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Revising my 2024 Reading Goal

Coming into 2024 I resolved to read more books. I do read, and probably more than the majority of people, but nowhere near as much as I want to. I enjoy reading. But it is a constant battle against the Internet. So, making it a priority for this year is a thing I want to do.

I came in with the ambitious goal of reading 50 books this year, however I realized that this doesn't incentivize me the way I want. I've come to enjoy reading a lot more once I realized I can stop reading books when they stop being enjoyable or being worth the effort. And by making my goal 50 books, that pushes me not to quit books and thus makes picking up a book to read much more important.

First was "Our Oldest Companions" by Pat Shipman, which is a book looking at the history of humans and dogs. An interesting read, but I found it plodding at points and ultimately fell off. I had thought the book would be much more behavioral, and it does touch on that, but it is very focused on the transition point of wolves to dogs, and that as it turns out is not as interesting for me.

Second was a fiction novel which I'll admit I picked off of BookTok. "People from my Neighborhood" by Hiromi Kawakami. The pitch didn't reveal the true nature of the book, which I am glad for, despite it not being my cup of tea.

So, given that I'm in the third week of the year and I have abandoned two books already, it's clear that I need to change.

The current goal means I have to pick books which are ones I "have" to finish. And that isn't feasible. I need fluidity and flexibility.

Given this, I'm revising my goal. Rather than books, my goal is pages. If I arbitrarily set an average book length of 300 pages, then that translates 50 books into 15,000 pages this year. I tracked how far I got into each of the abandoned books, as well as the book I already finished. And it puts me at around 525 pages so far this year, which is a little behind pace for what I need for 15,000 pages. But is directionally where I want to be and so I feel good about it.

I've since finally dipped my toe in to Terry Pratchett's Discworld as I'm now reading Guards! Guards! and quite enjoying it. Additionally, I am working through an an audiobook called Scarcity Brain by Michael Easter. It's definitely infotainment, but I've taken a few interesting tidbits away from it. I'm glad I'm taking it as an audiobook, I think if I had read it as a book I would have bounced off at a few portions.

Currently Reading: 'The Perennials: the Megatrends Creating a Postgenerational Society'

I spent a bit yesterday reading, I'm currently working on "The Perennials: the Megatrends Creating a Postgenerational Society" which delves into some of the macro trends going on with society and the impacts they are having on us.

The book's blurb:

In today’s world, the acceleration of megatrends – increasing longevity and the explosion of technology among many others – are transforming life as we now know it.

In The Perennials, bestselling author of 2030 Mauro Guillén unpacks a sweeping societal shift triggered by demographic and technological transformation. Guillén argues that outmoded terms like Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z have long been used to pigeonhole us into rigid categories and life stages, artificially preventing people from reaching their full potential. A new postgenerational workforce known as “perennials” – individuals who are not pitted against each other either by their age or experience – makes it possible to liberate scores of people from the constraints of the sequential model of life and level the playing field so that everyone has a chance at living a rewarding life. Guillén unveils how this generational revolution will impact young people just entering the workforce as well as those who are living and working longer.

This multigenerational revolution is already happening and Mauro Guillén identifies the specific cultural, organizational and policy changes that need to be made in order to switch to a new template and usher in a new era of innovation powered by the perennials.

As I've been reading, I highlighted a few passages that jumped out at me.

◆ 1. The Four Stations in Life

This chapter largely spent time discussing the concept of the stations, highlighting their relative importance, and that middle age is overlooked as a crucial stage of a person's life.

Excerpts:

In combination, compulsory schooling, wage-based employment, and pension schemes became the foundation for the sequential model of the “four stations in life,” a poetic term resembling the cosmic seasonal calendar. Indeed, by the turn of the twenty-first century, virtually every country in the world had embraced the idea that life proceeds in the four separate and sequential stages of play, study, work, and retirement. It came to be taken for granted as if it were the natural, ideal, and inevitable way of organizing our lives.

I had never really heard the "four stations in life" before, at least not so directly. Interesting to see how the concept became a largely global concept.

The problem has become so pervasive that the Journal of Accountancy felt it necessary to publish a paper on “The Financial and Human Cost of Loneliness in Retirement,” directed at certified public accountants (CPAs) who work as financial planners. “Until recently, social isolation and loneliness were considered purely qualitative factors when it came to retirement satisfaction. They were not something that could be measured with dollars and cents.”

Referring to the impact of loneliness of elders in retirement.

Far from being a biological necessity, retirement somehow became a requirement and a life goal in and of itself. Obviously, some occupations lend themselves better to working well beyond what’s normally considered to be the “retirement age.” But politicians, financial advisors, and real estate developers have persuaded us that this last stage of life is something to aspire to and to long for.

