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What are you reading?

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Re: What are you reading?

#161

Post by fauigerzigerk »

perfectlyfrank wrote: post #149
fauigerzigerk wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I took her meritocratic stance seriously until I heard her defend inherited wealth, which is ridiculously inconsistent.

"Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth--the man who would make his own fortune no matter where he started. If an heir is equal to his money, it serves him; if not, it destroys him." - I think she's still basing it on merit. While I disagree with some of what she says, and she says a lot, she does a decent job of staying consistent.

It would be consistent if everyone who was fit to inherit actually did inherit. But that is not the case. Some of those who are fit do not inherit and others do. What is the basis for this inequality? Birth.

She destroys the idea of meritocracy that she herself presented so eloquently and discredits libertarianism as yet another excuse for those born wealthy to keep their wealth.

If an hair is not equal to his money it destroys him? Come on, what does it even mean to be "equal to money"? And how can someone who does not inherit wealth even prove that he or she is "equal to the money"? That's just the kind of fluffy nonsense that moral philosophers are so infamous for.

Re: What are you reading?

#162

Post by nandemo »

rw wrote: post #96
jerryji wrote: post #63

"How to Get Rich" by Felix Dennis ( http://www.amazon.com/How-Get-Rich-Felix-Dennis/dp/009191265... ) THE best get rich how-to guides that I've read (not that I've read too many of them, though :)

Let us know how the advice seems after you've made your money.

Actually, a very likely outcome of reading that book is that you give up the idea of getting rich. The book is good, though.

Re: What are you reading?

#163

Post by sb »

kwantam wrote: post #25

The Reasoned Schemer by Friedman, Byrd, and Kiselyov Purely Functional Data Structures by Okasaki Programming Language Pragmatics, 3rd ed by Scott Fast Analytical Techniques for Electrical and Electronic Circuits by Vorperian

I second "Programming Language Pragmatics" it is a fantastic book, and he is a very good writer, with illustrative examples and just the right balance between breadth/depth.

Re: What are you reading?

#164

Post by wwkeyboard »

Gertm wrote: post #130

Real World Haskell http://book.realworldhaskell.org/

I'm bouncing between that book and "The Haskell School of Expression"( http://www.haskell.org/soe/ ). The second seems to be better at describing data structures and building the language in your mind while the first is more of a reference of useful ideas.

Re: What are you reading?

#165

Post by djm »

Mongoose wrote: post #3

I'm currently reading "Persepolis," the graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi, and MIT Press' "A History of Modern Computing." I recently acquired a copy of Steven Levy's "Hackers," which I'd like to at least start before the end of the summer.

Steven Levy is a brilliant writer. If you want to read about computer history from the position of the hackers building it then I'd also suggest reading his other books, especially 'crypto' and 'insanely great'.

Re: What are you reading?

#166

Post by matt1 »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #30
quantumhobbit wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ayn Rand was a philosopher. And like most philosophers, she started out with some good ideas and over applied them to everything in life, which leads to some scary conclusions. My favorite Rand book was Anthem. It was short and therefore didn't have space to extrapolate Rand's ideas to their scary conclusion. I just finished reading Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo. It is just as long and pompous as Atlas Shrugged, but…

I once listened to a 80-hour overview of the world's great philosophers, given by modern professors. What amazed me was how many of them came up with a good idea that was new and revolutionary -- and then spent the rest of their life taking the damn thing too far. I guess great people fall so much in love with their great ideas that it never occurs to them that the most important piece is finding the boundaries for w…

What's the series called?

Re: What are you reading?

#168

Post by Estragon »

ddemchuk wrote: post #151
zemariamm wrote: post #29

. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig . Programming Clojure . Little Schemer (re-reading) . Evidence-Based Technical Analysis: Applying the Scientific Method and Statistical Inference to Trading Signals by David Aronson

+1 on ZAMM, very interesting book...do you plan on moving on to Lila, the "sequel"? I've read that very few have a full understanding of the point of the second book...I never got around to reading it after the first...

That book caused me no end of confusion, when I read it as a teenager. By the time Lila came out, it was no surprise to me that in it he repudiates much of what he said in ZAMM.

People should avoid reading it, because it's useless, and if they do read it, they should take it a lot less seriously than it does itself, because it's clear from the sequel that the author himself does.

Re: What are you reading?

#169

Post by greggraham »

roryokane wrote: post #42

I'm reading Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson for the third time, and understanding it more than the second time. It has wonderful technical digressions that seem aimed precisely at geeks/hackers. In fact, on the the main characters is a programmer, and another is a code-breaker in the military who sees an opportunity for geeky analysis in everything he sees. (There are also many accounts of military battles from a so…

I recently read _Cryptonomicon_ after having put it down last year. It was fun, and overall it was definitely worth it. I'm reading his _Snow Crash_ now. It was published in 1992, before the Web, and it predicts a time close to present day. It's interesting to see what he got right, and what he got wrong. It's also a fun read if you are generous with the disbelief suspension.
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