15 March 2006 Blog Home : March 2006 : Permalink
"The Algebraist," by Iain M. Banks: Hey, it can't be all work and no play. Science fiction - specifically, Isaac Asimov's Foundation - is what got me into economics in the first place. Mr. Banks, a Scot who isn't that well known in the United States, is probably my favorite contemporary science-fiction writer. If you're interested, I'd suggest "Use of Weapons" as an introduction.
I didn't find the Algebaist to be one of Iain M Banks' better books but I strongly endores the "Use of Weapons" suggestion and also recommend "The Player of Games" as well as "Excession". I can sort of see why Foundation would get you into economics, it didn't get me into it and, in fact, although I enjoyed the first Foundation volume I was far less enamoured with the rest of the series. Actually I recall reading somewhere that Asimov was inspired by Gibbon's Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire, and one result of readin Asimov was that I did begin to read Gibbon. I don't think I got terribly far but I do remember enjoying some of it.I wonder if those who read science fiction in childhood can be divided into those who liked Robert Heinlein better, with his swashbuckling individualism, and those who preferred Isaac Asimov, with his technocratic fantasies. And I wonder if those early preferences semi-reliably map onto the conservative/liberal divide . . .
I read both as a child and liked both. As an adult I find Heinlein to be more (re)readable than Asimov but some Asimov still gets periodicaly reread by me - for example "The Gods Themselves" - and some Heinlein no longer takes up space on my bookcase. Politcally I'm very much of the Bernado de la Paz school, i.e. at the anarchist end of libertarianism.