Real Analysis: A Long-Form Mathematics Textbook by Jay Cummings [0] finally helped me conquer elementary real analysis. It was fast, smooth and streamlined experience. Your millage may vary, though, as this one wasn't my first analysis encounter.
This book enters the pantheon of books that were tremendously helpful to me: Learning to Reason by Nancy Rodgers, Discrete Math by Susanna Epp and Linear Algebra by Kuldeep Singh.
It is a self-help book rooted in Jungian theory, widely discredited in modern psychology. His understanding of modern and postmodern philosophy is only deep enough to convince readers with no knowledge of those topics that he knows something about them.
I urge everyone to look at this video. If this is the best the left can do, they are in big trouble. JP is much more convincing than this video is.
Also - I see this a lot - he is attacked on ideological grounds, while his entire argument is that the discourse should be grounded in science, not ideology.
Here's an example: many people seem to think that if you give men and women equal rights and opportunities, that this will automatically lead to 50-50 in STEM, health, politics etc.
The problem here is that extensive research shows that in the societies where the most equal opportunities exist (Scandinavia) the differences between men an women in those areas actually increase. This research has not been refuted by anyone.
Apparently when men and women are free to choose the life they want to lead, they make different choices.
Which leads to the question: should we really push for equity in the sense of equal representation or is that just another form of oppression?
Again: if this video is the best the left can do, they are in big trouble.
I'm not sure where I got this book recommendation but I've read about 1/2 of it and I've very impressed with the advice. I also applaud the way it's presented.
Self-help advice is mostly the author's opinion. It's very hard to prove or disprove any of it scientifically. So readers have to make a decision on whether it's good or not for themselves.
Why is politics an issue? I ask because I was surprised it even came up.
Anyhow, the book is worth reading. It gives very practical advice. Especially if you are just starting out in your career or the rest of your life for that matter.
I think it's just people here being a bit unclear about whether 12RFL qualifies for the non-fiction part. I mean, to me it's clear that it does, but with Peterson also being the author of "Maps of Meaning", mixups are inevitable.
I avoided this book for a long time because of a video I saw of Peterson taking an uncharitable stance towards trans people, but it was recommended to me so often by people I trust that I decided to check it out. I found I disagreed wildly with much of what he had to say, but often agreed enthusiastically with much else. An incredibly thought-provoking book, especially if you're interested in self-examination and living a better life. Don't take his 12 rules as a prescription for how to live life. Rather, think of the book as an extended conversation with a smart, somewhat disagreeable man who will spur you into thinking about what your 12 rules are.
Bottom line: I'm glad I read it and would recommend it. With this caveat: don't take his 12 rules for life as a prescription
The review I read in the Guardian barely talks about the content of the book, and mostly talks about Peterson's ideology instead (in a negative way, which reflects how bad the left-right chasm is. This is not a book about politics)
Probably a good book to read to understand why Peterson has a lot of fans.
It's all about how in Japan there's this tradition of gifting (and never purchasing for oneself) matsutake, as a way of showing appreciation. However, this tradition grew alongside deforestation.
Japan has done a pretty good job conserving forests, but this strange mushroom they like so much only grows in deforested forests out of skinny pines, so now it has to be imported from Oregon, Finland, and China.
The author embeds herself a bit with Laotian refugees that do mushroom hunting in Oregon, and describes the various interesting ways these communities operate. Auctions, forest hunting, how kids get started, etc.
And then she explains how these two intensely social and human concepts (the gift giving and the harvesting) are connected via an impersonal cynical international supply chain that commodifies everything.
The Goal was a surprise hit for me this year. It was a recommendation from an airplane seatmate some months ago. Lots of good advice on starting to analyze systems for bottlenecks.
"The Everything Store," was very enlighting to me on Bezo's thoughts on business. It's just one nugget from the book. All the Amazon news stories that are propagation these days aren't really surprising once you read the book. Bezo's primary view on business is that you must work hard to get by in this world. All who do will get by and even thrive. All that don't will not. A Dog eat Dog kind of view. It's very good. I highly recommend it.
I read this too. I loved the first 30%. Couldn't put it down. After that he gets into modern history and inserts his own opinion and politics into the facts, which I found distasteful and distracting. He's also very hostile to religion. I'm agnostic so I agreed with most of what he said, but it seemed so unnecessary and again distasteful and distracting.
I'm really liking How to Invent Everything by Ryan North. It's instructions for rebuilding civilization if you were stranded in the past, and is just the right mix of funny and interesting.
The book keeps getting recommend on HN presumably by true fans of DOOM. Apart from a few brilliant bits scattered throughout, it was a disappointing read for me.
I liked the book because it was pretty fast paced and gave insights into the PC game industry of the '80s and '90s, which I didn't know anything about. The rest of it I feel like I enjoyed because I was a kid in the '90s who loved Doom and Quake.
