were shaped by the business interests themselves.

http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500

So, in light of the fact that the way you think political outcomes in this country are decided is simply... wrong, the fact that we have rock solid bipartisanship in the broad outlines of the most important policies for the country, how certain are you feeling about the narrative that it's due to the GOP (hell, let's not even say solely - let's say your claim is that it's mainly the fault of the GOP - 60% or so) that the country has been destroyed over the past 40 years?

But it's the Republicans who've been pushing neoliberalism you say? Without them and their ideologues we wouldn't have neoliberalism and ergo we wouldn't be in this mess?

Really? Here's someone who disagrees:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/

He argues, in fact, that the process by which industrial-capitalist countries come to be dominated by financial-capitalists, and move from exporting goods to exporting capital overseas, as is the case with the neoliberal globalized economy, is inherent in the capitalist system.

So, do democrats and liberals support capitalism, or not? Then, if we accept that the communist analysis of the matter is correct, you must share the blame. Even communists are telling you that merely acquiescing, enabling, accepting capitalism is tantamount to agreeing to neoliberalism.

Now, what else is liberalism? It's actually pro-interventionist government, pro-government regulation. It's a Statist ideology, in other words.

Libertarians, are of course, anti-State. You know who else is anti-State?

Yep, Anarchists and Communists.

So, whereas out in the ideological extreme, radicals are arguing over whether capitalism is ultimately the prime evil (communists), or whether it's statism (libertarians), or "cheating" by claiming it's actually both, can't we get rid of both at the same time? (anarchists) you guys are actually both pro-statism and pro-capitalism.

Still think you liberals are on sound ideological ground?

But anyhow, let's set ideology aside for a sec, and examine practical matters - how you can accept or reject "greed, corruption, and blatant attempts at manipulation" etc. etc. with your political behavior.

Since I've claimed earlier on that ideology isn't what determines what policy outcomes we get (and you should know this, since poll after poll shows that the US population prefers liberal/progressive economic outcomes and measures, usually by pretty strong margins), then what does? I've hinted that money almost certainly has something to do with it, but let's see if we can generalize it further.

Think for a sec about the "ideology" of monarchies or imperial polities. Their "doctrine" or "religion" told them that their king or emperor was the sovereign by divine grace, or in some cases, was actually a divinity himself. Now, under such an ideological system, how on earth is it possible for anyone to oppose or overthrow the king or emperor?

And yet, the history books are filled with cases where kings or emperors were deposed or overthrown. In short, polities sometimes (often? nearly always?) do not work according to how their legitimizing mythology/ideology/doctrine claims they work. No matter what theory says, the King has to have the support of the great feudal lords that control the military muscle, and the clergy that confer legitimacy on his reign, and do the vitally critical work of telling the peasants they must obey their king, or this big spirit high in the sky will get very angry with them and make their crops fail, or whatever.

I submit that our polity is no different in this regard. All the stuff you've been fed about how the people elect representatives based on their ideas and values, and the representatives make decisions based on those ideas and values, and the net outcome is some sort of grand average, net combination, middle ground of the ideas and values of all the people in the United States - pure BS. The system doesn't work like that at all. Instead, the system has an architecture, a structure that consists of how power/influence/wealth are distributed in our society, and this constrains the actions and choices of the participants in the political system. To put it simply, people who want to get along, must go along. Anyone serious about getting into power, or staying there long, has to cater and sell out to business interests, or non-business interests like the national security establishment, etc. etc.

Which is why pretty much any democrat that receives "serious candidate, worthy of your attention" treatment from the corporate MSM you can conclude automatically is no good. Has sold out, or has indicated he's willing to sell out and play ball. And if you could parse the rhetoric of these people correctly, you would understand why. You might have thought that Obama's campaign rhetoric in 2008 was "less-hawkish," therefore making things on the imperialism/war front a bit better, but you would have been wrong. In fact, his rhetoric was about restoring a much-needed camouflage cover for American imperialism - Obama's job was basically to give American Empire a make-over, which Bush's ineptness had almost pulled the curtain on, to expose the brutal truth.

Anyhow - I won't belabor Obama any further, since it's clear you see him for what he really is. But I did want to point out that he is what he is not because of the Republicans; what you think makes the Democrats "better" - i.e. their multi-lateralism, their veneer of cosmopolitanism, their willingness to "work with and listen to foreigners" (actually, almost always foreign governments, which are often in bed with us despite their people's wishes) - are actually absolutely essential components in the project of American imperialism.

So the problem is much deeper and fundamental than simply Republican mouth-breathing, chest-thumping bellicosity.

But anyhow, so if voting for a "realistic" candidate does no good, then what does? For starters, when someone like Ron Paul stands up in front of Republican audiences to preach an anti-Empire, anti-Fed, anti-NAFTA, anti-War on Drugs message, you should recognize that for the godsend, the gift-horse that it is, and back it. Because, the thing that makes you accept the Democrats, no matter how bad they get, is that the Republicans are just a bit worse, right? How convenient for the Democratic party's leaders. Now, how can we defeat this simple yet diabolical trap? Oh wait, we could... go mess with the Republican party - pull it leftwards on some key, big issues. You know, by, e.g., backing Ron Paul.

Other than that? Well, the traditional political activism of calling your representatives, writing to them, to urge the correct decisions surely cannot be wrong. Although at this point I am seriously skeptical about your average liberal's ability to tell good decisions from a French horn.

Oh and hit the streets. Anti-war rallies. OccupyWallStreet. Both of which would be much larger and energetic if the Republicans were occupying Washington DC.

Ok? Sorry that was so long. As you no doubt know it's much more intellectually challenging and more work to make your points with less lengthy prose, and it's late here, and I'm tired, so all I could give you was a semi-stream-of-consciousness, semi-rant deluge. On the other hand, I figure there's more than enough anti-liberalism arrows there to keep you busy for at least an hour or so trying to parry them.

u/bg478 · 1 pointr/politics

I'm familiar with this popular understanding of what nationalism is but I'm saying it doesn't really line up with scholarship on the ideology and it's history. Read Nationalism by Anthony D. Smith or Imagined Communities by Benedict Anderson in order to get a basic introduction to the subject as they're usually among the standard college textbooks used in relevant courses. I've said this elsewhere in the thread but nationalism at it's most base level is a belief in the existence of nations, nation states and the concept of self-determination. A nation is an amorphous political concept that can be based on a large number of things from a perception of shared ethnicity to shared geography to shared history. The basis for the creation of a nation is known as national identity. Practically every country in the 21st century , professes a national identity and when a country does this it is known as a nation state (the wikipedia article for this concept is fairly narrow as it focuses on states that tie national identity to ethnicity and all but ignores civic nationalism and to some extent left wing nationalism )

The United States is a nation state as, like most every other modern country, it has a national identity. The key however is in defining what American national identity is. Trump and many of his followers likely understand American national identity to be rooted in whiteness and Christianity while most other Americans understand American national identity as being rooted in a form of civic (not ethnic) nationalism which embodies a shared sense of republican (not the political party but the system of government) ideals and essential freedoms. This is bolstered by a shared national culture that manifests itself in things like Thanksgiving which is based on and celebrates a national myth and was established with the express purpose of fostering a common national culture. Celebrating Thanksgiving is literally participation in American national identity and therefore an expression of American nationalism.

Nationalism is further reinforced by national symbols for example flags and national anthems. The concept of every nation (not only nation-states but stateless nations like the Ainu as well) having a flag is something something that emerged concurrently with the notion of nationalism because the newly emerging nations needed symbols to tie their identities to. Thus displaying any kind of flag associated with a nation (state or otherwise) is a display of nationalist sentiment.

With that out of the way let's go back to the Olympics. I stated that the modern Olympic games themselves were founded upon nationalism and the belief that athletic competition offered a healthy outlet for duking out national rivalries as an alternative to conflict. That is why the Olympics themselves are an orgy of national symbolism from the Parade of Nations, the fact that athletes represent their nations at all instead of themselves, the playing of national anthems at medal ceremonies, etc. etc. With all that in mind rooting for your nation's athletes at the Olympics is an expression of nationalist sentiment. But don't take my word for it! Here's a couple of articles I was able to find on the subject after a two second Google search since I don't feel like digging up old academic articles. Hell, here's the perspective of a Communist (i.e. someone who actually rejects nationalism since they believe in the dismantling of all states and national identities).

Nationalism in and of itself has absolutely nothing to do with blind loyalty to a particular government although chauvinistic nationalism does indeed manifest itself that way. In fact nationalism isn't contingent on the existence of a nation-state or government and doesn't even necessarily advocate for one. Just look at the history of Black nationalism in the USA of which only a few strands (known as Black Separatism) advocated the creation of an African American state.

As far as patriotism goes it's a tricky question but while not every display of patriotism is nationalism the vast majority are as they acknowledge the existence of or loyalty to a nation or nation-state and more often than not incorporate national symbols such as flags. Remember that a nation is not solely the government but the amorphous political body of individuals who share some common identity so when professing to "love a nation" someone could just as easily be talking about the people as opposed to the government.

u/Surferbro921 · 22 pointsr/SandersForPresident

Unity comes when people within the party know their leader cares for them.

Do you honestly think that Hillary (and Bill) Clinton care about you AT ALL?

Reality check: SHE DOESN'T. (AND HE DOESN'T.)

She'll do whatever to make it SEEM like she cares, but SHE DOESN'T CARE ABOUT US (99% of Americans).

She's in this presidential election to win so her rich donors can get their federal appointments on boards and commissions and their interests lobbied and heard in DC, and implement laws that will ONLY benefit them.

Hillary Clinton is a puppet that's being manipulated by corporate interests.
ie. Clinton Cash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LYRUOd_QoM

https://www.amazon.com/Clinton-Cash-Foreign-Governments-Businesses/dp/0062369296/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1469736845&sr=8-1&keywords=clinton+cash

If it comes down to Trump and Hillary, I am NOT voting for the lesser of the two evils that are Trump and Hillary.

Progress will only be made with someone like Jill Stein of the Green Party, who shares the most similar values and beliefs as those of Bernie Sanders.

If you are a true Bernie Sanders supporter, you would vote for Green Party's Jill Stein in 2016.

The only reason Bernie endorsed Hillary is to save his political career.
If Bernie had held out until the very end and refused to endorse Hillary at the Democratic National Convention, then establishment Democratic politicians would not like him, and this would further impede his influence and progress in the Senate, where establishment Democrats make up a good amount of the Senate seats.

So the next best thing we can do is to elect progressive leaders to Congress to impede Trump or Hillary from furthering their top 1% interests and fighting for the 99% (the American people).

u/staomeel · 5 pointsr/PoliticalRevolutionID

We need a trust circle in which the party, activists, and the average voter can engage in dialog and support. A philosophical stalemate between activists and the Idaho Democratic Party has led to a total communication breakdown. The average citizen has given up completely as they know the Democratic Party serves only millionaires and up. The activist resent the IDP for their greed, ineptitude, and frank reluctance to show any support for FDR's values.

The IDP refuses to acknowledge that neoliberalism has failed utterly and completely. The party base continues on roaring into the void while the IDP declines to support what might have been their best field organizers. Unfortunately the IDP has been hooked on the D.C. money funnel for so long they fail to see they have lost all credibility by supporting the DNC. If the IDP were to turn off the tap and start having faith in the citizens to provide for their economic well being they might turn things around. They dare not become accountable to the majority. The simple math determines that pleasing a wealthy minority easier and more profitable then attempting to solicit funding from the cash strapped average citizens. Politics have become a safe career to leach money from the upper crust, see Sally Boyton Brown skipping town.

The enthusiasm among the citizens for the IDP has bottomed out due to the radical differences in finical desires. Idaho's majority individuals lives in poverty or near poverty.. The average the median per capita income for Idaho was $24,273 in 2015. You need at least 30k to stop living pay check to pay check per person. The citizens want healthcare, green jobs, education and social security. The IDP waits in vain for a Idaho millionaire/billionaire to help build the "collation of the ascendant" that will never come to Idaho and what little was here has begun to crumble.

The Democrats for the past 40 years have been slowly dismantling the FDR values that brought them easy votes for multiple generations. They have become lazy and spoiled expecting the working class to keep blindly heaving them over the finish line. The working class well has finally run dry, see the 2016 Presidential elections. Now we face an impasse, do we burn down the crooked orchard and start again or do we try to prune down the twisted roots put down by the neoliberal elite?

The answer is neither. The IDP needs radical restructuring so as to knock out the hierarchical leadership. All party decision should return to directly to precinct captains. As in precinct captains act as a virtual house of representatives that elect a virtual senate made of the district leadership. The senate elects a party leader. Why add all this crazy complication to the political machine?

  1. The average citizen can have a direct impact on the Idaho democratic party without leaving their home precinct. It gives the power back to the people.
  2. It forces the democratic authoritarians running the party to face democratic libertarians in a honest political discussion for once.
  3. It democratizes how the donations get distributed.
  4. It gives potential candidates opportunity to practice politics in a sandbox.
  5. It limits the center-right brow beating the hierarchical structure delivers.
  6. It pushes the career political wonks away from the money and levers of power.
u/God_And_Truth · 21 pointsr/Catholicism

I'm not sure how much my words will be of use for you, as I am myself not yet Catholic (I'm currently going through RCIA). However, I can relate with regard to a lack of Catholic friends. I'm an immigrant from India who was raised in a Hindu family; most of my friends are Indian and nominally Hindu. I've had only a couple of Christian friends in my life and never a Catholic friend. Reading and researching through books, articles, podcasts, videos, etc. have led me to the faith.

Oftentimes, in defending the faith, I have debated my family, my friends, and others close to me. It became clear to me that I needed a systematic plan if I was going to do this with any shred of ability. Here's mine. Perhaps it will be of use to you or somebody else who clicks on your post because they can relate.

  1. Learn logic. I'm working through Socratic Logic by Peter Kreeft right now. It's clear, readable, has plenty of examples, many of which are from interesting works, such as those of G.K. Chesterton or C.S. Lewis. It's an investment, to be sure, as it's running for ~ $20 online, but it's well worth it.

  2. Study Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy. St. Thomas Aquinas is the universal doctor of the Catholic Church. You're not going to find a better source of philosophy, theology, and wisdom than this saint. Now, I don't recommend jumping right into the Summa Theologica or the Summa Contra Gentiles, at least not without a study guide, primarily because modern thought holds assumptions which Aquinas would have rejected. Therefore, to understand Aquinas' arguments, and really the arguments of any philosopher before Descartes, you need to understand the basic metaphysics (the understanding of being as being) of the classical (Aristotle, Plato, etc.) and medieval (Augustine, Aquinas, etc.) philosophers. Edward Feser is an American analytical philosopher who is also an orthodox Roman Catholic. He's written two books which I would highly recommend. First, and foremost, I think you will be well served by his The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism (I'm sure you can see why). It's very readable but also deep. It's also polemical; you'll laugh out loud quite a bit. Second, I would recommend his Aquinas: A Beginner's Guide. This is an introduction to Thomistic philosophy. It goes over the metaphysical foundations, Aquinas' Five Ways to demonstrate the existence of God, Aquinas' philosophy of ethics, and Aquinas' philosophy of psychology.

  3. Once you have worked through these three books, I think you'll be ready to work through the more difficult works. However, and this is key, the vast, vast, vast majority of atheists and skeptics you'll come across and meet in your journey through this world can be easily and completely refuted if you familiarize yourself with and understand and think through the arguments laid out by Feser in these two books. Depending on your intelligence level and the availability of time, going through these three books might take you a bit of time. Don't worry. Take it slow. Once you understand their relevance and validity, you'll be able to both defend the faith and also show how atheism is false, incoherent, and dangerous.

