to-read
(3218)
currently-reading (9)
read (1281)
did-not-finish (0)
own (557)
fiction (506)
comics (224)
philosophy (97)
2014 (86)
2013 (83)
2023 (62)
currently-reading (9)
read (1281)
did-not-finish (0)
own (557)
fiction (506)
comics (224)
philosophy (97)
2014 (86)
2013 (83)
2023 (62)
2015
(58)
2021 (58)
2022 (56)
2016 (53)
2017 (50)
2024 (49)
2025 (48)
2019 (45)
2020 (45)
cultural (42)
history (36)
2021 (58)
2022 (56)
2016 (53)
2017 (50)
2024 (49)
2025 (48)
2019 (45)
2020 (45)
cultural (42)
history (36)
“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.”
― I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon
― I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon
“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.”
―
―
“A Man Said to the Universe
A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”
― War Is Kind and Other Poems
A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”
― War Is Kind and Other Poems
“Physical objects are conceptually imported into the situation as convenient intermediaries not by definition in terms of experience, but simply as irreducible posits comparable, epistemologically, to the gods of Homer . . . For my part I do, qua lay physicist, believe in physical objects and not in Homer's gods; and I consider it a scientific error to believe otherwise. But in point of epistemological footing, the physical objects and the gods differ only in degree and not in kind. Both sorts of entities enter our conceptions only as cultural posits.”
―
―
Laurance’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Laurance’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
More friends…
Favorite Genres
Polls voted on by Laurance
Lists liked by Laurance