As for me, I was quite a 'hardcore' gamer in the late 90s early 2000s. So it was interesting to read where the games that I've played came from, because they owe a lot to DOOM.
The first game I remember playing was Wolfenstein 3-D. Or well, my father played it mainly and I watched, and only occasionally dared to play it myself. So perhaps for me it was more the nostalgia of Wolfenstein rather than DOOM that did it :)
I always admired Carmack, even before reading the book. I could agree with the 'sociopath' sentiment though, but that doesn't diminish his genius in my opinion :)
+1 for Sapiens, it was really perspective-broadening for me. His two followup books, while good, were not quite of the same caliber in my mind. While I would unconditionally recommend Sapiens to everybody, I would only recommend Homo Deus and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century to more limited audiences.
“Hackers” is brilliant. No other book captures so well the iconoclastic adventurer spirit at the heart of the microcomputer revolution from '75 to '85.
Because I and my future boss had just read “Hackers” (in 1986), we spent a job interview exchanging favorite vignettes from the book, which led to my first job in programming. This book changed my life. Thanks, Steven (and Greg)!
hah. i actually have this in my list of book I recommended to junior developers. it’s not about software but the way of thinking and approaching the problem will make you a better software developer.
How To Fail At Almost Everything And Still Win Big - Scott Adams (2013)
One of my favorite quotes:
“I put myself in a position where luck was more likely to happen. I tried a lot of different ventures, stayed optimistic, put in the energy, prepared myself by learning as much as I could, and stayed in the game long enough for luck to find me.” pg - 158
1. Use systems, not goals. A system lets you feel good every time you follow it, whereas a goal only makes you feel good when you reach it
2. Combination of skills. If you can be good (say top 20%) in more than one domain, then that combination of skills can be enough to make you very sought after.
3. What all adults should know, like public speaking, psychology, business writing, accounting, design, and conversations.
4. Learning from failures. This is a theme throughout the book. Each failure can teach you something. If you attempt something and fail, you at least gained experience. This experience will be useful for your next project.
Regarding #2: Does the book go into any specifics on how exactly you're going to be sought after or at least how to look for the people who needs generalists?
I consider myself a generalist but I never ever see much interest for hiring someone like me. There's always ask for a person who's a focused pro in some niche area AND then possesses a cloud of tangential skills, though.
I think the idea is that you are somewhat a specialist in 2 areas (but not a worldclass specialist). As I recall, that advice does not apply to being a generalist.
Top 20% is definitely good enough, the value having removed the issue with transcendence between two normally unrelated fields will improve your advantage by many factors.
The idea isn't about being a generalist, but rather being valuable because you're like getting two okay guys or gals in one package.
Adams' own example is how he's by no means a highly talented artist nor is he a top comedian, but the combination of being halfway decent with a pen and having a better than average sense of humor suddenly puts a person into a much smaller group on the Venn diagram. And adding in just one more thing - his experience in the corporate business world, allowing him to create strips a lot of people could relate to - was enough to catapult Dilbert into a global phenomenon.
There are tons of moderately funny people in the world. And many okay line artists. And it's not hard to find someone with experience working in a corporate office. But the number of people who meet all three criteria is incredibly tiny. Heck, just having two of the three is quite rare.
The point being, it's far easier to become a big success by being above average in a few things, than it would be to try to be one of the best in a single area.
Finding a way to combine yout skills to make that success is the key, of course. And may require learning new skills or improving areas in which you're merely average.
One of the big themes of the book is how you shouldn't worry too much about trying new things and failing. For one, humans are terrible at anticipating what sort of work we would truly enjoy or be good at, and the only reliable way to find a true match is to try a lot of things and keep redirecting yourself. And for another thing, any skills you learn along the way only increase the odds of eventually finding a combination of skills that can lead to great success.
One thing many people reading the book overlook, I think, is that being mediocre in a lot of skills isn't the point. It can't hurt, of course, but the idea is to be above average in a combination of skills that can be utilized together in an interesting way. Recognizing that combination is more likely to be a process of trial and error rather than high minded planning.
> Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it.
I also used to enjoy Scott Adam's blog and ideas, that's why it was quite shocking to me when I revisited his site and found out what he has turned into. I can't take him seriously anymore.
"what he has turned into" is roughly "a Trump fanboy" for those who don't want to go trawling through his blog. I also used to really enjoy his blog for his unconventional but mind-opening ideas before he started blogging about Trump in the pre-election runup.
it's more than being "trump fanboy". It's his confabulating of abstruse theories like "master puppeteer" and all this gibberish talk.
I find it irresponsible the opposite of what he has done before. Is this really the same person who created Dilbert and the above mentioned useful book?