    In summary, I'd recommend reading the following books in this order:
  4. The Last Superstition by Edward Feser: https://www.amazon.com/Last-Superstition-Refutation-New-Atheism-ebook/dp/B00D40EGCQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1504537006&sr=8-1&keywords=the+last+superstition
  5. Aquinas: A Beginner's Guide by Edward Feser: https://www.amazon.com/Aquinas-Beginners-Guide-Guides-ebook/dp/B00O0G3BEW/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1504537006&sr=8-2&keywords=the+last+superstition
  6. Socratic Logic by Peter Kreeft: https://www.amazon.com/Socratic-Logic-Questions-Aristotelian-Principles/dp/1587318083/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

    God Bless and take care.
u/emk · 3 pointsr/languagelearning

How much study time do you have available per day? Have you ever learned a foreign language successfully before? Do you speak any other Romance languages fluently?

Assuming you can study at least two hours per day, I would recommend:

  1. Get Assimil's New French with Ease with the CD, and do two lessons per day. Spend 30 minutes on each lesson, following whatever variation of the Assimil Dutch instructions pleases you. In 25 days, this will give you a good, basic intuition for how French works, and teach you some useful vocabulary. The nice thing about Assimil is that if you follow the instructions, it works well for almost everybody, and it produces solid results. If you want a grammar overview to go with Assimil, get Essential French Grammar, which is dirt cheap, focused only on the essentials, and an excellent complement to Assimil.
  2. Since you need to speak very soon, get Benny Lewis's book, which has some good advice on efficiently mastering survival stuff and polite conversation starting very early on.
  3. A week or two before you leave, skim How to Improve Your Foreign Language Immediately, which is the bible of dirty tricks for faking a better level than you have. Definitely do his "islands" exercise, and prepare 10 or so islands, getting them corrected on lang-8.

    If you think of yourself as a hardcore geek, and you're generally good with languages, there are also a couple of ways to boost your listening comprehension substantially in 30–100 hours.

    Total cost: Less than $100, plus some money for iTalki tutors if you follow Benny's advice. But expect to work really, really hard—faking intermediate French after 30 days is a bit like sprinting straight up a steep mountain with a heavy pack. You're trying to compress 350 classroom hours into a month, which means working very hard and efficiently.

    Anyway, if you can spend an hour a day on Assimil, and an hour a day on Benny's speaking advice, then you'll get some pretty useful survival French under your belt by the end of the month. Going further than that will probably require studying obsessively.
u/GreenWizard2 · 1 pointr/Stoicism
  • Meditations: Either get the one by Gregory Hays or Robin Hard. I have both. Hays uses more modern English and is easier to understand, but he can be pretty liberal with his translation. Hard is a little more straight laced in his translation it seems but still uses pretty modern English. Also the Hard translation contains Letter from Marcus to his Rhetoric teacher Fronto which are cool to read. Other versions of Meditations do not have this in them afaik.
  • Epictetus, Enchiridion + Discourses: Epictetus's Discourses, Fragments, Handbook by Robin Hard. Best translation of Epictetus I have found ( I like more modern English). Lots of good footnotes in this one.
  • Seneca's Letters: Either Letters from a Stoic to get a taste of what Seneca is like, or go all the way in and get Letters on Ethics which contains all 124 letters to Lucillius. Hardcover book is awesome, high quality, great foot notes throughout.
  • Seneca's Moral Essays: There are a bunch of these, I haven't found a favorite translation yet. If you only read one, read On the Shortness of Life
u/gbd_628 · 1 pointr/SlaughteredByScience

Haven't you ever wondered why the scientific consensus is the opposite of your claims?

For starters, IQ isn't a great all-around measure of intelligence. It does accurately predict social outcomes and is highly correlated with many intellectual and academic accomplishments, but it has severe flaws. Take for example the Flynn Effect: previous generations had much lower IQ scores than today, when normalized to be on the same scale. The rapid increase of IQ globally (Great Britain saw an increase of 15 points in 70 years) cannot be explained by any plausible genetic explanation—the increase has simply been too fast. Genetic effects couldn't have spread throughout the entire population. There is also no plausible argument that general intelligence has improved by that much. If it had, 40% of the British population a century ago would be mentally damaged by today's standards.

The reasons for the Flynn Effect are unclear. A rise in standardized testing and formal schooling appears to be at least part of it. What is clear is that when comparing people from wildly different environments, IQ is a poor measure of general intelligence. (When comparing people from similar environments, it does remarkably well. The reasons for this are still being studied.)

_

Even if IQ were a good measure of intelligence (which it isn't), that doesn't mean IQ score differences are genetic. Indeed, we know for a fact that they aren't.

Take the Burakumin of Japan. They are an ostracized class and have been for centuries; due to complex religious/spiritual/social reasons, if you have an ancestor who engaged in an "unclean" profession (e.g., a prostitute, a butcher, an actor, etc.), you too are unclean and are socially inferior. The important thing is that the class is genetically identical to the rest of the Japanese population. You can't tell the difference by looking, which is why the Burakumin were forced to get tattoos, and why corporations started keeping lists of who was Burakumin so they knew who not to hire. Today, while those lists are banned, they are still socially stigmatized, and the group forms the ranks of the Japanese mafia, with the tattoos becoming a source of pride.

Anyway, the average have an IQ of the Burakumin is 10-15 points lower than the average Japanese person. See here. This is the same as the gap between white Americans and black Americans. Importantly, both gaps have been shrinking. Most interestingly, the Japanese gap completely disappears among immigrants to the United States—the people here don't know that they're supposed to discriminate against one of the groups.

Similar stories of vanishing IQ gaps appear all over the field. Adopting someone at three years old from Sub-Saharan Africa into a European family cuts the IQ gap by 15 points., cutting the IQ gap in half. The remaining gap, to reiterate, is the same sized that is known to be caused by discrimination. And note further that this is without any improved pre-natal care, which is known to be extremely important to a child's health.

_


Finally, this is all assuming that "race" is a thing, scientifically speaking, which it isn't. To draw an analogy, it's like constellations. Yes, some stars are closer to others. But the physical differences have little connection with how they appear in the sky, any anyways are not clustered into distinct groups. The stars and the distances between them exist; the pictures only exist in your head. I mean, the idea of "whiteness" isn't even self-consistent and varies across time. Are Poles white? Are Russians? Are Italians? Are Southern-Europeans? Are North-Africans and Middle-Easterners? Are Indians? Are Jews? Are Spaniards? Are Mexicans? Are Chileans? (The last few are the most hilarious currently—the jumps required to assert that South Americans are genetically inferior to "us", but "us" includes the Spanish and Portuguese, are hilarious.)

__

Race doesn't exist the way you think it does. Intelligence might, based on the g-factor (scores in completely different aptitude tests are correlated, suggesting a legitimate "general intelligence"), but IQ is not a good measure of it cross-populations. Intelligence is not a metric of moral standing; the Jews aren't naturally the superiors of everyone else just because they have higher IQ. And IQ differences are entirely explainable by environmental factors.

u/Celektus · 3 pointsr/BreadTube

At least for Anarchists or other left-libertarians it should also be important to actually read up on some basic or even fundamental ethical texts given most political views and arguments are fundamentally rooted in morality (unless you're a orthodox Marxist or Monarchist). I'm sadly not familiar enough with applied ethics to link collections of arguments for specific ethical problems, but it's very important to know what broad system you're using to evaluate what's right or wrong to not contradict yourself.

At least a few very old texts will also be available for free somewhere on the internet like The Anarchist Library.

Some good intro books:

  • The Fundamentals of Ethics by Russ Shafer-Landau
  • The Elements of Moral Philosophy by James and Stuart Rachels
  • Ethics: A Very Short Introduction by Simon Blackburn

    Some foundational texts and contemporary authors of every main view within normative ethics:

  • Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotles for Classic Virtue-Ethics. Martha Nussbaum would be a contemporary left-wing Virtue-Ethicist who has used Marx account of alienation to argue for Global Justice.
  • Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals by Immanuel (or Emmanuel) Kant for Classic Deontology. Kantianism is a popular system to argue for anti-statism I believe even though Kant himself was a classical liberal. Christine Korsgaard would be an example of a contemporary Kantian.
  • The Methods of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick for Classic Utilitarianism. People usually recommend Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill, but most contemporary Ethicists believe his arguments for Utilitarianism suck. 2 other important writers have been R. M. Hare and G. E. Moore with very unique deviations from classic Utilitarianism. A contemporary writer would be Peter Singer. Utilitarianism is sometimes seemingly leading people away from Socialism, but this isn't necessarily the case.
  • Between Facts and Norms and other works by the contemporary Critical Theorist Jürgen Habermas may be particularly interesting to Neo-Marxists.
  • A Theory of Justice by John Rawls. I know Rawls is a famous liberal, but his work can still be interpreted to support further left Ideologies. In his later works like Justice as Fairness: A Restatement you can see him tending closer to Democratic Socialism.
  • Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche for... Nietzsche's very odd type of Egoism. His ethical work was especially influential to Anarchists such as Max Stirner, Emma Goldman or Murray Bookchin and also Accelerationists like Jean Baudrillard.
  • In case you think moralism and ethics is just bourgeois propaganda maybe read something on subjectivism like Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong by J. L. Mackie
  • Or if you want to hear a strong defense of objective morality read Moral Realism: A Defense by Russ Shafer-Landau orc
u/Lacher · 1 pointr/Destiny

I think that if the person reports it was her duty so save other soldiers, it's not really a classical case of altruism. So in that case I agree. But that's unique to the reported reason of someone handling out of "duty" rather than "empathy".

On an act being egoistic as soon as some pleasure is derived, allow me to quote these nicely written paragraphs from this book.

> The egoist might respond: if you are doing what you really want, aren’t
you thereby self-interested? It is important to see that the answer may well
be no. For all we know, some of us deeply want to help other people. When
we manage to offer such help, we are doing what we really want to do. Yet
what we really want to do is to benefit someone else, not ourselves.
Now, if people get what they really want, they may be better off as a
result. (But they might not: think of the anorexic or the drug addict. Or
think of the cases of disappointment discussed in chapter 4.) Yet the fact
that a person gains from her action does not prove that her motives were
egoistic
[1]. The person who really wants to help the homeless, and volunteers
at a soup kitchen or shelter, may certainly derive pleasure from her efforts.
But this doesn’t show that pleasure was her aim. Her aim may have been to
help those in need. And because her aim was achieved, she thereby
received pleasure.

> As a general matter, when you discover that your deepest desires have
been satisfied, you often feel quite pleased. But that does not mean that your ultimate aim is to get such pleasure. That’s what needs to be shown; we can’t just assume it in trying to figure out whether our motives are
always self-interested.

I also think describing altruistic behavior as epigenetically, deterministically or evolutionarily is as useful as describing love as an influx of dopamine and oxytocine. It's scientifically nice but also kind of restricting in understanding humans.

[1] If I reward you with a cookie for taking the shortest path to work, and you enjoy that reward, that does not prove you took the shortest path to work because of my reward--you would have taken it anyway and under what I understand to be your conception of human behavior there is no accounting for this possibility.

u/colin_000 · 2 pointsr/worldpowers

I think that The Tragedy of Great Power Politics is a really neat book. This is somewhat unrelated to your niche, and some of you guys have heard me speak about this on IRC. I have no education in International Relations and a high school education in history, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but it really does a good job at explaining ambitions that underpin nations foreign policy and what causes them to have such ambitions. It's certainly not a perfect book, but it does a good job at explaining a staunchly, sobering realist theory of international relations. One reviewer puts it this way, "I found the book an enjoyable read but Mearsheimer has a surprisingly superficial grasp of world history. However, he does provide a helpful explanation of American foreign policy over the past 200 years." That's important to know before digging into this book, and it's also important to know that John is very staunchly realist. In my own opinion, I think realism is a very good theory, but it also assumes (again, my uneducated opinion) that (like with books like the Dictators Handbook) that leaders are psychopaths with no emotions. That ideology doesn't play a role on some level in decision making. That foreign policy is entirely predicated around protecting a nation.

I'd like to hear /u/Fresh-Snows thoughts on it. He studies international relations extensively from what I've heard. He could offer an interesting opinion.

Also, Ender in Exile is a very good book that I am currently reading. If you have read Enders Game, or of Scott Cards books on the Ender universe in general, I highly suggest picking up this book.

u/Bizkitgto · 4 pointsr/C_S_T

A lot of what you are describing of the Trivium appears to be very similar to the (lost?) Liberal Arts: are those subjects or skills that in classical antiquity were considered essential for a free person (Latin: liberalis, "worthy of a free person") to know in order to take an active part in civic life, something that (for Ancient Greece) included participating in public debate, defending oneself in court, serving on juries, and most importantly, military service. Grammar, logic, and rhetoric were the core liberal arts, while arithmetic, geometry, the theory of music, and astronomy also played a (somewhat lesser) part in education. LINK

I believe what you are talking about is summarized in the book: Closing of the American Mind

The liberal arts have been largely removed from education, and is de-emphasized in colleges and universities. I took STEM, and when I was in college liberal arts were looked down upon. It's only recently that I have taken up an interest in the liberal arts and I know have a profound respect for it. St John's university runs a very interesting course on The Great Books that looks fascinating, and is what I believe is missing from our modern education.

The Great Books Curriculum: The four-year program of study, nearly all of which is mandatory, demands that students read and discuss the works of many of Western civilization's most prominent contributors to philosophy, theology, mathematics, science, music, poetry, and literature.

The program involves:

  • Four years of literature, philosophy, and political science in seminar
  • Four years of mathematics
  • Three years of laboratory science
  • Four years of language (Ancient Greek, Middle/Early English, and French)
u/prances_w_sheeple · 1 pointr/politics

> It's a big government that has been purchased and is currently being run by big corporations.

The corporate form is relatively recent (4, 5 centuries?) so let's generalize it to "the rich."

The problem is, if you study history, governments have pretty much always been associated with the rich. It is an institution that is either created by, or controlled by the rich, or in cases where the government is imposed by those who control military force, the guys who control it in very short order become "the rich" and use their control of government to make that state of affairs permanent.

As far as corporations are concerned - don't forget how corporations are created. By a State Charter. I.e. corporations are entities created when the government bends the rules and exempts some rich people from liability laws for some of their investment/business activities.

So there is a case to be made that government supporters are ultimately responsible for the problem of corporations.

> Big corporations that Ron Paul wants to further remove regulations from.

How did those corporations get so big? Who controlled the government when it enacted those regulations? So what purpose do those regulations really serve?

http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Rule-Investment-Competition-Money-Driven/dp/0226243176

> Just as thinking the problem is only democrat or only republican caused

I don't think that. The vast majority of you liberals or Democrats think that. That is a big part of the reason why I yell at you.

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1i6ac5/wounded_soldier_writes_letter_about_being_forced/cb1mwdd?context=3

> thinking Ron Paul the deregulatory is the solution shows that you just aren't paying attention.

Of course he's not "the solution." But his campaign in 2008 and 2012 were probably the best efforts to back, to make things better.

Because corporate/Wall Street scam #1 is imperialism.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/

And a guy who is speaking out against that, in front of Republican audiences, is pure fucking gold.

> Why do you think Ron Paul is the only "crazy" the media allows to have even a small voice?

