News:

And we're back!

Main Menu

Grand unified books thread

Started by Syt, March 16, 2009, 01:52:42 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

crazy canuck

So multiple reasons to avoid.  :)

The Brain

At least she likes Richard Gloucester.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Habbaku

Loving Eddy IV is easy. Hating Henry VI is just cruel. Hating Richard III is based upon faulty scholarship.  :P
The medievals were only too right in taking nolo episcopari as the best reason a man could give to others for making him a bishop. Give me a king whose chief interest in life is stamps, railways, or race-horses; and who has the power to sack his Vizier (or whatever you care to call him) if he does not like the cut of his trousers.

Government is an abstract noun meaning the art and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so as to refer to people.

-J. R. R. Tolkien

Sophie Scholl

Quote from: Habbaku on May 19, 2020, 02:40:40 PM
Loving Eddy IV is easy. Hating Henry VI is just cruel. Hating Richard III is based upon faulty scholarship.  :P
Agreed on all counts!  :cheers:
"Everything that brought you here -- all the things that made you a prisoner of past sins -- they are gone. Forever and for good. So let the past go... and live."

"Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don't dare express themselves as we did."

The Minsky Moment

They were all a bunch of glorified mobsters with fancy titles, except possibly Henry VI who may have been genuinely mentally ill.
The purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists.
--Joan Robinson

The Brain

Quote from: The Minsky Moment on May 19, 2020, 02:53:30 PM
They were all a bunch of glorified mobsters with fancy titles, except possibly Henry VI who may have been genuinely mentally ill.

If only Henry had been a glorified mobster, then England's soil would have been depriv'd of rivers of English blood. :(
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Valmy

Quote from: The Minsky Moment on May 19, 2020, 02:53:30 PM
They were all a bunch of glorified mobsters with fancy titles

Mobsters usually do have fancy titles.

Edward IV was pretty cool though. Pity he died at such a shitty time for his kids.
Quote"This is a Russian warship. I propose you lay down arms and surrender to avoid bloodshed & unnecessary victims. Otherwise, you'll be bombed."

Zmiinyi defenders: "Russian warship, go fuck yourself."

Valmy

Quote from: The Brain on May 19, 2020, 03:01:22 PM
Quote from: The Minsky Moment on May 19, 2020, 02:53:30 PM
They were all a bunch of glorified mobsters with fancy titles, except possibly Henry VI who may have been genuinely mentally ill.

If only Henry had been a glorified mobster, then England's soil would have been depriv'd of rivers of English blood. :(

True. Not being a mobster was bad news for your people.
Quote"This is a Russian warship. I propose you lay down arms and surrender to avoid bloodshed & unnecessary victims. Otherwise, you'll be bombed."

Zmiinyi defenders: "Russian warship, go fuck yourself."

Habbaku

Quote from: The Minsky Moment on May 19, 2020, 02:53:30 PM
They were all a bunch of glorified mobsters with fancy titles, except possibly Henry VI who may have been genuinely mentally ill.

If he wasn't mentally ill, what was he? Just extremely motivated to take a brain nap for a year?
The medievals were only too right in taking nolo episcopari as the best reason a man could give to others for making him a bishop. Give me a king whose chief interest in life is stamps, railways, or race-horses; and who has the power to sack his Vizier (or whatever you care to call him) if he does not like the cut of his trousers.

Government is an abstract noun meaning the art and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so as to refer to people.

-J. R. R. Tolkien

jimmy olsen

Anyone can recommend books on ancient Mesopotamia before the rise of the Achaemenid Empire.

I'm particularly interested in the Neolithic and Bronze Age civilizations, the earlier the better.

I just read this article and it peaked my interest

https://www.ancient.eu/article/688/love-sex-and-marriage-in-ancient-mesopotamia/
It is far better for the truth to tear my flesh to pieces, then for my soul to wander through darkness in eternal damnation.

Jet: So what kind of woman is she? What's Julia like?
Faye: Ordinary. The kind of beautiful, dangerous ordinary that you just can't leave alone.
Jet: I see.
Faye: Like an angel from the underworld. Or a devil from Paradise.
--------------------------------------------
1 Karma Chameleon point

The Brain

Quote from: jimmy olsen on May 22, 2020, 11:05:10 PM
Anyone can recommend books on ancient Mesopotamia before the rise of the Achaemenid Empire.

I'm particularly interested in the Neolithic and Bronze Age civilizations, the earlier the better.

I just read this article and it peaked my interest

https://www.ancient.eu/article/688/love-sex-and-marriage-in-ancient-mesopotamia/

It covers the globe, not just Mesopotamia, but I found https://www.amazon.com/Human-Past-History-Development-Societies/dp/050029335X/ref=dp_ob_title_bk very interesting and informative. I have an earlier edition.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Eddie Teach

Gilgamesh was more powerful than the Bull of Anu! You should read his biography.
To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

grumbler

Too late.  Tim's interest, as he pointed out, has already peaked.
The future is all around us, waiting, in moments of transition, to be born in moments of revelation. No one knows the shape of that future or where it will take us. We know only that it is always born in pain.   -G'Kar

Bayraktar!

jimmy olsen

I picked the most recently published book in the bibliography for that article and am 28% in so far.

Kriwaczek, P. Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilization. St. Martin's Griffin, 2012.

Pretty damn interesting in my opinion, but this is an area of which I knew extremely little, so I'll have to read a few more books to really judge it.

The author does get overly philosophical at times, the preface especially where he waxes on about the Iran-Iraq war and the 2003 invasion is a bit overblown.

I'm really interested in the 4000-3000BC period and the theorized theocratic command economy of Uruk, but obviously given the paucity of written records of the time there's not much to go on. 
It is far better for the truth to tear my flesh to pieces, then for my soul to wander through darkness in eternal damnation.

Jet: So what kind of woman is she? What's Julia like?
Faye: Ordinary. The kind of beautiful, dangerous ordinary that you just can't leave alone.
Jet: I see.
Faye: Like an angel from the underworld. Or a devil from Paradise.
--------------------------------------------
1 Karma Chameleon point

Admiral Yi

Paucity was nice, but one's interest is piqued Timmy, not peaked.  It's possible for interest to have peaked, but that means something different obviously.