A thought provoking work. Hägglund's basic thesis, developed out of a close inspection of primarily Marx (but decorated with dozens of writers and thiA thought provoking work. Hägglund's basic thesis, developed out of a close inspection of primarily Marx (but decorated with dozens of writers and thinkers), suggests that both capitalism and religious faith limit our ability to maximize our freedom and our quest for the good.
I'm with him about 4/5 of the way. I wish he had edited the book down a bit (he got a bit repetitive and could have probably said the same thing in 1/2 the words). Like I said, I need a bit more time (my leisure) to really clearly communicate the areas I enjoyed (there were many) and the areas I thought were a bit self-indulgent (also many). I think as I get older I get a bit more suspect of so much certainty, whether religious, economic, or philosophic.
"Like your first ankle monitor bracelet or your fourth divorce, the occasional break with reality was an important part of any hedge-fund titan's biog"Like your first ankle monitor bracelet or your fourth divorce, the occasional break with reality was an important part of any hedge-fund titan's biography" - Gary Shteyngart, "Lake Success"
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Like great Indian food, I'm not exactly sure why this novel works for me, but GOD this book was delicious. OK, so I know SORTA why it works. It is brilliantly absurd, and sharp enough to almost immediately, and almost painlessly, draw blood. I kept thinking that this novel was like a mirror presenting this ridiculous reflection that seems a bit freaky, distorted, and ugly. You think it is funhouse mirror from a carnival, but there is a moment of clarity when you realize the mirror is FINE. The reality is just that you ARE a bit freaky, distorted, and ugly. Shteyngart's novel arcs like Bellow's The Adventures of Augie March mixed with a bit of Kurt Vonnegut and Paul Beatty. While I can't say it was as literary or timeless as Bellow's Great American Novel of exploration and identity, it still hummed with some of that same wild, kinetic energy.
'Lake Success' contained only a few characters to love (Shiva, Jonah, Seema's father, and a couple others), but many, many to learn from. The obvious two are the protagonists (Seema and Barry). They are the super-rich, .01%, Lucy and Ricky, of America in the 21st Century. They aren't the protagonists we need, but the protagonists we deserve.
And then there are the watches, and the pimp juice, and the crack, and the maps, and the sadness. So so much sadness. If I say anymore, I'll just f-it up and ruin the surprise and melancholy joy (No, no. Not joy really. Pleasure? Hell no. experience? trip? Maybe) that this novel was. Thank you Mehrsa for recommending it....more
““We are all up to something” - Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle, Vol 3, Book 3
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This is the end. Beautiful end. Assayed. The end. The eighth a““We are all up to something” - Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle, Vol 3, Book 3
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This is the end. Beautiful end. Assayed. The end. The eighth and final book of this series, which also shares the same name as the final volume of this series: (The System of the World). This final book in an eight book series is driven largely by two large and parallel events (the corronation of King George is a mere distraction). First, the hanging of Jack Shaftoe. Second, the Trial of the Pyx (and by proxy, a trial of Sir Isaac Newton). There are other events: the spiriting away of Solomon's gold, the escape of Jack's sons and Dappa (the First mate of the Minerva who ends up caught in a funky antislavery campaign against Charles White (one of the many villians of the book), the death of Roger Comstock (and other deaths ane ressurrections).
are all essentially prequels to: Cryptonomicon. I enjoyed the dance. It might have been one volume too much. Reading Stephenson, some days, does feel a bit like Peine forte et dure. How about just one more volume? That said, I did read all of the diaries of Samuel Pepys, so I am a glutton for the English Restoration period. I found this a fantastic (often literally FANTASTIC) way of examining the period and systems of science and religion and politics during this period. Obviously, much of the specifics are fiction, but many of the things floating like mouches volantes are grounded in facts. Sometimes, the best way to learn history is not to read it, but to play with it a bit; bend it and examine it under unusual lights and in different heats....more
“For most of the day and night, time oppresses me. It is only when I am at work on the innards of a clock-or a lock-that time stops." - Neal Stephenson“For most of the day and night, time oppresses me. It is only when I am at work on the innards of a clock-or a lock-that time stops." - Neal Stephenson, The Currency
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Stephenson continues the last volume (The System of the World) of his Baroque trilogy with Book 7: "Currency". Like in Book 6, Solomon's Gold, "Currency" is primarily focused on Daniel Waterhouse trying to track down Jack Shaftoe (or Jack the Counterfeiter) who is making England's money financially dubious by messing with the Pyx (and hence putting ALL of England's currency at risk). Isaac Newton is helping Daniel Waterhouse track down Jack, both because as the Master of the Mint his reputation (and head) are at risk. But he is also motivated because as an alchemist he suspects that Jack Shaftoe has some of Solomon's gold. While all of this is going on Eliza is trying to help Princess Caroline survive the inevitable succession issues that will develop (including assassination attempts) once Queen Anne dies.
