I finished my senior thesis and graduated from college (okay technically the thesis was done in April, but it was at the end of April and the presentation was in May).
I am reading:
Other Minds: The Octopus, The Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith
r!Animorphs: The Reckoning by Duncan Sabien
Volume II of On What Matters by Derek Parfit (Also about halfway through Reasons and Persons, but that’s on hold for the moment)
I am also rereading Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, and when I’m done with Other Minds I’m intending to start Sidgwick’s Methods of Ethics
Also, I have a question: What do people think of the His Dark Materials series? I see a decent bit of discussion of Ender’s Game around here, and while I love Ender’s Game I think His Dark Materials is on a similar level, and should be similarly revered by rationalists. Granted, Lyra is not portrayed as extraordinarily intelligent like Ender, but she is extremely strong, and the series has several rationalist themes, e.g. s-risk (gur haqrejbeyq*), x-risk (gur fhogyr xavsr*), saving the world from these, the Problem of Evil, many-worlds (kind of), etc. Is it just that not as many people have read His Dark Materials, or is there some other reason it’s not really talked about?
I enjoyed His Dark Materials but felt that the quality of the writing went downward as the amount of anti-religious axe-grinding went up. (Not because I have an axe to grind; I am an atheist myself and enjoy anti-religious axe-grinding when it’s done well.) I wouldn’t say that the books feel particularly rationalist, for what it’s worth, despite the relevant themes you mention.
Yep, I agree (ETA: about the fact that the books aren’t especially “rationalist”; I don’t remember thinking that the quality of the writing went down as the amount of anti-religious axe-grinding went up, but it’s been long enough since I read the books that maybe if I read them again with that claim in mind I would agree). Rereading Ender’s Game and have changed my mind about His Dark Materials being especially rationalist since writing that comment. ETA: Ender’s game has a ton more stuff in it than I remembered that could basically have come straight out of the sequences, so my mental baseline for “especially rationalist-y fiction” was a lot lower than it probably should have been. Also probably some halo effect going on: I like the books, I like rationalism, so my brain wanted to associate them.
On reading this again, I suppose the technically correct answer to my question is probably something like, “discussing books is not the primary purpose of this site, so the vast majority of books will never be discussed here. So it shouldn’t be surprising that [x book series] is not discussed here.” I guess I don’t really intend the comment to be asking that question literally, but more as 1.) a query of people’s opinions of the books, and 2.) a suggestion that these books might be good candidates to earn a similar status around here as e.g. Ender’s Game, for purposes of referencing for metaphors, inspiration, etc. (of course a big factor here is “how many people read these as a kid and were influenced by them”. If it turns out that just very few people have even read the books, then that would be a reason not to give them that status, because the references wouldn’t be gotten by many people. But if many people have read the books, what I’m doing here is something like putting in a bid to make the books more culturally salient).
I finished my senior thesis and graduated from college (okay technically the thesis was done in April, but it was at the end of April and the presentation was in May).
I am reading:
Other Minds: The Octopus, The Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith
r!Animorphs: The Reckoning by Duncan Sabien
Volume II of On What Matters by Derek Parfit (Also about halfway through Reasons and Persons, but that’s on hold for the moment)
I am also rereading Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, and when I’m done with Other Minds I’m intending to start Sidgwick’s Methods of Ethics
Also, I have a question: What do people think of the His Dark Materials series? I see a decent bit of discussion of Ender’s Game around here, and while I love Ender’s Game I think His Dark Materials is on a similar level, and should be similarly revered by rationalists. Granted, Lyra is not portrayed as extraordinarily intelligent like Ender, but she is extremely strong, and the series has several rationalist themes, e.g. s-risk (gur haqrejbeyq*), x-risk (gur fhogyr xavsr*), saving the world from these, the Problem of Evil, many-worlds (kind of), etc. Is it just that not as many people have read His Dark Materials, or is there some other reason it’s not really talked about?
*rot13
I enjoyed His Dark Materials but felt that the quality of the writing went downward as the amount of anti-religious axe-grinding went up. (Not because I have an axe to grind; I am an atheist myself and enjoy anti-religious axe-grinding when it’s done well.) I wouldn’t say that the books feel particularly rationalist, for what it’s worth, despite the relevant themes you mention.
Yep, I agree (ETA: about the fact that the books aren’t especially “rationalist”; I don’t remember thinking that the quality of the writing went down as the amount of anti-religious axe-grinding went up, but it’s been long enough since I read the books that maybe if I read them again with that claim in mind I would agree). Rereading Ender’s Game and have changed my mind about His Dark Materials being especially rationalist since writing that comment. ETA: Ender’s game has a ton more stuff in it than I remembered that could basically have come straight out of the sequences, so my mental baseline for “especially rationalist-y fiction” was a lot lower than it probably should have been. Also probably some halo effect going on: I like the books, I like rationalism, so my brain wanted to associate them.
On reading this again, I suppose the technically correct answer to my question is probably something like, “discussing books is not the primary purpose of this site, so the vast majority of books will never be discussed here. So it shouldn’t be surprising that [x book series] is not discussed here.” I guess I don’t really intend the comment to be asking that question literally, but more as 1.) a query of people’s opinions of the books, and 2.) a suggestion that these books might be good candidates to earn a similar status around here as e.g. Ender’s Game, for purposes of referencing for metaphors, inspiration, etc. (of course a big factor here is “how many people read these as a kid and were influenced by them”. If it turns out that just very few people have even read the books, then that would be a reason not to give them that status, because the references wouldn’t be gotten by many people. But if many people have read the books, what I’m doing here is something like putting in a bid to make the books more culturally salient).