The media has to maintain the illusion we're a free country with a free media. So they can't simply ignore a movement of a couple million people. It's the same sort of stuff they do with #OWS or anti-war rallies. They can't completely bury it, so they either play down the numbers (i.e. anti-war rallies with hundreds of thousands of people made to look like it was "only" 50 thousand) or portray them like crazy kooks (Ron Paul, #OWS).

http://www.businessinsider.com/jon-stewart-ron-paul-media-video-2011-8

u/xonoph · 1 pointr/philosophy

I recommend the Wadsworth website. This link is to their timeline series:
http://www.wadsworth.com/philosophy_d/special_features/timeline/timeline.html
They also have by topic and by philosopher.
Another good website, mentioned by others, is Squashed Philosophers, but it has a different purpose (to skim original works).

If you prefer audiobooks, there's a good lecture series, Great Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition:
http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/coursedesclong2.aspx?cid=470
You probably don't need the whole 84 lectures, just a few of the bigger names like Plato, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Hegel, and Wittgenstein will give you a solid foundation.

For books, Philosophy Made Simple is a solid entry level intro,
http://www.amazon.ca/Philosophy-Made-Simple-Richard-Popkin/dp/0385425333

I also like from Socrates to Satre
http://www.amazon.com/Socrates-Sartre-Philosophic-Quest/dp/0553251619
Which goes in for just a few big names, and has a companion tv show.

There's no definitive anything, and probably better than these that I'm not aware of, but a good approach is to graze a little from a few different introductory books, aiming to familiarise yourself with terms and names - and then graze again to get a slightly deeper insight into how they connect etc.

u/Seifuu · 3 pointsr/NeutralPolitics

By my appraisal, in the US, it's largely


a) Jingoism trussed up as international policy.


US Americans are, culturally, one of the most nationalist and patriotic people. Because it is cultural, many Americans are unaware of it and assume that citizens of other countries are just as nation-focused.


Something that's important to understand is that the jigsaw puzzle of sovereign nation-states is largely a modern invention. It was pushed by land-owners and empiricists to further the strength of existing "nations" (like the UK) and give them justification for colonial holdings/future cultural imperialism (like Japan).


So, this is generally where fear of "Globalists wanting one world government, etc etc" comes from. People have been conditioned to believe in a competitive, invidious world state that really only came about in the last couple centuries and that, I might add, runs counter to the idea of a nation-state (which is a unity of people based on economic, territorial pragmatism, regardless of cultural differences, etc.). "Suppression of traditional cultural identities" refers to things like gay marriage, the non-denominational holiday greetings, etc. which are all White Christian culture finally being forced to give up its top position (which is why many non-discriminatory modern nationalists call for "White America").


b) An inherent feature of modern economies being blamed on the scapegoat of globalism


Basic, academic consensus economic theory teaches us that it is better to participate in a global market - allowing certain countries to produce or trade goods for which they are better equipped (i.e. bananas coming from tropical regions).


However (and this is the same fear as the one of automation), in the US, those benefits go to private businesses and then the government is supposed to tax those businesses and distribute those taxes as benefits to the people (oversimplification, I'm sure). Since businesses at that scale seemingly exist solely for profit, their structure requires them to try to avoid taxes and maximize income. Large businesses will continue to pour resources into successfully finding/squeezing through tax loopholes (because they're basically in a spending race against the US government) and smaller businesses might see modest expansion tethered by increased taxation.


In Western economies, that's basically the existing plutocracy increasing its capital aka "the rich get richer". Which is a natural consequence of the US economy in which the more capital you have, the more capital you can get. It's as true domestically as it is internationally - wealth disparity in the US was worse in the early 20th century, when isolationism was popular.


Reading this comic might give you a clearer picture on the rationale behind US populism. You'll notice the fear of international influence (China), the lack of belief in international regulatory or diplomatic solutions to exploitative business practice (moving of labor/production), and the mindset that any benefit to the existing hegemony is taboo. Not to say that there weren't/aren't legitimate grievances with this specific trade agreement, but they're muddled by omen.


It's Manichean us vs them, the USA vs other countries, the poor vs the rich - which pretty much defines populism. You can only have a group by defining who is and isn't part of the group - and if you make it "common sense" to act in the "group's best interests", then everyone who acts against your group must be acting against your best interest (rather than acting in their own interests, or to prevent negative consequences of your group's actions). Never stopping to ask if your group is actually acting in its own best interest or if those interests were even rationally defined in the first place.


Of course, that's also how things like FDA and EPA regulation got implemented. I'm not sure exactly where the line is between "slaughterhouse sanitation policies reduce risk of disease" and "the Chinese are coming to take my land and the Muslims are coming to kill us all". I think it's to do with significant, measurable risk vs nebulous potentiality.

u/convictp · 4 pointsr/French

I'll say this. As someone who wears the hat of both a torrenter and a language learner, I find that there is such a wild abundance of free (or cheap) learning material that you don't need to search to the ends of the Earth to shake a few dollars out of a small company like RadioLingua. Not putting you down, because I've looked for it also.

So, what I'd like to suggest to you are free resources that would be similar to the paid content of Coffee Break French

  • FSI Basic French course A little dated and tedious, but incredibly comprehensive audio / written course. Enough material for months of learning.
  • LingQ Native content (phone calls, tv shows, articles) with transcripts
  • News in Slow French App Daily news, read slowly. A couple free transcripts with each installment.

    If you're willing to shell out a few bucks, there's this:
  • Assimil French With Ease course (more comprehensive and formal than CBF)

    Not to mention that Coffee Break French serves perfectly well as an Audio-Only course. It's how I got started.

    If you need any help, let me know.

    Edit: Added links and explanations.
u/x384 · 3 pointsr/determinism

We can change our desires and tendencies, but we will change them according to our current ones which include desire to change them in the first place. Moreover, our current desires are based on our previous desires which are based on even older desires. Ultimately, if we follow causation of each desire, we will end at factors upon which we had no control.

I assume, those factors which are beyond our control are what Einstein referenced when he paraphrased Schopenhauer.

In a previous thread you mentioned Sam Harris as a person who piqued your interest in free will debate. Even though I am a layman, I came to conclusion that Sam unknowingly or even worse knowingly left out many important questions (of which Frankfurt cases are most significant) unanswered in his book and speeches. I strongly encourage you to read proper positions on free will debate. My suggestion is book called 'Four Views on Free Will'. I also recommend Derk Pereboom's lectures if you gravitate toward position similar to hard determinism.

u/runeaway · 1 pointr/Stoicism

There are several good translations, but I'll suggest the translation by Robin Hard, which includes selected correspondence with Marcus' rhetoric teacher Fronto and good footnotes.

I also think it's helpful to have more than one translation to compare phrasing. There are older translations you can find for free online. They are a little less readable than a more modern translation, but for comparison they're useful. The best two free ones are by George Long and by George Chrystal.

u/hypnostic · 4 pointsr/AcademicPhilosophy

I'm honestly not sure how relevant this is going to be, but I took a Philosophy course in college just last semester for this exact reason (to get the "essentials"). I guess the "right" place to start would be with the ancient philosophers and see which ideas you like and then look for those similar ideas in later philosophers. As I find that sometimes the later philosophers either prove, disprove, or add something to the original ideas. Not that there's anything wrong with original ideas but it's pretty interesting watching the evolution and gives a good idea where it originated.

The text we used was: Questions that matter The only thing I really got out of this text was an introduction to Descartes. I am enthralled by the mind-body duality that he proposed.

This book was my initial exposure to philosophy when I was a teenager. I probably need to read it again as it has been quite a while.

I have also found wikipedia to be a very good source for looking up different schools of philosophy. Like, for example you want something on Existentialism. I would also recommend the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

u/GlyphGryph · 2 pointsr/changemyview

I'll ignore the "insult" part and just focus on the label.

Liberals isn't just used by people talking about those who are "too far left". They are people who believe in or advocate for one of the liberal ideologies. Why do you think it's "toxic" to have a label we can use to refer to those who believe in and advocate for a specific ideology (or family of closely related ideologies)?

Now, I'm not going to disagree it's not misused, but that's a thing that's always going to happen with words, especially ideologies. It's a useful rhetorical tool and, let's be honest, most people aren't gonna have, want, or need a nuanced understandings of the features that differentiate their perceived enemies. Euphemisms happen. Ignorance is a fact of life. I understand people are going to call me a liberal sometimes because they don't know what I am, and that's okay - I'm sure I've done the same to others in other situations!

And yeah, it's gonna get misused as a symbol for the purpose of virtue signaling, but anything could be.

That doesn't mean the word isn't useful, and it is (often) used in a way that is perfectly descriptive. To a certain extent, I sort of feel like this post is an attempt to deny that the ideology even exists, or that it's particularly common - but it is an ideology, a fairly coherent one, and it is a common (often outright dominant) ideology on college campuses, in news rooms, in the entertainment industry and the halls of politics on the Democratic side. How else will you better describe those ideologies and their advocates if not using the word that literally means that?

I think it's also important we have the word, so we can differentiate between the different flavours of leftist thought - between the liberals, the neoliberals (who really aren't particularly liberal despite the name), the socialists (of various flavours) and those who identify as none of the three.

What exactly do you think "Listen, Liberal" should have been called instead? Who exactly would we say the book was trying to address?
https://www.amazon.com/Listen-Liberal-Happened-Party-People/dp/1627795391

u/StevenMaurer · 1 pointr/politics

You are certainly welcome to believe anything you'd like, but if you insist on holding pejorative views of others, don't be shocked when they don't react positively.

In terms of you claiming that the Democratic party leadership not reflecting the values of the Democratic electorate - you are correct. Democratic leaders are considerably more liberal and progressive than the general public at large. Again, the whole thing that started this conversation we're having is me pointing out the election results, which clearly shows this issue.

I clearly understand how you get to that condition. Thanks to The Big Sort, lefties in big emerald blue cities almost can't help but fall into group-think. While suburban and rural Democratic activists are stuck trying to explain to you that America isn't all a bunch of frustrated socialists.

In terms of Donald Trump, please understand that there is a huge white temper tantrum going on, as the 1950s economy, where if you were American, white, and male, you could get a job more or less straight out of highschool, even if you learned nothing there. The US hasn't fallen behind in the market, so much as the rest of the world has caught up, and succeeding if you're the "right" kind of person, isn't so easy anymore. Hence the tantrum.

Most of this tantrum exhibits itself as blatant white racism and nativism, but there is the leftist version of this as well. Scratch the surface of a so-called "millennial" supposedly angry at "capitalism", you find they're no more in favor of raising taxes on the rich than others. Measure 97 in particular, lost in Oregon because the public got convinced by the "rich plutocrats give people jobs and low prices as a gift - not because that's what the market will bear - so tax increases on them will all be passed on to you" canard. It's depressing.

Quite literally, in 150 yeas, no non-incumbent Democratic party candidate has ever followed a Democratic President. This is not due to "incompetence", it's due to the fact that 25% of the public always just votes against the president's party no matter what. It is generally true for Republicans as well, with the exception of Reagan, who successfully convinced the public to shift dramatically to the right.

The voters, mind you. Not the leadership.

No. Democrats are not socialists. We worship neither at the altar of "free markets" nor "government everything". Both concentrate power in the hands of a few, which leads inevitably to authoritarianism. We happen to be pulling in the same direction as socialists - advocating for more government control of completely out of control crony-capitalism and plutocracy that the GOP espouses. But we also see the lessons of socialist corrupt fascism, and don't want that either.




u/chjones994 · 1 pointr/IRstudies

>Make note, I'm just a high schooler. I don't have any significant experience in academic IR studies, and I get most of my information from books, magazines, and journals. To be honest, I'm a little fuzzy on theory


I was the same in high school, trying to self-teach. If you have the opportunity to take a college intro-IR course it clears up sooo much. If you did it like me, you are teaching yourself out of order and context, and in a way that biases strongly towards some things and not others. Anyway, if you can't take an organized class, try to pick up a book on theory and that starts at the basics. I haven't read it yet, but if you like Realism then The Tragedy of Great Power Politics is supposedly excellent. Likewise, The End of History is the go-to Liberal book. Haven't read that either yet, so someone correct me if I'm way off-base with these recommendations. There's also Constructivism as the new thing, but I'm not really familiar with it. Anyways, getting theories down more helps a ton, it definitely changed my views on whether or not certain wars were good/bad ideas. But from your post you seem to have a good grasp on things, so IDK if this advice will help that much.


(^ this isn't related to your question, I just thought it might be helpful)


Anyways your question is basically Liberal Vs Realist it seems. A liberal of the Neoconservative (Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, ect.) branch would say Saddam violated the liberal order first, and now the newly democratic Iraq has removed the threat. Iraq will join the other democracies and only attack dictators til there are none left and we have world peace. (this is really dumbed down, but you get the point)



Other less militaristic liberals (the Clintons, Woodrow Wilson especially) would say that that was an expected occasional break-down in the liberal order, and that liberal institutions for the most part prevent this sort of thing from happening more often, as it would if there was no UN or WTO ect. In their eyes, if Bush were ever put to international court and tried then it would be proof of the liberal order's success. The liberal order includes international free trade, which liberals say makes war unprofitable, and so they say, unlikely.


Realists (George HW Bush, Nixon, Kissinger) would agree with your middle paragraph, that the 'global order' is a manifestation of American hegemony, and that liberal institutions are set up to maximally benefit the USA, which is why other powers become revisionists; Iran/China/Russia does not feel it benefits from a US-led order (the WTO, World Bank, ect), and wants to set up an new order that maximizes their own power instead.


So its depends on who you ask, there is no real consensus here. For what its worth, I think you are dead on about the 'liberal order' really being the 'American order', and like you said, its mostly been a good thing.

u/cypherhalo · -1 pointsr/Christianity

u/tathougies has it. There is legitimate reason for the gov't to support 1m1w marriage because it can (and usually) does produce children. Gov't has a vested interest in making sure those children are raised well. Yes, not all marriages produce children, please don't bring that up as if I'm unaware of it. Given they're the exception to the rule, it's not relevant.

There's no other valid reason for gov't to be involved in marriage, why does gov't care who you love? Does gov't care who your best friend is? No. So all this talk about love is irrelevant, you can love whomever you want but there's no reason for gov't to get in the middle of it unless there's children or the possibility of children.

I highly recommend "What is Marriage?" and "Correct, Not Politically Correct" for a lot more in-depth look at the subject. Neither quotes the Bible or relies on it to make their case. "Correct, Not Politically Correct" is a lot shorter and more "layman" in its approach. Plus it has a handy Q&A in the back.

Take care!

u/charkshark · 1 pointr/IAmA

> I'd like to learn French this year, but I have less time to commit than I have in previous years. Is it possible to work language learning into a situation where you're short on time?

Most definitely. What matters most is consistency. Coincidentally, this is one of my favourite language courses ever, for French. The Assimil method in particular is built upon the "day-to-day method", meaning you work on one lesson a day, for 15 minutes to an hour. If you do that for a few months (I believe that course is 115 lessons), your French will be WELL on it's way. There's more to the Assimil method in particular, but that is mostly covered in the Amazon reviews if you're curious.

> Also, how do you feel about high school/college language courses?

They can be great with an enthusiastic teacher. But students in general don't tend to care about them enough, and as a result learn nothing.

u/hcirtsafonos · 1 pointr/politics

>They also assume that if we were taxed less that we would give more, which isn't necessarily the case, plus we already have charitable donations accounted for in our tax code.

To your first point, I'm reading a book on this right now, Who Really Cares?. It's fascinating and it basically says that, for people of a certain type (he posits religious people, I would argue it could be extended to married families in general), the less they are taxed the more they will give in charity.

What exactly do you mean by "we already have charitable donations accounted for in our tax code?" I assume you're referring to deductions here. The truth is they arent entirely accounted for at all...yes you're allowed to deduct upto 50% of your contribution base (look at 1(G)), and they don't give an incentive to donate per se, it just means that you can give the money to an organization that isn't the government.