I 100% agree with your opinion. Initially when he was discussing his analysis of Trump it felt like he was doing to tell us about Trump’s skills in persuading etc., but it has just turned into it being a mouthpiece for Trump. It’s so sad that such a talented person can become that. I truly enjoyed the book though
That Adams would join the Trump train isn't all that surprising when you read the book. Right from the beginning, he mentions that he didn't get a promotion at work because of upper management's 'minority hiring' policies (this was in the '80s, I believe). He doesn't provide much information about this policy, only that he perceived himself to have been left behind because of it.
He does provide information later in the book: an explicit policy to no longer promote white males. That policy was communicated to him by his boss, and was one of his primary motivations to become self employed.
It's not just his politics. He has become a delusional an egotistical person.
He kept talking about how Twitter shadowbanned him for months. When he was on Joe Rogan's podcast, Joe Rogan suggested ways to test if this is true. He got upset and tried to change the subject. When pressed by Rogan, he finally said: "I don't really want to find out. I just like the idea that I am important to be shadowbanned."
Dreaming in Code by Scott Rosenberg. This book is, so far, the closest I've come to finding a "spiritual successor" to The Soul of a New Machine by Kidder. If you liked The Soul of a New Machine, or if you like watching Halt and Catch Fire, you may well like Dreaming in Code.
Inspired by Marty Cagan. Really solid overview of the essentials of product management.
The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect by Judea Pearl. Judea Pearl is, of course, a giant in the worlds of statistics and AI, and this book distills his work on "causal inference" and lays it all out in a pretty accessible manner. Not a textbook per-se, but not completely non-technical either. Read this if you're interested in how statistical analysis can be used to truly establish cause/effect relationships.
Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal by Ayn Rand. Do you think you hate Capitalism? Do you not understand why so many people love Capitalism? Have you based your opinion of Ayn Rand on second-hand commentary instead of actually reading her works? Then read this book.
I read a chunk of “Capitalism” on my train commute, and it was really interesting how often a fellow passenger felt the need to start a discussion. I’m not sure if this is a warning or a recommendation… I’m going with recommendation.
I presume this was heavily downvoted because of the Rand. While I'm not a fan of her either, that's unfair: 1. Dreaming in Code and The Book of Why are excellent (I haven't read the other two), and 2. Rand makes some points that some people need to learn, even if I don't buy her whole worldview.
I presume this was heavily downvoted because of the Rand.
Yeah, that's the norm here, sadly. You can post a list of 20 books and if one of them is by Rand, your post will be down-voted into oblivion. It's almost like some people have this Pavlovian reaction when they see Rand's name.
I mean, I get that not everyone appreciates her works, and that's fine and totally understandable. "Different strokes" and all that. But the zeal with which her haters go on the attack is a bit strange.
2. Rand makes some points that some people need to learn, even if I don't buy her whole worldview.
Exactly. This is the same reason that I have copies of Mein Kampf, The Communist Manifesto and Mao's Little Red Book on my shelf waiting to be read. I don't have to agree with a work to find benefit in reading it. Quite the opposite... I believe that if I'm going to argue against something, I should probably have a reasonable understanding of it. And I prefer to go to primary sources than rely on secondhand commentary.
I tried to read Mein Kampf and could not. The language is just so incredibly bureaucratic and dull that I gave up after 50 pages. Maybe it reads better in German, but I can't read German.
I suspect a lot of dogmatic texts are the same way. Rand is at least not a total drag to read even though I find a lot of her ideas hilarious (chief of which is: the very ethical, honest, and hard working rich people).
My money is on the patronising defensive presentation of the book:
> Do you think you hate Capitalism? Do you not understand why so many people love Capitalism? Have you based your opinion of Ayn Rand on second-hand commentary instead of actually reading her works? Then read this book.
All of this could easily be reversed to mandate reading all three volumes of Marx's Das Capital.
All of this could easily be reversed to mandate reading all three volumes of Marx's Das Capital.
Absolutely. And, in fact, I would absolutely advocate reading Das Kapital. I actually have all three volumes on my shelf waiting to be read. But it's easier for me to submit a personal recommendation for Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal given that I've actually read it.
Tim Harford’s “Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure”¹, an enthralling collection of tales from really diverse projects. I’ll freely admit to only picking it up because I recognised the name from the More or Less² podcast, but it was well worth the read.
You're on the right track with that, although I'd say it's centered around order, rather than entropy.
It's hard to do it justice here, but the book builds off of existing information theory to offer an explanation of why there are pockets of order in the universe (like our solar system) instead of uniform chaos.
From there it explains how natural systems can increase in complexity over time, and then moves eventually into human systems like cities and economies.
He basically uses physics and thermodynamics to explain economics, which I found fascinating.
This book made me realize just how valuable dense cities are for economic progress and innovation (and why that is - one reason being that it's relatively difficult to transfer knowledge and know-how from one human to another). It also provides an interesting sort of grand purpose for humanity - to be caretakers of this little region of ordered information we find ourselves in.
