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The Age of Fallibility: Consequences of the War on Terror
 
 
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The Age of Fallibility: Consequences of the War on Terror (Hardcover)

by George Soros (Author)
Key Phrases: radical fallibility, changeable society, changeless society, United States, European Union, President Bush (more...)
3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (21 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Review
"It is hard to deny [Soros'] thorough familiarity with today's profoundly interdependent world." -- The St. Louis Post Dispatch

Product Description
The legendary financier-and founder of the Open Society Institute-offers crucial insight into the real meaning of freedom, and how societies can best promote it

After reflecting on his support of a losing Democrat for president, George Soros steps back to revisit his views on why George Bush's policies around the world fall short in the arenas most important to Soros: democracy, human rights and open society. As a survivor of the Holocaust and a life-long proponent of free expression, Soros understands the meaning of freedom. And yet his differences with George Bush, another proponent of freedom, are profound.

In this powerful essay Soros spells out his views and how they differ from the president's. He reflects on why the Democrats may have lost the high ground on these values issues and how they might reclaim it. As he has in his recent books, On Globalization and The Bubble of American Supremacy, Soros uses facts, anecdotes, personal experience and philosophy to illuminate a major topic in a way that both enlightens and inspires.

See all Editorial Reviews


Product Details

  • Hardcover: 288 pages
  • Publisher: PublicAffairs (June 12, 2006)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1586483595
  • ISBN-13: 978-1586483593
  • Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.3 x 1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #529,970 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

21 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (21 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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45 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Open society, not anti-american, August 25, 2006
By Z. Freeman "Zach" (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)      
I had never heard of George Soros until I read an editorial he sent in to the Wall Street Journal. The editorial piqued my interest and so I looked him up and discovered this book.

The Age of Fallibility is very well written and presents very complicated theories in an easy to grasp from. Soros writes with the mentality of someone that really wants to get his point across: He tells you what he is going to talk about, talks about it, and then tells you what he just talked about. This has the affect of seeming a bit repetitive, but at the same time, you realize that the ideas are actually sinking in.

The first half of the book is dedicated to Soros' theory of reflexivity. Basically, reality isn't a fixed thing that we work around, it is constantly changing because of our actions and our thoughts. The idea of an open society is one that accepts that we will never reach a "perfect" solution to anything and so we must always work together to improve what we are doing, understanding that each improvement we make will require additional improvements.

The second half of the book is geared towards asking what is currently wrong with America, what is wrong with the world, and what we can do to fix it. Soros gives an in depth look into all three topics and makes some very good points.

To say that George Soros is anti-American is just silly. He merely points out the ways in which Americans can improve in our domestic and foreign policies. This is part of the open society model. There is always room for improvement. Pointing out that something can be improved is not the same as being against it.

The book got over my head a bit towards the end. I don't know enough about Russia to follow a lot of the points made there. Overall, this is a great book for someone who is interested in what is currently happening in this country and the world and would like to know more.
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152 of 171 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Soros is the Consummate Rationalist, June 10, 2006
People in other reviews have claimed "Soros hates Americans", however this is far from an accurate reflection of his beliefs. Soros *IS* the consummate rationalist. If U.S. policies that inflict massive harm on people around the world changed, he would revise his opinions. He is not irrational. He merely points out the harm the policies cause.

Soros theories on how thoughts are now being made to become reality are very novel in the space of social philosophers and very real today. Soros points out the fundamental issue, namely that people who wish to prevent future atrocities will need to counteract the way in which the thoughts of people are being used to create reality and facts.

Idolize Soros, or hate him because he doesn't support your political candidate ... either way, you will always learn something by listening to him and reading his books. Soros is very good at pointing out flaws in thinking. This has recently especially been the case with respect to the Iraq & Afghanistan military actions conducted by the U.S. It is a fact that these wars were imposed upon us by politicians financially backed by Texas-based oil monopolies and defense contractors. These are two major industrial groups facing complete marginalization and irrelevancy in the future in the absence of massive new orders for infantry weapons/supplies and new control of oil fields. These industries need each other, they needed the Iraq war, and they put a politician in the White House that gave it to us.

Soros is a rationalist and a realist. Soros will not dismiss a hard material observation for any reason and the result is that he routinely reminds us of thought methodologies that make it more difficult for politicians to use rhetoric such as "bombing cities for freedom" without also conjuring up the image of how many people are harmed, killed, and deprived of their freedom in the process of being bombed.