This has probably been the least "exciting" of the novels, but like any long work (eventually, the Baroque Cycle will clock in at about 2650 pages) there are bound to be parts of a work that float down the narrative current rather than quant down. Still, I did enjoy it....more
"As we have seen repeatedly in our own day, any successful business that engendersa a large surplus is, potentially, an embryonic bank." - Ron Chernow,"As we have seen repeatedly in our own day, any successful business that engendersa a large surplus is, potentially, an embryonic bank." - Ron Chernow, The Death of the Banker
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A more accurate title might be "Death of Banking", or "The Death of Pimp Merchant Bankers", or perhaps ... "A Chronicle of an Almost Banking Death Foretold Far To0 Early" or "The Democratization of Money and the Rise of Mutual Funds". Interestingly, this book was published in 1997 right before banks enjoyed their CMO/securritization/post Glass–Steagall ressurrection. Everytime someone predicts banking/bankers are about to die, they get bailed-out, patched-up, mutates, and grows again. For this reason, this book hasn't aged well. It missed the biggest story about finance in the last 50 years (the Financial boom and bust of 2007/8).
The first 2/3 of the book is basically a lecture Chernow delivered in Toronto (the Barbara Frum Lecture sponsored by the University of Toronto History Department and the CBC). Chernow added two essays (the last 1/3) totalling about 45 pages on J.P. Morgan and the Warburgs. These are basically extended summaries of Chernow's earlier Banking Dynasty books: "House of Morgan" and "The Warburgs". Not included (because the book came later) was Chernow's third Banking Dynasty book on the Rockefeller family.
So, it is hard for me to like this as a book. It is a good, if out-dated, essay and summaries of 2/3 books Chernow's banking books I've recently read. I would recommend anyone interested in this topic to simply read Chernow's three banking books. But, if you have read everything else Chernow is published and you want to be a completist because you are kinda/sorta A.D.D., go ahead. You can read it in a couple hours. It is more conversational than his histories and you've heard most of the stories, quotes, and themes before....more
"It was the Warburg's good fortune that whenever we were about to get very rich something would happen and we became poor and had to start over again."It was the Warburg's good fortune that whenever we were about to get very rich something would happen and we became poor and had to start over again." - Siegmund W. Warburg, quoted in Ron Chernow's 'The Warburgs'
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Working in finance, the Warburg name wasn't unknown to me, but it never carried the same cachet as the Rothchilds, the Morgans, the Rockefellers, or the Medicis. Part of this is certainy geography. Being American, I've had more exposure to the myths and the institutions created by the Rockefellers and the Morgans (the Mellons and the Goldman-Sachs). But it was more than that. The Warburg family and banking stretched over multiple generations and dynasties. It also peaked right before the Nazis came into power, so the Warburgs faced a large amount of antisemetism (like almost all European Jews) during the late 19th and first half of the 20th century.
