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昨天阅读1个小时,累积阅读56个小时。
We will be guided by what is most lively. The ethics side is straightforward, as part of the general Fat Tony–Isocrates asymmetry, and I have gone deeply into the matter thanks to a highly argumentative collaboration with the philosopher (and walking companion) Constantine Sandis. Tort law is equally straightforward, and I had thought it would occupy a large section of this volume, but it will thankfully be minimal. Why?
Tort law is insipid to those who don’t have the temperament that takes one to law school. For, prompted by the fearless Ralph Nader, a coffee table in my study accumulated close to twenty volumes on contract law and torts. But I found the topic so dull that it was a Herculean task for me to read more than seven lines per sitting (which is the reason God mercifully invented social media and Twitter fights): unlike science and mathematics, law, while being very rigorous, doesn’t offer surprises. Law cannot be playful. The mere sight of these books reminds me of a lunch with a former member of the Federal Reserve Board, the kind of thing to which one should never be subjected more than once per lifetime. So I will dispatch the topic of torts in a few lines.
As we intimated in the first paragraphs of the introduction, some nonsoporific topics (pagan theology, religious practices, complexity theory, ancient and medieval history, and, of course, probability and risk taking) match this author’s naturalistic filter. Simply: if you can’t put your soul into something, give it up and leave that stuff to someone else.
Talking about soul in the game, I had to overcome some shame as follows. In the Paris episode of Hammurabi at the Louvre, when I stood in front of the imposing basalt stele (in the room with Koreans with selfie sticks), I felt uneasy not being able to read the stuff and having to rely on experts. What experts? This would have been fine if it was a cultural journey, but here I am professionally writing a book going very deep into that stuff! It felt like cheating not knowing the ancient text the way it was read and recited at the time. In addition, one of my episodic hobbies is Semitic philology, so I had no excuse. So I have been distracted by an obsession to learn enough Akkadian in order to recite Hammurabi’s law with Semitic phonetics, sort of having some soul in the game. It may have delayed the completion of this book, but, at least, when I mention Hammurabi, my conscience doesn’t make me feel I am faking anything.
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