Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Grimalkin]

Who are the Great Thinkers of our times?

So I'm at home at the moment on a month's holiday and I have plenty of time to catch up on my reading and I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations. I have plenty of light reading material but I'd also like to read something a little more thought provoking.

I know for myself I would have to include Richard Dawkins becauce he added whole new depths to my understanding of Darwin's theory of evolution and radically changed the way I thought about life and the world around me.

Is there anyone who has given you new insights?

I'm not confining it to any one area. Arts, History. Religion (particularly anything on Buddhism), Philosophy, Politics......whatever!

All suggestions will be gratefully considered.

[Moldy Rutabaga]

Just looking at my shelf for a moment..

C.S. Lewis (non-fiction)
Camille Paglia
Jared Diamond
John Kenneth Galbraith
Alvin Toffler
Harold Bloom

Ken:>

[ChopChaeJoe]

Ray Kurzweil
Stephen Wolfram
Alasdair MacIntyre


I guess J. Derrida, William Burroughs, John Cage and Richard Feynmann are a bit before this time. I'm not too hip.

[Woland]

Malcolm Gladwell's two books, The Tipping Point and Blink, have both had sections that have had some influence on how I think about teaching. In particular, the chapter on 'stickiness' in The Tipping Point should be basic reading for any materials and curriculum designer.

Gladwell's colleague at The New Yorker, James Surowiecki has written a book, The Wisdom of Crowds, which contains a lot of useful ideas about how to take a advantage of and get the most out of work done in groups.

Duncan Watts' Six Degrees: The Science of the Connected Age is an interesting look at research that he and others have done on the small world problem, showing why the world has to be small, what it is about networks that requires this, and how these results can be applied in the real world.

Noam Chomsky consistently produces readable and well-cited political analysis. Even if you disagree with him, he'll make you think about how you construct your arguments.

If you fiction that will teach you something, the third volume of Madison Smartt Bell's trilogy about Toussaint L'Ouverture and the Haitian slave revolt, The Stone that the Builder Refused, has come out. The first volume of the series, All Soul's Rising, is a masterpiece, the finest historical novel I have ever read. The second, Master of the Crossroads, while not matching the first, is also great. I have high hopes for the third. All are based on historical documents, some provided in appendices, along with copious notes. Not your usual novels.

If you're a baseball fan, you should read some Bill James. For serious, but clear, discussion of how statistics work and what their limits are, his work is without parallel. Try either The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract or Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame: Baseball, Cooperstown, and the Politics of Glory

[Qinella]

Let's not forget the great thinkers of Dave's ESL Cafe: Otis, Jinju, Alyssa..

[ella]

J.D. Salinger (except for "Catcher in the Rye" - read any of his books but that one). He understands people like no one else.

[Grimalkin]

Thanks for the responses so far. Most of the names I'm unfamiliar with so I'm going to google them and find out a little bit more.

Special thanks to Woland for the background info he gave on his selection.

Anybody care to offer an opinion on Camille Paglia from Moldy's selection? I've read about her before but I've never read anything by her.

[pastis]

[Satori]

[pastis]

If you haven't already read it, I recommend you pick up Sartre's Nausea, it's probably the best existential novel ever, and still relatively recent.

You might also give Foucault a try. It's pretty accessible and interesting. Some of his ideas are up for debate, but his analysis of history is definitely worth a look. I read Madness and Civilization a few years back, I thought it was really interesting.

[pastis]

[Satori]

Definitely a very interesting read, and brings a lot of ancient Greek and Roman mythology into her work, and slices it up with modern psychological tools.

[cbclark4]

Michael Crichton
Andrew Scott Card
Harry Turtledove
Abdullah Yusuf Ali

cbc

[JeJuJitsu]

Oprah
Dr. Phil
Deepak Chopra
Judge Judy



To a lesser degree:

Tim Berners-Lee
James Joyce
Jefferson
Franklin
Pal Erdo
Da Vinci
Dean Kamen

[Grimalkin]

Okay I've googled and there are some definites I'm going to read. Camille Paglia I might skip for the moment tho' (thanks for the comments Pastis and Satori) as I suspect I'd probably just agree with some of what she has to say and discount the rest and I'm looking more for people who will change my way of thinking or give me new ideas.

I can see it's going to take me more than a month to get thro' most of these but I'm still open to more suggestion (I'm pretty much an intellectual lightweight so I need all the food for thought I can get!)