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Author Topic: What Book Are You Currently Reading?  (Read 396469 times)
compson III
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« Reply #1200 on: February 26, 2015, 12:47:44 PM »
« edited: February 26, 2015, 12:50:54 PM by compson III »

The thing with prospect theory, as I recall, is that it adds a lot of complication without much extra predictive power. The classic model actually holds up pretty well when you test them against each other.
Predictive power in what sense?  Take hyperbolic discounting.  There's no good way to isolate discount rates anyways.  Ask a sell side analyst where he gets his WACC from...

But in a very indirect sense, relative utility is a great explanation for why we don't see any kind of Beta premium.  People would rather ride the highs with his neighbor than experience  a better long run risk-adjusted return.
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Kalwejt
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« Reply #1201 on: February 26, 2015, 02:59:57 PM »

Maurice Gaudefroy-Demombynes, The Birth of Islam
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politicus
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« Reply #1202 on: February 26, 2015, 04:38:51 PM »

Maurice Gaudefroy-Demombynes, The Birth of Islam

What do you think about it?
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Mr. Smith
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« Reply #1203 on: February 26, 2015, 11:55:59 PM »

Technically assigned, but I just finished Little Pink House by Jeff Benedict.

Very sad sad look into the abuse of eminent domain by private corporations, specifically what happened in New London 15-10 years ago.
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TNF
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« Reply #1204 on: February 27, 2015, 12:52:58 PM »

Labor's Giant Step: The First Twenty Years of the CIO by Art Preis
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Beet
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« Reply #1205 on: March 01, 2015, 06:28:49 AM »

The Glorious Cause by Middlekauf
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #1206 on: March 03, 2015, 01:33:58 PM »

Recently finished H is for Hawk. It's amazing and you should all read it.
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Sumner 1868
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« Reply #1207 on: March 03, 2015, 01:58:21 PM »

Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years by Carl Sandburg.
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Kalwejt
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« Reply #1208 on: March 04, 2015, 01:24:53 PM »

Maurice Druon, Alexandre le Grand
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« Reply #1209 on: March 04, 2015, 08:28:41 PM »

"A Canticle for Leibowitz". Loved it until Br. Francis died. Not sure what to think of the book's second part.
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anvi
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« Reply #1210 on: March 05, 2015, 07:58:29 AM »

Floating Clouds (Ukigumo) by Hayashi Fumiko, translated by Lane Dunlap.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
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« Reply #1211 on: March 05, 2015, 09:18:55 AM »

"A Canticle for Leibowitz". Loved it until Br. Francis died. Not sure what to think of the book's second part.
It's good.  It suffers from a fate common to many well-beloved SF works, heirs getting a second rate sequel written from something in the notes left behind so as to milk some extra money out of fans, but that doesn't affect the book itself.
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« Reply #1212 on: March 05, 2015, 12:24:28 PM »

Floating Clouds (Ukigumo) by Hayashi Fumiko, translated by Lane Dunlap.

!!!!!!!

What do you think?

"A Canticle for Leibowitz". Loved it until Br. Francis died. Not sure what to think of the book's second part.
It's good.  It suffers from a fate common to many well-beloved SF works, heirs getting a second rate sequel written from something in the notes left behind so as to milk some extra money out of fans, but that doesn't affect the book itself.

Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman isn't a bad book, and there was a lot more of it to work with than just 'notes' when Miller died, but it's definitely a major step down from Canticle. Canticle was one of the best sci-fi novels of its generation; Wild Horse Woman isn't even the best of its year.
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Blair
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« Reply #1213 on: March 05, 2015, 12:39:19 PM »

The Last Campaign: Robert F. Kennedy and 82 Days That Inspired America
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anvi
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« Reply #1214 on: March 05, 2015, 01:27:47 PM »

Floating Clouds (Ukigumo) by Hayashi Fumiko, translated by Lane Dunlap.

!!!!!!!

What do you think?


It's beautifully written and interesting so far (I'm about a third of the way through it).  I assigned it for a class I'm teaching.  I was inclined to do so because of a book written by a friend of mine that talked about this novel in the context of the roles women played in Japan's mid-century occupations and post-war circumstances.  I can see why Hayashi's works were so popular, they're both expressive and quite realistic at the same time.
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KingCountyRepublican
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« Reply #1215 on: March 06, 2015, 12:38:23 AM »

Meets the Eye by Christopher Golden.
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Nathan
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« Reply #1216 on: March 06, 2015, 03:20:17 AM »
« Edited: March 06, 2015, 01:36:28 PM by sex-negative feminist prude »

Floating Clouds (Ukigumo) by Hayashi Fumiko, translated by Lane Dunlap.

