Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility by James P. Carse
|
Book Summary Author: James P. Carse Edition: Mass Market Paperback Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published) Published: 1987-08-12 ISBN: 0345341848 Number of pages: 192 Publisher: Ballantine Books |
| New | New Usually ships in 1-2 business days | $126.01 | ||
| Used | Used Usually ships in 1-2 business days | $3.83 |
Your purchase is protected by the A-to-z Safe Buying Guarantee. Amazon.com automatically transfers your payment to the merchant so you'll never need to pay a merchant directly. Amazon.com A-to-z Safe Buying Guarantee covers both the delivery of your item and its condition upon receipt.
Book Reviews of the Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility
Customer Review: A good book for some...
Summary: 1 Stars
...but not for me. His definitions and classifications are on their face thought-provoking, but ultimately too abstract and contradictory to be of any value to me. The establishment by examples of his game theory in the first section in my eyes seemed most unfortunate. He would've been much better off, in my opinion, approaching the subject from the idea of "play" rather than "game". It seems that using the term "game" at all put the whole reading in a concrete, finite position, and when we can only identify the infinite through its actions in the finite, of what real value is the infinite?But then again, maybe this was all by design. The interplay of abstraction and contradiction has been what's made the best religious/spiritual writings what they are. I personally no longer find any spiritual sanctity in this kind of willful complication of thought, hence where his writing and my reading may part ways.
Worth reading? Sure. What book isn't? But if you have any particular taste for logic and rationality at all, as God asked Noah(via Bill Cosby), "How long can you tread water?"