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Original Title: | But What If We're Wrong? |
ISBN: | 0399184120 (ISBN13: 9780399184123) |
Edition Language: | English |
Literary Awards: | Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Nonfiction (2016) |
Chuck Klosterman
Hardcover | Pages: 262 pages Rating: 3.62 | 13755 Users | 1497 Reviews
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We live in a culture of casual certitude. This has always been the case, no matter how often that certainty has failed. Though no generation believes there’s nothing left to learn, every generation unconsciously assumes that what has already been defined and accepted is (probably) pretty close to how reality will be viewed in perpetuity. And then, of course, time passes. Ideas shift. Opinions invert. What once seemed reasonable eventually becomes absurd, replaced by modern perspectives that feel even more irrefutable and secure—until, of course, they don’t.But What If We’re Wrong? visualizes the contemporary world as it will appear to those who'll perceive it as the distant past. Chuck Klosterman asks questions that are profound in their simplicity: How certain are we about our understanding of gravity? How certain are we about our understanding of time? What will be the defining memory of rock music, five hundred years from today? How seriously should we view the content of our dreams? How seriously should we view the content of television? Are all sports destined for extinction? Is it possible that the greatest artist of our era is currently unknown (or—weirder still—widely known, but entirely disrespected)? Is it possible that we “overrate” democracy? And perhaps most disturbing, is it possible that we’ve reached the end of knowledge?
Kinetically slingshotting through a broad spectrum of objective and subjective problems, But What If We’re Wrong? is built on interviews with a variety of creative thinkers—George Saunders, David Byrne, Jonathan Lethem, Kathryn Schulz, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Brian Greene, Junot Díaz, Amanda Petrusich, Ryan Adams, Nick Bostrom, Dan Carlin, and Richard Linklater, among others—interwoven with the type of high-wire humor and nontraditional analysis only Klosterman would dare to attempt. It’s a seemingly impossible achievement: a book about the things we cannot know, explained as if we did. It’s about how we live now, once “now” has become “then.”
Define Out Of Books But What If We're Wrong? Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past
Title | : | But What If We're Wrong? Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past |
Author | : | Chuck Klosterman |
Book Format | : | Hardcover |
Book Edition | : | Deluxe Edition |
Pages | : | Pages: 262 pages |
Published | : | June 7th 2016 by Blue Rider Press |
Categories | : | Nonfiction. Philosophy. Writing. Essays. History. Science. Audiobook. Thriller |
Rating Out Of Books But What If We're Wrong? Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past
Ratings: 3.62 From 13755 Users | 1497 ReviewsRate Out Of Books But What If We're Wrong? Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past
As the opening chapter questions whether we could be wrong about the existence of gravity, I thought this would be a book about philosophy and the nature of existence. Of course, I should have looked closely at the author's name - Chuck Klosterman writes about the arts and pop culture, so rather than questioning the nature of existence, mostly this book questions our value judgements on the arts and pop culture. The chapter on books asks just how wrong we can be about who will be the voice ofThis was a fun book. I received an ARC in exchange for my review, and I have to say that I would strongly recommend this to anyone who loves to ask "What if?" This is one of those books you just can't take seriously at all, but if you're willing to follow the author down the hypothetical scenario rabbit hole, it's quite amusing. You will ponder who the next Kafka will be, whether the Beatles will still be historically important in the far future, whether there is another version of you (or
As the opening chapter questions whether we could be wrong about the existence of gravity, I thought this would be a book about philosophy and the nature of existence. Of course, I should have looked closely at the author's name - Chuck Klosterman writes about the arts and pop culture, so rather than questioning the nature of existence, mostly this book questions our value judgements on the arts and pop culture. The chapter on books asks just how wrong we can be about who will be the voice of
If you're the type of person who gets annoyed at conversations that seem unsolvable (i.e. "What if the color red I see isn't the color red you see?"), then do not read this book. However, if you're fascinated by these philosophical quandaries (Neil deGrasse Tyson calls them "beer conversations" in the book), then this book is for you. I love his overriding concept of trying to figure out how to today will be judged by tomorrow. At first I was worried that it might veer into "pot conversation"
The starting point of this book is absolutely interesting: let us imagine what people would think about our own age in 500 or 1,000 years, assuming that there are still people. Not a simple matter, of course, but there is a strong tendency to immediately conclude that what we now take for granted will turn out to be completely wrong, just as we now see that what was thought 500 or 1,000 years ago largely was wrong or at least not adequate enough.Klosterman illustrates this by asking, for
Best thing I've read this year.The premise is pretty simple. Basically, Klosterman spends most of a book...not PROVING that we're wrong about just about everything, but asking questions that make us think, "If I step outside myself for a second, I COULD be wrong."You'd be amazed the places he goes with this. He starts with fucking gravity! STARTS with. Not proving that gravity is nonexistent as we experience it, but that it may be an emergent force, which is a force that results from other
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