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The Age of Fallibility

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The Age of Fallibility

Consequences of the War on Terror

Public Affairs,

15 min read
10 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

Is it too late for America to reclaim its place as a guiding light for the rest of the free world?

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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Innovative

Recommendation

Self-made billionaire George Soros offers a dense, philosophical and theoretical book about the state of the United States and the world. Whether you like Soros’ politics or not, he speaks as a caring, major figure in investments, politics and philanthropy, where his strategies are well conceived and academically founded. This book covers the theoretical foundations of his political philosophy, and his concerns about democracy and open societies. He describes his vision for a better world, and talks about what his foundations are doing to fulfill that vision. Soros also talks very personally about his family background, his experiences with persecution and his struggle to reach the top, having arrived in London as a penniless refugee. He also explains how he recognized the investment opportunities that made him a billionaire. This highly unusual political and economic treatise is a glimpse inside an extraordinary contrarian mind. Agree with him or not, getAbstract thinks you will find that Soros is interesting company. (As is true of every Abstract, the following views are those of the author and not of getAbstract.)

Summary

The Power of Thought

Each person has a vision of reality that is defined and limited by how he or she thinks and acquires knowledge. Deeply rooted ideas may hinder your objectivity, though you can’t measure how much. Science is uncovering a lot of new information about the workings of learning and knowledge, but still no one knows how the mental interaction between ideas and facts begins.

People use what they know – whether it is accurate or not – to define their version of the truth about how the world works. In science, truth corresponds to facts. But when ordinary people define reality, they add their own filters, their inherently individual and imperfect understanding of the world. They can’t rely on their knowledge, because they did not generate it. Everything they “know” came from other people.

This does not stop most people from assuming that they can discover reality independently, apart from the bias of their viewpoints. This “correspondence theory” of truth depends on a clear demarcation between thinking and objective reality. But that methodology doesn’t work, because people are not dispassionate. They cannot perceive what is real beyond the fog of...

About the Author

Billionaire investor George Soros founded a global network of foundations dedicated to supporting open societies. He has written several books, including The Bubble of American Supremacy, Underwriting Democracy and Open Society.

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