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"Books That Will Make Me Smarter"

Friedmett

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Makes me smarter?

More making me more aware of who I am and what I can do.

Some good books I can recommend:

The science of getting rich by Wallace D Wattles

You were born rich by Bob Proctor

Think and grow rich by Napoleon Hill

Constant reading those 3 above books makes a ton of difference to your paradigm knowing what power you have inside to be creative to reach any goal you could possibly want.
 

Venas

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Wow, very interesting list but I would add some my books: Desert Solitaire, Geek Love, Giovanni's Room and articles from http://paperity.org/ about knowledge, world, law etc.


 

Lionel Hutz

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Lionel Hutz

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I am a Charlie fan and have that book. Maybe I will pass it on, as you suggest.

I keep telling myself I have to make it to one more annual meeting before he dies, I guess I should book this next one, it has been 10 years since I last went
 

himichael

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The kid is in high school. There is nothing wrong with that list as a starting point. The task is NOT futile IMHO, neither is the list odd. Encourage him or her to press on and reevaluate the list from time to time. Also to learn a second language.



A High School kid told me that ze wanted to read:

Dr. Zhivago
Essays by Joan Didion
The Power Broker
Umberto Ecco
Swann's Way
Ayn Rand
War and Peace
Pushkin
Dead Souls (Gogol)
Lolita
Don Quixote
Catch-22
Toni Morrison
Joyce Carol Oates

so that ze would be smarter (ze is currently in the middle of Crime and Punishment and then moving on to War & Peace. I gather the list came from zir head and is sort of a "books literate people have read" list.

Apart from the futility of the task and the oddity of the list already compiled, what books would you suggest? My approach would be not to focus on "books literate people have read" which is near endless, but rather choose books that would be mind expanding and introduce new ways of thinking. So apart from the various Dialogues, I would suggest something like Taleb's Black Swan and Hofstader's Godel, Escher, Bach. Especially since the kid is already pretty well read in the humanities from what I can tell.
 

A_G

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"How Not to Be Wrong" by Jordan Ellenberg.

Great insight into how to apply mathematical thinking to everyday life. Note, thinking mathematically is a different skill than being good at replicating and using formulas. Feyman once complained that he had higher level students who were excellent at plugging and chugging formulas, but when he asked an exam question which required a student to think on their own, the number chuggers didn't do well.

Because a lot of philosophy books have been suggested, I feel I should mention a book I wish I had read in parallel to the books already mentioned.

"At The Existentialist Café: Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails" by Sarah Bakewell

Great introduction to the development of existentialist philosophy. It will cover everything from Hegel onwards and provide important context to the character's ideas based upon the character's lives. Not only will you get a nice intro to different ways of seeing the world, you'll also learn about the less than ideal lives of "great thinkers" as well as the arbitrary (but sophisticated and logically rigorous) nature of philosophy. If I read this earlier, I wouldn't have taken myself so seriously when reading philosophy books. Philosophy is an excellent toy to play with and to sharpen your mind, but don't confuse it with lived reality.... is something I wish I had learned earlier.
 
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Lionel Hutz

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Some good comics. Seriously, people who only read "important" books are clueless assholes. Being well rounded means exactly that, not just slavish genuflection towards the classics.

Something about economics and finance. Again, if you want to be well rounded having a foundation in monetary theory is pretty relevant.

The Federalist Papers.

I think basics of personal finance are really important for a HS kid as are a historical study of behavioral finance (such as https://www.amazon.com/Devil-Take-Hindmost-Financial-Speculation/dp/0452281806)
 

Lionel Hutz

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Freakonomics is a great suggestion.
I read Ender's Game and liked it, but I would put the Foundation Trilogy or Dune ahead of it in the SF category.
Haven't read the other two but thing Art of War might be a great choice as well. Not sure I want to recommend Philosophy other than for reasoning.

I didn't enjoy The Art of War but I am currently reading Meditations by Marcus Aurelius and I'm blown away . . .

next is Franklin's autobiography, Twain's autobiography and one other but it is escaping me right now (already read JJR's Confessions so that's not it)
 

Jeremiah Say

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Try "Barking Up the Wrong Tree" by Eric Barker. Funny AF, entertaining as hell and changed the ways I view the world.
 

Tasya

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lately I have become interested in time management and books that help manage time, advise what you helped, please
 

Ericloveslife

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The science of getting rich by Wallace D Wattles

You were born rich by Bob Proctor

Think and grow rich by Napoleon Hill

Constant reading those 3 above books makes a ton of difference to your paradigm knowing what power you have inside to be creative to reach any goal you could possibly want.

Yup they can't get any better than this. I would add some few new books like Tim Grover's Relentless (Lifetime trainer of Michael Jordan) and T Harv Eker's Secrets To A Millionaire Mind. Also just read and watch stuff by Dan Pena. It will blow you away.
 

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