It is bold of Chernow to take on this family history. It is a big thesis. And it is a difficult task to write a compelling family history framed around banking and Germany and Nazis and not create a hot mess of a book. At times, I felt this book was falling into a hot mess. It spread out, banks fractured, families squabbled, and for a couple hundred pages the book was a chore. But, ultimately, Chernow almost pulled it off. I was fascinated by characters like Aby, Max, Paul, Felix and Fritz Warburg (the Mittleweg Warburgs). Sometimes, I felt as if each of the brothers carried a characteristic or passion I could relate to. Most of the attention of the book is spent on brothers who bank (the exception being Aby, the art Historian and rabid book collector), so the sisters while addressed, get a smaller role. Later, as the Warburg banking empire starts to rebuild, attention is spent on cousins Eric, Paul, and James (Mittleweg Warburgs), and Sir Siegmund Warburg (Alsterufer Warburgs). By this time, the Warburg families have spread mostly out of Germany to America, Switzerland, Sweden, the Netherlands, etc. But like with the previous generation of Warburg men, I found characteristics of these dynamic men that I could relate to. They were all different, often difficult and driven, but fascinating.
Chernow writes primarily about banking families and American biographies:
Upon reviewing my reviews, I'm convinced Chernow does slightly better at writing histories of individuals rather than families; politics rather than finance. However, I should note, I've enjoyed ALL of his books and he's a master at his craft....more
"Never before in the history of the world has there been such a powerful central control over finance, industrial production, credit, and wages as it "Never before in the history of the world has there been such a powerful central control over finance, industrial production, credit, and wages as it is at this time vested in the Morgan group." - Former Republican Chairman, quoted in Fortune, August 1933.
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Ron Chernow's first financial biography/history is large It is 720 pages, plus notes/etc., and spans 1938 - 1989. It started off strong. Part I: The Baronial Age (1838-1913) is focused on the MEN, namely George Peabody, Junius Spencer Morgan, and J. Pierpont Morgan. The banks were simply extensions of the men. This section was 5-stars. It was fascinating. Part II: The Diplomatic Age (1913 - 1948) is focused on the bank(s). It begins with J.P. Morgan's death follows the House of Morgan through the war years (with "Jack" Morgan shepherding). Towards the end, with Glass-Steagal, the House of Morgan breaks into three major entities: Morgan Grenfell (already separate, English), Morgan Stanley (Investment Banking), and J.P. Morgan & Co. For me this was 4-stars. Part III: The Casino Age (1948-1989) explored the explosion of banking activity post war, the focus on M&A, and the loss of stature of the House of Morgan, both as it lost power and prestige. The book ends before J.P. Morgan was bought by Chase in 1990 (the book was published in 1990). This part was interesting, but like a shotgun, the further from Pierpont you get, the more diffuse the narrative. Eventually, there just seemed too much (too many actors, too many scandals, too many narrative threads). This part probably desereves 3-stars.
All in all, I liked the book. It showed Chernow's early talent for financial storytelling and gift for capturing historical characters. For me, the most valuable part of this book (besides the information on Pierpont) was the information on the other major partners that played a big roll during the wars, and Morgan's relationships with various 19th and 20th century figures (financial, cultural, political). I was fascinated by the deep relationship the House of Morgan had with fascist Italy, ultranationalist Japan, Germany, and the Vatican. I was entranced by Tom Lamont, Monty Norman, Russell Leffingwell, etc. The book was worth the effort just to learn about these other Morgan men.
Chernow writes primarily about banking families and American biographies:
Upon reviewing my reviews, I'm convinced Chernow does slightly better at writing histories of individuals rather than families; politics rather than finance. However, I should note, I've enjoyed ALL of his books and he's a master at his craft....more
It is wise to enjoy that which is possible without hoping for the continuance of a favorable conjecture and the persistence of good luck." - Joseph de It is wise to enjoy that which is possible without hoping for the continuance of a favorable conjecture and the persistence of good luck." - Joseph de la Vega, Confusión de Confusiones.
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I work in finance and read a lot. Most people assume I read a bunch of business and finance books. Not really. Often, I think you learn more about leadership from history and more about people from poetry and fiction that you can ever find in a business or leadership book. But I've always wanted to read these two pieces. Bernard Baruch was a huge fan of Mackay's "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds" and both books seemed too damn perfect for this Bitcoin, market volatility moment.
Without giving away the game, this book is actually two major pieces and a fantastic introduction:
1. Introduction to both works, with historical background, by Martin S. Fridson (probably one of the best known analysts in the high yield world). Fridson puts both books into historical and financial perspective and introduces both authors.
2. Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841) by Charles Mackay is divided up into three case-studies: i. The Mississippi Scheme/John Law (1716-1720): Dealing with France during the era between Louis XIV and Louis XV (Duke of Orleans as regent) and Law's involvement in both paper money AND the French enthusiasm for the Mississippi Scheme. It details the rise and fall of both Law and how this financial disaster almost destroyed France (one could argue that it was a big contributor to the French Revolution). ii. The South Sea Bubble/Harley Earl of Oxford (1720): Deals with a similar bubble as the Mississippi Scheme, but was handled a bit differently and ended a bit neater. But again, Mackay details the same factors driving the stock prices up, and what eventually lead to the collapse of prices. iii. Tulipomania : Holland's experience with the Tulip bubble (1636-1637). Primarily in the Netherlands, but also to a lesser degree in England. Mackay details the mania and its spread, as well as the implications (legal and social) after its collapse.
3. Confusión de confusiones(1688) by Joseph de la Vega is a book, written originally in Spanish by a Portuguese Jew, published in Amsterdam. Like Mackay, De la Vega is at heart a poet, so the book contains Biblical allusions, mythology, etc., but focuses on the Amsterdam stock exchange, and looks primarily at the trading of shares of the East and West India Companies. It is amazing (AMAZING) to think that within a decade of the Dutch East India company being created, markets had already developed that would not just buy and sell shares, but options, futures, calls, puts. The market in the 1600s in Holland doesn't feel too different than the NY Stock Exchange or NASDAQ of today.
It is hard to pick a favorite between these two. Both men had financial brains but the hearts of poets. I loved them. De la Vega sees more method in the madness of the markets, while MacKay sees the mass hysteria as the cause of crazy markets. Both men are probably correct to degrees. Both men are hugely influential in the way we think about the market, risk, speculation, and people. Just like I'd recommend poetry to financial analysts, but I'd recommend these financial books to poets. No one will be disappointed.
I should add a part here about Gamestop. The book now seems incomplete....more
“It has been my view for some years that a new System of the World is being created around us. I used to suppose that it would drive out and annihilat“It has been my view for some years that a new System of the World is being created around us. I used to suppose that it would drive out and annihilate any older Systems. But things I have seen recently, in the subterranean places beneath the Bank, have convinced me that new Systems never replace old ones, but only surround and encapsulate them, even as, under a microscope, we may see that living within our bodies are animalcules, smaller and simpler than us, and yet thriving even as we thrive." -- Neal Stephenson, The System of the World
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Solomon's Gold (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 3, Book 1)
“On the contrary, my lord...there is nothing quite so civilized as to be recognized in public places as the author of books no one has read.” - Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle, Vol 3, Book 1
I can feel the end of this series closing in. The sixth book of this series, nested, like a Russian doll inside of Volume 3 (The System of the World) centers primarily on Daniel Waterhouse. Daniel has been summoned back to England to act as a middle-man (or a narrative bridge?) between Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz concerning the invention of Calculus. Someone tries to kill him with an infernal device (mechanical bomb). The book ends with Jack Shaftoe (aka Jack the Coiner) attempting a heist of the Tower of London where Netwon is the "Warden" and later "Master" of the Royal Mint. Newton has been using this role at the Royal Mint to standardize the guinea, but also to to search for Solomon's lost gold.
The book tends to bend easily between swashbuckling adventure and nerdy historical/light scifi fiction. It is dense in parts, but it is hard to not respect Stephenson's ability to weave the real with the almost supernatural and the outrageous. I'm constantly entertained by The Baroque Cycle but the charm is starting to tarnish a bit and I'm ready for this almost literary adventure/ride to end.
