Here we go. 2 reviews for the reading of one post. It’s a steal.
More Sex is Safer Sex — Steve Landsburg
I picked up this book casue I saw the title and it had bunny rabbits on the cover and that amused me. So when ever you here that old saw about not judging a book by its cover you should tell the asshat repeating it to fuck off cause you’re sure as hell going to judge it by it’s cover. Otherwise you’d never pick the damn thing up. We always judge things by the cover then we revise those judgments on the content later. Twats.
Anyways, this is a lighthearted economics book that’s pretty light on theory but fairly rich on ideas. The main point of the book is to challenge readers with little to no economic experience or understanding on things they think are just common sense. Things like less monogamy could actually reduce STD rates(backed up by studies at Harvard), perhaps people shouldn’t always go to the back of the line(Queuing theory and Poisson processes), why no one over the age of legal drinking age should be allowed to vote on drinking age(they don’t feel the costs just the benefits). Now there are some things in there I don’t agree with simply due to practicality issues. Many ideas that are proposed would be good if there was someway to enforce the costs while allowing the benefits but there aren’t any real reasonable ways to do that in real life. One good point is that humans do put a price on life every single day. It seems humans are willing to accept a 1 in 1000000 chance of death for 5 to 7$ . That implies every day humans put a price of roughly 5 to 7 million on a life. People hate to hear it but it’s true to an extent. We always make a decision on whether to help someone or not and whether or not to change behavior that could lead to death every day. And those decisions all come with costs and benefits. Either way I need to go get a nice micro/macro economics book and chew through it/them. I really could stand to know more about economics beyond what I studied in highschool and my industrial management course. Hell as my friend Karl points out every time we discuss the subject “you can’t make an informed political decision in this country without knowing more about economics”. As such I may hit borders and see if I can find a decent book or two for less that text book costs. All in all I’d say this is a book worth reading even if you don’t agree with the ideas just to get yourself thinking. Hell many of the ideas and solutions are proposed just to make you think.
Atheist Manifesto – Michel Onfray
Well now… This book got a nudge on the Colbert Report this Thursday so you may have heard about it in the states. I saw it in B&N a while back then finally picked up a copy about 3 weeks ago cause I was feeling pissy about the religious right again. It’s not a bad read and though it does get a bit ranty/preachy towards the end, it’s fun times! See he’s a philosophy professor in France so he actually has a tolerance for reading long, dry, tedious work which means he’s apparently managed to suffer through the Torah, Halmud, Bible, Koran and Hahdid (sp?). At least he cited passages like the dickens when he was writing about them. As is the book runs through the various contradictions in each of the works, the bloodshed that they’ve spread over the centuries and the mayhem they’ve played on social and scientific advancement. Pretty standard fare really. I did learn a few good things mostly about St Paul of the Romans, Corinthians, etc fame. That man was a true and honest FUCKER. With a capital FUCKER. It’s a shame he didn’t get crucified sooner, before he could spread his body hating, intelligence despising and god fearing doctrine to the masses. Power is descended from god and thus to question power is to question god? FUCK YOU! Either way this book is worth a read if you’re feeling interested in what a famous atheist has to say. As I’ve possibly said before… when arguing shit like this it’s somehow useful to refer to famous peoples’ opinion. Well here’s what I think and these 8 dead famous guys agree!!! wooo wooo!!!! chooga chooga!!!! woo woo!!