Tag Archives: Mortimer J. Adler

Before Machiavelli, there was the Bible

One of my several reading projects is to make my way through the Great Books of the Western World—the works selected by Mortimer J. Adler, Robert M. Hutchins, and their fellow editors for inclusion in the 54-volume set published by … Continue reading

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when reading is not just reading

It’s 5:17 p.m., and I’m in the midst of my daily “reading” block. I put it in quotation marks because I also do things other than reading in the strict sense. My reading block is structured. The first part of … Continue reading

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Aristotle, meet Paul. . . .

On Thursday, March 7, 2019, I reached a personal milestone: I finished reading the works of Aristotle. I read them mostly from the 2 volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica’s Great Books of the Western World that contain his works: volumes 8 … Continue reading

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Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture, volume 1: making the perfect human

Paideia 1: The Ideals of Greek Culture: Archaic Greece: The Mind of Athens by Werner Wilhelm Jaeger My rating: 5 of 5 stars An impassioned, authoritative, and in-depth account of how the character-shaping ideas of education and culture developed in … Continue reading

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how astrology works, part 3: don’t do your own thing

In my last post I said that it was my study of the art of storytelling that eventually brought me to an understanding of why astrology works. Science might be able to show that astrology works—this is what Carl Jung attempted in … Continue reading

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The Capitalist Manifesto by Louis O. Kelso and Mortimer J. Adler: turning the 1% into the 100%

The Capitalist Manifesto by Louis O. Kelso My rating: 5 of 5 stars This mature, rational examination of what kind of economy a modern democracy needs to have is even more relevant today than it was in 1958. I bought … Continue reading

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The Paideia Proposal by Mortimer J. Adler: learning to be citizens

The Paideia Proposal: An Educational Manifesto by Mortimer J. Adler My rating: 5 of 5 stars This short manifesto gives a cogent overview of what public schooling should be setting out to achieve, the rationale for doing so, and how … Continue reading

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what have we got to hide? I’ll tell you

While I can’t say that I’m surprised at the recent revelation of the handing over of millions of telephone-call records to the U.S. government by Verizon (and no doubt other operators), for some reason it has stirred fresh anger in … Continue reading

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The Angels and Us by Mortimer J. Adler

The Angels and Us by Mortimer J. Adler My rating: 4 of 5 stars This short philosophical text examines the idea of angels from different points of view, and shows why angels matter—whether we believe in them or not. In … Continue reading

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Ten Philosophical Mistakes by Mortimer J. Adler

Ten Philosophical Mistakes by Mortimer J. Adler My rating: 4 of 5 stars This short, authoritative text surveys some of the major gaps and problems in modern thought. I bought a used copy of this book in 2010, as part … Continue reading

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