The Idiot Board Readers Corner - General Discussion

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

I've been reading through The Black Swan. Late pass, I know.

Criticism aside, Taleb's diatribes can often have an amusing sort of rythym. And his central thesis, that we're prejudiced towards the obvious and past instead of the more potentially dangerous hidden and future, is a good one. But I've been having an issue with his analysis of causality.

Perhaps I'm missing something that has since been explained, but it seems like he relies way too much on criticizing the bias of others in reference to survivorship (in trading, or as a species). He appears to claim that since a number of speculators will neccessarily do well as a matter of pure luck, those that have done well should be considered lucky until proven otherwise, a stance which seemingly contradicts his anti-Platonified lauding of "Fat Tony types."

My other issue was that he dismisses the high odds against life existing with the platitude, "well, we wouldn't even be here if we weren't so lucky! We ourselves are the result of survivorship bias!" While true, this seems to beg the question; the interesting point is not THAT we are lucky, but WHY. The latter question is what presses people to look into the night sky.

To use an example, if you crossed a busy battleground blindfolded, without armor, and avoided getting shot, it would be of great interest how you managed to survive. The fact that your suvivorship is implied in the question is pretty well beside the point.

Anyway, it's worth a read.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

Reading a few books at the same time, and just finished

In Fifty Years We'll All Be Chicks by Adam Carolla

If you've ever listened to Carolla's podcast, the format of the book should come as no surprise. It's a series of rants on favorite Ace topics such as "chicken shit traffic tickets", annoyances at the airport, and pies versus cake.

I have only listened to Ace for a little over a year, but there were many parts of the book that I recalled him saying on air before, and more than once. Considering the book is a slim 240 pages, the amount of recycled material is disheartening.

More importantly, the work is highly uneven. Some parts are very funny and make good arguments. Many others are short-sighted and dull, as Adam and his ghost writer(s) lack both the originality to make a more interesting point, and shockingly enough, the sense of humor to really pull off the funny.

For whatever reason, Carolla's stories and rants aren't nearly as humorous in book form. Comparing this to similar books like Forrest Griffin's "Got Fight" or Maddox's "The Alphabet of Manliness", this book is significantly inferior.

Maybe part of it is the repetition; Ace keeps up the same rant style, sentence structure, and even types of jokes all throughout the book. Eventually, they become predictable and dull. Whatever the reason, I had a hard time finishing the book as quickly as I expected.

I thought it would take me a single evening, as Griffin's and Maddox's respective books did, but I kept having to put it down once the writing and jokes got too stale.

Don't get me wrong; it's not a bad book, just "okay", but I was expecting a lot more entertainment here.

It's not worth paying $13, but if you're an Ace fan like myself, you don't mind supporting the guy for all the great free content he gives us on his site. Just realize that literature is not a good medium for him.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

Now I just feel dumb for not paying a few extra bucks to buy this instead. Especially since I like audiobooks so much.

It's been a few years since I last checked, but I'm just happy that Knuth is alive and well. How in-depth does this new book go? Does he only cover the basics of permutations, partitions, and trees, or does he go into more advanced stuff? And how difficult are the problems? Comparable to the earlier volumes?

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow.

Astrophysics and theoretical physics were never my strong suit. This thing blew my mind. I'm not even sure you could summarize it in a review. It started out fine with a wonderful history lesson. The beginnings of scientific observation in the early Western Philosophy and modern science: Descartes, Laplace, Newton, Galileo. Basic, high school, college physics and laws. Moves onto Einstein and things get a tad abstract; then Feynman which begins to branch into an entirely different head space of understanding.

Then he gets to "M-Theory", a 10 dimensional view of our own universe and 10 to the 500th power other universes that could/are our universe's history AS it is applied to gravitational relativity... which they don't really understand yet. Not to mention all the minuscule particles and waves of energy and time itself that also play upon these conditions, further complicating history going back to the big bang. Everybody got that? Doesn't even scratch the surface of everything going on.

