We are joined by Mike from the YouTube channel Mike Reads the World to chat about his reading project and our year in reading.

Mike's channel is at https://www.youtube.com/@mikereadstheworld His "favorite books" video we mention is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6aH-YHa_y4 His "Magic Mountain" essay is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyA6Oc6_pIU

Mike's books mentioned: Sei Shonagon - The Pillow Book The I-Ching Fariduddin Attar - Conference of the Birds Ovid- Metamorphoses Ngugi wa Thiong'o - The Wizard of the Crow Thomas Mann - The Magic Mountain Anna Comnena - The Alexiad

We also proposed a read-long for Correction by Thomas Bernhard.

Our friend Freddy joins us to talk about scams, politics and how they overlap.

Tom walks us through the book The Essence of Reality by 'Ayn al-Qudat, a 12th Century Sufi text about going beyond the intellect to embrace mystical experience.

We chat about our cookie headaches and X-Com and Lebanon and Hannah Arendt.

Mentioned:

Eichmann in Jerusalem by Hannah Arendt Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt On Revolution by Hannah Arendt

The X-Com 2 mod guy Tom mentions is christopherodd

Marlon Ettinger, a journalist living in France, joins Don to talk about French politics. Find Marlon on Twitter at @MarlonEttinger his new pod at @flep24pod and his book Zemmour & Gaullism.

Our friend Freddy joins from Vienna to talk about his Euro-Trip, Noam Chomsky, the war in Gaza, and the point of philosophy.

The Third Reich at War by Richard J. Evans. Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson. Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky. Left anti-communism: The Unkindest Cut by Michael Parenti. My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgaard. This Is a Robbery (Netflix documentary about 1990 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery).

We chat about the failing Dream Port, the peace plan, paying off our debts, soul corn, some books and elections.

Mentioned: Harland's Half Acre by David Malouf. My Struggle Book 1 by Karl Ove Knausgaard. Historical Capitalism by Immanuel Wallerstein. Language and Myth by Ernst Cassirer. Our Bloc by James Schneider.

Tom tells the history of the Crusades, the Mongol invasions, and the rise of the Mamluks in part 3 of a series on Muslim history. The full series is available on Patreon.

An excerpt from a premium episode available through a Patreon subscription, in which Tom provides a history of the rise and fall of the original Islamic state, and a description of the Muslim world's social structure at the time, including the institution of slavery and transformations that came about as a result of the Islamic movement. (re-uploaded to fix some audio issues)

A quick and casual Q&A in which we field questions from the Discord about Russia/Ukraine, our military vehicles of choice, UFOs, the future of VR, and our astrological signs.