On discussing the concept of retirement and how it is a construct of society.

◆ 2. Soaring Longevity and Health

As the chapter title says, focused on the life and health expectancy of people. Discussing the history of national pension programs, and the future outlook of them. It doesn't post solutions so much as review the concepts and the problems being faced. This chapter also managed to finally make me understand why decreasing birth rates poses such a problem, beyond just a familial issue, and a larger economic and social one.

Excerpts:

It makes a big difference that the average American born in 2022 is expected to live thirty-two years longer than in 1900: seventy-eight compared to forty-six.

I obviously knew the length of life expectancy has grown, but also found this stark increase shocking to see. That is a massive increase in lifespan expectancy.

“Once we have passed reproductive age, the genes can get sloppy about copying, allowing mutations to accumulate, because natural selection no longer cares.” Thus, the remarkable success in increasing life expectancy has multiplied the rates of all sorts of nasty health problems, including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, and dementia.

I had never considered this correlation, that in many, passing the age of expected reproduction sees higher incidences of other diseases. Whether it is truly tied to biological clocks in cells, I don't know.

“When we try to determine how justice can be advanced, there is a basic need for public reasoning, involving arguments coming from different quarters and divergent perspectives,” writes Amartya Sen, the Indian Nobel Prize–winning philosopher and economist, in his path-breaking book The Idea of Justice (2009). “An engagement with contrary arguments does not, however, imply that we must expect to be able to settle the conflicting reasons in all cases and arrive at agreed position on all issues. Complete resolution is neither a requirement of a person’s own rationality, nor is it a condition of reasonable social choice.”

I will say, The Perennials is giving me numerous excellent other books to read. I highlighted this passage both for its content, but also as a way to remember to check out Sen's book.

There are two ways of addressing any given problem, Russ calmly explained. One is to solve it. That means finding a way to overcome the immediate issue within the existing system design parameters and constraints. In the case of a major city’s rush-hour transportation woes, that might involve fine-tuning schedules, adding more bus lanes, anticipating traffic-light changes, directing passengers to less busy routes, or increasing fares during peak hour so as to discourage use. In a way, solving problems is like kicking the can down the road.

The other course of action, Russ would calmly propose, is to dissolve the problem altogether, to eradicate it. This second method consists of redefining the situation in such a way that the problem simply vanishes. In a brilliant stroke, he proposed to the London transit authorities that during rush hour, the fare collectors should not be riding on the back of the bus but standing at each bus stop. If one conductor were not enough for the busiest stops, two should be stationed. Not only would this dissipate the potential for conflict between drivers and fare collectors, but the process of loading passengers at each stop could be accelerated by several orders of magnitude. The problem thus simply went away.

I quite liked this passage as I was reading in bed. As I read it in the morning, with a fresh view, it isn't as stunning as it was when I read it. The core concept is good: when possible, remove the problem altogether, don't simply patch it. The solution to the London bus issue was an excellent one. I had this concept running through my mind as I fell asleep last night, thinking about some bigger issues which need to be eradicated in my life.

◆ 3. The Rise and Fall of the Nuclear Family

I haven't finished this chapter yet, but it is discussing the idea of a nuclear family and the larger role it plays in history and current society.

Excerpts:

According to historians Peter Laslett and Alan Macfarlane, the nuclear family living in a “simple house” was the norm in England as early as the thirteenth century. In fact, they argue that it was precisely the flexibility and geographical mobility of the nuclear family that made the Industrial Revolution possible, and not the other way around. The logic of the market requires malleable and redeployable individuals detached from the chains of kinship and community. Sociologists

I have never heard it framed this way, that the idea of the nuclear family being a requisite to enable the industrial revolution. I found it a fascinating concept to consider.

It is worth noting that in 1960, only a handful of Western European countries had a proportion greater than 10 percent (Iceland, Austria, and Sweden), and most were below 5 percent. At the time, it was 5.3 percent in the United States, and 4.3 percent in Canada.

This excerpt pertains to reported percentages of children born to unwed mothers and a potential fallacy in the logic and framing jumped out at me. It presents these numbers without any context or notes, and given the context I suspect that this could be suffering from underreporting due to societal pressures and norms.

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Overall I'm enjoying the book. It wasn't what I had expected going in, but it has been enlightening in numerous cases thus far. Looking forward to reading more of it today.

Currently Reading: The Perennials

Blurb for the book:

In today's world, the acceleration of megatrends – increasing longevity and the explosion of technology among many others – are transforming life as we now know it.

