Guus Bosman

This is the story of two Dutch journalists who travel through the United States to 28 places called "Holland", to find out what the history of those places is.

It's an entertaining book, which gives some insight in the American society and very strongly in how a lot of Dutch people look at the American society.

In the author's own words, this book is about "different imaginative visions, different world-pictures, different myths by which we try to make our choice intelligible". It is a philosophical book, but with practical explanations on why certain world views (myths) are popular today, and how they have evolved over the last few hundred years.

She does a great job in pointing out various biases modern Western readers have, and how they may influence our world views and acceptance of certain theories of the world. Ideas like 'social contracts' and 'memes' are being analyzed. A central question is the mind/body relationship, and why there is a distinction between the two in the first place in our world views. The author forces you to reevaluate old ideas, and points to subtle assumptions in your thinking. My father gave me The Myths We Live By as a present and the dedication he wrote in the book fits this perfectly: "philosophy is always keep asking questions".

She identifies as a weaknesses in grand theories a large abstract 'black box' between vast principles and specific cases (p. 85). She credits such theories with the fact that they can shed light on certain moral questions, "light up and clarify some special aspect of life, to supply conceptual tools which will do a certain necessary kind of work. Wide though that area of work may be, it is never the whole, and all ideas lose their proper power when they are used out of the ir appropriate context" (p 156).

A year ago I read Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond and I enjoyed that book tremendously. Collapse was just as good.

The book describes how various societies have failed in the past, and analyses what the root causes of those failures were. Deforestation and unsustainable population growth were some of the common causes, as was an inability by some societies to changes cultural values when necessary. The Norse Greenlanders for example, seemed to have had a taboo against fish eating -- incredible if you consider the availability of fresh fish in Greenland.

This is good read on interviewing and hiring new employees. It helps you get in the right mindset to interview people.

When I read it the first time a few years ago it also helped me get up to speed with how interviews are done in the United States.