Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution
Book of Proof
Designing Data-Intensive Applications: The Big Ideas Behind Reliable, Scalable, and Maintainable Systems
Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
We Make the Road by Walking: A Year-Long Quest for Spiritual Formation, Reorientation, and Activation
Soul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury after War (for a friend)
Master and Commander
Educated
Without Getting Killed or Caught: The Life and Music of Guy Clark
Stretch goal: The Power Broker, as a warm-up for Caro's LBJ series
The Bible (perpetual, I don't get through it every year, but I get through much of it, often)
EDIT: I also hilariously underestimate the number of books I want to read. Here's one more I think is vital for my 2020:
The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science
I feel like i already know what i am doing wrong re tech addiction but that i think is psychological issue with me. Not sue what a book can tell me.
Perspective: sometimes a writer puts things in a way that illuminates or alters how I see my situation.
Tools: sometimes a writer has an idea or a scheme that I can put to practical use. The pomodoro timer on my desk has been handy even without adopting every aspect of the method. That came from a blog rather than a book, but same idea (to me.)
The book is both - an intro of "look how awesome you can be without the tech", a detox plan, and a plan to deliberately reintroduce helpful technology.
I am as guilty as anyone in that I have partly read the book, implemented a few of the suggestions, but haven't fully embraced. I think the holidays will be a great time to finish reading it and start my 30 day declutter.
I'd already implemented most of your recommendations before reading it, and this year I feel like I've finally balanced tech consumption so that it's at a healthy level. It's allowed me to read over 20 books, pursue my hobbies in more depth and spend more time with my kid.
Things that worked for me:
- no tech in the bedroom, I leave my phone in the living room every night. - start a morning routine without tech every day, I meditate, do stretches and a light work out. - i try to read as much as possible in hard copy from the library. 3 week loans push me to finish things. I look forward to getting a notification that one of my reserves has arrived. If the library doesn't have a book it will inter library loan or purchase it for me most of the time. - all phone alerts turned off except for text msg/calls - only use FB messenger light if I'm going to use FB at all - plenty of time to do nothing. I don't think the human machine is meant to be on all the time
I try to follow Derek Sivers advice as much as possible: https://sivers.org/pa
Downloading the audiobook as I type this.
Also the chapter on pain. Fascinating.
It's also useful to know that Diamond does not have a degree in Geography and many geographers aren't particularly on board with his ideas.
I think of him the same way I do Malcom Gladwell, a good story teller but he does this by cherrypicking anecdotes more than by a robust assessment of reality.
Jump to 'The Power Broker' instead. Now that's an interesting read.
I've read a couple of the LBJ books which are really amazing and plan on getting to power broker eventually.
He has degrees in history and anthropology and has been a professor of geography for decades.
Software Requirements - Karl Wiegers
Programming TypeScript - Boris Cherny
Associate Cloud Engineer Study - Dan Sullivan
Design Patterns - Gang of Four
Refactoring - Kent Beck, Martin Fowler
Programming Pearls - Jon Bentley
Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture - Martin Fowler
The Pragmatic Programmer - David Thomas, Andrew Hunt
CSS: The Definitive Guide - Eric A. Meyer, Estelle Weyl
Working Effectively with Legacy Code - Michael Feathers
Head First Design Patterns - Eric Freeman, Bert Bates
Code Complete - Steve McConnell
Peopleware - Tim Lister, Tom DeMarco
Clean Code - Robert C. Martin
The Clean Coder - Robert C. Martin
Clean Architecture - Robert C. Martin
Don't Make Me Think - Steve Krug
Functional Design Patterns for Express.js - Jonathan Lee Martin
The Surrender Experiment - Michael A. Singer
Principles - Ray Dalio
The Power of Now - Eckhart Tolle
The Effective Executive - Peter F. Drucker
Think and Grow Rich - Napoleon Hill
Extreme Ownership - Jocko Willink, Leif Babin
Influence - Robert B. Cialdini
The Startup Way - Eric Ries
The Lean Startup - Eric Ries
12 Rules for Life - Jordan B. Peterson
Measure What Matters - John Doerr, Larry Page
The Fish That Ate the Whale - Rich Cohen
The E-Myth Revisited - Michael E. Gerber
The Score Takes Care of Itself - Bill Walsh, Steve Jamison, Craig Walsh
Management - Peter F. Drucker
Thinking in Systems - Donella H. Meadows
Blue Ocean Strategy - W. Chan Kim, Renee MauborgneCareful not to burn yourself out, that is a long list of technical books, that have nothing to do with the books you’ve read and enjoyed in the past that are from other genres.