This book got a lot of headlines about eradicating intelligent design. It barely touched on the subject, really. In fact, they asserted their position, but didn't really hammer it home. Probably because they can't prove it yet. One could argue FOR intelligent design with the information presented in the book. The authors explained that it was such a slim chance the universe was created so perfectly and in a working harmony, allowing life of any kind to exist. I'm not saying one way or the other, just saying if someone reads it, they could interpret it that way. Just a publisher's ploy to sell copies. Really, this picks up where "A Brief History of Time" left off. If Hawking lives, expect another book in 10 years extrapolating on the theories presented here.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

Finally finished another Murakami novel,

Dance Dance Dance-

Wow. Even more incredible of a masterpiece than "A Wild Sheep Chase", and like "Norwegian Wood", one of the greatest things I have ever read. And here I thought that after finishing "Lord Jim", any serious literature immediately after it would be a disappointment. Not the case.

It's Murakami's creative blend of sex and death, a completely emotionless protagonist and setting contrasted with sudden, crazy bursts of feelings. It's completely unexpected, and mixes unusual urban fantasy with a somber, harsh realism.

But really, none of my words or praise can do it any justice.

If you have the slightest interest in reading, you need to check this book out.

 

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Has anyone read any books by Philip K Dick? I was thinking of reading Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said. (Heard about it while watching the philosophical movie Waking Life). He wrote a ton of books, just wondering if you guys had any advice on which one to read.

 

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I've just finished reading Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go

It's a perfectly decent book, however I feel it's a bit of a missed opportunity. The premise and plot are really interesting and open up a lot of philosophical themes and ideas, but Ishiguro doesn't seem to want to go all the way there and so it ends up seeming a bit half-hearted. Such a good idea (in my view) deserves a better execution, and I found some of it quite repetitive, especially when Kathy, the main character is describing other characters within the novel. Maybe I'm being too hard, maybe I'm missing the point, but in the end I felt a lot of potential was wasted.

But in better news I've started on with Legend of a Suicide by David Vann...wow. I think I will finish before I post my thoughts, but so far, so good.

 

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Whoa shit. I typed in the title of the book to see if the author has any other books, but all that came up were websites for a gay magazine in Florida. ROTFLMAO!!!

 

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Downloaded Assholes Finish First and wish I could get my money back.

Most of it was one-liners with short fabricated stories built around the joke that wasn't that funny to begin with. Reading about a guy in his mid-thirties using "dude" every other sentence is kind of sad.

Time to reinvent yourself, buddy. Take your idol, Eminem, for instance. He doesn't rap about beating up boy bands anymore, because that shit's old hat. Likewise, no one wants to hear about a guy approaching middle age trying to relive his youth.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

Finally read Assholes Finish First.

I'll be honest; I freaking loved it. I can understand growing out of Tucker's material and no longer enjoying it, but judged by the same criteria that I Hope they Serve Beer was, this was a massive improvement in every way.

For starters, Tucker is simply a much better writer. His descriptions are more apt, he sets up the punchline in a more streamlined manner, and even his analogies, similes, and pop culture references are vastly improved. I have to respect a guy who compares the way two exes eye each other to a Rudyard Kipling story about a mongoose fighting a snake. This already makes it a significant upgrade over the first book.

However, Tucker, while lacking a certain amount of depth and self-awareness, is also better at analyzing a situation and getting into the headspace of his characters. He has matured and gotten smarter, and this is evident in the work.

This new ability also helps carry some of the stories that are not particularly funny by themselves, his relationship with Hollywood girl Courtney/"Alexa" being a prime example.

Much like the original, the story that Tucker felt was the "craziest", (in the original, it was "The Most Disturbing Conversation Ever") also turned out to be the most boring and yawn-inducing. The Harlem RV story was just too long, drawn out, and too much of "look how fucking crazy/awesome I am!!!"

That being said, the ending to AFF was legitimately hilarious and excellent. I was definitely pleased with my purchase, far more than I was with "I Hope they serve Beer".

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

I have to say, I read both of them, and I thought they were both kind of terrible.

It's to be expected -- Tucker and I clearly don't share a sense of humor, and when you have a protagonist that is SO thoroughly unlikeable, there's not much to lean on.

