1984, The Robot Series by Issac Assimov, Stranger in a Strange Land by
Robert Heinlein, Dune by Frank Herbert.
Transformational experiences?
I was an AFS student in Brazil. Being an exchange student in Brazil deeply affected my outlook on things. It was one of the most transformative experiences of my life. I loved much about Brazil. I especially adored my boisterous Brazilian host family, who were very kind to me, and opened up a whole new world to me. Unfortunately, over the years we gradually lost touch, as my Portuguese faded because of disuse and I could no longer respond fluently to their letters. Too bad social media and google translate weren’t around in those days.
I should say that as much as I loved Brazil, parts of the experience shocked me. The crushing poverty of the poorest Brazilians, for example, was something that up to then I had never really seen the likes of up close and personal. I mean my family was basically broke during much of my youth, but we weren’t destitute. I never was or even saw an emaciated child begging on the streets. But it wasn't just the crushing poverty that affected me, it was the apparent indifference to it of so many of the better off Brazilians that I met and got to know. Though this was in the days of Nixon administration, the US of my youth had not yet executed a full-scale retreat from Johnson's declaration of a "War on Poverty." Indeed, the idea that fighting poverty was a worthy aspiration of a great, wealthy and compassionate nation had a big place in my youthful idealism. Brazil, which seemed at the time to have nothing like that as a shared national aspiration, was a shock to my young system.
So you had zero exposure to philosophy?
I did a presentation on idealism for a class in High School once. I don’t remember all that much about it. I do remember the teacher being impressed. Not sure what the assignment was that led me to doing a presentation on idealism. I must have read about it in an encyclopedia. I don’t recall reading any original texts on the topic. It was my junior year in High School for an American Studies class...which was sort of an educational innovation. Instead of traditional History and English my school allowed you to take this two period American Studies course junior year. It was project and presentation based. Not really a fixed curriculum or text book. My main project for the year was a cartoon version of the Odyssey. I teamed up with three of my friends in the class to make it. The class was a lot of fun, in lots of ways. It involved lots of discussion, argument and debate, hands on
