The soul of the new machine.
Prompted me to complete the hardware part of nand2tetris and now looking for something between it and rigid textbooks such as Computer Architecture.
Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
51–60 of 88 posts
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any English translation worth reading?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashtavakra_Gita#Translations Thomas byrom's "The Heart of Awareness" is a popular translation for a quick read. If you want something denser with commentaries and explanations, Swami Nityaswarupananda's translation is great. Another good translation keeping western audiences in mind is Duet of One by Ramesh Balsekar.
Thanks!
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#53Permutation City by Greg Egan. I actually didn't like the story that much, but the book is just dense with ideas that I keep thinking about years later.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#54The Phantom Tollbooth. Hands down. Yes, it helps if you read it before you are 10, affecting dramatically more of your life than anything read as an adult.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#55"The Dawn of Everything" by the Davids, Graeber and Wengrow.
It's a little dense and a bit meandering at times, but the core idea behind it: we have a strong bias in believing that civilization comes in stages. We believe we go 'hunter/gatherer/primitive' -> agriculture -> 'real' civilization. Basically, this is totally false.
Not only is it totally false, but one of the reasons we might have this bias is because, while the native Americans were being eradicated, Western thinkers and theologians had to justify why Western civilization was 'better', despite native Americans basically giving Westerners the seeds for individual liberties and social blueprints for the Western Enlightenment...
It really uprooted my deepest beliefs about human history, civilization, and (most importantly for me) what I believe "the future" should look like. Mind-expanding for sure.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#56Awareness by Anthony de Mello
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#57My own diary. It's like debugging a server log of your mind. Note that I quickly deviated from any expected norms of "dear diary, today _____ happened and it made me feel ______", and instead simply decided to write, whatever cames to my mind, every day, no matter how nonsensical. Most of it is pointless and cringe, but there's some brilliant opinions, descriptions of values, and even poetry in there. A diary is, aft…
Good answer. Personal writing can also help you understand stressful events in life.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#58"The Illuminatus! Triology" by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson.
Great to see RAW is getting some mentions here.
His other stuff can be of interest too, like Prometheus Rising and Cosmic Triggers. It’s not that what he writes about is necessarily scientific or rigorous, but he offers a bunch of worldview building blocks that one can try and find very useful.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#59In terms of knowledge:
"A brief history of nearly everithing"
In terms of soft skills: "Outliers"
Re: Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?
#60Leslie Kean's UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record. Reading this started my deep dive into the rabbit hole of high strangeness phenomena. Can't say one way or another if it's all just bunk or not, but at least it's entertaining.
Have you paid any attention to Skinwalker Ranch?