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May 28, 2021Liked by N.S. Lyons

Thank you for the flattering comments to your readers ;-)

Having read too much, from Shakespeare´s sonnets to his Dark Lady to Sophocles and Marx, I stay away from one-subject-books. For me to understand our present, Mises, JB Peterson from Bible series to all strands of psychology, and an in-depth history of Western Civ are good essentials. Re-reading Genesis and Exodus and the Gospel St. John took me months and was deeply gratifying, too.

Our hybris of being smarter than our ancestors can only be cured by a solid understanding of history, for the opposite is the case.

To get a grasp of China, I found the German book "Die Chinesen" by Stefan Baron and his Chinese wife the best yet.

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"The Captive Mind" by Czesław Miłosz. Here in contemporary life, fandom drama has always been a cringey rabbit hole, but for several years I've noticed a more specifically authoritarian moralistic streak in these social media arts and entertainment circles that used to have a reputation for creativity and openness. It actually gets really silly, like if somebody thinks a fantasy evil overlord is cool, they are accused of secretly having bad politics in real life(!) And it turns out these accusers are, like, 30-year-old professionals and academics, not just teenagers going through a phase. And this lack of distinction between fantasy and reality, or between the personal and political, is a major shift that has spilled into the real world. Back to the point of "The Captive Mind": it demonstrates how artists and writers and other creatives not only fall for totalitarianism like anyone else, but they are often *early adopters* of it. I reviewed the book itself on my blog.

"Vanya: A True Story" by Myrna Grant. Demonstrates the 1970s U.S.S.R. escalating abuse, torture, and eventual murder / "accidental" death of a young Christian all because he admitted, within earshot of other military conscripts, to losing track of time in prayer. From its main intended faith-based lens, it is about martyrdom and the power of God. From a secular lens, it is about the violence that ensues when the existence of a personal life is considered a political threat, and how authoritarians become the very "fanatics" they try to suppress.

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May 28, 2021Liked by N.S. Lyons

I picked back up Voltaire’s Bastards again this week, which I’ve been slowly working my way through. I wouldn’t rate the writing as the best, but it’s definitely thought provoking and has aged pretty decently in my opinion. His comparison of elites and bourgeois to courtiers seems quite relevant.

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May 28, 2021Liked by N.S. Lyons

Thank you for sharing your captivating work with us, N.S.

In the April issue of First Things—in print and on the magazine’s website—there is a piece by Matthew Rose called “Masters and Slaves” in which philosopher Alexandre Kojève‘s interpretation of Hegel is presented as an explanation for how/why “identity politics” has, broadly speaking, consumed the West. I find it most convincing. Also, Maël Renouard’s Fragments of an Infinite Memory from NYRB is a lighter but equally revelatory study of the internet culture that increasingly IS our culture.

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The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self by Carl R. Trueman

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Its not over production; its shrinking the pie. What is shrinking the pie? As an example, look at academia a lot of the "overproduced elite" could have made a living in academia. Academia took a clue from the corporate world and turned almost everybody into adjunct contract labor.

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" See Satan Fall Like Lightning" by Rene Girard. Chapters 13 & 14 - "the other totalitarianism" is absolutely prophetic about our modern world.

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I was scouring the web for mentions of 'elite overproduction' and I came across this post, but I've been a reader of yours for some time. While useful, I think the concept could benefit from some historicization in how it manifests socio-culturally. I recently authored a piece on how elite overproduction materialized in Czarist Russia, intuitively understood by Dostoevsky and many of his contemporaries. Maybe worth checking out, cheers.

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Currently reading "Archetypes and Unconsciousness" by C.G. Jung. Jung also provides a good perspective on your topics. He points out that the human beings actually need spirituality and some kind of perception of depth. To oversimplify, this results from the fact that human mind is still not entirely explored by us (even as of today, and much less at Jung's times) and irrational explanations are necessary. Otherwise, Jung says, if we rationalize everything completely, we literally lose our minds. If you are new to his theories it is good to begin with summaries by later Jung adopters, such as "King Warrior Magician Lover" by R. Moore.

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The "elite overproduction" thesis goes back to Hayek and Schumpeter. Nothing new there.

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The Sovereign Individual- although it sounds like you have already read it and that it is part of your world view.

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This brief summary by William Sims Bainbridge on his work (in the 1980s) with Rodney Stark on the inevitability of religion is worth a read:

https://cdn.centerforinquiry.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/26/1988/04/22160944/p21.pdf

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