In The Perennials, bestselling author of 2030 Mauro Guillén unpacks a sweeping societal shift triggered by demographic and technological transformation. Guillén argues that outmoded terms like Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z have long been used to pigeonhole us into rigid categories and life stages, artificially preventing people from reaching their full potential. A new postgenerational workforce known as "perennials" – individuals who are not pitted against each other either by their age or experience – makes it possible to liberate scores of people from the constraints of the sequential model of life and level the playing field so that everyone has a chance at living a rewarding life. Guillén unveils how this generational revolution will impact young people just entering the workforce as well as those who are living and working longer.

This multigenerational revolution is already happening and Mauro Guillén identifies the specific cultural, organizational and policy changes that need to be made in order to switch to a new template and usher in a new era of innovation powered by the perennials.

I began it last night and I highlighted this blurb as it was discussing national retirement pensions:

In combination, compulsory schooling, wage-based employment, and pension schemes became the foundation for the sequential model of the "four stations in life," a poetic term resembling the cosmic seasonal calendar. Indeed, by the turn of the twenty-first century, virtually every country in the world had embraced the idea that life proceeds in the four separate and sequential stages of play, study, work, and retirement. It came to be taken for granted as if it were the natural, ideal, and inevitable way of organizing our lives.

The "four stations of life" here isn't something I had heard before. So I found it interesting to see it framed this way. I didn't highlight it, but it did discuss that German's Kaiser Wilhelm was the first to implement a national retirement pension in the world, and doing so diverted revolts at home.

It went on to discuss the role of school in both educating the masses, and also building in the mentality of working for the industrial revolution, etc. And when I stopped last night, it was discussing middle age and the fact it is the least of the four stations of life when it comes to research and writing. Looking forward to digging into it again later today.

What I'm Reading

Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties

By: Tom O'Neill

A journalist's twenty-year fascination with the Manson murders leads to "gobsmacking" (The Ringer) new revelations about the FBI's involvement in this "kaleidoscopic" (The New York Times) reassessment of an infamous case in American history.

I started this a while ago and then got distracted by another book. I've come back to it and am just beginning to dive in.

How to Be Perfect

By: Michael Schur

From the creator of The Good Place and the cocreator of Parks and Recreation, a hilarious, thought-provoking guide to living an ethical life, drawing on 2,400 years of deep thinking from around the world.

This one is my current audiobook. I had started it also a while ago and stopped thinking I wanted to delve deeper with the audiobook. But when I saw it available as a library audiobook I decided to go with it.

Braiding Sweetgrass

By: Robin Wall Kimmerer

Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, and as a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings—asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass—offer us gifts and lessons, even if we've forgotten how to hear their voices.

Another I had started as an audiobook but I didn't manage to finish it before it was returned to the library, and it hasn't been available for me when I've wanted it since then (everytime it came up I was in the middle of another book.) So, this week I picked up a physical copy from Barnes & Noble.

Others On Deck

These are books that are at the top of my unread pile. Will they actually be next? No idea.

• The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu and Ken Liu - Another I had begun as an audiobook and quickly realized the book required more focus and attention from me.
• The Climate Book by Greta Thunberg - We just had the hottest week ever, I don't think we can consume too much information about what is going on and what needs to be done.
• Checkmate in Berlin by Giles Milton - Honestly, this is one I picked up months ago and then the physical book got buried and I lost track of it.

And then this is what the most recent books are in my ebook library:

Currently Reading - 22 Feb. 2023

An Immense World by Ed Yong

A review of the book on goodreads:

This is one of the best science books I have read. Read this if you are at all curious about how other animals experience the world. You probably weren’t aware that humans can echo-locate. But other animals are capable of so much more than we are. Their abilities are amazingly fine-tuned to meet their needs. All of the concepts and experiments were very clearly explained and the audiobook was expertly narrated by the author.

Still early into this book, but I'm looking forward to it. It's fascinating, already, and I'm just into the first chapter.

The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant by Drew Hayes

Just begun this morning as an audiobook from the library after a recommendation from a friend. Already enjoying it, though I'm just a little ways in. It's campy urban fantasy which is something I enjoy for the lightweight nature of it. We'll see how it develops.

I had started King's The Gunslinger but fell off. Based on genre and writing, I should enjoy it and perhaps if I pushed through I would, but I just haven't gotten hooked. So, when Fred the Vampire Accountant became available from the library, I switched over.

"Ministry of the Future" By Kim Stanley Robinson

I'm currently reading this book. I'm almost a quarter of the way through it and it's a tough read. It's gritty and real and at times I'm not clear if the author is speaking to me the reader or if it is in the story, which is - to be blunt - fucking frightening, because of the state of climate change and the danger we are all in.

Highly recommend the book, but buckle up and be ready to look yourself and society in the mirror.