The true question is, if there are organizations that can provide services more efficiently than the government (I completely agree with your last paragraph), why don't we let them, and then put the saved money towards other useful things?

u/AshNazg · 2 pointsr/languagelearning

The best way to do that is supplement your "going around and talking to just about anyone you see" with some Assimil French exercises.

You're going to do great, just don't be afraid of sounding like an idiot at first. Another French curriculum that many people praise is the Pimsleur method. I loved the Pimsleur Vietnamese course I took, and it worked out great; I'm sure French is much better, being an easy language to learn.

Remember, you can "buy" these from the internet for an extremely low "price".

u/gayotzi · 1 pointr/AskAnthropology

Not totally accurate, but if you’re looking for popular science/entertainment that’s somewhat anthropology related.... Kathy Reichs is a board certified forensic anthropologist and has written a lot of books. They (she) are what the TV show Bones was based on.

Stiff by Mary Roach is a good one

For nonfiction, and if you’re interested in things highly relevant politically now, these are some incredible works on immigration.

Becoming Legal
They Leave Their Kidneys in the Fields

I’m pretty sure this author is a sociologist, but still a great book. imagined communities

u/bluepious · 1 pointr/AskThe_Donald

As you said you saw the usual classics I'll skip over Hayek, Hazlett, Milton Freedman, Orwell, ect

1.A very interesting read on America's Economic History. Not econ theory, this is the history of our economy crushing it for over 200 years. Will give you the faith that America's best days are always ahead of us as long as we remain capitalist :

https://www.amazon.com/Empire-Wealth-History-American-Economic/dp/0060505125

2.The best book on Foreign Policy I've ever read. It's a realist take on internation affairs which is what we are finally back to under this admin.

Nation's will work in thier own self interest, armies need to take territory to win wars, you need a great economy to have a great military, China must be confronted, ect:

https://www.amazon.com/Tragedy-Great-Power-Politics-Updated/dp/0393349276

u/n1n2n3n4n5n6 · 1 pointr/movies

> I'm fine with you or someone else saying, "based on this and this definition for an objectively good movie, I find X movie to be objectively good" what I am not fine with, is if someone just says "Y is an objectively good/bad movie" without context. This would be a miscomunication as the person who said that uses a different defeinition than most others.

Yes, one needs to be clear on the conception of beauty being used.

>I couldn't disagree further

On what grounds? I encourage you to read up on epistemology - the field that specializes on knowledge, reason, evidence, and the like. Robert Audi's introduction to the field is good!

u/kinematografi · 1 pointr/AskReddit

This is a good start

and so is this!

This is, possibly surprisingly, good too.

If you're looking to jump right into a text and think you have a grip on the language, try Foucault's Madness and Civilization It's great and pretty easy to read.

Another good introduction (or at least, MY introduction to philosophy is Slavoj Zizek. He's pretty easy to read and understand, but makes ties to Lacan, Nietzsche, Heidegger, etc in a cohesive manner that makes you want to learn more. Of his work, I'd check out The Sublime Object of Ideology, The Parallax View or watch his movie! (Which is extraordinarily entertaining for how dense it is. He's also kind of amazing in a philosophical rock star kind of way.)

Hope that gets you started!

u/love-your-enemies · 2 pointsr/Catholicism

Maybe I'm wrong, but I do think appealing to the natural / biological realities of our bodies as fundamental to our ethical and theological beliefs can appeal to people. It's pretty undeniable that, biologically speaking, the purpose of our sex organs is to procreate.

Anyway, I think I see the point you're making, as well. I think I will leave it at that, but if you haven't already read this book I will recommend it to you because I think it's interesting and helpful on the topic of marriage.

u/williafx · 1 pointr/environment

Continued support for the military industrial complex
Bold and expressed support for the war in Iraq
Pushing for the war In Syria
Continued support for more wars abroad, even adding 4 more major conflicts under the Obama presidency
Continued support for the war on drugs
Continued support for the prison industrial complex
Continued support for predatory lending industries
refusal to support a living wage
refusal to support single payer / medicare for all / universal healthcare
refusal to support extending public education beyond k-12
growing support within the party to move towards greater and greater privatization of public services
Enactment of the ACA, a healthcare proposal initially concocted by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.
refusal to break up the big banks
refusal to support or truly fight for a carbon tax
a continual decline of support for unionized labor
The continued and increasing acceptance of legalized bribery / money in politics
A general abandonment of leftist economic policy


The democrats do pander very frequently to leftist ideals, but they are either extremely ineffective at governing toward their ideals or are disingenuous. In my view I lean toward the latter, mostly due to the blatant and transparent acceptance of enormous sums of money from special interest groups. It makes them look like they are paid to lose/throw the fight - but still pander to the left and win votes.


This criticism of the Democratic party as moving rightward by no means excused the disgusting sprint toward facism of the Republican party, but the Democrats have been trying for years to run away from being branded with associations to FDR or New Deal style politics. For a very thorough analysis, check out this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Listen-Liberal-Happened-Party-People/dp/1627795391


u/867-5309NotJenny · 1 pointr/politics

> I'm familiar with this popular understanding of what nationalism is but I'm saying it doesn't really line up with scholarship on the ideology and it's history. Read Nationalism by Anthony D. Smith or Imagined Communities by Benedict Anderson in order to get a basic introduction to the subject as they're usually among the standard college textbooks used in relevant courses. I've said this elsewhere in the thread but nationalism at it's most base level is a belief in the existence of nations, nation states and the concept of self-determination. A nation is an amorphous political concept that can be based on a large number of things from a perception of shared ethnicity to shared geography to shared history. The basis for the creation of a nation is known as national identity. Practically every country in the 21st century , professes a national identity and when a country does this it is known as a nation state (the wikipedia article for this concept is fairly narrow as it focuses on states that tie national identity to ethnicity and all but ignores civic nationalism and to some extent left wing nationalism )

None of this is about how the word is used in a socio-political sense though. And there is a very good argument that the popular view is the current correct view of the word's meaning.

> The United States is a nation state as...

I agree with most of your 2nd paragraph, but I would argue that for most people it's an expression of American Patriotism.

> Nationalism is further reinforced by national symbols ... ...Thus displaying any kind of flag associated with a nation (state or otherwise) is a display of nationalist sentiment.

Or patriotic sentiment.

> With that out of the way let's go back to the Olympics. I stated that the modern Olympic games themselves were founded upon nationalism and the belief that athletic competition offered a healthy outlet for duking out national rivalries as an alternative to conflict.

Agree.

> hat is why the Olympics themselves are an orgy of national symbolism from the Parade of Nations, the fact that athletes represent their nations at all instead of themselves, the playing of national anthems at medal ceremonies, etc. etc.

Agree

> With all that in mind rooting for your nation's athletes at the Olympics is an expression of nationalist sentiment.

Disagree. Most people who participate in and watch the Olympics are more than ready to acknowledge when their country isn't the best at something, and when other countries do well. That's Patriotism when they root for their team under those circumstances.

> Here's a couple of articles I was able to find on the subject after a two second Google search since I don't feel like digging up old academic articles. Hell, here's the perspective of a Communist (i.e. someone who actually rejects nationalism since they believe in the dismantling of all states and national identities).

All three are opinion pieces. The Vox one is actually talking about patriotism, but has fallen into the Nationalism/patriotism 'synonym trap'. Communist countries officially reject nationalism, but in practice are just as nationalistic as every other country.

> Nationalism in and of itself has absolutely nothing to do with blind loyalty to a particular government although chauvinistic nationalism does indeed manifest itself that way.

Not completely blind, but it does encourage unhealthy behaviors towards others. That behavior isn't implied in patriotism.

> In fact nationalism isn't contingent on the existence of a nation-state

Correct. Post WWI there was a lot of nationalism from ethnic and cultural groups that hadn't had their own country in centuries. However, gaining a country was their goal. A good example actually is post-colonial Africa.

> government and doesn't even necessarily advocate for one.

Actually, they always do eventually.

> Just look at the history of Black nationalism in the USA of which only a few strands (known as Black Separatism) advocated the creation of an African American state.

One would argue that the factions not advocating for separate statehood were actually patriots.

​

u/[deleted] · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

If you're getting started in epistemology, I recommend Roderick Chisholm's Theory of Knowledge. This one is a little older, but in my opinion it's still one of the best. Another decent introduction is Robert Audi's Epistemology. Another good introduction is by Goldman and McGrath, but in my opinion it tries to do too much for an introduction.

As far as ethics is concerned, depending on your level, a good place to start is Gensler's Ethics. This is a decent survey of a number of ethical 'schools', although the downside is that it is too clear that Gensler is heavily biased towards the Golden Rule, and the tone of the book is a little on the sophomoric side. Another decent introduction is this book, which selects some writings from major philosophers and gets your feet wet at least. Of course there are many more books, but I am assuming you're at an introductory level, so there you go.

u/scallon · 1 pointr/TrueReddit

I didn't realize I had to do your homework for you. This was the top result of a google search for "shaker heights sociology study schools". When I saw this study last it was in article format but I am not surprised the author wrote a book about it.

Anyways, you are remembering the study incorrectly. It was a study of middle class black families in comparison to middle class whites within the same community. He found that the white parents were significantly more likely to preach the value of education and homework and hold their children responsible when they performed poorly academically, whereas the reverse was true with the black parents. They did little to reinforce the importance of school or homework and blamed the teachers/schools when their children did poorly. So yes, actually, it addresses this point directly.

Look, I do not care to "convert" you. I couldn't care less if you believe what I am saying. The link to the book is of zero help to you as you are not going to order it and read it and you have demonstrated an unwillingness to search for any evidence that is contrary to your claim (unless it is spoon fed to you), so what do you want? Shall I xerox the relevant pages of the article (assuming I ever find my copy) and mail them to you? Why is that my responsibility? I have told you that there is evidence to support my claim, I gave you a really good jumping off point, and you do not want to do any work. Fine. Again, I don't care. But do not make the mistake of assuming that your laziness or my apathy is reason enough to continue believing you are right about this.

u/Metatronos · 1 pointr/mormondialogue

People seems to be interested these days in symbolic logic, which in fact is believed to be superior. Nevertheless, I feel that Socratic Logic is the method preferable when trying to ascertain truth. I recommend Socratic Logic by Peter Kreeft edition 3.1.

Another field I would recommend is the study of the Stoic philosophers. There is much wisdom that is quite apt for our day and our journey through life. I recommend this site as a launching point into the subject.

>What man can you show me who places any value on his time, who reckons the worth of each day, who understands that he is dying daily?" Seneca The Younger (Letter I: On Saving Time in Moral Letters to Lucius).

u/1066443507 · 6 pointsr/askphilosophy

It depends on what you want to get out of it. If you want a clear, intro-level overview of the subject, check out Shafer-Landau's Fundamental's of Ethics. It's a fantastic place to start, and it is the book I recommend if you really want to understand the subject and plan to read outside the context of a class.

If you want primary texts, I suggest that you get the book's companion, The Ethical Life.

If you want a textbook that is a little shorter and more engaging, check out Rachels' The Elements of Moral Philosophy.

If you want an introduction that's informative and fun to read but less informative than the Rachels or the Shafer-Landau, check out Sandel's Justice. You can also watch his Justice lectures online. This book, as opposed to the other two, is written for a popular audience.

u/chase1635321 · 2 pointsr/SeriousConversation

Readings on Metaethics

  • Beginners Book (Normative ethics, not metaethics): Russ Shafer-Landau The Fundamentals of Ethics
  • Short article overview of metaethics: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/
  • Short article on moral realism: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-realism/
  • Short article on anti-realism: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-anti-realism/
  • Metaethics overview book: Andrew Fisher's Metaethics: An Introduction. 2011.
  • Metaethics in depth book: Mark van Roojen's Metaethics: A Contemporary Introduction. 2015
  • Metaethics Youtube Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBE50_tfAIA&list=PLXKKIUdnOESH7mWijTiv4tTFAcQnEkFDJ
  • More recommendations on the philosophy reddit

    Defenses of God/Christianity

  • William Lane Craig is essentially the Christian counterpart to Sam Harris. If you haven't heard of the cosmological argument, fine tuning, etc he's a good place to start. Not a great destination though if you're looking for something in depth and I don't think some of his arguments work in the end.
  • Alvin Plantinga is a philosopher known for his contributions to modality, and is also a Christian. He's written some books on his faith, including "Warranted Christian Belief". He's basically the Christian counterpart to Daniel Dennent.
  • David Bentley Hart is what I would consider the Christian counterpart to Nietzsche. His book "Beauty of the Infinite" is written in a similar style and has a long discussion of the will to power. That book is pretty dense though. An easier starting point is "The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss". Which attempts to disentangle an informed view of God from the somewhat corrupted popular conception of it. He has also written a response to the new atheists called "Atheist Delusions"
  • Edward Feser is probably my favorite on this list. He's written good intros to the Philosophy of Mind and to Aquinas. He defends the existence of God in "Five Proofs of the Existence of God". His magnum opus, however, is probably "Aristotle's Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science". This book is a (dense) defense of Neo-Aristotelian metaphysics, which is central to his defense of the existence of God. He has also written an intro to Scholastic Metaphysics, and a response to the new atheists called "The Last Superstition"

    Many of the people listed above have done interviews and talks if you're not inclined to read an entire book.

    Let me know if this does/doesn't help or if I should narrow the list.
u/h1ppophagist · 1 pointr/AskScienceDiscussion

I can help with a few of those.

An excellent introduction to political philosophy that takes a historical view is this one by Jonathan Wolff. One that looks at contemporary political theory only is this one by Adam Swift. I recommend reading both of them. They both have excellent suggestions for further reading. I will also recommend this book on contemporary political philosophy by Will Kymlicka, which is one of my favourite books. It's not quite as accessible as the previous two books, but Kymlicka's writing is clear and powerful.

You will likely find some useful readings on social classes and equality in this syllabus^PDF from a class taught by a Canadian sociologist.

u/TheSciences · 2 pointsr/soccer

Not a website but, depending on what you mean by 'cultural', you may be interested to read Brilliant Orange by David Winner.

It draws connections between Dutch culture (including visual art, architecture, and urban planning) and the football philosophy that developed in the Netherlands in the second half of the 20th century. It's not an academic piece, and there's lots of football anecdotes in case it sounds too dry or academic. It really is a wonderful book: ambitious in scope, but accessible. Can't recommend it highly enough.

u/NateRoberts · 1 pointr/Kossacks_for_Sanders

>Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal. Indeed, they have scarcely dented the free-market consensus at all. This is not for lack of opportunity: Democrats have occupied the White House for sixteen of the last twenty-four years, and yet the decline of the middle class has only accelerated. Wall Street gets its bailouts, wages keep falling, and the free-trade deals keep coming.

>With his trademark sardonic wit and lacerating logic, Frank's Listen, Liberal lays bare the essence of the Democratic Party's philosophy and how it has changed over the years. A form of corporate and cultural elitism has largely eclipsed the party's old working-class commitment, he finds. For certain favored groups, this has meant prosperity. But for the nation as a whole, it is a one-way ticket into the abyss of inequality. In this critical election year, Frank recalls the Democrats to their historic goals-the only way to reverse the ever-deepening rift between the rich and the poor in America.

From the publisher's description of Thomas Frank's Listen, Liberal. Sounds like I gotta read this book!

u/degustibus · -1 pointsr/reddit.com

The fact is religious people do more for others: Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compasionate Conservatism Who Gives, Who Doesn't, and Why It Matters

Why don't you point out to us the great works of missionary charity undertaken by atheists throughout the world that merit support?

u/kwame_kilpatrick · 6 pointsr/The_Donald

I eagerly wait their reply. The movie was narrated and based on the book Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich. I mean the title sounds like the book has already made up the author's mind, and I guess it has... I have not read the book, but it is on my list now. I'd like to see the counterpoints, but the way it is portrayed in the video, the evidence is pretty damning.