I've spent a considerable amount of time studying top performers and learned how to manage stress levels effectively. I do exercise, meditation, yoga, stretching, forest bathing, mindfulness, journaling, and other activities that battle against burnout.
I am much more worried about failing to meet my goals than I am burnout. Appreciate your concern though!
That sounds pretty awesome..
For example, I'm currently reading Clean Architecture by Martin that is on your list. While the words on the pages are not hard to understand and it doesn't rely on any advanced computer science/engineering concepts, actually comprehending the posed principles, their implications, how to reason about them and how to pull them off well in a real world scenario is absolutely non-trivial.
I have met many people in tech that devoured douzends of books and conference talks, hundreds of podcast, blog posts, articles and that were an endless source of catchy quotes found in them. But they weren't able to actually apply all this "knowledge" to anything beyond the most basic. And in cases where these people where in leadership/management positions this often had negative impact on the project/product.
To finish with a catchy quote from Clean Architecture:
"The more haste, the less speed."
For patterns, "Head First" is a bit childish maybe, but the content is fine for someone learning to recognize patterns. "Patterns of Enterprise..." is also good, but more dry. I'd stick with one of those two. And then skip the one by GoF, unless you want to read the "original" for some reason.
"The Pragmatic Programmer" is probably the book that has shaped my work the most.
There's also "Patterns for Fault Tolerant Software" by the same author that looks pretty interesting too.
I'm confused by the praise for this book. I couldn't finish it. No real insight or anything technical, just fluff (Dreams + Reality + Determination = Success!).
I'm with Josh Wolfe [1]; I think Bridgewater is going to be exposed as one of the random, large hedge funds that got lucky for a spell, but is not any better than an index fund, ex-fees.
Modern programming is heading in a different direction already so it'd be better to move forward without it.
When you are working with an old codebase, you are going to run across design patterns. You will see terms like factory, builder, observer, decorator, pool, flyweight, etc... and it's going to be helpful to know what those are. A lot of the value of design patterns was in the terminology.
If you are working with Java or C++ these are the two languages where these patterns will appear, even in greenfield projects due to developer loyalty. If you are working with languages other than this, then you are more likely not to encounter these patterns that often.
Thus avoid the book unless you want to become an expert in Java. Also these patterns can be learned without the GoF book just off of quick scans of articles on the internet.
Presumably some of the problems they intend to solve still exist.
Is there some resource you can point to that says in the past when faced with situation X developers tended to use pattern Y, these days that has been superseded with way of doing things Z?
I've seen some of those patterns leveraged to great effect in modern software. But genuinely curious about alternative ways to solve the same problems.
I've definitely noticed the trend towards more and more functional programming these days. I doubt it's simply a case of "just use FP and there are no more problems".
This is about OOP vs. everything else.
Rust, Go and javascript are three languages that are moving away from the OOP paradigm. None of those three languages are classified as functional.
>Is there some resource you can point to that says in the past when faced with situation X developers tended to use pattern Y, these days that has been superseded with way of doing things Z?
No. A general trend is an anecdotal observation. Still a quick google search yielded: https://blog.cleancoder.com/uncle-bob/images/fpvsoo.jpg
Take a look at the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QM1iUe6IofM
While I don't agree with a lot of it, I think it sums up my opinion really clearly. It's not about DP's but because DP's focus around OOP and the video is a criticism of OOP therefore the arguments apply to DPs.
