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Dec. 26th, 2013 12:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogLast night, while playing Master of Orion II with folks here, I also worked through more Spanish Rosetta Stone and finished reading "The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism". I like this work methodology.
If I'm being honest about Weber, I have to say that it seemed like there was way more stuff in that book than there needed to be. But I'm also not familiar with the requirements that existed for presenting a solid, academically-based argument a century ago. His argument (that Protestant asceticism is largely what led to then-current conceptions of capitalism as a nigh-religious calling to business, sacrificing any immediate comfort and pleasure in favor of furthering one's business) seems reasonable. I'd like to read some more modern commentary and criticism on it. And as I noted earlier, it's oddly relevant to Atlas Shrugged, which I've now gotten through half the third tape of, and which I might well give up on shortly.
Next on my reading list is Foucault's "Discipline and Punish" which I now have in eBook form. It's a philosophical history of the system of public (that is, state) punishment and discipline. I can tell from the first few pages that this will be a much less ponderous text to get through; I'm looking forward to it. My own ideas have been influenced enough by what I've heard of Foucault, that it's definitely time to read him directly.
Today, I'm also going to type up my notes from the AAA conference, finally, and start looking for some of the material that I intended to follow up on.
If I'm being honest about Weber, I have to say that it seemed like there was way more stuff in that book than there needed to be. But I'm also not familiar with the requirements that existed for presenting a solid, academically-based argument a century ago. His argument (that Protestant asceticism is largely what led to then-current conceptions of capitalism as a nigh-religious calling to business, sacrificing any immediate comfort and pleasure in favor of furthering one's business) seems reasonable. I'd like to read some more modern commentary and criticism on it. And as I noted earlier, it's oddly relevant to Atlas Shrugged, which I've now gotten through half the third tape of, and which I might well give up on shortly.
Next on my reading list is Foucault's "Discipline and Punish" which I now have in eBook form. It's a philosophical history of the system of public (that is, state) punishment and discipline. I can tell from the first few pages that this will be a much less ponderous text to get through; I'm looking forward to it. My own ideas have been influenced enough by what I've heard of Foucault, that it's definitely time to read him directly.
Today, I'm also going to type up my notes from the AAA conference, finally, and start looking for some of the material that I intended to follow up on.