Most of the situations the film covers involve the Clinton Foundation or Bill Clinton getting massive speaking fees from foreign countries or businessmen who have an issue being debated by the State Dept. and soon after a check arrives, they get an agreement approved. It's A LOT of that. As the author states in the film: one or two times...OK, maybe coincidence, but it seems to happen A LOT. Beyond that, the deals she agrees to are part and parcel against the progressive values she spews out of her mouth (i.e. human rights, woman's rights, environment, etc.) ....all things she claims she fights for but then proffers favors for shady characters in exchange for cold hard cash.

u/WhenIntegralsAttack · 1 pointr/Conservative

There's a great anthology of Rousseau's political writings that comes up in an Amazon search of "Rousseau". Kant's Critique of Pure Reason is a great book to understand why there might be a problem in establishing a society on pure reason and the progress of science (like we currently have). Locke's two treaties of government are his best works. Also, Descartes is great.

Beware, reading these books is not going to be done in a month or so. It takes years. As a result of this, I advise you to start off with the book The Closing of the American Mind by Allan Bloom. It's an absolutely devastating critique of modern America and its so-called "values". Basically, he chronicles the development of American thought from the Enlightenment to the modern day and shows that much of our language such as "value relativism"/"Multiculturalism", or "I just need to find myself" come from German philosophy which is deeply antithetical to Enlightenment ideals. If you ever had a sense that our Democracy is eroding from the inside out, and much of what we see if a result of the weakness of the people, this book will make a lot of sense to you. If you ever thought that our embrace of multiculturalism led to us "losing ourself" more so than "finding others", this book will make sense. If you enjoy that book, you can decide for yourself if "going to the sources" is worth it for you.

u/LadyLib2 · 10 pointsr/WayOfTheBern

lol. no way I could do it justice... thanks!

I like bobswern's comment where he politely suggests kos take a sabbatical and give all this some more thought. Im tempted to pile on and tell markos to log off DKOS, turn off MSNBC for a week or two and go read a few good books. Go hole up or have a few drinks with Meteor Blades maybe, heh.

start with this one:

https://www.amazon.com/Listen-Liberal-Happened-Party-People/dp/1627795391

Im sure we collectively could come up with a pretty good reading list for him lol

u/dan_blather · 8 pointsr/AskSocialScience

Cites you want?

There have been many studies done on the schools in Shaker Heights, Ohio, an affluent (generally middle class to very wealthy), racially integrated suburb of Cleveland. Even in one of the best funded districts in the state, black students perform worse than white students.

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/csd/summary/v044/44.6jackson.html

Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb presents an interesting departure from traditional studies of the Black and White achievement gap. A trio of elements made this study uniquely different. First, the school district is considered to be one of the best in the nation. Second, Shaker Heights is an upper middle-class suburb with a median family income of $66,000. Third, Shaker Heights is a highly educated community with an estimated 61% of the residents over 25 years old holding at least a bachelor's degree. The presence of these three elements, which are traditionally used to explain the achievement gap, adds a perplexing dynamic to the research contained in this book.

The gap in academic achievement between Black and White students in Shaker Heights led to the fundamental question that guided this research: Why do Black students, who seemingly have the appropriate conditions of life that should lead to academic success, still perform far below their White counterparts? Interestingly, the academic performance of Blacks in Shaker Heights was above the state and national average for Black students.

A few more cites:

http://www.amazon.com/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb/dp/080584516X (considered the most authoritative study)
http://wesscholar.wesleyan.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1565&context=etd_hon_theses (pdf)
http://generaltoolbox.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/the_canary_in_the_mine.pdf (pdf)
http://annenberginstitute.org/pdf/cj_acheivement_gap.pdf(pdf)


For several years, I lived in South Euclid, a lower middle- to upper middle-class, stably racially integrated suburb not too far from Shaker Heights. There was the same gap between black students and white students, with special programs at the high school targeted specifically towards black students to ensure they graduate.

http://www.clevescene.com/cleveland/class-action/Content?oid=1502634

TL/DR: the district didn't succumb to the soft bigotry of low expectations.

Meanwhile, district officials, led by Superintendent Bill Zelei, refused to let daunting national trends discourage them. Half of black male students drop out anyway. Why bother trying? They didn't ship the new arrivals to special ed or let them coast in dumbed-down classes. They didn't pull money out of the high school and into majority-white elementary schools. They kept the honors courses, the Japanese language instruction, the art classes, and the drama club.


u/PapaFish · -4 pointsr/politics

>No, what I'm saying is the means are totally justified, and the ends will be what they are.

Wow. This is some truly terrifying, Nazi level rhetoric.

>I think Donald Trump is in hock to the Russians.

So much for innocent until proven guilty.

>After what Trump did in the 1990s, no American bank wanted to work with him and he had to go to Russia to get cash.

You mean while he was a democrat?

>If he's capable of separating that from his duties as Commander in Chief, god bless him

He literally just outlined out his plans for doing this.

>And, frankly, his views on Russia are extreme in the American political landscape, so my expectations for him in the investigations aren't so high right now.

Oh, so now the democrats are the hawks? Interesting.

> I care far more about good results than I do about good process.

Glad to hear you are for stop and frisk! Worked in NY!

>Hasn't always been that way, but then I got into international business at the executive management level, and I got a family. In short, I grew up.

Please. You're middle management material...

>This is me being a patriot and wanting to make sure that my government isn't, in fact, a puppet to a foreign power.

Ever stop to think that YOUR reaction is actually the one the Russians want to invoke?

Go read a book from one of the foremost experts on the subject - the highest ranking Soviet Intelligence Officer ever to defect to the US:

https://www.amazon.com/Disinformation-Strategies-Undermining-Attacking-Promoting-ebook/dp/B00D99V2RY

A patriot, you are not. Soldiers who defend the president/country, regardless of political persuasion are patriots. Are you nothing close to the person you imagine yourself to be.

Besides, Clinton is already in Russia's pocket. The UraniumOne deal proved that.

https://www.amazon.com/Clinton-Cash-Foreign-Governments-Businesses/dp/0062369296

u/richiecherry · 2 pointsr/Ask_Politics

A book recommendation for you: The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. Mearsheimer builds up a clear argument, with analysis of historical relevance stretching from Napoleonic France, Nazi Germany up to the modern United States.

His view is arguably colored by his assumptions about International Politics. However, the author makes this clear in the first few chapters, explaining his theory of Offensive Realism. It is at the same time a logically understandable and depressing view of the interaction of states.

The book finishes with a chapter wherein it is predicted that the rise of China is unlikely to be peaceful. There also are suggestsions of strategies for the U.S. to deal with this change in the balance of power. A clear and convincing read, highly recommended.

To give some sense of overview, there are other views of International Poltitics, this is just one of them, there is enough room to be critical. This book gets a serious debate going though, which you are looking for, reading from your post.

And since you are asking my opinion: Great Power politics are likely to trump relatively minor factors of environment and language in international relations. I assume that being the leading nation in the world means having the most power in the world. This has little to do with language and less to with environmental policy. It has everything to do with military forces, arsenals and alliances. Economic power as well, has a higher priority.

I am not saying the factors you point out are unimportant. The spread of language and the accompanying culture can be a spread of "soft power". The spread and popularity of Hollywood movies is an example of this. Many people throughout the world today speak English. But this can change. It is not hard to imagine that in three generations Chinese can have spread its influence as a language significantly.

If Chinese military and economic growth can be turned into a dominant position, other countries will study its culture in order to court and befriend it and hopefully benefit from associating with them.

u/jamestown112 · 1 pointr/Libertarian

I'm not sure your hypothesis is backed by the evidence. People are plenty different, not just due to cultural differences, but also due to basic differences in their personalities (which are largely determined by genes).

Moreover, to say that Ice-T's agreement with Rush on the issue of gun control is evidence that we're all simiilar s spurious. Let's see how they compare on other issues? These two are oil and water. That they agree on one issue at all is surprising.

Edit: This is a great read on the issue http://www.amazon.com/The-Big-Sort-Clustering-Like-Minded/dp/0547237723/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1343416477&sr=8-1&keywords=the+big+sort

u/nomadicwonder · 15 pointsr/WayOfTheBern

I'm glad Jimmy didn't let Thomas Frank off the hook for voting for Clinton. Jimmy obviously loves Frank's book, Listen, Liberal, but seriously, how do write that masterpiece and still remain loyal to the Democratic Party?

u/discontinuity · 2 pointsr/Cleveland

Bullet three is exactly backward. Shaker Heights high school used to be ranked in the 90th percentile, but as the mix changed to the one you quote, the Percentage of Students Passing All Four Parts of the Ohio Graduation Test dropped to 67.4%, the high school stopped being one of the most desirable, and white flight has and is occurring.

I agree with you that Clevelanders do NOT fear integrated education, but people value education and will chase these rankings. So if an influx of black students changes a highschool's pass rate, you will see white flight based on the change in status of the highschool. It's also worth noting that the high desirability of these schools is a draw which creates demand for real-estate and as the rankings decline, people will abandon the community as it is a precursor to declining home values, which is where most of the middle-class has the majority of their wealth, exasperating the "white flight" scenario.

There was a Black American Students in An Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement written about the phenomenon.

The author John U. Ogbu was ostricized by the black community because of it.

u/malvoliosf · 4 pointsr/worldnews

> deciding to be a part of society means that you agree to be taxed for the common good.

No it doesn't. I'm part of society and I don't agree to be taxed for the common good.

I don't even agree that it is for the common good (but even if it were, I'm not agreeing to pay).

>> Republicans, for example, give a lot more of their own money to charity than Democrats.

> lol, Source?

Uh, reality?

How about this? Here for a summary.

It's pretty much a commonplace now. Conservatives give about one-third more of their income than liberals.

u/admorobo · 4 pointsr/suggestmeabook

Honestly, I think the "Very Short Introduction" series by the Oxford Press is the best way to go. There are literally dozens and dozens of short, easy-to-read books that break down different concepts objectively and succinctly. The Very Short Introduction to Philosophy will probably be good for him, and then he can always jump off into others [Existentialism, Epistemology, et cetera) as he'd like. Hope this helps!

u/bearCatBird · 1 pointr/Anarcho_Capitalism

I just finished reading this book.

And I'm 100 pages into this book.

The first says:

> Morality is the effort to guide one’s conduct by reason - to do what there are the best reasons for doing - while giving equal weight to the interests of each individual affected by one’s decision. Moral Philosophy is the study of what morality is and what it requires of us. There is no simple definition of morality. But there is a “minimum conception” of morality - a core that any moral theory should accept. What do we know about the nature of Morality?

>1. Moral Judgments must be backed by good reasons.

>2. Morality requires the impartial consideration of each individual's interests.

The second book compares morality to art. While all art is subjective, people still practice and study art and become knowledgeable. It would be foolish to think we couldn't learn something from those who devote much time and energy to the subject. In the same way, we can learn about morality.

u/poor_yoricks_skull · 6 pointsr/askphilosophy

It sounds like you are interested in learning more about various philosophers and their ideas, but don't really have a good starting point right now.

This isn't really the place to conduct an entire overview of the history of philosophic thought, because we could get lost in the weeds very quickly.

But, I have found this book to be a very accessible starting point to introduce the history of philosophy. I would recommend reading it (or another overview style book like it). I bet you will find at least one philosophic idea in the book that makes you think "Yeah man, I've thought this before!" and that would be a great starting place for a deeper dive.

u/Lochleon · -7 pointsr/PoliticalDiscussion

This NYT piece explores that question pretty thoroughly, and includes a lot of outside links

This section is a decent summary:

>In other words, upscale voters were just as important to the Obama coalition as downscale voters. One consequence of the increased importance of the affluent to Democrats, according to Bonica and the three co-authors on the inequality paper, is that the Democratic Party has in many respects become the party of deregulated markets.

>“The Democratic Party pushed through the financial regulation of the 1930s, while the Democratic party of the 1990s undid much of this regulation in its embrace of unregulated financial capitalism,” the four authors write.

> They cite the crucial role of congressional Democrats in enacting the Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act of 1994, which eliminated past restrictions on interstate banking; the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act of 1999, which repealed the 1933 Glass–Steagall Act separating commercial banking from other financial services; and the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, which restricted government oversight of most over-the-counter derivative contracts, including credit default swaps — all of which played a role in the financial crisis of 2007-2009.

>The critique of the increased Democratic dependency on the rich by Bonica and his co-authors is modest in comparison to that of Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page, political scientists at Princeton and Northwestern. In a 2014 essay, “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens,” they analyze congressional voting patterns and conclude that

> >"The majority does not rule — at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites or with organized interests, they generally lose."

> >“These findings may be disappointing to those who look to the Democratic Party as the ally of the disadvantaged,” Gilens wrote in a 2012 essay published by the Boston Review:

It's going to be more slanted, but the Thomas Frank book Listen, Liberal charts the road the Democrats traveled from focusing on common welfare to catering to the needs of the upper-middle professional class.

u/gec_ · 25 pointsr/TheMotte

I do think you're romanticizing and overestimating the extent to which other countries have a coherent 'natural' ingrained ethnic/national identity by so rashly describing
> Nowhere else in the world is your identity conferred through bureaucracy

I mean, read a book like The Discovery of France that talks about the mapping of France and construction of the French national identity by the government. Up to WWI, the majority of the population wasn't even fluent in French, all the little villages had their own dialects. Spain still has smoldering independence movements and unique languages besides Spanish, from in Catalonia to the Basque region. Imagined Communities by Benedict Anderson is another great book that talks more broadly about the beginnings of the concept of nationhood, tying it in Europe to the rise of the printing press which enabled a national language for the first time.

And you mention India, which probably wouldn't even be a unified country if it weren't for the conquest under the British empire and subsequent independence. India is culturally and ethnically divided in the extreme, up to and including their caste system.


Not to mention the great success and relative stability of very divided multi-ethnic societies in countries such as Switzerland or Singapore in the first world. Many of these peoples have a longer shared history than the ethnic groups in the United States do, but I don't see why that makes a huge difference in terms of the strength of identity. In either case, the memory of that shared history has to be constructed anew for each generation. Our shared history up to this point is more than enough to serve as a basis to construct national identity on; these days few Italians or Irish descendants of immigrants have any other primary identity than 'American'. Imagining a shared national community such that it is a primary identity isn't easy but the American government has played a large part with mandatory public schools and other measures. Bureaucracy is a large part of forging national identity, no doubt, your mistake is thinking that this is isolated to America.


So your description of America as

> not a serious country

on these grounds says more about your unique antagonism to it than anything else. If America is particularly notable on these grounds it is that as a relatively young nation compared to many of these older countries, our national identity ambiguities and contradictions stand out more. You're doing a negative version of American exceptionalism, which I think is just as incorrect.

u/Ascythopicism · 1 pointr/philosophy

From Socrates to Sartre gives a pretty good overview. Yes, there are many gaps, but by the end of the book you should have a pretty good framework that you can work off of.

u/omid_ · 2 pointsr/exmuslim

The Phantom Tollbooth isn't philosophy but it's a great book when it comes to critical thinking and insight.