The good: If you're read his imitators, you know how difficult it can be to pace an essentially plotless story and keep it interesting; Max is very good at mining his own life for story material, and making it fit into the format he's chosen. Neither book drags in any significant way.

The bad: Lets start with the major one:

The smug, self-satisfied asshole persona only works if you've got the comedic chops to back it up. I didn't get that at all from this book. Maybe I'm becoming a pussy, but I don't really think there's anything cool about stealing people's food and yelling at them through a bullhorn.

The fact that not only is GoldenBoy impressed with this display of "wit", but also Tucker was so self-impressed that he had to put it in the book pretty much says everything about our differing standards of humor.

The sex stories are whatever. I guess they're mildly amusing in a novel sort of way, and they're all short enough that even when they're not interesting, they don't really drag down the quality of the book. Lets move on.

Is this funny assholishness? Not to me. This makes me hate the protagonist, and by extension the book, all the more.

Yawn.

Ha?

The Tucker Max Experience: Again, I don't even find these things faintly humorous. They just struck me as self-important navel-gazing covered in thin spots of laddishness.

Failure Stories: Feel cursory and forced.

The post-fame sex stories...just feel lacking. I mean, it was something to read, and it wasn't bad, but lets not kid ourselves. Tucker Max is no David Sedaris.

Heck, he's not even a Sloane Crosley.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

Look, everyone has a different sense of humor. I'm not going to convince you that the new book is funny, although I have to ask why you registered for the TMMB and posted there so often if you weren't a fan of Tucker.

And yeah, Tucker is an asshole, including to you personally on the old forum, but that doesn't affect my enjoyment of the stories, since identifying with the protagonist isn't necessary to enjoy it.

But I do take issue with one thing;

Dave Sedaris?! Dude, this would be like criticizing Joe Rogan as a stand-up comedian...and then saying "he's no Kathy Griffin/Dane Cook!" Sedaris is painfully unfunny to me most of the time, and while a senses of humor are unique, comparatively speaking, how do you find Sedaris more humorous than Tucker?

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

"How could you prefer blue to red? Blue is painfully ugly to me."

He's a critically acclaimed author who has not only outsold Tucker, but is also critically lauded. I like Tucker just fine, but the overwhelming consensus amongst both the general populace and the 'chattering class' is that Sedaris is a pretty funny guy.

Personally, I like both but prefer Sedaris. If I had to pinpoint it, I'd say that Sedaris has a higher sense of irony and the humor of neuroses and the banal, whereas Max's humor is more about over-the-top situations. Sedaris has a better wit, as well, and tends to be more 'adult' humor.

Do you like Seinfeld, Woody Allen, and Larry David? Because if you don't, it makes a lot of sense that you wouldn't like Sedaris.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

"Critically acclaimed"? Dude, who freaking cares? Is that really a replacement for an actual argument about the quality of his work?

And Stephanie Meyer has outsold the both of them put together by a factor of 10. Clearly, Twilight is a modern masterpiece by your logic, right?

Again, who cares? The "general populace" is fucking dumb, and thinks "Transformers" is an awesome franchise.

If you like Sedaris and want to advance an argument for why he is funnier than Tucker, cool. But when your main sources are "what most people think", what's the point in even reading books anymore? You've exchanged your own point of view for those of a nameless, faceless mass of morons.

By the way, I don't mind liking or disliking either guy in a vacuum; humor is unique. But I just don't see the argument that Sedaris is better than Tucker. You can hate both or love both, but Tucker's writing is stronger and funnier than Sedaris'.

I like and respect Seinfeld and Larry David, and absolutely love Woody Allen, who was a fucking genius in his day, even if he is a revolting human being.

But Sedaris is just a poor man's imitation of any of those guys, just like "Ryan Million" was a homeless meth addict's imitation of Tucker Max. Sedaris' writing lacks the observation and wit of those guys, and is just the same, stale jokes with a dash of undeserved pretension.

Those are all very general statements. Their subjects are different, of course, but the reason I feel the two are comparable is because both write observational humor about the absurdity of the situations and people they encounter.

