h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

O <-- hastily proffered donut.

But you're right about what happens when humans find themselves in a corner, unexpectedly. The aftermath of Hurricane Andrew comes to mind.

But I also think that, when people behave as badly as some did after Andrew (looting, cheating, fighting over food) it demonstrates their unpreparedness for reality.

I understand all that, but how do you react when you've been in a corner and you don't even know it?
-when one of the kids talks another one into being greedy about the sand so he has one less person to fight with over the toy?
-I know, I know-kudos for the first kid for using his brain, the stupid one shouldn't be so gullible (sp?), Blah, blah, blah.

Sometimes I want to just scream: 'Fragile mind! Please handle with care!' But then I know that those that scream: 'Survival of the fittest!' would flock to me like hungry vultures to eight day old carrion, infested with maggots and smelling sweetly of rot.

It just makes me depressed that there are people like this.

But don't get me wrong, my favorite types of books are Sword & Sorcery
types. I know that most writers have a good look at life.

I just don't think that a really fake-happy book should tell about us.
No matter what era, there's always been greedy people, and people who just smile and ignore the bad stuff cuz it's not happening to them, & that is wierd because we've all seen the movies, we all know about bad juju so why have we not learned yet?

I would like to propose two books (really a book and a movie )

1st - (book) Ender's Game, deals with what happens when the human race is put into a corner, and then what happens when the corner disappears. Also deals with interpersonal communication, rebellion, and the human character under stress.

2nd - (movie - although the screenplay could be considered a book, and I fell like cheating ) American Beauty, deals with a classic dysfunctional family, their relations, their awakening into an aspect of reality and the ways they deal with this awakening.

Courtesy

I agree with Courtesy about American Beauty, but the book I had in mind following Phul's post was Anna Karenina. I thought Tolstoy was a genius in how he made Anna's husband unlikeable and yet evoked so much sympathy for him in the course of the story.

But there you have the inevitable and ineluctable clash of human needs that makes it seem impossible for anyone to have a right to happiness.

Nice to see you out and about again, Courtesy.

i think this movie is one of the best recent examples of how the human condition in general can be understood so well by examining these random details and how they interact... examining the general via the specific almost as if everything about everything can be contained in any single item if one examines it thoroughly enough. leibniz's "monadology" anyone?

It seems to me that everything is in a sense relative to everything else, somehow connected by the details however vague or specific. I don't know if this is what you meant, but it leads me toward what I've been reading lately; Plato The Collected Dialogues. Much of Socrates' philosophy (seems to me) is about asking a question to answer a question. This view inspires me to believe that any answer could be reached by asking simpler questions and compairing the answers.

The Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu. Check it out, in various translations.

somewhat close to what i was describing, but leibniz describes it more the way i see it in my head, rather than that old greek frat boy club. The "dialogue format" that they use irritates me to no end. But it does demonstrate (to me, anyway) that there is no such thing as a final answer, knowledge is only reached through questions, and questioning questions, and then even more complicated questions about those questions which create more questions like bunnies on a three-week honeymoon. simplicity is not possible in a system built on the complicated. i resent the whole attempt at simplifying, since it bases its effort on the assumption that we are simple beings with simple lives and simple thoughts that need simple answers. if only life were that easy on some level we're well aware that it's not, and the only way to reach greater understanding is... umm... to make things more confusing. because that's exactly what they are. if that makes any sense to anyone not living in my head.

yummy
ancient chinese philosophical texts by lao tzu or confucius or mencius, etc... almost make me want to contradict that anti-simplicity rant above.. almost
i think the possibility for various interpretations of all of those texts, plus similar ones (i.e. buddhist philosophy), enforce the concept that uniqueness is the norm, despite some basic common elements of the human condition. almost everyone can extract something meaningful, but it is almost always something different, tailored to the individual.

i am delirious. i wonder when my brain left for a vacation without leaving a bye-bye note.

i miss it already.

You'll get over it soon. I know I did.

Right after you read _Oh The Places You'll Go_ by Dr. Seuss, my new nomination.

My favorite of Dr. Seuss is Sneeches
& a close second is Fox in Socks, cuz I absolutely love the Beetle Battle...

i don't think i read enough dr. seuss as a child... and when i did i think it all blended together a bit too much, so i really should go back to it and set it straight in my head. or maybe it's better as some kind of whipped pudding aspect of my mentality. did that even seem one bit coherent? i didn't think so.

I think-
like all meshed around and blended very smoothly?
(or not so smoothly)

I'd like to nominate Wuthering Heights. All those feelings, passion, pride and misunderstandings seem pretty much to exemplify the human condition to me.
Or for a slightly more obscure choice, how about Narziss and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse. Years since I read it but as I remember it the two main characters represent two opposing faces of human nature - pure reason and muddy emotion, or artistic v scientific thinking.

I was lent N and G about 2 years ago and *still* haven't read it... Maybe this is the inspiration I need

It sounds very interesting!

N&G sounds interesting. How about some good old Russian novels, Crime and Punishment or The Brothers Karamozov (sp?). Both are great looks into the mind and journeys along relationships.

Courtesy