Interestingly a great deal of progress can simply viewed as reducing or containing entropy.
Whenever a claim is made that something "improves developer productivity" I am very dubious of that claim. Instead I try to evaluate it along the axis of "how much entropy does this help contain? And what ways does the abstraction leak? That is to say where is this thing adding to the overall entropy of the system?". I find that gets better mileage.
This was definitely the best book I read in the last year and really changed my larger worldview and led me down the path into information and chaos theory. I particularly like how you put it here:
"It also provides an interesting sort of grand purpose for humanity - to be caretakers of this little region of ordered information we find ourselves in."
that is an elegant summary of that concept which really resonated with me, but I hadn't been able to quite put into words. Thanks!
The journey of how nike became what it is today. It is a must read because, it gives an in depth knowledge about how Companies used to be built without the VC's.
Righteous Mind, Why good people are divided by politics and religion by Jonathan Haidt (also applies to classic nerd feuds like Mac vs windows vs Linux)
The Mom Test, how to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you by Rob Fitzpatrick (worst title ever, book is great)
Seems somewhat of an odd tagline "why good people are divided by politics"...
All people are divided by politics.
Perhaps it's one to give a read though.
I swear I'm noticing a systemic failure at a global level of people to recognize they are always-on 24/7 political machines living inside an always-on 24/7 political machine and it's mostly Garbage In, Garbage Out.
That's the default mode of operation. Most people are wrong about most things. Couple that with the fact we are de-facto tribal animals that can't turn our politics off. All you get is one big, giant disagreement where everyone is likely wrong and nobody will admit it.
But I keep noticing patterns in everyones language... Patterns that make an assumption that the crazy political debates we find ourselves in are somehow an abnormal state and the world has "descended into madness" or "we've gone mad" or "it seems people have really lost their minds lately".
This pattern crops up over and over again. It's like no man, look at the hardware and software producing the outputs. This is the output the system is designed to produce. We haven't "lost our minds" or "gone crazy", we were always this batshit insane and this is always the protocol we have operated on.
Curious what the framework the book lays out and what resemblance it bears to my own framework...
Right but "good" itself is a moral/value judgement, so you wind up with the question "who is doing the defining?" And that descends into a disagreement. That is our M.O.
Actually looking at description of this book and some of the reviews it's basically what I'm saying. Though my thesis contains a large component centering around our complete inability to calculate the truth value of most truth claims a priori and our inability to recognize that leads us to being utterly convinced our erroneous conclusions are correct and getting angry at people who disagree with us. This coupled with all the literature on how dissenters are treated and how groupthink takes hold. We are a walking recipe for disaster.
This will make for a good read. Probably help me to expand on my own model even more.
I think a lot of turmoil and confusion could be avoided if we collectively upgraded our protocols for dealing with each other.
The point of the tag line is to humanize people on the other political side from you.
> Curious what the framework the book lays out and what resemblance it bears to my own framework...
I haven't read the book but I assume it follows the framework the author developed (he's a moral psychology academic, I believe) and laid out in a TED talk a while ago (back when they were still good). If you're curious about it, check out the talk on YouTube.
I should order that! I emailed him after I read The Righteous Mind (2016, 2017 maybe?) asking what his opinions were of the shifts we had seen since the book was published and whether his opinions have changed and how hopeful he was, etc. He did take the time to reply, even if it was short, and answered my questions; always appreciate when an author interacts with readers like that.
It's great, if troubling. I wasn't taking some of the cultural shifts very seriously until reading it. Very few books shift my thinking on current events so significantly.
If you like “Why We Sleep” I recommend “The Sleep Solution” as a companion. Why We Sleep is heavy on interesting sleep science but light on practical tips for improving sleep (The Sleep Solution is the opposite...)
Thanks for the recommendation. I agree, I wish the author had gone a bit more into practical tips and cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia. I'll check out The Sleep Solution.
Can vouch for Circadian Code. The first two third of the book is accompanied with practical actionable items and helped me to gain control on my sleep.
In the past, I could always rely on the fact that I was able to sleep well the night following a bad night. After I couldn't sleep two nights in a row I started to get very worried.
I changed three things:
1. Before going to bed I meditate (I usually listen to the app from Sam Harris)
2. No more caffeine after 11 am
3. 100% of what is called in books "bed hygiene", meaning: when I go to bed I immediately switch off the lights and sleep. I do nothing else. Also, I try to always sleep around the same time, even on weekends.
I believe 3) has been the biggest change. I used to read and even sometimes watch Netflix in bed. I miss reading in bed but since I stopped doing that and only focus on sleeping I have never had problems to fall asleep anymore, despite going through some stressful times.
I do sometimes still wake up early, but since I sleep well before I can handle those days pretty well. My life has changed a lot for the better, one of the best things I have done recently
I also enjoyed Longitude when I read it, but it's been described as "suffer[ing] however from a major flaw, it is a distortion of the real history it is claiming to relate."