With geniuses like Gandhi, Roosevelt, Einstein, and Popper now passed away, Soros has emerged as one of the smartest still living people on the planet. Soros has made billions of dollars by simply predicting trade imbalances and trading on the side of them as they corrected. His theories, while not infallible, have a predictive and reliably accurate quality that is unsurpassed by the statements of any other living human being.

Soros teaches us to always ask questions.

Namely ... how "free" is the family cowering in their basement with their children awaiting death as their city is being bombed by "freedom fighters"?
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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars It's a Worthwhile Education, September 6, 2006
By C. Kurdas (Brooklyn, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)      
Soros probably writes too many books and doesn't spend enough time crafting them. Certainly he stuffs each book with too many ideas and topics, some of them decidedly under-developed. For all that, the insights are well worth the slog.

If you've read his earlier books, in particular The Alchemy of Finance, you already know his philosophy and can quickly scan the first 70 pages of this book for new nuggets and then go on to his take on the current situation in America. Even if you're new to his blend of theory and practice, you may be better off skipping the passages that don't mean much to you. There's something useful for everybody here, so don't get bogged down, go ahead and piece together the good bits.

What particularly appealed to me is the application of his conceptual framework to the American political scene. The framework is about the two-way interaction between thinking and reality: We can't know what's going to happen, whether in markets, elections or wars. But our thoughts direct our behavior thereby shaping reality, which boomerangs back to our minds.

A simple example: people think [...] stock will rise so they buy it and it does and people think it will rise even more. Such is the stuff of market bubbles. Misconceptions become reality.

Soros applies this dynamic, arguing that Americans went along with Bush feel-good nostrums because they don't like to face unpleasant facts. Political reality was re-made in the same sense as demand for [...] causes a real bubble. Soros argues for a change in attitude.

The odds are probably against him. However, as he writes, one trades in order to win but one takes political positions because one believes in them. Now that's not really correct--plenty of people mouth political messages because they're paid to do so. But not Soros, more glory to him. All this is an overly simple sketch; read the book at least in part to get the flavor.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Why America's world status is in doubt
Self-made billionaire George Soros offers a dense, philosophical and theoretical book about the state of the United States and the world. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Rolf Dobelli

5.0 out of 5 stars Thought Provoking for the Open-Minded
First of all, it must be said right off that this is not a book about trading. Soros is most famous in the financial markets for his managing of the Quantum Fund and making a... Read more
Published 18 months ago by John Forman

3.0 out of 5 stars A good start and a stale finish
The book has basically three parts: a) Introduction, b) Conceptual Framework, and c) The Present Moment in History. Read more
Published 19 months ago by Rodrigo Silveira

2.0 out of 5 stars Summer Reading
This book has two pieces. The first half is a mix of philosophy and analysis, centered on the theme of open society. Read more
Published on June 26, 2007 by bjcefola

3.0 out of 5 stars Good book but with too widespread and not concise line
The books is based on three pilars:
1) Representing the falsification theory of Popper, which becomes to some extend boring, since every George Soros book repeats this... Read more
Published on April 15, 2007 by Apostolos Dereklis

5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling advocacy of [the] open society
Most of the meat of this decidedly philosophic opus by one of the world's most successful financial wizards concerns the differences between the closed and open societies that... Read more
Published on March 25, 2007 by Dennis Littrell

4.0 out of 5 stars George Soros, Philosopher
Anyone who has done some reading in philosophy or the sociology of knowledge will quickly recognize George Soros' key concepts. Read more
Published on February 1, 2007 by Izaak VanGaalen

5.0 out of 5 stars If You Really Want to Know...
Soros' book is insightful into a human fallibillity that has been destroying our legislative process. The political fallout of this intentional path is at hand. Read more
Published on January 12, 2007 by T. Olson

5.0 out of 5 stars A hard-hitting survey for any interested in the current state of American thinking.
What are the errors in thinking in our current 'war on terror'? To receive an exacting analysis, try George Soros' THE AGE OF FALLIBILITY: CONSEQUENCES OF THE WAR ON TERROR. Read more
Published on November 5, 2006 by Midwest Book Review

4.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as he says or as bad as his worse enemies make him out to be
One can accept the Soros version of Soros , or one can search elsewhere and find far more critical versions. Read more
Published on September 18, 2006 by Shalom Freedman

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