What are the best non-fiction books you have read that expanded your views, hobbies, interests etc.
Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
1–10 of 92 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#2John Seymour's self sufficiency books.
Haven't been able to put it all into practise, but they opened my eyes to what's possible, and provided some motivation to make the best use of the space we've got.
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#3Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#4Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#5Daring Greatly by Brene Brown
This book has had a profound impact for years now on how I look at myself and those around me. I never saw shame as it's own entity beforehand and simply thought it was part of culture and the way things are. Now I see it as something to avoid like the plague for the sake of myself and those around me.
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#6I really enjoy anything from John McPhee, especially Coming Into The Country.
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#7I recently read Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari and it nearly broke my mind. It was on Obama and Bill Gates' reading lists that year and it is phenomenal. It's like one of those books that took some ideas I had been kicking around for years and blew the whole thing wide open.
If you want to get a taste, go look up 'The Legend of Peugot' from the book.
There was also a sale on the ebook for $3 on Amazon this weekend -- not sure if it's still going.
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#8Please don't... every time a thread like this shows up on HN, I end up impulsively buying some of the recommended books. I'm usually very happy about the purchase, though. :).
Humor aside; not sure if favourite of all times, but definitely impacted my thinking a lot:
- "Rationality: From AI to Zombies" - https://intelligence.org/rationality-ai-zombies/ - read this when it was still a bunch of posts by 'Eliezer on LessWrong. It cleaned up my thinking quite a bit, and introduced to couple new ideas from economics, sociology and epistemology.
- SICP, obviously.
- "How to Win Friends and Influence People", and "How to Stop Worrying and Start Living" - from the father of the whole genre of self-help/personal development, and one whose books are still probably the only good ones in this genre, Dale Carnegie. They explain exactly what it says in their titles.
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#91. Sapiens - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23692271-sapiens
2. The Gene: An Intimate History - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27276428-the-gene
3. I Contain Multitudes - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29083367-i-contain-multi...
4. Stuff Matters - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19553030-stuff-matters
5. Rework - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6732019-rework
Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite non-fiction books of all time?
#10- "Rationality: From AI to Zombies" - probably the most influential book I've read in my life, profoundly changed the way I think. It's a collection of LessWrong essays on science and rationality.
- "On Intelligence" and "I am a Strange Loop" - how mind works.
- "Rework", "Zero to One", "Start Small, Stay Small" - insightful startup advice.
- Fun autobiographies: Ghost in the Wires (Kevin Mitnick), iWoz (Steve Wozniak), Catch me if you can (Frank Abagnale), Just for Fun (Linus Torvalds), Elon Musk, Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!
- How companies work: Creativity Inc (Pixar), In the Plex (Google)
- On writing: Art of fiction/nonfiction by Ayn Rand, Story by Robert McKee, Save the Cat, Step by Step to Standup Comedy.
- Other: The Selfish Gene, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, Serious Creativity, Hackers & Painters, Hacking Growth, Angel (on angel investing, by Jason Calacanis).
Also collections of essays by Paul Graham [1] and Scott Alexander [2]:
[1] https://www.dropbox.com/s/2no0sqybnxurpcd/Paul%20Graham%20-%...
[2] https://www.dropbox.com/s/i43lqpdyd4qa255/The%20Library%20of...