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Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

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Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#501

Post by mindcrime »

stevenwiles wrote: post #500
mindcrime wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how Ayn Rand always seems to trigger down votes here. Me either, but I'm used to it. Whatever. The downvoters are probably the people who thought Ellsworth Toohey was the hero in The Fountainhead .

Actually, its because Rand readers tend to have mentalities like yours - "Anyone who doesn't agree with me just doesn't get it because they don't recognize how supremely intelligent I am". You aren't the first and you won't be the last Rand fanboy with this attitude. :)

Anyone who doesn't agree with me just doesn't get it because they don't recognize how supremely intelligent I am

Where in the world did you get the idea that I think anything remotely like that??? Nothing could be further from the truth. But downvoting a post simply for mentioning Rand or one of her works? To me that's very clearly just ideological bias, which is what I was referring to above.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#502

Post by captn3m0 »

peckrob wrote: post #232

I read a lot of Science Fiction for fun. These are a few of my favorites that I've given to other people: 1. Vacuum Diagrams by Stephen Baxter. When I think of epic hard science fiction, the Xeelee Sequence books spring to mind. With a story line that spans millions of years (and a few dozen books), this collection of short stories is a good introduction to one of the best and most underrated sci-fi series out there.…

On (6) Coyote: I read it a while back (4-5 years), and don't remember much, but I really enjoyed the first two books as well. "The Madwoman of Shuttlefield", a chapter from the first book in the series which was published independently in Asimov's is one of my all time favorite short stories of all time.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#503

Post by captn3m0 »

RegW wrote: post #456
cure wrote: post #148

Fiction, because it is so funny: * Good Omens, by Terry Pratchet and Neil Gaiman [1] I wish Pratchett and Gaiman had written more books together. [1] https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060853980?ref_=sr_1_1&pld...

I gave this to one son when he was about 18, along with a pretty much complete set of Discworld: http://www.terrypratchettbooks.com/discworld-reading-order/ . These were collected over many years, so a bit of a wrench. The best of which might be: "Wyrd Sisters" (Shakespeare), or "The Truth" (Newspapers). He can make fun of pretty much anything, while still showing it great affection. Neil Gaiman's "The Graveyard Book…

I recently read the graphic novel version of Graveyard Book. Would highly recommend that as well, it is quite well done.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#504

Post by fennecfoxen »

grandalf wrote: post #469
fennecfoxen wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling Ender's Game pro-genocide is a riot, but I guess if you didn't read the next 3 novels where Ender is trying to atone for his unwitting participation through an allegory on the book of Mormon, it works. There's Pastwatch which is so pro-genocide that it has a future civilization go back in time to inoculate the Americas against European diseases, and they successfully Westernize their technology just enough to…

> Card had to fend off scathing criticism from his own church (and others') This actually supports my hunch that Card has been pressured to make a public pronouncement of homophobic values, since the messages in the Ender series are largely subversive and pacifistic. I'm not too familiar with the Book of Mormon, so any detail you care to share about the allegory would be appreciated.

Ultra-abridged version: The prophet sees a new, better way of living, gathers a few people to himself, gets rejected by society at large, and ultimately they wander off to the wasteland to found a city which will be a beacon to humanity by showcasing a more enlightened way of living.

That's the Homecoming series plot (complete with the voice of a guardian spirit / computer system that only a chosen few hear), the (extended) Ender's Game endgame, the Alvin Maker endgame, the Wyrms endgame, and you can see deep dark shadows of it in Pastwatch and Treason, among others. Oh, and you can see clearly that the unfinished series that Lovelock is going that way to boot.

It's not a bad tale, but the variety's a trifle lacking.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#505

Post by stevenwiles »

mindcrime wrote: post #501
stevenwiles wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, its because Rand readers tend to have mentalities like yours - "Anyone who doesn't agree with me just doesn't get it because they don't recognize how supremely intelligent I am". You aren't the first and you won't be the last Rand fanboy with this attitude. :)

Anyone who doesn't agree with me just doesn't get it because they don't recognize how supremely intelligent I am Where in the world did you get the idea that I think anything remotely like that??? Nothing could be further from the truth. But downvoting a post simply for mentioning Rand or one of her works? To me that's very clearly just ideological bias, which is what I was referring to above.