Currency (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 3, Book 2)
“For most of the day and night, time oppresses me. It is only when I am at work on the innards of a clock-or a lock-that time stops." - Neal Stephenson, The Currency
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Stephenson continues the last volume (The System of the World) of his Baroque trilogy with Book 7: "Currency". Like in Book 6, Solomon's Gold, "Currency" is primarily focused on Daniel Waterhouse trying to track down Jack Shaftoe (or Jack the Counterfeiter) who is making England's money financially dubious by messing with the Pyx (and hence putting ALL of England's currency at risk). Isaac Newton is helping Daniel Waterhouse track down Jack, both because as the Master of the Mint his reputation (and head) are at risk. But he is also motivated because as an alchemist he suspects that Jack Shaftoe has some of Solomon's gold. While all of this is going on Eliza is trying to help Princess Caroline survive the inevitable succession issues that will develop (including assassination attempts) once Queen Anne dies.
This has probably been the least "exciting" of the novels, but like any long work (eventually, the Baroque Cycle will clock in at about 2650 pages) there are bound to be parts of a work that float down the narrative current rather than quant down. Still, I did enjoy it.
The System of the World (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 3, Book 3)
““We are all up to something” - Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle, Vol 3, Book 3
This is the end. Beautiful end. Assayed. The end. The eighth and final book of this series, which also shares the same name as the final volume of this series: (The System of the World). This final book in an eight book series is driven largely by two large and parallel events (the corronation of King George is a mere distraction). First, the hanging of Jack Shaftoe. Second, the Trial of the Pyx (and by proxy, a trial of Sir Isaac Newton). There are other events: the spiriting away of Solomon's gold, the escape of Jack's sons and Dappa (the First mate of the Minerva who ends up caught in a funky antislavery campaign against Charles White (one of the many villians of the book), the death of Roger Comstock (and other deaths ane ressurrections).
are all essentially prequels to: Cryptonomicon. I enjoyed the dance. It might have been one volume too much. Reading Stephenson, some days, does feel a bit like Peine forte et dure. How about just one more volume? That said, I did read all of the diaries of Samuel Pepys, so I am a glutton for the English Restoration period. I found this a fantastic (often literally FANTASTIC) way of examining the period and systems of science and religion and politics during this period. Obviously, much of the specifics are fiction, but many of the things floating like mouches volantes are grounded in facts. Sometimes, the best way to learn history is not to read it, but to play with it a bit; bend it and examine it under unusual lights and in different heats....more
“When a thing such as wax, or gold, or silver, turns liquid from heat, we say that it has fused,” Eliza said to her son, “and when such liquids run to“When a thing such as wax, or gold, or silver, turns liquid from heat, we say that it has fused,” Eliza said to her son, “and when such liquids run together and mix, we say they are con-fused.” - Neal Stephenson, The Confusion
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Part Two of Stephenson's massive Baroque Cycle consists of Books 4 and 5 (Part One, if it isn't obvious, consisted of Books 1-3). Since both books 4. Bonanza and5. Juncto are concurrent, Stephenson threads/interleaves the two books together (hence Con-Fusion).
This volume continues with the major characters: Daniel Waterhouse, Eliza, Bob Shaftoe, & Jack Shaftoe, along with a host of other fantastic characters both real (Newton, Leibniz, Louis IV, Pepys) and imagined. Like the previous volume, 'The Confusion' takes place during the end of the Nine Years' War (and the period shortly after) and explores the beginning of the Enlightenment, complete with politics, war, modern economics, science and the scientific method, currency, information technology, trade, religion and cryptography. Usually, when Newton or Leibniz are discoursing, Stephenson is waxing philosophic about atoms, thinking machines, or currency.
Fundamentally, these books are historical fiction for geeks. He pushes some people and events to the point of soft-SF/mysticism (I'm thinking of Enoch Root, a man who appears and disappears and acts as a catalyst for change throughout time). It wasn't perfect and there were some points where I was a turned-off by the jocular humor, but these were minor issues. It isn't close to high art, but it is a fascinating read....more
"Over and over again we see the pattern of the Titanomachia repeated—the old gods are thrown down, chaos returns, but out of the chaos, the same patte"Over and over again we see the pattern of the Titanomachia repeated—the old gods are thrown down, chaos returns, but out of the chaos, the same patterns reemerge.” - Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon
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I didn't like it as much as Anathem or Snow Crash, but like those two Stephenson novels Cryptonomicon has a large cult following, and was on the bleeding edge of a lot of ideas only starting to bubble up in 1999.