The image you linked it interesting. I want to dive more in on the how/specifics. I don't necessarily buy the argument it's trying to make that "just make a function and you no longer have a need for factory pattern". You're trying to accomplish something fairly specific with that. Functions compose, I could see how there are properties they have that can be leveraged to achieve the same goal, but I'm guessing the functions you write or the way you write functions to achieve each of those specific aims likely differ in subtle yet important ways. I'm very interested in those details.
The same pattern is achievable with functions but the implementation is so trivial in FP that it doesn't even need a name:
Just have a function return another function. That's a function factory.
Same thing with dependency injection:
Just have a function take another function as a parameter.
Outside of this I wouldn't even recommend either pattern at all. It's bad practice in all paradigms. Only have data flow through your execution path, don't have new "execution paths" flowing through your execution paths, such architectures tend to be over-engineered.
I've recently gotten a copy of the book Domain Modelling Made Functional. I'm yet to read it, but I'm pretty intrigued by some of what I've seen and I have heard it comes highly recommend.
I'd be very keen to hear of other high quality examples of things people consider good reference material.
Also note that the trend I see in the industry is not exactly movement towards functional programs but more movement towards borrowing features popular in functional programming as well as getting rid of classes.
Are you going to be happy on your death bed that you lived "approximately" a good life?
I can definitely recommend the book. It could reveal to you those aspects of your life that you feel are off the mark.
That book is seriously underated.
Also hope to get some good recommendations here :)
[1]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30659.Meditations?ac=1&f...
[2]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/242472.The_Black_Swan?ac...
[3]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23463279-designing-data-...
If you have the time/inclination and haven’t already I’d also suggest reading Epictetus and Seneca first.
NB: My favorite of all the available Aurelius translations so far is Martin Hammond (Penguin Classics)
[1] https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/marcus-aurelius/meditation...
[2] https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/epictetus/the-enchiridion/...
[3] https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/seneca/dialogues/aubrey-st...
Thank you - in the future I will clarify.
e.g. Parts seemed quite obsessed with death - which is in part a stoic thing - but also just because at time of writing he was already old & his health was failing.
It might be good to spread out reading it over a long time. Read until you find something that clicks with you. Repeat after a few weeks.
You might also want to look into the works of Epictetus, Seneca and Cicero.
General
====
- Master & Margarita (w reader's guide)
- Why we sleep
- The righteous mind: why good people are divided by politics and religion
- The wisdom of insecurity
- The denial of death
- The three body problem (friend's advice: slow burn, stick with it)
- The dubliners
- The devils (Dostoyevski)
- The name of the rose
- Enten-Oller (Kierkegaard)
- Zero to one (Peter Thiel, recommended reading as palantir new joiner - not fantastic but has some thought provoking ideas; i.e. which very important truth would very few people agree with you on?)
Economy/finance
===
- Basic economics (Thomas Sowell)
- How an economy grows and why it crashes
- Know the city
Math
===
- Coffee time in Memphis
- Real analysis (mathematics textbook)
- Problems from the book (Halfway through this one, and I found it really enjoyable, even with only a CS bachelors)
If anyone has read any and has feedback/notes, I'm looking forward to hearing them!
It's much more rewarding this way than how I went through half of the book in the past ignoring a lot of things I was ignorant of, but it's a way slower process.
It's an experience I'm thoroughly enjoying, but some of the characters described seem to me like they couldn't be real people, but this might just be that my way of thinking as someone living now clashes so heavily with how actual monks in the 14th century thought about the world. I'm giving the author the benefit of the doubt on this for now, as, again, I'm very ignorant on this topic and he was an actual academic in the broader field we're discussing.
Could you elaborate? I'd like to hear what you find dissonant.
Master and Margarita: Very recommendable.