I have not read it, but judging by the synopsis on Goodreads, it seems to gloss over any developments during the Islamic Golden Age. Is this judgement accurate?
Interesting, thanks for the comment. Unfortunately the post you linked is not about the book Longitude, and the blog the author links to for people who want to "discover more about what really took place" is a 404.
I'd like to see a breakdown of the facts vs. what Sobel wrote. I read the book because I'm a mechanical watch enthusiast, and I was not disappointed in any of the descriptions of the Harrison timepieces or what made them work. I plan to go see them next time I'm in London.
I still recommend the book, especially to watch enthusiasts.
The book is Richard Dunn & Rebekah Higgitt, Longitude: How Ships, clocks and stars helped solve the longitude problem, Collins and Royal Museums Greenwich, London 2014. It is from the people who were behind that 404ing Royal Observatory blog. At least some of that blog's posts are archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20150919110228/http://blogs.rmg....
The blog is still on the Royal Observatory site, but their site redesign makes it nearly impossible to find since they are merged with all their other blog posts and they didn't set up redirects. Here's that final post (the links to other blog posts are dead, but I've found most with a "site:" search with the post title): https://www.rmg.co.uk/discover/behind-the-scenes/blog/so-lon...
I followed your link but it did not lead to a discussion of Longitude. It lead to a discussion that mentioned Longitude and had a link to a longer discussion, which however was dead for me. If you could fix that, I for one would be interested in more.
“Never Split the Difference” was fantastic. Still it was super weird that unlike the advice in the book, some of the book comes across as bragging. Also, Chris Voss does not perform the audiobook although in the book he discusses his mastery of voice, his smooth radio jockey voice and covers different speaking techniques. Still, one of my favorites of 2018.
I might not end up reading this one due to the comments about bragging, but I wanted to ask: what's with the title? Why would you never split the difference?
I finished the book recently and I cannot recommend it enough. The bragging sometimes shows through the stories and the end of the book feels like a clever marketing about his company. But the book is well written, well structured, stories are good, and each chapter brings new techniques. The book changed the way I handle communication. There are actionable practical tips and tools for communication and it shaped how I think about a hard phone call, how to prepare for a meeting and how to push coffee chitchat at work in more interesting directions. You will have to ignore more self-centered persons in your life than this book's author anyway, take it as a practice lesson :) And to Chris Voss defense he also talks about examples he made mistakes.
Chris Voss's interview on Shane Parish's podcast is filled with some really good nuggets. I have not read the book but found the podcast like a condensed version of his skills/expertise: https://fs.blog/2018/01/chris-voss/
I second Libby. You can get just about any of the books recommended on this thread for free. Additionally, for me, I like to get my books from the library since it gives me a reason to read them before I have to return them.
I have not tried Libby yet but recently started checking out eBooks from my local public library (via Overdrive) to read on my Kindle. I am pleasantly surprised how convenient and straightforward that process is. And all that without spending any money.
Libby is the new and somewhat flashier version of Overdrive. My old Android tablet doesn't handle it as well as the old overdrive app, but it works. I think it also has better support for multiple library cards than overdrive, but I haven't tried that yet.
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[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 219 ms ] threadThis book enters the pantheon of books that were tremendously helpful to me: Learning to Reason by Nancy Rodgers, Discrete Math by Susanna Epp and Linear Algebra by Kuldeep Singh.
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Real-Analysis-Long-Form-Mathematics-T...
Also - I see this a lot - he is attacked on ideological grounds, while his entire argument is that the discourse should be grounded in science, not ideology.
Here's an example: many people seem to think that if you give men and women equal rights and opportunities, that this will automatically lead to 50-50 in STEM, health, politics etc. The problem here is that extensive research shows that in the societies where the most equal opportunities exist (Scandinavia) the differences between men an women in those areas actually increase. This research has not been refuted by anyone.
Apparently when men and women are free to choose the life they want to lead, they make different choices.
Which leads to the question: should we really push for equity in the sense of equal representation or is that just another form of oppression?
Again: if this video is the best the left can do, they are in big trouble.
In fact the video states that the assertion there are biological differences between men and women is uncontraversial.
Self-help advice is mostly the author's opinion. It's very hard to prove or disprove any of it scientifically. So readers have to make a decision on whether it's good or not for themselves.
Why is politics an issue? I ask because I was surprised it even came up.
Anyhow, the book is worth reading. It gives very practical advice. Especially if you are just starting out in your career or the rest of your life for that matter.
Here's a video of Jordan Peterson saying feminists support the rights of Muslims because of their "unconscious wish for brutal male domination."
Interesting pick!