Stephenson's prose can go from poetic to obnoxious pretty fast and the tone of this novel was sometimes kinda ridiculous, but ignoring a couple big things that I generally rolled my eyes at -- I loved the novel. It moved, was moving, and came together very well at the end.
Think of this novel like a REALLY good war thriller (Red Storm Rising) that runs with three or four distinct story lines and about a dozen characters that jumps to another storyline every 6-1o pages. So even when a storyline was dragging a bit, soon I was flipped into another zone that I enjoyed a bunch. It is also a fantastic historical war novel, focused on cryptography during WWII. So, it kept reminding me of other historical novels of WWII. It seeemed a bit like Wouk's The Winds of War (except this book was strictly focused on areas mostly ignored by Wouk). Finally, it was a well-paced gernational/family novel (see Roots or The Godfather).
Anyway, it is a good book to read during the 2017-2018 boom (and perhaps bust) of cryptocurrency, since the 1997 portion of this novel deals A LOT with the establishment of a cryptocurrency (NOT a blockchain encrypted currency). Supposedly Paypal's founder Peter Thiel used to require his employees to read Cryptonomicon. It might be a myth, but if so, it is a good one....more
"to be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships." - W.E.B. DuBois
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Every few years there is "to be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships." - W.E.B. DuBois
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Every few years there is a book that is so powerful it turns me into a book nerd, policy evangelical. I go out and buy several copies and press them into friends hands with the fervor of a recent convert and tell them they "NEED" to read it. I think the last nonfiction book to do this for me was Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right or maybe The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine. Usually, the book has both a financial angle and a policy tint. It usually also explores unfairness. That makes sense. In my previous life I was a policy analyst and I now work in the finance industry as a financial planner. Most days, I'm a pretty mellow guy. I meditate, read, drink tea, Netflix and chill. But reading about inequality and unfairness, for me, catalyzes me for action.
If the last few political cycles have taught us anything, it is America still struggles with its "original sin" of slavery and the ugly descendants of slavery: discrimination, segregation, inequality, despair. We have seen, just this week (actually for the last few years), protests about the way Black Americans are treated by police officers. That subject deserves its own space, so I wont dwell too much on that here, other than to say the interaction of Black Americans and police officers ISN'T simple. It isn't a subject that can easily be explained just by saying police are racists, or unarmed Black Americans should behave differently (different from whom?). There are structural, geographic, economic, historical, and political forces that all contribute to awful outcomes.
Just like blue on black violence isn't easily explained in a tweet or a FB post, the interaction between Black Americans and banks has a long, ugly, and painful history. It is a history that is important to understand if one REALLY wants to explore topics like income inequality, segregation, credit, crony capitalism, corruption, exploitation, state power, wealth, etc... Mehrsa's book explores the policies, laws, programs, politics, economics, and history of black banks AND the history of Black Americans with banks. She points a fairly bleak picture of the fault/chasm that exists between the two financial markets that exist in America. One is the banking structure that exists for a majority of Americans and doesn't need to be explored. But for years that economic structure, that allows people to save (AND BORROW) didn't exist for a large segment of Americans. And when it eventually did, it was skewed heavily. Separate was never equal in banking. Blacks paid a heavy price to save, to borrow (if they could). Even laws that were designed to help pull Americans out of poverty, accumulate wealth and avoid taxes through home ownership, benefited one segment of America while ignoring or fleecing the other.
It is a painful read. It is also necessary. Unlike Mehrsa Baradaran's* previous book, How the Other Half Banks: Exclusion, Exploitation, and the Threat to Democracy, this one spends little/less time on prescriptions. She is laser focused on what is wrong, what went wrong, and why. It is a dense (without ANY of the negative connotations typically associated with that word) book. One that required me to open THREE different post-it flag packages. I was marking things that were new, quotes that amazed, items I didn't want to forget and I often found myself marking 3 or 4 times a page.
