Life/Perspective changing books or inputs

[Broch]

OK, can we agree that reading on its own is not enough, comprehension and thinking is also required? However, books have been the source of information that stimulates thinking for hundreds of years. I don't think modern information resources (social media, YouTube etc) present information in a way that stimulates thinking; it's presented as fact without question. It reminds me of the fire and brimstone preachers in Methodist Chapels when I was a nipper

 

[gibson 175]

• Atonement by Ian McEwan
• Bel Ami by Guy De Maupassant (or any of his short stories)
• Dostoevsky-Crime and Punishment

...to name a few that I would recomend. Changed my perspective/.made me see life differently/made me think. I like books that give some insight into the human condition, what it means to be a human being. Like a good painting we will see things we have not seen before but in a beautiful way. A good book will articulate thoughts and ideas in ourselves that we may not have seen and we will be the better for it.

 

[HillBill]

Platos 'the metaphysics of morals'. Rachael's sister did a degree in psychology. and this book was a standard part of the course. When she finished, she passed it on to Rach, and i read it.

We literally exist as a a moral society that was decreed 2400 years ago. Our entire civilisation and civil laws and rights, are based on the Sumerian system... from 5000 years ago. (all western civilisations are)

Anything since are just edits or manipulations.

Really does make you think, because you were never taught that. But once you know, you can check, and then you feel stupid for thinking we're the ones who had it all figured out. As though time did us a favour, that we are more advanced... spoiler, we aint. We've got worse, not better. The internet has allowed people to say what they want, without real consequence. Back in't day, if someone said to someone in person what i've seen people say online to each other, said person would get, shall we say, physically rebuked, perhaps leading to the end of their life. These days... where is the moral compass? Its on the individual, based on their parents moral compass... its a taught thing,a learned thing, not a granted a birth thing. And with the way things are... its not taught so much or an ingrained from a parents thing so much.. So yeah. The Metaphysics of Morals, by plato. It should be the first book everyone is taught as soon as they are capable of reading and thinking.

 

[HillBill]

• Atonement by Ian McEwan
• Bel Ami by Guy De Maupassant (or any of his short stories)
• Dostoevsky-Crime and Punishment

...to name a few that I would recomend. Changed my perspective/.made me see life differently/made me think. I like books that give some insight into the human condition, what it means to be a human being. Like a good painting we will see things we have not seen before but in a beautiful way. A good book will articulate thoughts and ideas in ourselves that we may not have seen and we will be the better for it.

Nice to see the odd classic or two motioned. Its hard to change ones perspective, while reading the works of those with the current perspective.

 

[CLEM]

How about Microadventures - Alastair Humphries.

The eye opener about adventure not having to be some big thing.

I very much enjoyed that one, i reckon it’s time to find my copy and dip in to it once more.

 

[Wayland]

I have read so many over the years but I do recall Jonathan Livingstone Seagull feeling quite profound at the time.

 

[RonW]

He turned atheism into a religion. Interesting read but I shall not tolerate evangelists.

You mean Dawkins being an evangelist for atheism? Even atheism is a beliefsystem from the very beginning.
It left me with more questions than answers. His reasoning had many holes and inconsistencies.

 

[CLEM]

I taught myself to read, i remember how it happened lol. I was still a very young little boy, a little unruly, didn’t like school a whole lot, a bit headstrong and sometimes a bit quick to act. Luckily for me I wised up before getting myself into real trouble like some of the older lads i hung around with did.
It was the first weekend of the six weeks summer holiday, a whole six weeks off school, from my 8 ( i can’t remember exactly ) year old perspective 6 weeks stretching off into the distance and over the horizon looked and felt like six months to me. Anyone else remember that feeling, and that corresponding feeling of pure freedom.
As I say it was the first weekend and i wandered along to some event in the village, there was a jumble sale ( remember them ) on, and i picked up two books. One was called something like Tales/Story’s Of The Commandos, and the other about the 95th Rifles. The cover illustrations looked exciting to me, particularly the Commando one. I paid i dunno 5p for em and by the end of those six weeks i could read as good as anyone. And i loved it, read almost everything I could get my hands on thereafter. All sorts. If a book can make you think, make you question then it’s often a good book.

As that clever Greek bloke said/ wrote, “ It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought/idea without accepting it" Being able to look at & evaluate different values without necessarily adopting them is perhaps the central skill required in changing one's own life in a meaningful way” yep he was a clever chap that Harry Stottells.