I think it's just people here being a bit unclear about whether 12RFL qualifies for the non-fiction part. I mean, to me it's clear that it does, but with Peterson also being the author of "Maps of Meaning", mixups are inevitable.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Bottom line: I'm glad I read it and would recommend it. With this caveat: don't take his 12 rules for life as a prescription
Probably a good book to read to understand why Peterson has a lot of fans.
Signal and Noise by Nate Silver was more educational and enjoyable.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Signal_and_the_Noise
Fooled by Randomness was also good. Better than Black Swan IMO.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fooled_by_Randomness
Just started Einstein’s Shadow by Seth Fletcher. Am enjoying it.
https://www.amazon.com/Einsteins-Shadow-Black-Astronomers-Un...
——
Adding other books that I’ve read in the past that I see mentioned and also loved:
Masters of Doom
Longitude
I liked Logitude so much I called myself h4labs when I released apps in the App Store, after Harrison’s H4 watch.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/h4labs-word-search/id1311744...
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25510906-the-mushroom-at...
It's all about how in Japan there's this tradition of gifting (and never purchasing for oneself) matsutake, as a way of showing appreciation. However, this tradition grew alongside deforestation.
Japan has done a pretty good job conserving forests, but this strange mushroom they like so much only grows in deforested forests out of skinny pines, so now it has to be imported from Oregon, Finland, and China.
The author embeds herself a bit with Laotian refugees that do mushroom hunting in Oregon, and describes the various interesting ways these communities operate. Auctions, forest hunting, how kids get started, etc.
And then she explains how these two intensely social and human concepts (the gift giving and the harvesting) are connected via an impersonal cynical international supply chain that commodifies everything.
Beautiful book tbh.
The Goal by Eliyahu M. Goldratt - a management novel. Oddly engrossing and educational at the same time
The Everything Store by Brad Stone - about Amazon's history, culture, businesses
(None of these books was written in 2018. I just read them in 2018)
* Hackers: Heroes of the computer revolution (Steven Levy)
* Masters of DOOM (David Kushner)
* The simpsons and their mathematical secrets (Simon Singh)
* Countdown to zero day (about stuxnet, by Kim Zetter)
* Sapiens: A brief history of human kind (Yuval Noah Harari)
* Coders at work (Some interviews, not all, but I enjoyed it. By Peter Seibel)
The first game I remember playing was Wolfenstein 3-D. Or well, my father played it mainly and I watched, and only occasionally dared to play it myself. So perhaps for me it was more the nostalgia of Wolfenstein rather than DOOM that did it :)
I always admired Carmack, even before reading the book. I could agree with the 'sociopath' sentiment though, but that doesn't diminish his genius in my opinion :)
Because I and my future boss had just read “Hackers” (in 1986), we spent a job interview exchanging favorite vignettes from the book, which led to my first job in programming. This book changed my life. Thanks, Steven (and Greg)!
One of my favorite quotes: “I put myself in a position where luck was more likely to happen. I tried a lot of different ventures, stayed optimistic, put in the energy, prepared myself by learning as much as I could, and stayed in the game long enough for luck to find me.” pg - 158
My top ten list for the year: https://www.gregkamradt.com/gregkamradt/top-reads-2018
1. Use systems, not goals. A system lets you feel good every time you follow it, whereas a goal only makes you feel good when you reach it
2. Combination of skills. If you can be good (say top 20%) in more than one domain, then that combination of skills can be enough to make you very sought after.
3. What all adults should know, like public speaking, psychology, business writing, accounting, design, and conversations.
4. Learning from failures. This is a theme throughout the book. Each failure can teach you something. If you attempt something and fail, you at least gained experience. This experience will be useful for your next project.
This, it could seem something that could have limited effect in real life but it's not. Small daily improvements compound.
I consider myself a generalist but I never ever see much interest for hiring someone like me. There's always ask for a person who's a focused pro in some niche area AND then possesses a cloud of tangential skills, though.
Of course, not everything goes.
Adams' own example is how he's by no means a highly talented artist nor is he a top comedian, but the combination of being halfway decent with a pen and having a better than average sense of humor suddenly puts a person into a much smaller group on the Venn diagram. And adding in just one more thing - his experience in the corporate business world, allowing him to create strips a lot of people could relate to - was enough to catapult Dilbert into a global phenomenon.
There are tons of moderately funny people in the world. And many okay line artists. And it's not hard to find someone with experience working in a corporate office. But the number of people who meet all three criteria is incredibly tiny. Heck, just having two of the three is quite rare.
The point being, it's far easier to become a big success by being above average in a few things, than it would be to try to be one of the best in a single area.
Finding a way to combine yout skills to make that success is the key, of course. And may require learning new skills or improving areas in which you're merely average.
One of the big themes of the book is how you shouldn't worry too much about trying new things and failing. For one, humans are terrible at anticipating what sort of work we would truly enjoy or be good at, and the only reliable way to find a true match is to try a lot of things and keep redirecting yourself. And for another thing, any skills you learn along the way only increase the odds of eventually finding a combination of skills that can lead to great success.