A few caveats before I end. This isn't a perfect book. It isn't as exciting as a Michael Lewis book (this probably won't get made into a movie) and the prose isn't as pretty as Robert Caro's LBJ series. But it is important. It is a labor of both love and skill. Reading some chapters in it, I could tell Mehrsa spent months in presidential libraries. Well researched books give me a thrill. Especially when you recognize that a certain nugget of data or quote may never have seen the light of day if it wasn't for the doggedness of a skilled lawyer/historian. 'The Color of Money' deserves to be in the library of anyone who deals with or seriously thinks about income inequality, race, banking, inner cities, etc.
As a white, upper-middle, male who has benefited from educated parents, stability, wealth, and every advantage American history and politicians have blessed me with, it is difficult and humbling to realize just how many of the economic realities I take for granted every day weren't available to the parents of my black friends. Hopefully, more of these same financial realities WILL be available to the children of ALL my friends. Hopefully we can begin to cover both the scars of the disadvantaged, and the economic and social chasms that separate (unfairly) us. This book is both a bridge and a battle cry.
* It is probably appropriate here to say that I'm friends with Mehrsa. Friends in the sense of exchanged books (I've sent her a couple audiobooks, etc. and she signed one of her books and sent it to me AFTER I reviewed it. Each of her books were purchased, often multiple copies, by me.) and know a lot of similar people and interact and went to the same college. We are not friends in the sense that she's ever fed my kids, or I've ever watched her pets. So there's that. I have other friends who are writers, but usually they are friends first. I don't typically "read" friends books unless I would normally read these books without being friends. Romance novels written by "friends" or self-help weight-loss books, I'll never read no matter how often someone feeds my kids. She is one of a handful of people that read more than me (even in my best years). I'm not sure where she gets her energy....more
"...game theory isn't able to solve all the word's problems, because it only works when people play games rationally." --Ken Bilmore, Game Theory, A Ve"...game theory isn't able to solve all the word's problems, because it only works when people play games rationally." --Ken Bilmore, Game Theory, A Very Short Introduction
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Ken Binmore's Very Short Introduction (VSI #173) to Game Theory is my second selection of Oxford's huge, gigantic VSI series (quickly approaching 500 books). It was probably closer to 3.5 stars, but mainly because of the structural problems with surveying Game Theory in less than 200 pages. At less than 200 pages Binmore is able to break down Game Theory into chapters on chance, time, conventions, reciprocity, information, auctions, evolutionary biology, bargaining and coalitions, puzzles and paradoxes.
For the beginner, the problem with this book will be how quickly the book expects the reader to pick up on some of the accepted standards of game theory thinking and explanations (boxes, game trees, subgames, etc). For the non-beginner, the book sometimes skims over areas that the reader (or perhaps, just this reader) might want to wade deeper (more maths) into. This is the inherent tension in all the VSI. It is the dance, the game of the series. You have to be able to present your information in a package designed to be broad in scope, but small in application. Binmore does a good job, however. I was very satisfied with the progression of the book, and loved getting a bit more info on such game theory notables as Nash, Von Neumann, etc.
“Political power, properly so called, is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing another.” ― Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto
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Vo“Political power, properly so called, is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing another.” ― Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto
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Vol 20 of my Penguin Little Black Classics Box Set. To be clear, I'm not giving this 5-stars because I'm a Communist just waiting start a revolution (not that I'm against a good revolution here or there)*. I do come from a religious tradition that experimented in the 1800s with ideas of consecration and communalism. They called it the United Order. Even with a charismatic leader and the hope of Zion, it was a failed experiment.
As an economic system, I think there are serious flaws built into Marxism/Communism or any of the isms that derived from Marx and Engles ideas. That said, there are also SERIOUS flaws with Capitalism, Christianism, etc. I think the idea that there is one perfect economic dogma for all levels and all people and all societies is a bit naive. Anyway, I'm giving this 5-stars because it is a helluva tract. It, obviously, lit a fire that spread quickly through Europe, Asia, etc. Love it or hate it, we are all living in a world that has been marked by Marx. Personally, I dig Das Kapital more. I LOVE Marxist theory way more than Marxist practice.
* My wife and I DID have a cat in college named Marx....more
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