For philosophy in particular, getting a philosophy textbook is the best way to go, imo. Especially one that presents views in unbiased format. Philosophy, a very short introduction, while not perfect, presents ideas in the proposition/critique format that encourages thinkers to always be concerned with defending their ideas, not just presenting them.

u/ActionKermit · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

I do. The book was Socratic Logic by Peter Kreeft. I found it valuable because it's a comprehensive treatment of informal logic as presented by Aristotle, suitable for use in an undergraduate classroom, with practice exercises for each chapter and answers in the back of the book. The idea that stands out in my mind most sharply from that book was a throwaway observation Kreeft made at one point -- that the ends do justify the means because means are useless if they have no end, but good ends do not justify evil means. I was still in the process of trying to formulate my basic stance on moral issues at the time, so that idea hit me with a force that was almost physical. (Not sure why that particular idea should stand out so much more than the others, but it does.)

I used to identify completely with the positions presented in that book, but I've found plenty to argue with in the intervening time -- particularly on the subject of the theory of mind. If you decide to read it, it's important to remember that Kreeft has organized that book as a presentation of Aristotle's works on logic, so some of its positions can be painfully simplistic in light of subsequent research. (The example I'm thinking of is an early chapter section on the properties of the mind, which takes a naïve position that the mind actually goes to the places it imagines and changes size to encompass the things it imagines. Embodiment and phenomenology offer much better solutions than that.) That said, I think it's still the most valuable book of informal logic on the market, even if it needs to be taken cum grano salis.

u/Share-Metta · 1 pointr/streamentry

If you're interested in learning more about the debate surrounding free will, causal determinism, moral responsibility, etc. I recommend reading the following book:

https://www.amazon.com/Four-Views-Free-Martin-Fischer/dp/1405134860

​

It's an excellent introduction to the issues surrounding Free Will and it gives equal time and space to the various stances, and also allows the four authors to respond to each other's arguments. On a personal note, Fischer was one of my philosophy professors in college and I still consider him a mentor years later.

u/macdoogles · 2 pointsr/SocialDemocracy

I thought the documentary was great but it's very long and I think a lot of people don't catch the details. I also thought it was good to revive the video since I think it's informative and more people should check it out. This particular excerpt seemed relevant to social democracy.

The rest of the documentary is largely focused on Thomas Ferguson's book Golden Rule: The Investment Theory of Party Competition and the Logic of Money-Driven Political Systems and features quotes from Ferguson and Noam Chomsky quite heavily. Ferguson believes that you can predict government policy by following the financial backing of the various politicians. For example, it is argued that health care entered the US national debate in 2008 not necessarily because people wanted it but because various manufacturing industries were seeing their costs of labor go up and were feeling the pinch during the financial crisis and they in turn lobbied the politicians. At the end the documentary tries to make the case for both socialism and democracy.

u/jim_okc · 1 pointr/The_Donald

That's the liberal position, yes.

If you are interested in this topic and are willing to entertain a serious and secular defense of traditional marriage, the likes of which you will never be exposed to without seeking it out, here's a read:

https://www.amazon.com/What-Marriage-Man-Woman-Defense/dp/1594036225

Your views on marriage have been informed by pop culture. You can do better than that.

u/C_M_Burns · 2 pointsr/philosophy

I know I'm tardy to the party, but I found that it's best to start with general surveys of philosophy, so you're exposed to a wide range of thought, then narrowing down your interests.

Personally, I found the following to be the most helpful:

From Socrates to Sartre: The Philosophic Quest

Think

What Does It All Mean?

The Problems of Philosophy

u/SamisSimas · 1 pointr/NeutralPolitics

This isn't modern, but I'd recommend this book I read for the Philosophy of International Order class I took awhile back, it covers the history of western political philosophy in a pretty objective way, for the most part. I think seeing the development of political philosophy might be more helpful than just jumping into modern times.

[book in question]
(http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/019929609X/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1456905875&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=intro+to+political+philosophy&dpPl=1&dpID=41g5XpBgoSL&ref=plSrch)

u/JaredOfTheWoods · 2 pointsr/books

From Socrates to Sartre: A Philosophic Quest Its a pretty good starting point. Its basically just an overview of major philosophers. Also for some fiction try Genesis by Bernard Beckett. Its a pretty easy read and deals with what it means to be human.

u/Catfish3 · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

four views on free will. good book if you're interested in free will. each author has an article arguing for their position, and another responding to the other three articles. all four authors are leading writers on free will

u/DoughnutButtersnaps · 10 pointsr/neoliberal

Here's the thing, International Relations is all about figuring out why states act as they do, using culture as the metric misses a lot of motivation for how states interact as logical players in a somewhat anarchistic game of survival as a state.

I haven't read this book, but I've read Joesph Nye and he's also one of the standards that most IR students will end up reading.
https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Global-Conflict-Cooperation-Introduction/dp/0205851630/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

I also mention Mearsheimer's Tragedy of Great Power Politics in another comment. It's heavily assigned and great if you loved playing Risk as a kid.
https://www.amazon.com/Tragedy-Great-Power-Politics-Updated/dp/0393349276

u/RealityApologist · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

Four Views of Free Will is a good survey of the major positions.

But yeah, I agree with you. I've never been able to make sense of what Libertarians want (or, rather, how what they want isn't totally implausible); it seems to me also that the position demands something like magic. I know enough about philosophy to suspect that this is probably my failing, not theirs, though. Very few positions that lots of people hold are totally absurd; I'm sure there are stronger accounts of Libertarianism that I'm not familiar with. It's never been a deep interest of mine; I took a class on it as an undergraduate, came out of it thinking some flavor of compatibilism was probably right, and haven't thought too much about it since.

u/WillieConway · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

E. D. Hirsch's Cultural Literacy often gets attacked as being too conservative. I haven't actually read it to give my own opinion, but that's the reputation.

Allan Bloom's Closing of the American Mind might interest you, too. Bloom was definitely conservative, but the book curiously gets a certain amount of play among leftist thinkers.

u/TelevisionAntichrist · 0 pointsr/europe

Yeah, but there would be different issues at play, as well. There would be the whole issue, of European states looking at one another, or one European state looking at a non-European state, (i.e. Greece and Turkey) and possibly suddenly saying to themselves "I'm actually not 100% sure about that state's future intentions. I'd better make sure I'm not a paper tiger."

Slippery slope may ensue.

And it is that - in Mearsheimer's theory, that is The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (1992). (updated edition published 2014)

u/Ibrey · 35 pointsr/askphilosophy

I think you will learn the most by reading five textbooks, such as A History of Philosophy, volumes 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5; or something like Metaphysics: The Fundamentals, The Fundamentals of Ethics, Theory and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, and An Introduction to Political Philosophy.

If what you have in mind is more of a "Great Books" program to get your feet wet with some classic works that are not too difficult, you could do a lot worse than:

  • Plato's Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo, often published together under the title The Trial and Death of Socrates. Socrates is so important that we lump together all Greek philosophers before him as "the Presocratics," and this cycle of dialogues is a great window on who he was and what he is famous for.
  • The Basic Works of Aristotle. "The philosopher of common sense" is not a particularly easy read. Cicero compared his writing style to "a flowing river of gold," but all the works he prepared for publication are gone, and what we have is an unauthorised collection of lecture notes written in a terse, cramped style that admits of multiple interpretations. Even so, one can find in Aristotle a very attractive system of metaphysics and ethics which played a major role in the history of philosophy, and holds up well even today.
  • René Descartes, Discourse on the Method and Meditations on First Philosophy. Descartes is called the father of modern philosophy, not so much because modern philosophers have widely followed his particular positions (they haven't) but because he set the agenda, in a way, with his introduction of methodological scepticism.
  • David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. I think Elizabeth Anscombe had it right in judging Hume a "mere brilliant sophist", in that his arguments are ultimately flawed, but there is great insight to be derived from teasing out why they are wrong.
  • If I can cheat just a little more, I will lump together three short, important treatises on ethics: Immanuel Kant's Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism, and Anscombe's paper "Modern Moral Philosophy".
u/SammyD1st · 1 pointr/RealEstate

> By living in the same place where there are role models of people who care about the property, and the property itself is maintained to very high standards, you create an atmosphere that demands respect.

Nope, there is tons of data showing that this is demonstrably not true. That is exactly how people theorized Section 8 would work, and it hasn't: the worst drag people down, the best get the hell out and form their own communities.

I realize you're in the ivory tower. I hope that you'll actually listen to what the real landlords are telling you here.

u/4Ply4Ply4Ply · 1 pointr/Destiny

> gishgallop me

"Bro you gave me so many alternatives to my stemlord hyperdeterminism wtf gish gallop"

Amazing take

> mutually exclusive

If you read the first 10 pages of Tse's book he literally says that Robert Kane's model of Ultimate Responsiblity and Self Forming Actions are compatible with his criterial causation model, so no, they aren't mutually exclusive, he explains a different physical method of it occurring though the primary requirements for both forms of free will are the same.

> I'll start challenging them one by one.

Or you could just... read a fucking book :)

Harris's doesn't count btw.

> Pretending that Kane's position is not ridiculous is the opposite of being serious about the conversation.

I guess if i only read one page critiques and none of Kane's responses or none of the alternative formulations and explanations done by Mele like you did this conversation, then sure, I can see that being your take.

Whatever brother, I'll let you go back to complaining about Jordan Peterson and incels, you really are doing God's work, or just work once you finish that little endeavor of yours.

u/Redditron-2000-4 · 2 pointsr/politics

The Democratic Party hasn't been liberal for 35 years. It is astounding that liberals still believe the DNC represents them.

Thomas Frank explains it way better than I can, and it is worth a read or listen:
Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People? https://www.amazon.com/dp/1627795391

u/peritrope_ · 3 pointsr/askphilosophy

Popper's ideas are of the practical kind, regarding scientific inquiry. It is not epistemology in the traditional sense. For example, would you say that your empirically based idea X is knowledge? If you say yes, how do you know that tomorrow you won't discard it for an idea that fits the criteria even better, even if today you don't think anything could possibly fit the criteria better than your current idea? Many ideas that fit the criteria are eventually discarded not because a detail or a few in them can be improved, but because they turn out to be completely false (look at the history of physics, for example). Such epistemology is practically useful, however, it says nothing about epistemic justification.

There are a lot of theories in epistemology. Read the 'epistemology' entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Find a book about epistemology, such as this

u/Democritus477 · 1 pointr/atheism

>The point is you made an assertion that something is a myth without any evidence whatsoever.

It's based on my anecdotal experience. Like I said already, the original claim is not supported by any hard date either. To draw a comparison, there are no studies proving that unicorns don't exist, but you wouldn't criticize me for saying that they don't. Therefore, I feel no need to apologize for making a strong claim - in either case.

>that moreover others are propounding the contrary position (which like I said I've never heard before).

Here.

u/TravellingJourneyman · 1 pointr/labor

Definitely get Tom Ferguson's book then. Sadly, I haven't found a pdf of it online but your library or Amazon should have it. He has a number of articles that should be interesting. In short, he explores how the opportunity cost of voting causes political systems to be dominated by moneyed interests. As labor organizes, it becomes a moneyed interest and is able to get into the political system, which affects the composition of the parties. I should be able to snag his scholarly articles if you can't get them through your university or wherever. He spends some time talking about Europe too, so you should be able to get some useful info for making comparisons.

I'm afraid I don't have much on China, probably because unions are illegal and thus quite small and powerless.

u/mefuzzy · 2 pointsr/soccer

I assume it is The Damned United which the movie was based on?

You might also enjoy Walking on Water, Clough The Autobiography and I personally look forward to this, Nobody Ever Says Thank You.

> Any suggestions of other soccer related books is appreciated as well.

Would highly recommend Fever Pitch, Miracle of Castel di Sangro, Inverting the Pyramid, Brilliant Orange and Behind the Curtains.

u/Ralorarp · 2 pointsr/PoliticalDiscussion

I just bought this book for kindle. It seems alright, I'll check out "taking sides" as well. Thanks for the help. :)

u/sentient_NSA_bot · 2 pointsr/news

>“It just seems that in our quest to be tolerant of everything, we’ve become intolerant to everything,”

>That is a fantastic line.

I highly recommend the book, "The Closing of the American Mind" by Allan Bloom. It was written some time ago, but it pretty much nails today's intellectual landscape. I think even he'd be shocked to see the trends taken to the highest degree in 2015.

EDIT for link: http://www.amazon.ca/Closing-American-Mind-Education-Impoverished/dp/1451683200

u/wolfnb · 3 pointsr/goodyearwelt

>It didn't really change anybody's mind, and one's view on it was 99% shaped by what they were already thinking.

These books are about why they think that way. Hillbilly Elegy is about communities (mainly the non-urban communities that gave Trump huge support) that feel left behind and the recent history and thinking of those groups. The Big Sort is about the homogenization of social groups and thinking in the US, leading to why people feel comfortable throwing "grenades". The Righteous Mind is a book on the psychology of morality and politics in the US and why the ideologies are so different.

Trump may have won big with white voters of all stripes, but he also did better among Latinos than Romney, so it's obvious that it isn't just "poor uneducated whites", but if people don't try to figure out why the division is so strong and where the other side is coming from, what chance do we have for uniting and restoration?

I live in the most liberal district in one of the most liberal cities in the US. I have no difficulty in understanding that perspective and its driving forces. The other view is not so well illuminated

Edit: though I shouldn't have said anything in the first place. This is the one place I can go to avoid all the cross-talk about politics and ideologies. I like all of you guys and our light conversations about shoes. I'd rather not ruin that for myself.

u/tjshipman44 · 1 pointr/todayilearned

I think you're confusing cause and effect.

The big thing that's happened in the last 30-40 years in American politics has been sorting. Look up The Big Sort.

Essentially, before 1965, you had lots of Southern Democrats who were more ideologically conservative and a smaller, but still significant number of Rockefeller Republicans in the North who were more ideologically liberal. The largest reason for congressional dysfunction is that increasingly representatives are more responsive to their constituents than before. This causes more gridlock, not less.

Now, you can argue that those constituents are frequently not thinking of their own best interests, but it's hard to make the case that in the vast majority of instances, congress is more responsive, not less.

u/endoftheliner · 4 pointsr/GenderCritical

"With his trademark sardonic wit and lacerating logic, Frank's Listen, Liberal lays bare the essence of the Democratic Party's philosophy and how it has changed over the years. A form of corporate and cultural elitism has largely eclipsed the party's old working-class commitment, he finds. For certain favored groups, this has meant prosperity. But for the nation as a whole, it is a one-way ticket into the abyss of inequality. In this critical election year, Frank recalls the Democrats to their historic goals-the only way to reverse the ever-deepening rift between the rich and the poor in America." https://www.amazon.com/Listen-Liberal-Happened-Party-People/dp/1627795391

And the Dems are not listening to us. On the contrary, the money of the privileged class is speaking.

u/thesilverpig · 1 pointr/politics

cool. Thanks for acknowledging my point and stating your disagreement in a diplomatic way. I think we are getting to a real discourse here.

My first disagreement with your statement is I don't think fighting republicans and making democrats better is either or first or second type of situation. In fact, considering how the democrats are always chasing the republicans rightward often losing big in election seasons, I think that making the democratic party a stronger one that better represents and inspires its people will stop the rightward shift of both parties.

Because policy polling shows the democratic platform is way more popular than the republican one and actually on most polices, the majority of American's are left of the democratic party but the constant losing of ground on policy, the appearance of elitism and corruption, the focus on identity politics which doesn't resonate compared to economic issues, and the fact that economically the middle and working classes have been devastated by republicans AND Democrats are some of the reasons why Democrats keep losing. That and the Democrats constant shift rightward, because when voters are presented with the options of republican and republican light, they'll go with the real thing.

I do agree the republicans are worse and we should fight and obstruct their agenda I also don't think investing energy in trying to change the republicans is the most prudent strategy.

