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Arthur Herman, PhD, is the author of the New York Times bestseller How the Scots Invented the Modern World, which has sold a half million copies worldwide, and Gandhi and Churchill, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He is the author of six previous books and a senior fellow at the Hudson toon meer Institute in Washington, DC. toon minder

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The Scots certainly made a great contribution to the world in many ways. But like a lot of nations it had its rise and fall. Throughout history groups of men, indipendent of nations, have been the cause of change. One day when nations no longer exist and the world looks upon itself as a single entity containing areas within which different characters or cultures exist freely, there will still be, no doubt, groups of people who are contributing great things to the world as a whole.
 
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David-Block | 34 andere besprekingen | Jan 15, 2024 |
Though it was curious to read about Bonnie Prince Charles's ill-fated adventure and the beginning of Great Britain, the next chunk on David Hume etc. was really tough so i fast forwarded to Walter Scott, mostly skimming through yet pausing to read about the august visit of George IV to Scotland and it's unbelievable repercussions that followed Sir Walter's cunning machinations with the image of Scots. Until i finally hit upon what was most interesting in and what i expected most of the book- not theoretical foundations of modern world but rather practical betterments to humans' lot introduced by or with the help of Scots. Alas, this part occupies only less than a third of the book. Good thing is that it is jam-packed with multiple events and inventions that brought in Industrial revolution and many other changes, which indeed made our world what it is today, more or less. There we meet interesting types (known and unknown) and learn who of those brilliant people was in fact a Scot ( for example, James Cook ;). Names and stories of Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Lipton ( tea magnate), Tommy Dewar and John Walker ( both whiskey kings) and the two guys, who actually instigated Opium Wars make it all a very interesting read. And dozens of names are just mentioned in passing (Dunlop, McIntosh) hinting at most enjoyable Wikipedia detours :) Yammy!… (meer)
 
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Den85 | 34 andere besprekingen | Jan 3, 2024 |
If you LOVE the USA, this book is a MUST read! Learn how communism (so CURRENT a THREAT today) spread after WWII and how ONE man almost shut it ALL down! However more important read about his multiple successful actions!!
 
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roebi | 4 andere besprekingen | Sep 23, 2023 |
Wow, this is a book that someone has probably already used the word "magisterial" to describe; and it deserves it. This is a
This definitely goes in the 're-read' stack.

I was actually quite surprised to find out that Dr. Herman is a fellow at the Hudson Institute (look it up if you don't know), and this kind of leapt out in the last chapter. There are some conclusions drawn there that strike me as... dubious. (E.g. that the reason WWII ended the depression was because of pent of dynamism/productivity just waiting to be unleashed, and that post-New Deal government intervention had little or nothing to do with this, seemingly ignoring the glaring fact that government spending on the war effort was the biggest intervention of all; fan or not of such government activity, it seems a jarring misapprehension.)

That said, I learned a lot from the book, it has lead me to already buy several books referenced (Discourses, Nicomachean Ethics, etc.) and to put several more on my to-read list (I might actually get around to reading Road to Serfdom now.)


Also, there were a few garbled translations of physics (I forget exactly what... something re: elections) and the description of the formula for entropy (W is the number of states, not the probability of states. And it should be a lower-case k.) You, potential reader, will not suffer any loss from this; I care because physics is my area :)
… (meer)
 
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dcunning11235 | 8 andere besprekingen | Aug 12, 2023 |

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