331–340 of 400 posts
There are very few stories that strike me as having been 'natively' written for a reader like me; this is one of them.
I also bought book 1 of the Bartimaeus series, read it, and am now onto book 2.
* http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0786852550/ref=as_li_tl?ie=...
"The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains" by Nicholas Carr. I'm halfway through it. The main thesis of the book is that the Internet has quickly modified our brain (neuro-plasticity) so that we absorb information quickly but we don't get deep into any topic any longer. The book start strong with this thesis and then goes into a very interesting detour on the history of writing, from the egyptian to Gut…
Does the book address the issue of specialization in the professions and either exempt it or adapt it to the thesis?
Then the author dives deep into the history of culture (oral, written, mass-media, internet). So far I haven't encountered any mention of how the mind of a "professional" wouldn't be affected by the distracting impulses of the internet and digital communication.
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A good friend of mine recommended Atlas Shrugged a while back. I couldn't finish it. I just couldn't swallow the "better than you" venom Dagny spewed everywhere. Maybe I'm missing something
It's been more than 10 years since I read Atlas Shrugged, but what is often interpreted as disdain or arrogance in the characters, I took to be Arete . That is, the characters sought excellence in themselves and appreciated it in others, while holding those who were leeches on their achievements with disdain. I didn't read Atlas Shrugged as disdainful toward the common man (IE: those of us somewhere beneath excellenc…
Linear and Geometric Algebra by Alan Macdonald. It's a nice book but a bit slow for my taste. I wonder if anyone has a recommendation for a fast paced route to geometric algebra for somebody who is already familiar with conventional math?
Just finished "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" and "Kafka on the Shore" by Haruki Murakami (as recommended by this HN post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9127092 ). Haruki is amazing!
Currently rereading The Snowball by Alice Schroeder
and Eloquent Javascript
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385354045/ref=as_li_tl?ie=...
It's stunning that the comic book character was created by a man who secretly lived with two wives as part of the radical women's rights/free love movement of the 1920s...
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I'm about 40 chapters (~350 pages) through. I wouldn't say it gets better, or worse: I loved it from the beginning. If you aren't hooked by 100 pages, I'd put it down. However I'd recommend coming back to it later, maybe in a few years, try it again, see if you don't get more out of it. Also, if you didn't read the Edith Grossman translation, try that, it is very smart and modern. The older translation feels a bit st…
Thanks! I kind of felt I needed to visit Spain again to appreciate the cultural feel. :-) Do any movies do it justice?
I have not seen any, my guess is no! Sometimes I think Monty Python comes close.