Ask HN: Best books read in 2022?

Post by jnsaff2 » Sun, Dec 04, 2022, 10:25 AM UTC

uxcolumbo wrote: post #127

chadk wrote: post #125

The two best books I read this year, and have been recommending widely are: "The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity" by Graeber and Wengrow since it really shows how narrow our political imagination has been for the last 250 years, and makes me excited by people looking for new ways to organize. "The Ministry for the Future" by KSR, which has further radicalized me and challenged me to spend more of my tim…

Fighting climate change… what do you have in mind… what can folks in (soft) tech do? I’m equally interested but lacking in imagination currently how software can have a bigger impact. All the big impactful things are in hard tech, ie changing industrial processes, new / improved material design, renewable energy production, reducing energy waste or waste in general etc and planting tons and tons of trees at scale - b…

Post by pacija » Sun, Dec 04, 2022, 10:31 AM UTC

uxcolumbo wrote: post #129

cf141q5325 wrote: post #56

Joost Meerloo's "Rape of the mind". Its an incredible older book looking at the mechanisms exploited by totalitarian systems to subdue their victims. Namely nazi Germany, soviet Russia and revolutionary China. The author was part of the dutch resistance against the nazi occupation and headed the psychological department of the dutch army in exile after he had to flee mainland Europe. He later also acted as a witness…

How do you fight a totalitarian from the inside, eg China, Russia, Iran, where surveillance is high and any opposition will be ‘disappeared’. Does this book go into detail how the Dutch resistance did it?

Post by froggychairs » Sun, Dec 04, 2022, 10:36 AM UTC

wraptile wrote: post #121

"How to Be Perfect: The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question" by Michael Schur is my favorite read of the year. It's an introduction to the philosophy of ethics through real-life examples and anecdotes by the creator of The Good Place TV show (the audio book even features the shows actors). Unlike most of philosphy stuff you can actually finish it in couple of days and feel like you learned a whole lot! In particul…

Post by jargnar » Sun, Dec 04, 2022, 10:47 AM UTC

unmole wrote: post #104

jargnar wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd totally agree with you had Graeber not been an influential anthropologist (wherein one academically studies human activity, culture, trade, economics, social structures, institutions etc. from a rigorous historical lens)

Your demand would have made sense if Debt was a peer-reviewed scholarly work and not a political screed aimed at a lay readership. But then again, there is enough nonsense in there than can be picked apart without being a domain expert. For example, Graeber claims Adam Smith's famous "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own…

Post by bwoodward » Sun, Dec 04, 2022, 10:51 AM UTC

prepend wrote: post #41

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood by Quentin Tarantino, a great companion to the movie and expands on characters in really unique ways that make me think about them. Termination Shock by Neal Stephenson, a near future book about climate change and trying to fix it with an interesting geopolitical look of China acting like the US. I also liked Ministry of the Future but it was less fun of a read. Coddling of the American…