Goodreads Reading List

The Moral Basis of a Backward Society

by Edward C. Banfield

The Moral Basis has been among the most cited books in my readings. I was unwittingly transported back in time to 1954 and 1955 Montenegro, the ficticious name of a village in southern Italy, of which Banfield says "the extreme poverty a...

The Age of Confucian Rule: The Song Transformation of China

by Dieter Kuhn

The highlights of the Song dynasty, as far as I gleaned from this book, were the capitals of the Northern Song and Southern Song, Kaifeng and Hangzhou, respectively. Kuhn describes these two cities in great detail, even naming many famil...

The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man

by Marshall McLuhan

Chock full of ideas--so I give it four stars. However, be forewarned that a knowledge the visual arts is necessary for the early part of the book and something of music for the later parts. This and the fact that he doesn't very clearly ...

The Quest for Certainty: A Study of the Relation of Knowledge and Action

by John Dewey

A man and a book going against the grain of a couple of thousand years of philosophy. Even if you already know about his "practical" approach, it is well worth reading about it in his own words. I suppose it corresponds roughly to operat...

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