If you had to recommend ONE book...

[Hayabusa]

'Under The Volcano' by Malcolm Lowry

[Rhöna of the Rhein]

Originally Posted by Wreakin_Havok

yes man by danny wallace.

i'm reading that just now - good shout.

i'd recommend Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Luiz Zafon - think it's being made into a movie.

[djtoast]

[offtopic]

Originally Posted by endless psych

I think its usually fair to assume that in common usage when people say something is "shit" they mean they thought it was shit.

Er, obviously. That's just saying the same thing twice.

Originally Posted by endless psych

IE they didn't like it.

"ie" ??? How does that follow?

"It was (adjective)" is assigning a specific, intrinsic attribute to a thing; "I didn't like it" is stating a subjective opinion than can be both true for some people and untrue for others without causing contradiction- they are not synonymous. (Notice that the subject in the first sentence is the thing denoted by the pronoun; in the second it's the "I" and the thing is relegated to being the object. ie, the object exists in terms of the subject - not true in the first instance.

Originally Posted by endless psych

I fail to see the need for someone to qualify such an opinion by stating - "its perfectly well written/performed/etc but I thought it was shit"

I'm not saying people have to explain themselves. Just that if they mean they didn't enjoy something, that point is conveyed better by saying so, rather than expecting someone to guess that that's what they meant, but actually saying that it was bad.

(In this instance though I think Mark meant both: that he didn't enjoy it because (in his view) it was bad. Which makes perfect sense. But it would make semantic sense to say that you don't enjoy Shakespeare's writing because it's bad. By almost any sane measure though, there'd be a critical flaw (but not a logical one) at work there.

Originally Posted by endless psych

as most peoples default assumption of their meaning will be the former.

Well you may be right; that's not my experience on the whole. For the most part I think people assume that something described as "shit" has something wrong with it, some aspect you can attach a demonstrable criticism to. Are there things you happen not to like but still recognise as having merit? Would you really describe them as "shit"?

Originally Posted by endless psych

If you want to carry on an arguement based on the spurious notion that people on the internet should qualify statments of opinion so as to avoid confusing you into starting objective arguements about objective quality then feel free. I just think its rather pointless. (Particularly when your talking about objective consensus amoung experts in the arts...)

Look up "spurious" , it doesn't mean what you think. And look up "argument" and "your" too

I wasn't confused. It's easier to respond to what someone has actually said rather than what they might have meant... but I'll reiterate that I seem to have been right: Mark does actually find some fault in the book... That was the aspect I was addressing, not why he didn't enjoy reading it (hell, you could fail to enjoy reading something because someone was flicking you on the head the whole time you were reading, but in a discussion of literature I think it's more interesting to discuss what's good or bad about the book itself).


[/offtopic]

[fuckin-yaldie]

Originally Posted by djtoast

"ie" ??? How does that follow?

Dude, you're for getting that endless was the guy that cleverly constructed his "price of glasses" theorem explaining why the QM booked Goldie Looking Chain for Freshers week. Don't mess with him.

[yummy mummy]

I'd probably say Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes. It's not my all time favourite book, but everyone I've ever recommended it to has loved it.

[fracture4]

'panic' by jeff abbott is awesome!

[yummy mummy]

Originally Posted by Devastator

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. Unless you have no heart.

Mark Haddon's great I recently finished his second book, A Spot of Bother. Brilliant wee story.

[LesMTS]

Originally Posted by djtoast

Look up "spurious" , it doesn't mean what you think.

I dunno, you can legitimately talk about "spurious reasoning", meaning invalid (but not necessarily with intentional deception), which I think is the way the word is being used here.

[poprock]

Does it have to be a novel? I usually recommend Stop Stealing Sheep by Erik Spiekermann. If this has to be a novel though, I might go with Chinese Takeout by Arthur Nersesian or Going Postal by Stephen Jaramillo. Both easy-reading tales of youthful urban living in the mid-nineties, but both with a slightly dark sense of humour that edges them away from the mainstream just that tiny bit. Both obscure enough that most folk won’t have already read them, too.

[Largest of Als]

Another Autobiography.. if you like that sort thing..

Shooting Wars.. by Erik Durchmied.

(In some territories it's also called 'Dont Shoot the Yanquee')



Al

[djtoast]

Originally Posted by LesMTS

I dunno, you can legitimately talk about "spurious reasoning", meaning invalid (but not necessarily with intentional deception), which I think is the way the word is being used here.

Absolutely: reasoning can be spurious if it's based on suppositions which are untrue; here though the "should" in "If you want to carry on an arguement based on the spurious notion that people on the internet should qualify statments of opinion so as to avoid confusing you..." is something that couldn't ever be established one way or the other - the "notion" is a preference or opinion or whim, which can't be shown to be wrong - so where can the "untruth" come from that makes it spurious?

I'd say this was analogous to "refute" versus "deny."


ON topic (gasp) Bill Bryson: any really, even if you've not been to or planned to visit the place in question they're very entertaining and just a little informative too.

[LesMTS]

Originally Posted by djtoast

Absolutely: reasoning can be spurious if it's based on suppositions which are untrue; here though the "should" in "If you want to carry on an arguement based on the spurious notion that people on the internet should qualify statments of opinion so as to avoid confusing you..." is something that couldn't ever be established one way or the other - the "notion" is a preference or opinion or whim, which can't be shown to be wrong - so where can the "untruth" come from that makes it spurious?

I'd say this was analogous to "refute" versus "deny."


ON topic (gasp) Bill Bryson: any really, even if you've not been to or planned to visit the place in question they're very entertaining and just a little informative too.

You could say that expecting people to always do so is unrealistic. Yes, it's a preference or opinion but one which (any reasonable person must expect) is unlikely ever to be realised. So you could say the notion was kinda spurious in that sense.

[djtoast]

Nope. You can be wrong (eg if you make an unrealistic assumption, but still be entirely genuine.

Proofs of God's existence could be spurious; faith in God's existence could not be*, even if it's based on having seen a really big fish one time that couldn't possibly have evolved to that size. The reasoning contains fallacies but the faith is real, genuine, authentic faith.



*Well obviously you could claim to have faith in God's existance but not actually believe in God, but you know what I mean.

[Rowsbette]

Originally Posted by Rhöna of the Rhein

i'd recommend Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Luiz Zafon - think it's being made into a movie.

Excellent call.

Kate Atkinson's "Behind the Scenes at the Museum" is another one, haven't met anyone who dislikes it.

[endless psych]

Originally Posted by djtoast

[offtopic]Look up "spurious" , it doesn't mean what you think. And look up "argument" and "your" too

Well at least we know you have a "theory of mind" toast