41–50 of 151 posts
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. The timeless beauty and innocence of the book remains unparalleled.
Light in August, by William Faulkner. It is the opposite of the above, dealing with complex emotions. Faulkner's prose and characters are unmatched in their depth.
Le ton beau de Marot, also by Douglas Hofstadter. Was blown by his description of how making the typographical choice of starting the first word of each chapter with letters decreasing in height to the normal page font size, caused him to rethink a whole chapter (he couldn't use descenders, which limits the first word, which limits his first sentence, which constrains his first paragraph and so on).
Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, by Eliezer Yudkowsky. Every single chapter is potentially mind blowing. The whole approach of trying to instruct rationality through such fiction is itself brilliant I think.
This changed how I look at my life
http://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/dp...
There's also the Imperial Radch series which is a very, very good sci fi series which is unlike any other sf I've ever read[0].
[0]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17333324-ancillary-justi...
>Winner of the Hugo, Nebula, British Science Fiction, Locus and Arthur C. Clarke Awards.
The story of Everett's life among the Pirahã people in the Amazon. Everything you thought you knew about humans is wrong.
"Thinking Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman.
"Quantum Computing since Democritus" by Scott Aaronson.
"The Strategy of Conflict" by Thomas Schelling.
"Guns, Germs, and Steel" and "The World until Yesterday" by Jared Diamond.
"The Retreat To Commitment" by W. W. Bartley.
"The Myth of the Rational Voter" by Bryan Caplan. Despite the name it made me appreciate democracy a lot more.
"Wars, Guns, and Votes" by Paul Collier.
"I Am That" by Nisargadatta Maharaj.
A totally astounding introduction to how computing fits into the broader scale of understanding other phenomena in our everyday scientific lives — and, unlike most “oh wide-eyed wonder!” popsci books it contains code, equations, and deeply significant diagrams.