Jay > Recent Status Updates

Looking into the pandemic as a retrospective... it's really impressive how much of The Plague resonates because Camus pinpoints the specific details in urban life and modern society that give sanity to people.

A meaningful thing with "The Plague" is that in the midst of the growing epidemic in the story, one of the main characters, Tarrou, opines in a summative description of life as the plague rages on, "...I'm no different. But what matter? Death means nothing to men like me. It's the event that proves them right."

The moment the book spills open Camus' perceptions of the world in this moment, it gets goooooooood.

Restarted reading this one. Quick 13 pages before proceeding with more in my next dive :)

Fukuyama is definitely more (and subtly) critical of abnormal behavior, but certain positions he presents like on aging are a little interesting to entertain amongst a sea of questionable drivel. Fun exercise to read anyway especially as the copy I have often contains footnotes from a previous owner that wrote stuff on the side 😂

This is my first exposure into Francis Fukuyama, so like with many authors and ideas I come to it with an open mind and an awareness of what's to come especially in terms of topics regarding biotechnology and its effects on the "human nature".

A little delicate, her style is surprising, uncomfortable and little dizzying. But the thoughts are there, and they feel smut-ish but also mature and earnest.

Damn.

His Essay On Repentance is a remarkable study about the understanding of our own judgment, and how it is essential to our being and our living to almost always be considered in all our choices and decisions made.

Again, so deep and enriching to read!

Reflections on consistency and the ability to judge right from wrong, again he is often quite anxious in suggesting actions as compared to his ruminations on things!

His ruminations in "On the Education of Children" sometimes sound contradictory at first, yet summatively are concentrated on the fact that the best form of living in education is to let children learn as freely yet boundedly–at least with the way he constructs his arguments and analysis.

It's so loaded too for an essay that is just about 30 pages long.

His thoughts on Idleness pose a very relatable quip regarding the consequences of doing nothing as opposed to having something. It's funny seeing a guy from 1580 know what I'm thinking about today!

This is the type of helpful book to read after you've lived through a startup. Some ideas aren't necessarily fresh, they don't always validate my own experiences or possibly others', but even for a book made in the year 2008, the ideas are still there to think and ponder on.

the process improvement section ❤️

I feel like I'm getting a slight refresher (not so deep though) on stuff I learned from the beginner's courses in IE. A lot of it really is not too specific, not too eye-opening, but it is nice to be reminded of the fundamentals every once in a while.

Reading this in alternations of Stephen West and Jon Bois is incredible.

PHILIPPINE NOIR ESSAY. THATS ALL!

Notes regarding essays on the colonial world of print and a semi-critical assessment of Bonifacio:

- The perspective regarding Bonifacio's placement, as with the rest of the Katipunan, and the contextual reuse of its movement throughout the years as a form of identification, still ring true today.
- Print stuff is cool!

Enjoyed the opening essay on Nick Joaquin. Not insomuch as it is a new perspective, but that it highlights an important note about his place in history: with comparatively less academic credentials and a more "unorthodox" upbringing, the argument for Nick Joaquin's importance in history is quite necessary.