Three body problem: Got bored.
Enten-Eller: Delightful.
Basic economics (Sowell): Very recommendable.
How an economy grows and why it crashes: Childish and grossly simplifying. I read this one while taking a year's of economics on top of my CS. My impression is that some economists have a bad habit of not stating their basic scholastic assumptions. Sowell and Krugman are, in my opinion, not unbiased, but able to inform you at a level where you don't feel like they're also trying to brainwash you.
As for the remainder, I've taken a few notes for myself, so thanks. :-)
Since you seem to have similar taste (or people you respect?), what other books/authors have you enjoyed/would recommend? I am a big fan of Hesse, despite his works being very unrelated to anything on my list.
I've read "Why we sleep" on your list—I average about 20 non fiction a year. It made me think about my own sleeping habits, although I believe there is a blog post out there that claims there is little scientific evidence to back up some of the medical claims made in the book, I still found it beneficial and thought provoking. The history and theory around sleep and it's role in human evolution I found particularly interesting.
You might find this useful: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21546850
I was about to read the book based on a colleague's recommendation, but the blog post and a separate article in my local newspaper debunking few of the claims made me decide against it.
I was not raised Catholic and was a bit lost reading through some of it because I had no idea who some of the characters were or what the references meant. Made for some fun conversations with my girlfriend who read it first and was familiar with all those names and their historical context.
It was a fun book to read though. Got a bit boring for a while but the ending is great so I'm glad I stuck with it.
Specifically, it’s written for a Soviet audience at a time when the censor was hard to get past. So the only way you could publish controversial thoughts or critiques about society was to couch it in metaphor, sarcasm, and double entendres, in a way that requires a lot of cleverness and courage on the author’s behalf. Master and Margarita is considered to be one of the peaks of this genre, because the story it tells manages to have an interesting plot and narration style, even if it’s just there to prop up the incessant jabs at contemporary soviet elites and norms.
It’s sort of like reading a comedy in another language, that’s been translated to English, but all the jokes are region specific, satirical slant rhymes that are explained in the footnotes. It’s very good, but hard to enjoy in its, originally intended, viscerally funny delivery.
And the second and third books got even better. Especially the third one was mind-blowing beyond description at that time for me. I was sad when I finished them all because I didn't know when I would have a similar experience on another book/series.
The wisdom of insecurity: very very good if you are at all interested in the matters it explores
Zero to one: the whole genre of business wisdom books is crap IMHO, but at least this one is short
Basic economics (Thomas Sowell): total must read
After doing a thorough reading of “How to Read a Book” I decided to try rereading a few books to pull more out of them.
I can’t recommend “How to Read a Book” enough - despite its anachronisms and glaring faults, it’s the only book I’ve found that has genuinely made me feel that I’ve not really read a single book in my life.
I read a decent amount and enjoy it, but I feel in the end I don't get much from it. The time doesn't feel well spent. FWIW, I try to alternate fiction with non-fiction.
> Adler’s main point in the first section of his work about how to read a book is that it’s best to gain knowledge straight from the source. Instead of going through a teacher sharing the main points of a book, he considered it better to read the book yourself. He called this concept “original communication”—the idea that information coming directly from those who first discovered an idea is the best way of gaining an understanding.
Also worth checking out is Adler's "How to Mark a Book" : http://chuma.cas.usf.edu/~pinsky/mark_a_book.htm
it's not just about reading books, of course. it's about reading any long-form content.
"What We Cannot Know", which is an exploration of all the topics that we might never be able to know, such as how to predict the weather, is the universe infinite etc.
"Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder", because it's dauntingly long and I'm feeling masochistic.
"Commodore - A Company on the Edge" because I really enjoyed "Revolution in the Valley: The Insanely Great Story of How the Mac Was Made", so I think I'll also like seeing how another computer I really like (the Commodore 64) came about.
it's only 544 pages?
