jprussell | (Reply)

From:

1) It was "The Intellectual We Deserve" from Current Affairs, a quick search of my text message history tells me.

2) Naw, that's fine, I think it was worth it

3) Fair enough, though I've adopted something of a heuristic like "folks I'm interested in probably aren't as well-known as I assume" - obviously that applies less within their particular field, but sometimes I'm surprised, like I meet a science fiction fan that's never heard of Neal Stephenson.

4) Yeah, I'd also still be thrilled to read such a book, I just reckon I'd find it far less helpful than I would have five or six years ago.

And hah! Meditations on Violence is great. I don't know how short a list of favorite books it would go on, and I haven't read it in like 10 years, but I remember it being great. I'd also pre-order an ESR book on such topics the moment I could.