Seize Your Copy Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds Drafted By Charles Mackay Compiled As Digital Version

read this betweenandand am finally writing this review because I noticed a friend's review Thanks Jim Henderson! which was excellent.
So I recommend his short review highly,

I liked the book, BUT, there were issues, So do not read it uncritically,

Will return to this later, What a delightful read! Oh, to be reminded of humanity's follies and foolishness, Yes, plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose, I'm always delighted to read of the foibles of Walter the Penniless and Peter the Hermit, truly amusing but for the hundreds of thousands of misguided followers who met an early and painful death in the first crusade.
And how about those many thousands of suspected witches who met brutal deaths And on and on,

We see in this volume echoes of the enthusiasms that propel investing bubbles and the base populism that creates a President Donald J.
Trump. I believe that emotion is our worst enemy this work provides substantial evidence for that assertion, This book is quite a riveting book, The name of the book describes exactly what you might expect it to contain, “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds” provides a list of historys ridiculous schemes, fantasies, prophesies witchcraft, faith healers and more.
The author then debunks the delusions by citing the proof that was published at the time of the delusion.


I will list a few a few of the stories I liked best,

The first chapter teaches us about a Scottish character named John Law, Mr. Law canvassed European leaders to accept an economic plan to use paper currency as opposed to the metal coinage used at the time.
It took him a while but he finally found sympathetic ears in France who was experiencing, at the time, a chaotic economy.
Law instituted his scheme and it worked like a charm, The economy recovered mostly because the King allowed Law to control it, Law kept the currency steady and that revived the French economy, Afterwards, he became well respected financier,

With this respect behind him he unlaunched a devious grand plan, He sold paper certificates that proved ownership of a section of the Mississippi River which was under French control in theth Century.
He previously told the public that the banks of the river contained diamonds, gold and other precious metals, These paper certificates became so popular that a buying frenzy occurred with people bidding higher and higher to own one.
Unfortunately, the truth hit France and the certificates became worthless, causing many to go bankrupt, With this event Mr. Law floundered to just a footnote in history,

Another fascinating tale is the work of theth andth alchemists, The alchemists told of how they discovered the philosophers stone which gave them the ability to turn base metals into gold.
Many alchemists used this trick to swindle wealthy ignorant citizens and leaders of much of Europe into funding their alchemist trade in hopes of receiving gold in return.
One trick of the alchemist was revealed in this book, In order to gain the confidence of the alchemist's patrons the alchemist would have a wand, The Alchemist filled the wand with gold dust and capped it with wax ends, Then he placed the wand into a fire, the wax end melt and presto gold dust appeared, The amazed patrician would respond with a commitment to the alchemist, In all cases cited in the book eventually the alchemist would be exposed of his chicanery and often forced to spree.


A third one I found fascinating is the story of the Rosicrucians, Again in theth Century, a band with certain inhumanly characteristics created a sensation in Germany, They decried that God covered them in a thick cloud which protected them and they possessed the power to cure all maladies.
They also possessed all wisdom and never needed to eat or drink, They had six rules of conduct,

. They should cure all diseases they come across gratuitously,
. They should dress in conformity to the country to which they were residing,
. They should meet once a year
, That every brother should chose a person worthy to succeed him,
. The words “Rosecross” should be the marks used to identify each other
, Their secret should be kept foryears

They believed that they obtained these rules from a golden book found in the tomb of their creator named Rosencreutz.


Interesting enough the Rosicrucian group still exists, However, there is an annualmembership fee,

Popular haunted houses of theandth centuries which caused fear among the masses are discussed and explained.
The European witch scare is detailed as well, Would you believe the Crusades were ignited by one person who went by the name of Peter the Hermit Peter the Hermit stirred the passions of European Christianity into a war, that some historians say, lastedyears.


Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds is an extraordinary tale of some of historys most intriguing multitude arousals.





"Men, it has been well said, think in herds it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.
"

Written in, "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds" by Charles Mackay, the book is a great fun to read.
Let me just quote wikipedia, "The subjects of Mackay's debunking include economic bubbles, alchemy, crusades, witchhunts, prophecies, fortunetelling, magnetisers influence of imagination in curing disease, shape of hair and beard influence of politics and religion on, murder through poisoning, haunted houses, popular follies of great cities, popular admiration of great thieves, duels, and relics".
But basically, the book could also be summarized by this, people are stupid,

"There is scarcely an occurrence in nature which, happening at a certain time, is not looked upon by some persons as a prognosticator either of good or evil.
The latter are in the greatest number, so much more ingenious are we in tormenting ourselves than in discovering reasons for enjoyment in the things that surround us.
"

And they are, Always have been and always will be, The book, while written more thanyears ago, is not only about follies of people from his age, but also from centuries past.
And you read it, and you think, this is still happening, People rushing and investing their life savings in economic bubbles and then losing everything exists in today's world too, and every bubble, the people think they are

different, and every time they lose money, they think the situation was unique.
What's worse than losing all your money in the bubble than knowing that not only did you lose your money but you also repeated the same mistakes done by people centuries back

"In many of the bloody wars which defile the page of history, we find that soldiers, utterly reckless of the works of God, will destroy his masterpiece, man, with unsparing brutality, but linger with respect around the beautiful works of art.
They will slaughter women and children, but spare a picture will hew down the sick, the helpless, and the hoaryheaded, but refrain from injuring a fine piece of sculpture.
"

I guess, that's the most tragic thing about us today, Not that we are stupid, but that our stupidity is basic, normal, expected, and routine, You read this book and you realize how comfortably our modern people fit in it, and you think that, there is nothing important about our time, nothing enlightened about it.
In the future, deep thinkers will not consider us separate form ages past, Mankind has not made any real intellectual jump forward,

"How flattering to the pride of man to think that the in their courses watch over him, and typify, by their movements and aspects, the joys or the sorrows that await him! He, less in proportion to the universe than the all but invisible insects that feed in myriads on a summer's leaf, are to this great globe itself, fondly imagines that eternal worlds were chiefly created to prognosticate his fate.
How we should pity the arrogance of the worm that crawls at our feet, if we knew that it also desired to know the secrets of futurity, and imagined that meteors shot athwart the sky to warn it that a tomtit was hovering near to gobble it up that storms and earthquakes, the revolutions of empires, or the fall of mighty monarchs, only happened to, predict its birth, its progress, and its decay! Not a whit less presuming has man shown himself not a whit less arrogant are the sciences, so called, of astrology, augury, necromancy, geomancy, palmistry, and divination of every kind.
"

A final note, I enjoyed the part about popular slangs of the day, If you are ever looking to bring backth century slang, you can use "Quoz!" can be used as a reply to anything, "Walker!", "There he goes with his eye out!", "Flare up!", "Has your mother sold her mangle", and so on, but my favorite is, "What a shocking bad hat!" Once it is in vogue, you just yell that to a newcomer and everyone laughs.
Marvellous walk through all the madnesses of mankind known so far! Except for the Covid, of course, which the author was lucky enough to have been spared.
Oh, how he would have marveled at this total mess of delusional madness! A historically important compendium of urban myths gilded with a thin layer of facts and moralizing musings.
It can serve as a springboard to the study of actual history, economics, and psychology, or it can be an entertaining way to pass some time but don't believe everything you read here.
This is extremely difficult to rate, Or even define.

.for the first three sections which core on the specific bubbles that occurred in France, England, Holland during the centuries of early cross Atlantic ships.


I've read entire books before about the tulip mania which is therd one in time analyzed/ detailed here.


The book itself which has immense history of individuals who lived their lives obsessed with the turning of base metals into gold or sought composition of the philosopher's stone Those I have no idea how many's of pages possibly they went on here in this download.
I read for over a week off and on and only got to aboutof those pages re the philosopher's stone.
Which the great majority of humans believed existed, And also some seemed to be able to define,

I'm of the opinion that thecore first long chapters are the "book" as defined by the trailer.


Regardless, it's super interesting, How everyone "knows" things that are not, Or are mere value or core identities in practical applications that are nothing or very dissimilar than their "known" acceptance.
I've seen myself numerous cases of this in my own lifetime, Some of them as far flung in acceptance too as in thesemass obsessions situations,

We live in a time where almost any complete fallacy can be marketed or PR'd to maximum acceptance, IMHO.
Up is down and down is up, It's observable in social media, Also in almost any other type of media/ print/ mores etc, A "feeling" is produced that incites negation too of almost any human logic in the process, Just as in thosemain entire societal situations here,

This book will give you a straight story about how three different times an entire society/economic system/ government / public went bonkers in accepting such realities of "worth".
Today, July,, Amazon has a market capitalization of,,,and a price/earnings ratio of, That is, people have one hundred forty seven billion dollars invested in Amazon and at the present rate will earn back their money inyears.
This book is an excellent place to start if you want to understand how this could come about, There are excellent books on the financial aspecst or history of such phenomena, Galbraith or John Cassidy for example.
But at bottom this is not a financial phenomenon, but one of mob psychology, “Let us not, in the pride of our superior knowledge, turn with contempt from the follies of our predecessors.
The study of the errors into which great minds have fallen in the pursuit of truth can never be uninstructive.
As the man looks back to the days of his childhood and his youth, and recalls to his mind the strange notions that swayed his actions at that time, that he may wonder at them so should society, for its education, look back to the opinions which governed the ages fled.
He is but a superficial thinker who would despise and refuse to hear of them merely because they are absurd.
No man is so wise but that he may learn some wisdom from his past errors, either of thought or action and no society has made such advances as to be capable of no improvement from the retrospect of its past folly and credulity.
And not only is such a study instructive: he who reads for amusement only will find no chapter in the annals of the human mind more amusing than this.
It opens out the whole realm of fiction the wild, the fantastic, and the wonderful, and all the immense variety of things “that are not, and cannot be be but have been imagined and believed.
” This is one of the greatest books ever written,
First published in, I think it has been in print continually ever since, Rare for a non fiction book,
I read it about once everyyears to remind myself of mob psychology,
One of my favorite genres,
Also the author has a gift for storytelling,

About a dozen chapters, each one about a different set of events,
All examples of mob behavior,
How people can abandon critical analysis when "everyone else is doing it",
About the balance between Fear and Greed, and what happens when Greed turns to Fear,

The first several chapters are about financial bubbles, the tulip frenzy in Holland, the South seas bubble in Britian, and the Louisiana scam in France.


Then it moves on to other examples like the witch burning in Europe where over,people were killed by their neighbors because they were a "witch".

Other chapters inclued dueling, haunted houses and more,

If you buy at Amazon, com BEWARE:
Some of the editions they sell are not complete,
they only have the firstchapters.

Usually amazon tells how many pages are in a book,
they don't do that for any of the many editions of this particular book.

Almost every library has a copy,
.