Read on Twitter
Books that have started me on various intellectual journeys, a thread. Starting w/ the most cringe. Sowell's book started me on a lifelong journey of wrestling with Hayekian ideas. It's 1/2 excellent theoretical extension of "The Use of Knowledge in Society," 1/2 bad application
Popper was the first philosopher I really read, back as a teenager. I wouldn't call myself a critical rationalist now, but I still think this book is an excellent model for thinking about public discussion, the creative element of science and philosophy, and progress.
Bourgeois Dignity is the strongest book of this trilogy, but BV was very significant to me. It opened me up at a time when I had become very narrow. & the project "to revive a serious ethical conversation about middle-class life, the life of towns, the forum and agora." is worthy
Can't understate the impact of this book on me. It was like a well placed bomb under a weakening foundation; totally obliterated more assumptions I had clung to than any other single work. Set me into a journey reading about interpretation, meaning, & language.
Can't leave out @jtlevy from this thread! RP&F, along with The Multiculturalism of Fear, and various papers, changed the way I think about liberalism as both an intellectual project and an empirical phenomena in the world. I don't think I have to spell out the relevance of that!
If I had to recommend one book on systemic racism to skeptics of the idea, it would be this one. But on top of that, the sheer detail of the history in this book changed how I think about the way law operates, and was a big motivator for my current project https://adamgurri.com/2020/03/10/constitutionalism-project-the-concise-version/