The length on its own isn't that big of a problem. But if you want a simple idea which can be explained thoroughly in a couple of pages to be stretched out for hundreds pages in the most unbearably condescending and arrogant tone that you can imagine... then Antifragile will fit in great with your masochistic inclinations.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Lifespan-Why-Age-Dont-Have-ebook/dp/B...
This year I am finishing up the Harvard Classics and am looking for a new view point. https://www.myharvardclassics.com/categories/20120612_1
Unfortunately, the military only publish on New Years Day (traditionally as a sort of holiday gift to those under command), so the 2020 list is not out yet. Every title is free via either the base library or the Navy Digital Library. Most have free audio book narration. There are discussion guides also provided for free. The website is very easy to use and poke around in, I'd suggest looking at it from a Dev standpoint alone. That said, the 2019 list is here: https://grc-usmcu.libguides.com/usmc-reading-list
There are a LOT of titles so here are the Poolee through PFC levels:
Poolee:
BATTLE CRY by Leon Uris
CORPS VALUES by Zell Miller
GATES OF FIRE: AN EPIC NOVEL OF THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE by Steven Pressfield
GRIT: THE POWER OF PASSION AND PERSEVERANCE by Angela Duckworth
STARSHIP TROOPERS by Robert A. Heinlein
PFC through Lance Corporal:
CHESTY by Jon T. Hoffman
ENDER'S GAME by Orson Scott Card
THE LAST STAND OF FOX COMPANY: A TRUE STORY OF U.S. MARINES IN COMBAT by Bob Drury
THE MARINES OF MONTFORD POINT: AMERICA'S FIRST BLACK MARINES by Melton Alonza McLaurin
ON CALL IN HELL by Richard Jadick; Thomas Hayden
READY PLAYER ONE by Ernest Cline
RIFLEMAN DODD: A NOVEL OF THE PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN by C. S. Forester
THE WARRIOR ETHOS by Steven Pressfield
The 2020 list should have some froth in it (Greitens likely won't stay, but who knows, judge the art not the artist). I think it'll be a good look into a Corps that has been punched for a long time in Afghanistan. Still, some great titles in there.
Instead I would suggest Speaker For The Dead, the sequel to Ender's Game and a remarkable novel.
I started during a long train trip recently and found that I really enjoyed the tone of the first few chapters.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_Record_(autobiogra...
=====
Robert Caro - Lyndon B. Johnson series & The Power Broker
S.C Gwynne - Empire of the Summer Moon
Nassim Nicholas Taleb - Black Swan & Antifragile
Graham Hancock - America Before
Jared Diamond - Guns, Germs and Steel
Safi Bahcall - Loonshots
"A people's history of the United States" by Howard Zinn
there's factual information in there, but a lot of it is a bit exaggerated and from a very... shall we say, not-rigorous perspective, even if you largely believe in the thrust of what's being said and the facts aren't really up for dispute.
I agree. Perhaps when the book came out in the 80s, and there was far less access to "information", this book was probably great from a "history isn't always as it seems" perspective. Today we are far more conscious of the "elite narrative" of history. Now I think you'd be better served by perusing the table of contents and finding various sources on the subject matter that interests you.
It's well written, and Zinn is great. Just feels a bit dated.
Seven Brief Lessons on Physics - Rovelli, Carlo
Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman
Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment - Robert Wright
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind - Yuval Noah Harari
I have not read the others, but the 5+ books I read by Bill Bryson have been awesome, putting The Body on my year's list - thanks ;)
Boom Town: The Fantastical Saga Of Oklahoma City, It's Chaotic Founding... by Sam Anderson
Midnight In Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham
Dune by Frank Herbert
The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu (tried it this year and stopped, want to give it another go)
Stories of Your Life and Others - Ted Chiang (just finished Exhalation and I think it's great)
An Ursula K. Le Guin novel, have not picked one out yet
A book related to basketball (possibly Dream Team, but IDK yet)
Less Leisure Stuff:
Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration and How to Achieve Real Reform by John Pfaff
Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond
The End Of Policing by Alex S Vitale
Either Manufacturing Consent or Understanding Power by Chomsky
The Annotated Turing by Charles Petzold
Work:
Code Complete 2 by Steve McConnell
The Web Application Hacker's Handbook: Finding and Exploiting Security Flaws by Dafydd Stuttard, Marcus Pinto
Finish Writing An Interpreter In Go by Thorsten Ball
If I can get through all of these, I will be very pleased. Throw in a book or two at recommendation from friends and I think I'm full for the year.