!!!!!!!

What do you think?


It's beautifully written and interesting so far (I'm about a third of the way through it).  I assigned it for a class I'm teaching.  I was inclined to do so because of a book written by a friend of mine that talked about this novel in the context of the roles women played in Japan's mid-century occupations and post-war circumstances.  I can see why Hayashi's works were so popular, they're both expressive and quite realistic at the same time.

Diary of a Vagabond (Hōrōki) is also well worth reading if you can find it.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #1217 on: March 06, 2015, 05:28:57 AM »

I've picked up a novel from Henning Mankell's Wallander series. About halfway through.
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Nathan
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« Reply #1218 on: March 06, 2015, 08:53:43 PM »
« Edited: March 07, 2015, 03:39:05 PM by sex-negative feminist prude »

Anyway over the past week I've reread The Word for World Is Forest and read a terrible lesbian romance novel called Blindsided and most of the Chester Mystery Plays. I'm also working my way through The Wind from Vulture Peak: The Buddhification of Japanese Waka in the Heian Period, by an undergrad professor of mine whom I greatly admire.

The Sea of Fertility tetralogy looms before me like an inevitability in my development as a reader and I really don't know what to do with how drawn to it I feel.
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #1219 on: March 07, 2015, 02:30:47 PM »


An excellent choice of reading material. How are they to read from an American point of view (i.e. in terms of language)?
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politicus
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« Reply #1220 on: March 07, 2015, 03:38:18 PM »

The Sea of Fertility tetralogy looms before me like an inevitability in my development as a reader and I really don't know what to do with how drawn to it I feel.

Do you plan to read them in translation or in Japanese?
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Nathan
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« Reply #1221 on: March 07, 2015, 03:51:29 PM »


An excellent choice of reading material. How are they to read from an American point of view (i.e. in terms of language)?

I'm not entirely sure I understand the question. I went through a huge Chaucer phase in high school so I'm to some extent familiar with the general shape of English literature during the time period in question. The version that I'm reading from is the 1957 Drama Library edition, edited by Maurice Hussey; if I read this part of the introduction correctly (it was like one in the morning on a psychiatric ward when I started so I was both distracted and tired), Hussey modernizes the spelling but generally not the word choice or syntax, so parts of it are kind of confusing, but overall I don't find it all that much harder to follow than some of the earliest American poets, Anne Bradstreet for instance.

The Sea of Fertility tetralogy looms before me like an inevitability in my development as a reader and I really don't know what to do with how drawn to it I feel.

Do you plan to read them in translation or in Japanese?

My usual habit with Japanese literature is to read it mostly in English but with a Japanese copy on hand as well so that I can see how any particularly striking passages were constructed in the original. This greatly improved my experiences with Snow Country and Twenty-four Eyes.
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TheDeadFlagBlues
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« Reply #1222 on: March 07, 2015, 05:18:43 PM »

The Memory of Fire trilogy by Eduardo Galeano
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FEMA Camp Administrator
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« Reply #1223 on: March 08, 2015, 03:08:46 PM »

"A Canticle for Leibowitz". Loved it until Br. Francis died. Not sure what to think of the book's second part.
It's good.  It suffers from a fate common to many well-beloved SF works, heirs getting a second rate sequel written from something in the notes left behind so as to milk some extra money out of fans, but that doesn't affect the book itself.

Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman isn't a bad book, and there was a lot more of it to work with than just 'notes' when Miller died, but it's definitely a major step down from Canticle. Canticle was one of the best sci-fi novels of its generation; Wild Horse Woman isn't even the best of its year.

I've progressed farther into "Fiat Lux" and I have to say I'm loving it. The philosophical current of debate between secular vs. religious authorities, the weird post-apocalyptic empires, etc. Great stuff, all around. Gotta love the semi-medieval level of power that the church in the 4th millennium has.
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Rooney
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« Reply #1224 on: March 08, 2015, 05:01:41 PM »

Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan by Edmund Morris. What an odd treatment this memoir is. Morris spend a good deal of the time telling the reader about himself and questioning the intelligence and character of Reagan, whom hired him to write the memoir in 1985. Half the time I scoff at how pseudo-intellectual Morris is. He inserts French and Latin phrases almost as if to tell the reader, "Look at me! I am smart!" If one wants to read a good book on Reagan I do not think this is the one to go to. It is written in an engaging way, but the biographer seems more interested in himself than the subject of the biography.
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