There is a cogent argument made by Thomas Frank in his book Listen Liberal that the democratic party abandoning the working class in favor of the professional class is what led to them losing the majority of legislatures over the last 40 some years. So the way I see it, if the democratic party can take on the role of being the party of the people again, in a meaningful not rhetorical, way they will win seats and if the republicans want to stand a chance as a party they'll have to follow the democrats lead.

u/Theoson · 1 pointr/logic

I'm just a beginner but Peter Kreeft's book on Socratic Logic is very good. I've learned a lot from this introductory book. He's very effective at communicating rather complex concepts with simple language. There are also a plethora of exercises in the book at the end of every section.

https://www.amazon.com/Socratic-Logic-Questions-Aristotelian-Principles/dp/1587318083

u/I_Cant_Math · 3 pointsr/Random_Acts_Of_Amazon

A child's first words are adorable.
My son just told me no for the first time.
Are all first words adorable?


I'm sorry the class is ending, but that opens up room for new classes that may be equally awesome!

An item for you.

u/jub-jub-bird · 1 pointr/AskConservatives

The conservative viewpoint of the humanities tends to be focussed on the Western Canon and the great books curriculum or Classical education. A common conservatives opinion is that a classical liberal arts education is critically important and valuable, but that modern Academia mired in revisionist theories and nihilism and leaving students adrift in a sea of electives taught by radicals has lost the thread and are now largely useless at best and more often than not are actively destructive.

A few books about the humanities, philosophy, art & education by conservatives and/or approvingly cited by conservatives.

u/SocratiCrystalMethod · 1 pointr/philosophy

The "A Very Short Introduction" series has pretty killer philosophy entries, based on time periods and world regions.

https://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-Short-Introduction-Edward-Craig/dp/0192854216

This is the more basic of them. 200-level instructors might use these, but I was surprised to find that they contain a lot of information that was useful even for a 400-level Aristotelian metaphysics class. Also, Sue Hamilton is a distinguished Indian philosophy expert and wrote a VSI on it which is probably better and more accessible than just about anything.

u/EverWatcher · 1 pointr/politics

We could "un-sort" our way out of this by calling for a influx of citizens into the low-population states. California certainly can spare some. Of course, not all current Californians would be interested in that, However, there should still be more than enough to slowly bring the desirable changes and comforts into the ex-red states. Start with the Dakotas and Montana.

u/HP18 · 2 pointsr/soccer

This is the book "Brilliant Orange" I was referring to. For anyone with an interest in Dutch football, I'd suggest giving it a read. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brilliant-Orange-Neurotic-Genius-Football/dp/0747553106

u/James_Locke · 6 pointsr/changemyview

While some of OP's responses make me question that this is being asked in good faith, I will nonetheless try to answer.

First, one needs to consider the fact that there is literally a book on non-religious reasons why Gay marriage is bad policy. This is a pdf of the article that the book was later spun into with more arguments and sources. It is only 43 pages long and easy to understand.

Ultimately, it comes down to a couple of things: if you think there is value in humans procreating, then marriage policy should encourage biological sex (reproduction) in any shape or form to the exclusion of other relationships, otherwise, there is no added incentive to have children.

Similarly, you need to think of people as having natural ends, limited as they may be. Biologically, humans tend towards survival, reproduction, and expansion. If you do not think humans are supposed to, by our nature (because you deny that humans have a particular nature, which many people do and have done) do anything of the aforementioned, then this argument will ring hollow to you. You might say, is a computer natural? I would say yes, any tool is a natural expansion of our desire to survive and expand. Computers included.

Therefore, you might see then that while a liberal approach (classically speaking) might want to leave gay people alone to enjoy their rights to self determine, the same people might not want to extend incentives designed to reward a stable family unit to a relationship that will neither result in children, nor can.

From the article above:

> A thought experiment might crystallize the central argument. Almost every culture in every time and place has had some institution that resembles what we know as marriage. But imagine that human beings reproduced asexually and that human offspring were self‐sufficient. In that case, would any culture have developed an institution anything like what we know as marriage? It seems clear that the answer is no....The essential features of marriage would be missing; there would be no human need that only marriage could fill....Because marriage uniquely meets essential needs in such a structured way, it should be regulated for the common good, which can be understood apart from specifically religious arguments. And the needs of those who cannot prudently or do not marry (even due to naturally occurring factors), and whose relationships are thus justifiably regarded as different in kind, can be met in other ways.

You can take it or leave it, but it is rather meaningless now that gay marriage is the law of the US.

u/Underthepun · 1 pointr/Catholicism

Well it's actually a contemporary versus traditional work, but I really like Robert Audi's introduction to epistemology. He goes into why the typical "default agnostic" thing is a bit silly.

Traditionally, I usually refer back to Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange's work on Thomism (Reality: a Synthesis) and some more recent Thomists like Anscombe and Feser.

u/ayvictor · 6 pointsr/soccer

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brilliant-Orange-Neurotic-Genius-Football/dp/0747553106

Brilliant Orange by the famous Dutch team of the 70s. Haven't read it but it's really popular among the football community. I know I'll read it first chance I get.

u/TheGhostOfTzvika · 1 pointr/NotMyPresident_News

From the "Required Reading List":

[The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today's Students]
(https://www.amazon.com/Closing-American-Mind-Education-Impoverished/dp/1451683200/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1495471445&sr=8-1&keywords=Alan+bloom+closing+of) by Allan Bloom

***
And for those who don't have the time to read (and who does, these days):

  • “ ... Americans cannot believe that any really intelligent and good person does not at bottom line share the Will Rogers Weltanschauung, ‘I never met a man I didn’t like.’ ”

  • “ Of course, we are told, the healthy inner-directed person will really care for others. To which I can only respond: If you can believe that, you can believe anything. "

  • “ The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity but the one that removes the awareness of other possibilities, that makes it seem inconceivable that other ways are viable, that removes the sense that there is an outside. ”

  • “ I have seen young people, and older people too, who are good democratic liberals, lovers of peace and gentleness, struck dumb with admiration for individuals threatening or using the most terrible violence for the slightest and tawdriest of reasons. They have a sneaking suspicion that they are face to face with men of real commitment, which they themselves lack. And commitment, not truth, is believed to be what counts. ”

    ***

    Other thoughts from Bloom:

  • “ Intellectuals committed to the revolution are the last to resign themselves to the facts. ”

  • “ Civil societies are constituted by what they respect, by what men bow their heads before in reverence. When they no longer have anything before which they can bow, their world is near its end, and all the suppressed and lawless monsters within man reemerge. ”
u/scg30 · 1 pointr/soccer

Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football and Those Feet: A Sensual History of English Football by David Winner were both very well-written and enjoyable reads.

I personally didn't care very much for Franklin Foer's How Football Explains The World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization, just found it to be a bit glib in its characterization of the game in different parts of the world, and somewhat reductive in its treatment of specific clubs and their supporters.

Also, I haven't read Soccernomics myself, but have heard/read many rave reviews so that's probably a good bet as many ITT have already mentioned it.

u/jez2718 · 2 pointsr/philosophy

I think S. Blackburn's Think is an excellent introduction to some of the major areas in philosophy. You might also what to look at some of the philosophical books in the "Very Short Introduction" series, for example the Philosophy, Metaphysics, Ethics, Philosophy of Science and Free Will ones, which as you can guess are good places to start.

A book I quite enjoyed as an introduction to the great philosophers was The Philosophy Book, which not only gave clear descriptions of each of the philosophers' views, but also often gave a clear flowchart summary of their arguments.

u/learnhtk · 0 pointsr/languagelearning

I don't believe that you truly learned French.
Start anew. This time around, make sure that you can actually "speak" French. Focus more on speaking, instead of passive listening comprehension.

As for the "best" way, I believe Assimil French with Ease is a very popular course. I am not sure if it's "best", whatever that means, for you. You will have to find out what works "best" for you.

u/WTCMolybdenum4753 · 2 pointsr/conspiracy

>How could changing the outcome of an election not lead to impeachment?

Putin probably cannot be impeached

>Hillary Clinton would have won 2016 had the Russians not intervened.

and asked Hillary to sell them the uranium which was exposed in

Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich

which helped Trump win

u/PM_MOI_TA_PHILO · 3 pointsr/askphilosophy

The Fundamentals of Ethics by Russ Shafer-Landau. Note it's a two volume edition in which one book is the theory with exercises and the other is an anthology of excerpts from ethical texts. https://www.amazon.ca/Fundamentals-Ethics-Russ-Shafer-Landau/dp/0199997233

Hands down best intro to ethics I ever had.

u/PRINCEPS_DEI · 39 pointsr/The_Donald

I'm not quite done with it yet, but I was listening to Clinton Cash over the weekend. In addition to this, they raise the question of why all of these foreign entities need to funnel money through the Clinton Foundation at all rather than simply donating the money to local charities.

I'm only on chapter 7 or 8 so far, but they also discuss how much the Clintons' income for speeches increased during Hillary's tenure as SoS and how she used a special rule that had previously been used to employ experts like scientists to allow operatives to work for the State Department and the Clinton Foundation simultaneously.

It's pretty disgusting. It's as nakedly corrupt as you could possibly want without a full-throated admission of guilt. This is the Clintons' stock in trade. I cannot fathom how all of the liberals who bitched about the war crimes of the Bush administration and the foul influence of money in politics (typically vis a vis the Koch brothers) can possibly support this woman. If I had to dream up a character that embodied corruption I would never be able to supply you with a sketch more on the nose than Hillary Clinton.

I think Scott Adams is right. The only thing potentially stopping Trump is the "crazy racist" charge. If he can neutralize that, he wins in a landslide. There's simply no reason to support Hillary Clinton on the merits and a mountain of objective reasons to oppose her every holding any public office ever again.

u/NiggerJew944 · 1 pointr/AskReddit

Seriously you ask for my opinion and that's the reply I get? And I thought we were friends. I also find you attitudes on the achievement gap to be quaint. Here is a study by a black sociologist on the reasons black students perform poorly in a rich middle class school district. His conclussion...It isn't the teachers.

http://www.amazon.com/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb/dp/080584516X

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/ebx/rich-black-flunking/Content?oid=1070459

Here is another perspective from a white teacher who chose to teach in a primarily black school district. I am sure the blame for the achievement gap rest on his shoulders as well.

http://martynemko.blogspot.com/2009/06/white-teacher-speaks-out-what-is-it.html

u/ajantis · 2 pointsr/askphilosophy

It seems to me that your comments encompass wide range of topics but i think the problem of truth and meaning is at the center. Of course there is a huge literature about these topics but for a start Nietzsche's On Truth and Lie in An Extra Moral Sense can work as a thought provoking piece.

If you are into more scientific type of literature Maturana and Varela's Tree of Knowledge offers a theory of cognition which basically argues that all experience and knowledge are self-referential and constructed relative to the organisation and history of living systems.

In English speaking philosophy William James and Whitehead's different versions of empiricism are good places to look. In continental philosophy Foucault's writings on truth/knowledge can be helpful to put the concept in context of a more sociological perspective.

Edit note: The philosophical field which focus on these issues is called epistemology, some secondary and introductory type of books can work. For example Robert Audi's [Epistemology] (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Epistemology-Contemporary-Introduction-Introductions-Philosophy/dp/041587923X/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1373061172&sr=1-2&keywords=epistemology).

u/SchurkjeBoefje · 16 pointsr/europe

I've always enjoyed this confrontational quote by playwright Bouke Oldenhof, from David Winner's curious-yet-delightful book Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football:

> "Did you ever go to Auschwitz? It is very interesting: every country has its own barracks where it tells its own history. If you want to hear all the lies a nation tells about itself, you should go there: Holland is the most tolerant nation - we have a long history of tolerance; Austria was the first victim of the Nazis; Yugoslavia liberated itself; Poland won the Second World War; and only the Germans are honest. All lies!"

u/stuffmikesees · 4 pointsr/TrueReddit

>So where did nationalism come from? Most historians view nations as “imagined communities” and that many of their traditions were “invented”

Yeah, they're called that because of the book written in 1983 by Benedict Anderson called Imagined Communities, which coincidentally is where essentially all of the ideas outlined in this post come from without any form of citation.

The book is actually quite good. You all should just read that if you're interested.

u/Patango · 1 pointr/politics

Here is his new one , another home run imo

[Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?]
(https://www.amazon.com/Listen-Liberal-Happened-Party-People/dp/1627795391/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8)

>From the bestselling author of What's the Matter With Kansas, a scathing look at the standard-bearers of liberal politics -- a book that asks: what's the matter with Democrats?

>It is a widespread belief among liberals that if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right course.

>But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting, Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal. Indeed, they have scarcely dented the free-market consensus at all. This is not for lack of opportunity: Democrats have occupied the White House for sixteen of the last twenty-four years, and yet the decline of the middle class has only accelerated. Wall Street gets its bailouts, wages keep falling, and the free-trade deals keep coming.

u/dem4 · 2 pointsr/languagelearning

Here's a link to Assimil. You can find the book + the audio easily on torrents. And I think you should read the reviews on amazon, and generally reviews about assimil about what makes it so great. They probably word it better than I do, however even though assimil claims to take you to B1, I think A2 level is more likely, and after finishing the book, you can immediately continue with their advanced book which should take you above B1 called "Assimil Using French".

u/mullsork · 2 pointsr/soccer

I'm halfway through A Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football right now. I'm absolutely loving it!

u/RNGmaster · 3 pointsr/starterpacks

>Also Clinton supporters being right wing? I don't see it, like Trump supporters most Clinton supporters are coming straight from Obama and I don't see how they're right wing.

From a modern American perspective, no. But from a global perspective yes. It used to be very different, in FDR's time for example. People did fight against his social-democrat policies, but they were adopted and widely popular. I mentioned how the John Birch Society shifted the Republicans to the right, and that's where things started to change. After McGovern's loss and, later, 12 years of Reagan and his VP being massively popular somehow, Democratic leaders assumed that they couldn't win by appealing to the left (which ignored the other circumstances surrounding McGovern's loss and Reagan's win). When they got back into power it was with Bill Clinton, who explicitly pursued a centrist agenda (he called it "triangulation") that included dismantling/privatizing the welfare state (welfare reform), expanding the police state and deregulating the financial industry (Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000). And these are all positions which were considered right-wing in the pre-Bill Clinton era. Now fast-forward to Obama, who has basically pursued the same foreign policy as Bush II, and whose central accomplishment is a bill which is an altered form of a healthcare-reform idea proposed by the far-right Heritage Foundation, and he is basically being attacked as a secret communist by Republicans. Frankly, it's rather insulting to the communists to group Obama with them.

(The book Listen, Liberal discusses in more detail how the Democratic Party moved to the right, if you're curious in reading further into this.)

>the real problem that we both should be against is the current corrupt people in power which is why a lot of people support Trump's promises to get rid of the people dividing us further for their own gain.

His proposals for lobbying reform and term limits aren't bad actually. But his proposed cabinet is, well, it's certainly a change from Democratic corruption but not the good kind. The people he's proposing are mostly distinguished by loyalty rather than actually fitting their position (lol Ben Carson), most of them have conflicts of interest based on their business histories, and most of them are big donors to the Trump campaign. Is any of this unusual for a Presidential cabinet? Well, not really, but it doesn't inspire hope about Trump actually wanting to address corruption more than nominally. And maybe he won't appoint any people with connections to the right-wing's favorite boogeymen such as Soros (though Mnuchin is a close Soros associate so... lol) but for every Dem-aligned billionaire rigging the system in their favor there's a Republican one doing the same thing. There's the Kochs, ALEC, and so on. Corruption isn't a Dem-only thing. When businesses spend billions to elect their stooges, that's an assault to democracy, doesn't matter which party's doing it (as I've said, the two parties are not too different in their goals at this point). But I never see Trump supporters worry about the Kochs or ALEC, oddly. I think that they're using anti-corruption as a cover for partisanship, ultimately.