I also took two attempts for The Three Body Problem. Gotta say, I don’t understand the hype. Maybe something was lost in translation but it seems like another poorly written SF novel carried by a few interesting ideas. Not in the same league as Dune, Ursula Le Guin or some of Ted Chiang’s shorts.
Maths:
James Stewart's Precalculus
Spivak's Calculus
How to Solve It
Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
I Am a Strange Loop
Introduction to Linear Algebra
Euclid's Elements
The Principia: The Authoritative Translation and Guide: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy
CS:
The Algorithm Design Manual
Finish SICP
Computer Networking: A Top Down Approach
Computer Systems: A Programmer's Persepctive
C Programming: A Modern Approach, 2nd Edition
Operating Systems: 3 Easy pieces
Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment
Hacking: The Art of Exploitation
The Elements of Computing Systems: Building a Modern Computer from First Principles
Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools
Lions' Commentary on Unix
TCP/IP Illustrated
Finance/Econ/Business:
Liar's Poker
Investor Z (Manga)
Trading & Exchanges
Dynamic Hedging: Managing Vanilla and Exotic Options
Python for Finance: Mastering Data-Driven Finance
Never Split the Difference: Negotiating as if Your Life Depended on it
Alpha Masters
Fooling Some of the People All of Time
Dark Pools
When Genius Failed
Advances in Financial Machine Learning
Algorithmic Trading
Other:
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free productivity
Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes
Chaos: Making a New Science
Networks, Crowds, and Markets: Reasoning about a Highly Connected World
Data and Reality: A Timeless Perspective on Perceiving and Managing Information in Our Imprecise World
Can vouch for this one. Provides a great overview of systems through the lens of algorithms they are built on.
I was given it as a gift from a friend and have seen it recommend here on HN
After months of philosophy, I again questioned the value of the ideas the book hints at. It's one of those books that can be a guide - if you need one, are ready for one, and haven't yet encountered the deeper themes.
My list would be too long to post, but these are the ones next in line: - Meditations - Digital Minimalism - I Ching - Art of War - Tao Te King - Steppenwolf - Think and grow rich
In general want to focus on books of: business, leadership, self development, productivity and spiritualism (mostly buddhism).
Designing Data Intensive Applications.
Some books on leadership from the recent HN discussion, not decided which yet.
Death's End (book 3 of The Three Body Problem). The first two were really good.
The Algorithm Design Manual. Domain Driven Design.
Some chess books. Some general science and history. The yearly random self help book.
If I manage all that plus whatever I'll decide I want in the actual year, it will be a good year for reading, but maybe I need to have some more focus. We'll see.
Five Dysfuncitons of a Team: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21343.The_Five_Dysfuncti...
The Advantage: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12975375-the-advantage
Mine :
Harry Potter
I'd also recommend Brandon Sanderson. Mistborn series is very good, and Stormligh Archive is good so far. I really like his world-building, and I think the way he uses magic is something most HNers would approve of. It's often well defined, and the characters try to exploit it the same way a reader would.
