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Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

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Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#801

Post by bashwizard »

putzdown wrote: post #615

Maybe trite, but the Bible. For a mind-blowing experience, read Matthew chapters 5–7, and have in mind that the topic is: “what it means for a person to be righteous, or good.” The analysis of the role of moral rules, the place of worry and anxiety in driving us to short-sighted compromise, the tension between “secret” good-doing versus good-doing for public recognition, are all potent, helpful, and life-changing.

The bible is a great book for anyone in doubt about their beliefs.

It made me turn from an doubtful agnostic theist into an agnostic atheist 1/4 through it.

Amazing read. Will definitely not read it again!

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#802

Post by eranation »

jpollock wrote: post #75

Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People" - it changed how I approach teamwork and conversations. It made me aware of how my behaviour was limiting outcomes. :) Frankly, it made me aware that I was being an asshole and that I should change. However, it wasn't necessarily the book, but the course that I found really useful.

It took me way to long to listen to my dad's advice and read that book. It has a very bad title and will probably cause immediate social ban if caught reading it at school as a teenager (also kids/teen dynamics are sometimes 100% opposite than adult dynamics, being nice and non critic as a teenager can be super risky in some social settings, it's all about not caring and being sarcastic, thank god this period ends at some point, to most of us), but nevertheless, it's the must-have book to transition from the annoying, hot tempered, emotional, entitled, short fused, sarcastic and boasting teenager I was into an adult.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#804

Post by KuhlMensch »

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight_Little_Piggies

In his latest collection of essays originally published in Natural History magazine, paleontologist Gould examines diverse and diverting topics. The title piece refers to toes, and we learn that five is not necessarily the optimum number. Gould re-examines the work of astronomer Edmund Halley and 16th-century Irish Archbishop James Ussher, who pinpointed the moment of creation (Oct. 23, 4004 B.C.);

Edit: I see The Selfish Gene listed here quite a bit. It might be of special interest to you to read Dawkins "rival" on the other side of the pond - Stephan Jay Gould. His "punctuated equilibrium" resonates with me more than Dawkins take on evolution, simply because it involves something less "neat".

Plus, even as a child I found Gould made me laugh out loud sometimes.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#805

Post by dbrgn »

"Confessions of an Economic Hitman" by John Perkins. The claims are hard to prove and I'm not sure how much actually is true (although most things sound plausible), but it changed the way I think about geopolitical events. I usually try to find out what the economic incentives there are behind an event (e.g. wars and oil).

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#806

Post by KuhlMensch »

freedomben wrote: post #152

"Basic Economics" by Thomas Sowell. Not an easy read, but it deeply changed the way I think about incentive structures and the law of unintended consequences. It's a tough pill to swallow for people (like myself) who cling to utopian ideas, but the older I get the more I realize we must live in the world as it exists, with human nature as it really is. Dreaming of a better world is counter-productive if one does not…

Sounds good. I'll give it a try

Edit: hehe the reviews suggest its quite the polarising tome.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#807

Post by Mikhail_Edoshin »

cutler wrote: post #92

"Das Kapital" by Karl Marx is still the most accurate analysis of the causes of economic crises. His labour theory of value gets to the root of what's going on behind the smokescreen of market forces presented as fact in western Economics courses. "On The Road" by Jack Kerouac was a liberating, mind-expanding experience with no drugs involved. Kerouac's free-form style and open-ended approach to life made a great imp…

I think it was "The Fifth Discipline" by Peter M. Senge that described a business-style game (retail, wholesale, and production of beer) that in 95% of cases resulted in massive overproduction crisis, very much like what Marx has described. Of course, the cause was very much unlike what Marx suggested; the book is about systems thinking and this particular system was an example of a system with delays in signal passing.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#808

Post by franze »

mseo wrote: post #560
franze wrote: post #479

Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella H. Meadows https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1603580557/ I read it once a year. It changed how i think about everything. My career is based on this book. My interaction with people and groups of people is based on this book.

I just read that one and found it interesting, but also a bit shallow. Do you have any recommendations on what to read to dive deeper into this topic?

Yeah, it's a starting point, but still the best one with the most clearest thoughts. Every other System Thinking Book is more specialiced to one domain and seem to drive additional agendas.

I can recommend everything else she has written. I go back to "Thinking in Systems" once a year and analyze my life, my projects again with her framework. There is always something new to discover.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#809

Post by okaleniuk »

This: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origins_of_Political_Order

There are a few anecdotes there as well, but it's less fun than Freakonomics. Still, it explains so much about institutions, governing, and generally how societies work. It does make you rethink everything.

Re: Ask HN: What books changed the way you think about almost everything?

#810

Post by dmichulke »

technocratius wrote: post #790
freedomben wrote: post #152

"Basic Economics" by Thomas Sowell. Not an easy read, but it deeply changed the way I think about incentive structures and the law of unintended consequences. It's a tough pill to swallow for people (like myself) who cling to utopian ideas, but the older I get the more I realize we must live in the world as it exists, with human nature as it really is. Dreaming of a better world is counter-productive if one does not…

Although Sowell writes very convincingly and brings logical arguments at first sight, most of his statements on the free market are based on intuition rather than data. He consistently uses a handful of examples (minimum wage, housing market) and extrapolates those to other areas in the economy without substantiation. Always assuming a fully efficient market (which it is not, see different bubbles in past few decades…

> assuming a fully efficient market (which it is not, see different bubbles in past few decades)

Well, I think it's part of the book to speak in favor of free markets as opposed to centrally planned "markets" (such as prices for money, e.g., interest rate).

If you're criticizing an underlying assumption, then of course I can also go ahead and criticize parts of mathematics for some of their axioms. Yet, that doesn't make mathematics wrong, only more limited in scope.

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