If anti-corruption reform does happen, it's not going to occur thanks to politicians and businesspeople who've benefited from it. You can't use the system to change the system. Big money is the problem. And capitalism more broadly is the problem. Electing someone who'll just put the big businesses in power directly, rather than having them go through middlemen, isn't a solution in my opinion. If you want to get shit done, you do it through a mass movement and direct action. The civil rights and women's rights movements didn't succeed because they elected the right people, they succeeded because they essentially used sheer manpower (or, womanpower in the latter case) to make the government change shit. That's real democracy, IMO.

u/manthew · 2 pointsr/europe

> "because you believe that is right". I don't see a big difference.

That is a lot of presumptions there, you don't see it because you hardly know me, a random redditor on the internet. However, I'm an utilitarian when it comes to decision making.

Regardless, there are reason why some actions are perceived to be right. You would see why had you put a little more thoughts into it. Reading books/wikipedia/standford philosophy encyclopedia would help too.

An Introduction to Political Philosophy by Jonathan Wolff is a great book to start in my opinion.

u/PlumbTheDerps · 1 pointr/howto

Seconded on Elements of Style. Also, try reading authors who are known for straightforward and concise prose. It's only coming to mind because I was a political science major, but John Mearsheimer is great for this- his chapters precisely follow the "tell you what I'm going to say; say it; summarize what I just said" mantra.

u/MartyHeidegger · 3 pointsr/askphilosophy

I would highly recommend getting a few of the A Very Short Introduction series of books such as Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction. These provide great overview to several topics in various fields (Science, History, Philosophy, Etc). I've yet to come across one of these books that I didn't like.

u/JoshuaIAm · 14 pointsr/ChapoTrapHouse

The two books Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right by Jane Mayer and Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People? by Thomas Frank pair extremely well and are required reading for anyone that wishes to understand how US politics has been shifted so far to the right these past decades. Dark Money, while extremely informative regarding the propaganda of billionaires, largely gives a pass to the Democratic party which Listen, Liberal reveals as being undeserved.

u/I_Am_TheMachine · 1 pointr/POLITIC

I humbly suggest you read Winner Take All Politics, or if you're a voracious reader: Golden Rule: The Investment Theory of Party Competition and the Logic of Money-Driven Political Systems. These will free you of some fetters.

u/wap1971 · 3 pointsr/soccernerd

Okay, yeah was just wondering so I could compile a list. I've read a few.

These are probably books you'd find more interesting:

Behind the curtain

Tor! The Story of German football

Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football (especially good for learning more about the culture within the Netherlands).

Feel free to PM for any others or questions you may have, I feel these are the main ones that come to mind but perhaps you've read them?

u/NicCageKillerBees · 10 pointsr/Pennsylvania

There's an interesting book about this, The Big Sort by Bill Bishop. It looks at how people have moved to areas that align more with their politics, consciously or unconsciously, over the past 50 years. Worth a read if you like this sort of thing.

u/SD_TMI · 1 pointr/sandiego

You're just spamming the sub now with this.
Repeating the same things and not advancing your position.

Nor are you responding to my questions so that we can have a rational discussion by establishing what is "racism and privilege" exactly and how it pertains to the city.

Because right now it's all this fuzzy notion that makes excuses far too easy. Talking to you really does remind me of a good will hunting secene. I even brought up Howard Zin for cryin out loud.

Anyway, Perhaps something like John Ogbu's study "Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement" would be of benefit here.

Otherwise this is isn't going anywhere and it's clear that no amount of reasoning is going to change whatever some militant BLM mantra crept into your mind.

u/Gua_Bao · 0 pointsr/politics

I can't tell if this a bot response, or someone throwing their hands up in the air before even making an effort to have a discussion. If I'm not worth the time that's fine, but I do recommend that book. Here's a link. There are also plenty of interviews on Youtube where the author talks about details from the book. I promise it's all more worthwhile than talking to random dudes online for fake internet points.

u/RandPaulsBrilloBalls · 3 pointsr/politics

There are lots of critiques. In fact, to some extent, they all critique each other. Occasionally you can google around for book reviews.

Maybe a relatively inexpensive textbook like this would give you the lay of the land before you hop in.

Also, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is free. So just reading the liberalism, republicanism, and libertarianism sections might suffice for an overview. Then you could read individual entries of authors. So there's Marx and Rawls and Locke, etc.

You can browse or search the encyclopedia here.

u/Walkallroads · 0 pointsr/PublicFreakout

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0CQK1sKv8Y

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/09/21/former-haitian-senate-president-world-trusted-clintons-help-haitian-people-deceived/

(you should read this) https://www.amazon.com/Clinton-Cash-Foreign-Governments-Businesses/dp/0062369296/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474489652&sr=8-1&keywords=clinton+cash

(you should watch this) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmMe-2qaSss

Now I feel that it bears mentioning that I did say IIRC because I was on my phone and didn't feel like finding sources. As a result my statement wasn't completely accurate. They didn't STEAL 14.2 billion, they siphoned it. They lined their pockets with it while supplying "aid". So I guess in that sense, you're right. Congrats. Worth stalking me for a couple days?

But you know what? Even if you can prove definitively that they didn't directly steal 14.2 billion from the Haitian relief fund, there is simply too much blood on their hands and too much mud in the water for me to possibly concede that they aren't evil. The child trafficking, the e-mails, Bill's countless rape allegations, Project Veritas, voting fraud, her seizures, her shady af past, Lolita express, her ties to Saudi Arabia AND Russia (uranium deal), her collusion with MSM during the election, her collusion with the DNC to steal the election from Bernie, her ties to pedophiles and suspected pedophiles.

So yeah good job bud, you won an argument based on a technicality.

We done here?

u/bnr55 · 2 pointsr/education

Believe it or not, I actually have read that piece. These are issues I am very passionate about and follow closely. Free speech is still free speech and attempts to shut it down are totalitarian. What is considered 'hateful' has been expanding at an alarming rate and fewer and fewer views are considered acceptable. This is an incredibly dangerous trend.

I want to beg you to read: https://www.amazon.com/Closing-American-Mind-Education-Impoverished/dp/1451683200

I wish there was an article length synopsis, there might be one out there. I'm NOT saying you have to agree with it, we can agree to disagree but it's just another perspective.

Important edit

u/Koskap · 1 pointr/news

You really, honestly should. Especially if you take your interest in sociology seriously. It would be like not reading The Bell Curve (which a bunch of people disagree with)

https://www.amazon.com/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb/dp/080584516X/

u/DemNutters · -17 pointsr/politics

Speaking of political science, I'd like to recommend a couple of books to my liberal friends here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0029166500

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0226243176

That should drive a stake through the heart of the fraudulent scam and marketing/propaganda lie that is modern American liberalism.

u/ProfessorD2 · -9 pointsr/atheism

Since r/atheism is big on evidence, proof, stats, numbers, science, facts, instead of just shooting someone down for pointing out an inconvenient truth, I'm sure that standard of objectivity means nobody will mind it being pointed out that this one record is quite unlikely to change the fact that Religious people give more (money AND time) to charities and humanitarian aid than the non-religious.

u/ginnj · 1 pointr/politics

>1. The Democratic party, for some insane reason, followed the Republican party to the right. I dunno what the strategy behind that was, but if they had not, they would likely have control of most State governments + Congress.


Read or listen to Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People? by Thomas Frank

u/Dissentologist · 2 pointsr/chomsky

Golden Rule: The Investment Theory of Party Competition and the Logic of Money-Driven Political Systems SPOILER

Amazon

Google Books

B&N

If there is anyone who wants to read this and legitimately can't afford it.... reply to this... and I'm sure we can find a way.

The Golden Rule Documentary feat Noam Chomsky


Can you add some info about the book(official title, author) for those just arriving to the party? I was searching Amazon... but I don't know the author and there are a few "The Golden Rule".

u/danshil · 11 pointsr/CanadaPolitics

This is a bit of a personal conspiracy theory, but may be related to the degree that Russia interferes with Latvia:

I have Latvian friend who speaks glowingly of Latvian mythology and culture, and out of curiosity I browsed to the Latvian mythology Wikipedia page following a chat with her. I read through it, and was struck by how much it focused on the idea that Latvia's national myths are a very recent phenomena. Like, I'm somewhat familiar with the work of Benedict Anderson, but this was a Wikipedia page with a tone that was just out of keeping with what I usually come across.

I have the oddest suspicion that the page has been edited by pro-Russian agents.

u/simism66 · 5 pointsr/askphilosophy

Maybe try Robert Audi's or Michael William's introduction. They come at issues from somewhat different angles, but both are quite good.

u/LikeFire · 1 pointr/Stoicism

Also look into the Hard/Gill translation. I find it to be perfectly readable while being more precise in translation than Hays.

u/pleasedtomichu · 9 pointsr/Stoicism

The two best translations in my opinion are
Robin Hard & Gregory Hays.

u/Krugmanite · -2 pointsr/law

Are you assuming that there haven't been large demographic shifts in the past 20-30 years where the American populace have sorted themselves along common areas of culture? Journalists and political science PhDs write books about this sort of thing (for example: https://www.amazon.com/Big-Sort-Clustering-Like-Minded-America/dp/0547237723).

The people of the Northern Rocky Mountain states are substantively different from Californians, with different value sets, economic ideas, etc. How do you guarantee that decisions that affect those states aren't afflicted with a California flavor that is distasteful to those non-Californians?

u/dakta · 2 pointsr/inthenews

> forcing people into echo chambers of conformity

Nah man they do that on their own really really well. For an investigation of this phenomenon at scale in the real world, check out Bill Bishop's The Big Sort.

> excessive moderation

Funny, the least echo-chamber-ey subs I know of are some of the most heavily moderated. See /r/NeutralPolitics or /r/PoliticalDiscussion.

u/BastouXII · 2 pointsr/French

I don't know this one. I've used the Assimil one to learn Italian and I was really impressed by it considering I didn't think a book alone (I didn't have the version that came with audio CDs) could really teach a language well enough. Here's a link to get the Assimil French With Ease book with audio CDs on Amazon, but you can look into the one without discs if you're tight on budget.

u/ChieferSutherland · 1 pointr/AdviceAnimals

Here's one and the other is all the shit Comey said.

u/narrenburg · 9 pointsr/ShitAmericansSay

> Rich people aren't being represented obviously!

This book, outlined in this article and summarized in this video says otherwise. It is an inevitability of liberal democracy.

^^I'm ^^agreeing ^^with ^^you, ^^btw.

u/ewk · 2 pointsr/zen

Oh, you made up your own flavor of perennialism? You aren't the only one. It's very popular in the New Age crowd. Aquarius has a lot to answer for. Or hippies. Or Aquarius hippies.

> anyone who practices meditation practices zen.

Zen Masters don't teach this. So it isn't your opinion, just like it isn't your "opinion" that Abraham Lincoln said he was from the planet Grog and he had a wife there who was a lovely shade of cheese.

What you really have is a misrepresentation of Mumon. Which you flog, apparently, to validate your religious Perennialism.

I mean seriously man, come on. You can't go around telling people Abraham Lincoln said he was from Grog. That's BS. You know that. So why do you BS people about Zen?

There has got to be some area of your life in which you practice some intellectual integrity. Put yourself in my shoes. What if I showed up in your place of business and told people something about the field you studied for your job that was total BS that I made up?

I mean you don't have to go to school and get a degree in Zen, but read a book before you make up stuff and pretend Mumon said it.

If it isn't okay to do it about Abraham Lincoln, it's not okay to do it about Mumon or anybody else in his family, the family to which the name "Zen" refers.

.

I will add for those watching at home that I said Dogen's zazen was prayer-meditation. Note that this classification isn't as crazy cakes as some have suggested, at least to perennialists.

Wait, does that kind of evidence bolster my argument or not?

n/m.

u/puredemo · 1 pointr/WTF

Yeah really. Like it or not, he is pretty much correct.

For instance, check out this 30-year sociology study on academic habits.

u/tomtomglove · 3 pointsr/AskTrumpSupporters

that's one way to understand nationalism. here's the most influential book ever written on nationalism: https://www.amazon.com/Imagined-Communities-Reflections-Origin-Nationalism/dp/1784786756

u/the_grand_illusion · 1 pointr/politics

>This book was written in 2006, halfway through George W. Bush’s second term as president.

"Studies" like this have pre-determined conclusions.

George W. Bush wasn't conservative on issues that you should be conservative on, anyway. His tax cuts should've coincided with spending cuts. He expanded Medicare and sent out stimulus checks. He engaged in nation building. He was a progressive president - that's why he was a terrible president like Obama. Progressive presidents tend to be authoritarian. For example, FDR confiscated gold and re-valued it. FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court to force through his unconstitutional policies. Woodrow Wilson said he wouldn't take us into war but then did. LBJ escalated the war in Vietnam with no declaration of war. Nixon used a unilateral Executive Order to abandon Bretton-Woods.

Here's a quote from Amazon's editorial review of the book revenantae referenced:
Approximately three-quarters of Americans give their time and money to various charities, churches, and causes; the other quarter of the population does not. Why has America split into two nations: givers and non-givers? Arthur Brooks, a top scholar of economics and public policy, has spent years researching this trend, and even he was surprised by what he found. In Who Really Cares, he demonstrates conclusively that conservatives really are compassionate-far more compassionate than their liberal foes.

http://www.amazon.com/Who-Really-Cares-Compasionate-Conservatism/dp/0465008216

u/noompepper · -11 pointsr/politics

She already did stuff - its well documented. In fact, there is a book about it.

https://www.amazon.com/Clinton-Cash-Foreign-Governments-Businesses/dp/0062369296

Liberals don't care about it.

Why would I care about a Trump surrogate trying to make money?

The biggest threat facing our country is globalism and that is why Trump literally saved our country.

u/ProsperosRage · 7 pointsr/news

>Actually, the fact that these conservatives were invited in the first place would suggest the opposite about academia.

Usually by much maligned campus groups, like The Federalist Society, College Republicans, and other organizations which liberals bunch their panties over. (Asuza's President made the call, among the usual cacophony of humanities student protest.)

I could cite entire books, like Allan Bloom's Closing of The American Mind or Bruce Bawer's The Victims' Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Closing of the Liberal Mind, both of which convincingly demonstrate the top-down liberal "worldview" (with blinders) of universities.

Look at the response toward Lawrence Summers at Harvard for suggesting cognitive differences between men and women are a partial source of women's lack of representation at the elite-level of STEM fields.

Or, for polling numbers:

>College Faculties A Most Liberal Lot, Study Finds

>By their own description, 72 percent of those teaching at American universities and colleges are liberal and 15 percent are conservative, says the study being published this week. The imbalance is almost as striking in partisan terms, with 50 percent of the faculty members surveyed identifying themselves as Democrats and 11 percent as Republicans.

u/IAmNotAPerson6 · 2 pointsr/chomsky

Yeah, it seems like that's the lowest price for an ebook version. And the lowest prices for paperback are roughly the same at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. B&N has free shipping, and I don't know if Amazon Prime makes it cheaper there, so I'd just check both.

u/360-No-Stump · 5 pointsr/educationalgifs

A demographic shift taking place nationwide. This book puts it in a good context.

u/xeromem · 1 pointr/science

It has been noted that voluntary immigrants (whites, asians) do far better than most involuntry immigrants (most african americans, native americans).