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Reviews tagging 'Panic attacks/disorders'
Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe by Brian Greene
1 review
ekcd_'s review against another edition
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
This not the type of book I normally read and frankly it feels weird to rate it using the same system I rate fantasy and science fiction and romance.
But it gets a 5 because for me a boom only is a five is if it fundamentally changes how I go about my days - do I think about it constantly? Did I discover something new about myself? You get the gist.
And so this is 5 - not because the ideas are ground breaking but because they are so well organized. After a decade of devouring books and papers by existentialists and atheists and similar ilk I never quite found something that fit. Either the philosophies were just as mystical as main stream religion or they were apathetic to the degree they didn’t feel comparable with my inner experience. Language and mystery and art and meaning can and DO exist in a universe devoid of inherent Meaning. Greene finally opened my eyes to Physicalism, a theory that feels so intuitive that I can hardly stand it.
Note: it’s heavy heavy science even though he says it’s for laymen. I only understood about 50% of what he said but stuck with it because I could anticipate the payoff he was building to. I watch cosmology videos and podcasts so at least some concepts were familiar.
Lots of notes and references, for further reading and such.
He has a very purple way of writing for being a hard scientist, so I couldn’t read it for long stretches. But his floofy style added some much needed romanticism to (what I consider) and existentialism adjacent philosophy.
I’m glad it was compatible with things like theory of mind, sociology, linguistics, etc.
But it gets a 5 because for me a boom only is a five is if it fundamentally changes how I go about my days - do I think about it constantly? Did I discover something new about myself? You get the gist.
And so this is 5 - not because the ideas are ground breaking but because they are so well organized. After a decade of devouring books and papers by existentialists and atheists and similar ilk I never quite found something that fit. Either the philosophies were just as mystical as main stream religion or they were apathetic to the degree they didn’t feel comparable with my inner experience. Language and mystery and art and meaning can and DO exist in a universe devoid of inherent Meaning. Greene finally opened my eyes to Physicalism, a theory that feels so intuitive that I can hardly stand it.
Note: it’s heavy heavy science even though he says it’s for laymen. I only understood about 50% of what he said but stuck with it because I could anticipate the payoff he was building to. I watch cosmology videos and podcasts so at least some concepts were familiar.
Lots of notes and references, for further reading and such.
He has a very purple way of writing for being a hard scientist, so I couldn’t read it for long stretches. But his floofy style added some much needed romanticism to (what I consider) and existentialism adjacent philosophy.
I’m glad it was compatible with things like theory of mind, sociology, linguistics, etc.
Content Warnings
Minor: Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury