Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#1

Post by mantshitla » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 5:56 AM UTC

Best Data Science Books According to the Experts
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Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#2

Post by melling » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 6:42 AM UTC

I like the Data Science from Scratch book. I’m working through the book and rewriting the examples in Swift:

https://github.com/melling/data-science-from-scratch-swift/b...

I haven’t read it yet but the Think Stats book is available for free online:

http://greenteapress.com/thinkstats2/html/index.html

PDF: https://greenteapress.com/thinkstats2/thinkstats2.pdf

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#3

Post by blackbear_ » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 7:29 AM UTC

Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning (PRML) is absolutely recommended. Available for free as well! [1]

The Elements of Statistical Learning (ESL) [2] is also a very reputable source.

They also make a good pair: PRML has a Bayesian approach while ESL is traditionally frequentist.

[1] http://users.isr.ist.utl.pt/~wurmd/Livros/school/Bishop%20-%...

[2] https://web.stanford.edu/~hastie/ElemStatLearn/

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#4

Post by mrslave » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 7:30 AM UTC

I appreciate that on HN this article may provoke intelligent conversation, but this article is smells a lot like a "top N things you need right now" blog post where everything is an Amazon affiliate link.

(Edit: I was wrong about affiliate links. Not deleting to publically self-shame.)

The real data science would be producing articles like this automatically, and with good SEO, to drive revenue.

The list is OK. I've studied ISL (and some of ESL). A friend really enjoyed Think Stats. Charles Wheelan's book is in the same vein as How To Lie With Statistics (Darrell Huff?) but in greater depth.

I started with R because that's what my team was mostly using when I got into this area. Hadley Wickham's free books are good too.

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#5

Post by auraham » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 7:33 AM UTC

I have Deep Learning with Python (Chollet, first edition) and Hands-On Machine Learning (Géron, first edition). Both books are highly recommended.

Introduction to Statistical Learning is also available for free online:

http://faculty.marshall.usc.edu/gareth-james/ISL/

Although I only read a few chapters from that book, I really like it (but I would have preferred a python version of the book).

Personally, if you have to pick three books from the list, ypu can start with these three options.

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#6

Post by sgillen » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 7:40 AM UTC

blackbear_ wrote: post #3

Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning (PRML) is absolutely recommended. Available for free as well! [1] The Elements of Statistical Learning (ESL) [2] is also a very reputable source. They also make a good pair: PRML has a Bayesian approach while ESL is traditionally frequentist. [1] http://users.isr.ist.utl.pt/~wurmd/Livros/school/Bishop%20-%... [2] https://web.stanford.edu/~hastie/ElemStatLearn/

ESL is an excellent reference, if you are looking for an introduction instead I can recommend “An introduction to statistical learning” by (most of?) the same authors.

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#7

Post by jointpdf » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 8:05 AM UTC

More free books:

* Vectors, Matrices, and Least Squares — IMO the best beginner-friendly and applications-focused intro to (or review of) linear algebra. Covers a ton of fundamental ground while keeping things consistent and concise. Lots of exercises and a Julia supplement book. (http://vmls-book.stanford.edu/)

* Mathematics for Machine Learning — good coverage of the most important math concepts relevant to ML (https://mml-book.github.io/)

* Forecasting: Principles and Practice — best overall resource on forecasting that I know of; R focus. One of a zillion great R/data science books, virtually all of which are open and well-written. (https://otexts.com/fpp2)

* Dive Into Deep Learning — can’t personally vouch for this one but it looks comprehensive; numpy/PyTorch/TF focus (https://d2l.ai/)

* Speech and Language Processing — clear introduction to all things NLP, nice flow (https://web.stanford.edu/~jurafsky/slp3/)

Re: Best Data Science Books According to the Experts

#8

Post by henrik_w » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 8:07 AM UTC

The article notes that "Designing Data-Intensive Applications" is perhaps not a typical data science book, but it is still very useful. I agree. It is a fantastic book - one of the best technical books I have read. I wrote why, and a summary of it here:

https://henrikwarne.com/2019/07/27/book-review-designing-dat...