Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books. • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#51

Post by RobertL » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:07 AM UTC

"1984" George Orwell "100 Decisive Battles: from Ancient Times to the Present" Paul Davis

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#52

Post by rgrieselhuber » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:07 AM UTC

Shogun, James Clavell - read it when I was 9 or so, put me on the course to live and work in Japan. Has obvious faults but changed my life at an early age.

The Brother's Karamazov. Pleasantly surprised to see Dostoyevsky mentioned a few times in other comments.

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#53

Post by hamilton » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:08 AM UTC

Lately I've been staring at the Codex Seriphinianus quite a bit. Worth finding a copy if you haven't seen it before.

From a technical point of view, The Elements of Statistical Learning, by Tibshirani, Friedman, and Hastie. Far and away the most illuminating demonstration that so many ML / AI techniques have a long-standing statistical foundation, and, essentially, everything boils down to the linear model.

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#54

Post by systemtrigger » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:09 AM UTC

Don Quixote

Shogun

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#55

Post by slig » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:09 AM UTC

1984 and "the art of war"

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#56

Post by wgj » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:22 AM UTC

Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion

The Power of Now

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#57

Post by edw519 » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:22 AM UTC

"The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair

"When Bad Things Happen to Good People" by Harold Kushner

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#58

Post by falsestprophet » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:23 AM UTC

I'm not sure I have two most favored books. But, I'll recommend two:

  The Life and Death of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
  Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#59

Post by pingswept » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:24 AM UTC

Here's a list we maintain at work: http://blog.greenmountainengineering.com/greenmountain_engin...

I contributed Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder and Desert Solitaire by Ed Abbey, among others.

For nonfiction: Creating the Twentieth Century: Technical Innovations of 1867-1914 and Their Lasting Impact by Vaclav Smil

Re: Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.

#60

Post by throw_away » Mon, Oct 12, 2009, 3:35 AM UTC

Gödel, Escher, Bach

Infinite Jest