One thing many people reading the book overlook, I think, is that being mediocre in a lot of skills isn't the point. It can't hurt, of course, but the idea is to be above average in a combination of skills that can be utilized together in an interesting way. Recognizing that combination is more likely to be a process of trial and error rather than high minded planning.
> Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it.
I also used to enjoy Scott Adam's blog and ideas, that's why it was quite shocking to me when I revisited his site and found out what he has turned into. I can't take him seriously anymore.
I find it irresponsible the opposite of what he has done before. Is this really the same person who created Dilbert and the above mentioned useful book?
He kept talking about how Twitter shadowbanned him for months. When he was on Joe Rogan's podcast, Joe Rogan suggested ways to test if this is true. He got upset and tried to change the subject. When pressed by Rogan, he finally said: "I don't really want to find out. I just like the idea that I am important to be shadowbanned."
Dreaming in Code by Scott Rosenberg. This book is, so far, the closest I've come to finding a "spiritual successor" to The Soul of a New Machine by Kidder. If you liked The Soul of a New Machine, or if you like watching Halt and Catch Fire, you may well like Dreaming in Code.
Inspired by Marty Cagan. Really solid overview of the essentials of product management.
The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect by Judea Pearl. Judea Pearl is, of course, a giant in the worlds of statistics and AI, and this book distills his work on "causal inference" and lays it all out in a pretty accessible manner. Not a textbook per-se, but not completely non-technical either. Read this if you're interested in how statistical analysis can be used to truly establish cause/effect relationships.
Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal by Ayn Rand. Do you think you hate Capitalism? Do you not understand why so many people love Capitalism? Have you based your opinion of Ayn Rand on second-hand commentary instead of actually reading her works? Then read this book.
[FWIW, UK’s KGX-CBG line.]
As I said in my other comment I got in a few good conversations on my commute about it too, it almost felt like a dead time debating society ;)
Yeah, that's the norm here, sadly. You can post a list of 20 books and if one of them is by Rand, your post will be down-voted into oblivion. It's almost like some people have this Pavlovian reaction when they see Rand's name.
I mean, I get that not everyone appreciates her works, and that's fine and totally understandable. "Different strokes" and all that. But the zeal with which her haters go on the attack is a bit strange.
2. Rand makes some points that some people need to learn, even if I don't buy her whole worldview.
Exactly. This is the same reason that I have copies of Mein Kampf, The Communist Manifesto and Mao's Little Red Book on my shelf waiting to be read. I don't have to agree with a work to find benefit in reading it. Quite the opposite... I believe that if I'm going to argue against something, I should probably have a reasonable understanding of it. And I prefer to go to primary sources than rely on secondhand commentary.
I suspect a lot of dogmatic texts are the same way. Rand is at least not a total drag to read even though I find a lot of her ideas hilarious (chief of which is: the very ethical, honest, and hard working rich people).
Many people opine that forcing Neonazis to read it may be a way to get them disillusioned.
Hitler's strength was speaking to the masses, not writing.
> Do you think you hate Capitalism? Do you not understand why so many people love Capitalism? Have you based your opinion of Ayn Rand on second-hand commentary instead of actually reading her works? Then read this book.
All of this could easily be reversed to mandate reading all three volumes of Marx's Das Capital.
Absolutely. And, in fact, I would absolutely advocate reading Das Kapital. I actually have all three volumes on my shelf waiting to be read. But it's easier for me to submit a personal recommendation for Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal given that I've actually read it.
I also really enjoyed this book. It was a bitter story of an idealistic Open Source project failing miserably.
1. http://timharford.com/books/adapt/ 2. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qshd
http://a.co/d/jknRNxt
Fantastic read that gave me a new way to understand the world.
It looks quite interesting. I'm guessing it's centered around entropy?
It's hard to do it justice here, but the book builds off of existing information theory to offer an explanation of why there are pockets of order in the universe (like our solar system) instead of uniform chaos.
From there it explains how natural systems can increase in complexity over time, and then moves eventually into human systems like cities and economies.
He basically uses physics and thermodynamics to explain economics, which I found fascinating.
This book made me realize just how valuable dense cities are for economic progress and innovation (and why that is - one reason being that it's relatively difficult to transfer knowledge and know-how from one human to another). It also provides an interesting sort of grand purpose for humanity - to be caretakers of this little region of ordered information we find ourselves in.
Interestingly a great deal of progress can simply viewed as reducing or containing entropy.
Whenever a claim is made that something "improves developer productivity" I am very dubious of that claim. Instead I try to evaluate it along the axis of "how much entropy does this help contain? And what ways does the abstraction leak? That is to say where is this thing adding to the overall entropy of the system?". I find that gets better mileage.