Yes, I realize that describes most comedians, but I feel that the intellectual level of both guys is basically the same; Tucker is more low-brow, but their depth and insight into a given situation is on the same level.

That's a slight compliment towards Tucker, but more a criticism towards Sedaris, who isn't even a quarter as clever as he thinks he is.

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

To answer your first question, I posted on the board because...well because of people like you two. Interesting, solid posters who offered different and intelligent views on things. Then, there were mods like suapyg, donika and hotgrits who offered a wealth of wisdom, humor and yes, kindness. Then there were posters like vegaswatch, who led me to a passing interest in sports gambling (I still don't bet sports, because I'm not good enough yet, but I can definitely see myself betting baseball futures/sides in the next couple years).

Tucker had a relatively small influence on the old board. He has less on this board. I'm all in favor of that.

As an only tangetially related aside, I don't hate the guy, really. He's a smart guy, a shrewd businessman, a unique if deeply flawed writer; he's far from the oafish frat guy Jezebel would try to strawman him as. (I do still think his treatment of women is fundamentally fucked up. Doesn't make him a rapist, but he's a fairly inveterate misogynist, which deserves some mention).

 

Re: The Idiot Board Book Club

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test’s title is a lot like the book in that you’re out of breath by the end of it. If somebody told me this book was more than three run-on sentences long I would be surprised. I originally got it as a gift last year for Christmas, and put it down after about thirty pages because I couldn’t bear the hippie lingo and long-winded sentences for longer than that. A year later I picked the book back up with a bit more determination and a sense of debt to Tom Wolfe and found it quite rewarding. After a while my mind adjusted to the pace and vibrant colors of the book and I was able to get through all four-hundred-something pages in a few days.
The characters are the Merry Pranksters, lead by novelist Ken Kesey(although the pranksters technically don’t support leaders, Kesey just happens to be the one orchestrating almost everything that happens). Not many of the pranksters are deep characters or offer much to the story other than filling up what would otherwise be a lonely bus. “Mountain Girl” is the most interesting non-Kesey character and we even see her stand up to a Hell’s Angel at one point. Wolfe doesn’t delve into this character enough to establish her as anything more than a memorable sub-character with a few good lines. It’s evident from the beginning that the star of the show is Ken Kesey. This was interesting to me, as “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” is one of my favorite books, but for the non-fan I don’t think we got enough of the inner workings of Kesey. Wolfe makes it painfully obvious that Kesey was a brutish, flannel-wearing badass who occasionally delves into some Neitzche and that’s about it. At one point we meet Owsley, who has a lot of qualities that make him seem like an awesome character (such as creating the best drugs around), but his presence is short-lived. So a so-called classic that lacks in three-dimensional characters must have a great plot-line, right?

Sort of. The idea of hippies gallivanting around the country on a colorful bus trying to get everybody to join them on acid is interesting without a doubt. Wolfe hammers home the idea that it was the pranksters who really began all of the mayhem that happened throughout the Sixties, which is also neat. But there is simply not meat to justify the length or merit of the book. The most exciting part is when Kesey flees to Mexico and starts to lose his mind to paranoia, but even that gets dragged out too long.

From a merely artistic standpoint, Wolfe deserves credit. He took a swing at making a book about LSD use and expanded
consciousness by using ellipses and run-ons and a lot of cryptic words nobody says or ever said. His descriptions and repetitiveness certainly came off like someone on LSD might have written them, even though Wolfe has admittedly never tried LSD and tried marijuana… once. He made a book that has had critical and financial success while doing so, and my puny critique is not going to affect that. The book is enjoyable and worth a read if you’re interested in Ken Kesey or the acid culture. I hesitate to believe that this is the book that captures the essence of the 60s better than any other though, as many proclaim. There are quite a few moments in this book that are brilliant, and thus, redeeming. One of my favorite parts is when Wolfe points out the “beautiful people” idea, where students would write to their parents saying they had met some “beautiful people” and would be using that college money they gave them to go to Mexico and trip balls. Tom Wolfe ends up making it work because he’s that good. Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is worth reading just to say you’ve done it, but isn’t the most rewarding work by Wolfe.