31–40 of 283 posts
https://archive.org/details/StuffMatters
Very accessible and fun to read, and the book is structured around introducing a lot of fundamental materials science concepts in the context of everyday objects (silverware, chocolate, etc)
Lifespan by David Sinclair would be my recommendation if you want to energise someone for molecular biology/ biotech
A very tough question. I feel that it might be quite hard to lure a curious person into Computer Science, who doesn't know anything about the field yet. One of the books I liked (since I actually studied Linguistics in my Bachelor's) and what drew me towards CS was "Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software" by Charles Petzold.
I think maybe some of the history books could do it for cs. Like I'm very early into the book Crypto Anarchy, Cyber States and Pirate Utopias (2002 MIT PRESS), and it's kinda interesting. I'm not sure how the later parts are but chapter 1 is interesting. It definitely has an audience in mind but I think it could be an interesting book for someone outside of CS.
Particularly entertaining is his 'A pure waste of paper' (Appendix A of 'LOCUS SOLUM') (https://girard.perso.math.cnrs.fr/0.pdf). I could flip to a random page of his 'appendix' and just sink in.
A fine introductory work of his to the subject would be 'PROOFS AND TYPES' (https://people.mpi-sws.org/~dreyer/ats/papers/girard.pdf).
I started my career in international development, and the book above provides a dozen case studies on states using scientific management, stats, etc. to try and control their growth/populations/economies and failing miserably.
It is a beautiful book in that it illustrates how difficult it is to actually manage a country and economy well, especially if you are trying to completely change it (i.e., "develop" it, solve poverty, etc.). It humbled me as a 22 year old "professional" wanting to fix the world.
"The Death and Life of Great American Cities" by Jane Jacobs is a close second to this theme of economic, technocratic development.
EDIT: I notice 22 upvotes. WOW! If you are a fan of this book or curious to hear more, please comment. Happy to elaborate. If you want a third book, The Evolution of Civilizations[1] is another fun one here. It tries to apply scientific principles and hypothesis testing to historical analysis!
[1] https://10millionsteps.com/review-evolution-of-civilizations
Non-technical but very interesting and emotive to most people.
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