* Masters of Doom, by David Kushner
* What Doesn't Kill Us, by Scott Carney
* Bad Blood, by John Carreyrou
* The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondō
* How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big, by Scott Adams
No likable "characters" in that one. Fun reading about the era though.
I’m currently about half way through Principles by Ray Dalio and am enjoying it so far.
Next on my reading list is The coddling of the American mind, by Greg Lukianoff
The journey of how nike became what it is today. It is a must read because, it gives an in depth knowledge about how Companies used to be built without the VC's.
The Mom Test, how to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you by Rob Fitzpatrick (worst title ever, book is great)
All people are divided by politics.
Perhaps it's one to give a read though.
I swear I'm noticing a systemic failure at a global level of people to recognize they are always-on 24/7 political machines living inside an always-on 24/7 political machine and it's mostly Garbage In, Garbage Out.
That's the default mode of operation. Most people are wrong about most things. Couple that with the fact we are de-facto tribal animals that can't turn our politics off. All you get is one big, giant disagreement where everyone is likely wrong and nobody will admit it.
But I keep noticing patterns in everyones language... Patterns that make an assumption that the crazy political debates we find ourselves in are somehow an abnormal state and the world has "descended into madness" or "we've gone mad" or "it seems people have really lost their minds lately".
This pattern crops up over and over again. It's like no man, look at the hardware and software producing the outputs. This is the output the system is designed to produce. We haven't "lost our minds" or "gone crazy", we were always this batshit insane and this is always the protocol we have operated on.
Curious what the framework the book lays out and what resemblance it bears to my own framework...
Actually looking at description of this book and some of the reviews it's basically what I'm saying. Though my thesis contains a large component centering around our complete inability to calculate the truth value of most truth claims a priori and our inability to recognize that leads us to being utterly convinced our erroneous conclusions are correct and getting angry at people who disagree with us. This coupled with all the literature on how dissenters are treated and how groupthink takes hold. We are a walking recipe for disaster.
This will make for a good read. Probably help me to expand on my own model even more.
I think a lot of turmoil and confusion could be avoided if we collectively upgraded our protocols for dealing with each other.
> Curious what the framework the book lays out and what resemblance it bears to my own framework...
I haven't read the book but I assume it follows the framework the author developed (he's a moral psychology academic, I believe) and laid out in a TED talk a while ago (back when they were still good). If you're curious about it, check out the talk on YouTube.
* Why We Sleep: The New Science of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34466963-why-we-sleep)
* Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by Dava Sobel (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4806.Longitude)
* Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26156469-never-split-the...)
* Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25852784-evicted)
* Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11084145-steve-jobs)
PSA: if you use an e-reader or like audiobooks, check out Libby: https://meet.libbyapp.com/
I'm not affiliated with them. Nice app for borrowing ebooks and audiobooks from your local library.
In the past, I could always rely on the fact that I was able to sleep well the night following a bad night. After I couldn't sleep two nights in a row I started to get very worried.
I changed three things:
1. Before going to bed I meditate (I usually listen to the app from Sam Harris)
2. No more caffeine after 11 am
3. 100% of what is called in books "bed hygiene", meaning: when I go to bed I immediately switch off the lights and sleep. I do nothing else. Also, I try to always sleep around the same time, even on weekends.
I believe 3) has been the biggest change. I used to read and even sometimes watch Netflix in bed. I miss reading in bed but since I stopped doing that and only focus on sleeping I have never had problems to fall asleep anymore, despite going through some stressful times.
I do sometimes still wake up early, but since I sleep well before I can handle those days pretty well. My life has changed a lot for the better, one of the best things I have done recently
https://thonyc.wordpress.com/2012/09/10/dava-sobel-tries-her...
I'll have to do more research, but at first glance I don't see any criticism (yet?) on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longitude_(book).
I'd like to see a breakdown of the facts vs. what Sobel wrote. I read the book because I'm a mechanical watch enthusiast, and I was not disappointed in any of the descriptions of the Harrison timepieces or what made them work. I plan to go see them next time I'm in London.
I still recommend the book, especially to watch enthusiasts.
I have no interest in watches but it remains my favourite book nonetheless.
Here's another post, more about another book he recommends on the subject: https://thonyc.wordpress.com/2014/12/09/retelling-a-story-th...
The book is Richard Dunn & Rebekah Higgitt, Longitude: How Ships, clocks and stars helped solve the longitude problem, Collins and Royal Museums Greenwich, London 2014. It is from the people who were behind that 404ing Royal Observatory blog. At least some of that blog's posts are archived: https://web.archive.org/web/20150919110228/http://blogs.rmg....
The blog is still on the Royal Observatory site, but their site redesign makes it nearly impossible to find since they are merged with all their other blog posts and they didn't set up redirects. Here's that final post (the links to other blog posts are dead, but I've found most with a "site:" search with the post title): https://www.rmg.co.uk/discover/behind-the-scenes/blog/so-lon...
I really don't understand the need for libby