Haha, are you serious? You said:

"Whatever. The downvoters are probably the people who thought Ellsworth Toohey was the hero in The Fountainhead."

You just look at your downvotes and you make some pretty ridiculous assumptions about the people who disagree with you - that anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot who didn't understand who the hero of the book was.

If you expect to be taken seriously in discourse, you would do well to be mindful of how you present your views.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#506

Post by fennecfoxen »

sneak wrote: post #417
fennecfoxen wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're interested in reading someone's books without paying for them, I propose there are several decent alternatives: 1. Do the legal thing and go down to the local library, even at some inconvenience to yourself. 2. Drop the smug sense of moral superiority. 3. Stick up for your moral superiority by making a sacrifice by depriving yourself of the pleasure. It doesn't make a whit of difference in the economy, but…

> 1. Do the legal thing and go down to the local library, even at some inconvenience to yourself. How the fuck is that any different than my torrenting the epub and reading it on my iPad? The exact same words, read by the exact same person, for the exact same amount of value transferred between the exact same people. Stop it with this meaningless worship of the fiction of intellectual property. PS: Downloading conten…

I don't believe there is any difference, and have stated as much. But principles are supposed to be the things you seriously inconvenience yourself to defend, not the things you use as a convenient excuse to make things more convenient.

I mean, if you just said "property is theft!" as a justification when you lifted peoples' wallets, it'd seem a bit like "situational ethics". When you have an intellectual beef with someone while pirating their intellectual output in the form of literature, though, that's really going the extra mile. It may not be complete hypocrisy, but it sure has a lot of the appearance thereof.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#507

Post by mindcrime »

stevenwiles wrote: post #505
mindcrime wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone who doesn't agree with me just doesn't get it because they don't recognize how supremely intelligent I am Where in the world did you get the idea that I think anything remotely like that??? Nothing could be further from the truth. But downvoting a post simply for mentioning Rand or one of her works? To me that's very clearly just ideological bias, which is what I was referring to above.

Haha, are you serious? You said: "Whatever. The downvoters are probably the people who thought Ellsworth Toohey was the hero in The Fountainhead." You just look at your downvotes and you make some pretty ridiculous assumptions about the people who disagree with you - that anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot who didn't understand who the hero of the book was. If you expect to be taken seriously in discourse, you…

You just look at your downvotes and you make some pretty ridiculous assumptions about the people who disagree with you - that anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot who didn't understand who the hero of the book was.

I'm not making an assumption that anybody is an idiot. What I am doing is suggesting a measure of ideological bias on the behalf of those people... that is, the people who see Toohey as the hero of the story because they share that ideological outlook. Of course I might be wrong to say that, but I'm not calling anyone's intelligence into question, or comparing it to my own.

If you expect to be taken seriously in discourse, you would do well to be mindful of how you present your views.

Of course, that's pretty much a tautology. That said, there are times when one doesn't care whether the others take you seriously or not.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#508

Post by ehudla »

AlphaGeekZulu wrote: post #14

Douglas Hofstadter: Gödel, Escher, Bach

A nice book to pair with GEB is /From Frege to Godel: A Source Book in Mathematical Logic/. Certainly also better for someone who might find GEB a bit too idiosyncratic.

And, of course, if you want to simply read the proof, there's Nagel's /Gödel's Proof/.

Re: Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?

#509

Post by b_emery »

nl wrote: post #400
Frogolocalypse wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Black Swan is on my list too.

Is it really that good? I've started it a few times. Nassim Nicholas Taleb seems to make sure never to use one word when ten could possibly be used, especially if some of them about himself.

I thought fooled by randomness was much better. Higher information density.
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