1. Faust by goethe
2. I am That
3. Book of why
4. The gift by hafiz
5. Simulacra and simulation
6. Candide by Voltaire
7. Meeting the shadow: the hidden power of the dark side of human nature
8. Nonviolent communication
9. After the ecstasy, the laundry
10. Watchmen
11. Noble heart by Pena chodron
12. Developer hegemony
13. Brothers karamazov
- Paradise Lost
- The Divine Comedy
- The Aeneid
- Moby Dick
- Middlemarch
- Othello & at least the lesser Henriad
- Any of several Russian novels, of which I've read none (War and Peace, Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment probably being the biggest)
- Kafka's The Trial
- The Canterbury Tales (I've read Sir Gawain & The Green Knight but not this, WTF is wrong with me?)
- Don Quixote
But to name ones that I very specifically want to read/finish sooner than later... hmm... there are a number of books that fall more into the realms of history / anthropology / etc., that I have been meaning to read. Books like Guns, Germs, and Steel, and Sapiens - things of that nature. One of those that I'm already on, but probably won't finish before Jan 1, is Human Universals by Donald Brown.
I also want to get through some books on writing/reading mathematical proofs. Mathematical Reasoning: Writing and Proof by Ted Sundstrom, or The Book of Proof by Richard Hammack.
Another one I hope to get through is Designing Data-Intensive Applications.
Cultural Amnesia by Clive James
Exhalation by Ted Chiang
Silver, Sword & Stone: Three Crucibles in the Latin American Story by Maria Arana
The World As I Found It by Bruce Duffy
Alice And Bob Meet The Wall Of Fire edited by Thomas Lin
Masscult and Midcult by Dwight Macdonald
Big Bang by David Bowman
White Noise by Don DeLillo
The Wizard and the Prophet by Charles C. Mann
A House for Mr. Biwas by V. S. Naipaul
A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace
On The Abolition Of All Political Parties by Simone Weil
Collected Stories by Bruno Schulz
On Being The Right Size by J. B. S. Haldane
Bela Tarr, The Time After by Jacques Ranciere
La Vida Breve by Juan Carlos Onetti
The Clown by Heinrich Boll
Memoirs From Beyond The Grave by Francois-Rene De Chateubriand
Blood Dark by Louis Guilloux
The Liberal Imagination by Lionel Trilling
Cuentos Completos by Juan Carlos Onetti
Balcony In The Forest by Julien Gracq
Historia De España Contada Para Escépticos by Juan Eslava Galán
Diez Lecciones Sobre Los Clásicos by Piero Boitani
Waiting For The Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee
97,196 Words by Emmanuel Carrere
Brief Interviews With Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace
El Zafarrancho Aquel De Via Merulana by Carlo Emilio Gadda
Currently reading:
Republic - Plato
Being and time - Heidegger
On the list to begin reading:
Nicomachean Ethics - Aristotle
Recursivity and contingency - Yuk Hui
Wholeness and the implicate order or thought as a system - David Bohm
Finite and infinite games - James P Carse
Book lists:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/31590496?shelf=to-read
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/31590496?shelf=current...
Technical things I am working through are the:
- https://www.extension.harvard.edu/open-learning-initiative/a... along with the Artin text, writing proofs out by hand and in Lean.
- Seven Sketches in Compositionality: https://arxiv.org/abs/1803.05316
And as far as a deeper understanding of the work in question, I plan to listen to podcasts or lectures during my commute or when I'm getting ready in the morning. For example, Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations has a plethora of free lectures on YouTube.
Virgil's Aeneid, the best I know if is CS Lewis's partial translation. I'm unaware of a complete translation that has any of the magic of the original.
Dante's Divine Comedy, read the Clive James translation. This is the first one that captures some of the luminous quality of the Tuscan.
Beowulf, get Seamus Heaney's translation.
I don't read Spanish and cannot offer any insights on Cervantes, but maybe someone else can chime in. Likewise, do some research on translations of the Buddhist writings in volume 45.
One volume a week of this material is steep. A lot of this has its own pace and forcing your way through it faster loses the reason to bother. Milton's Paradise Lost, for example, is an awesome poem, but it implies a cadence, and it's a much slower cadence than modern readers are used to for nontechnical prose.
I have been trying fasting on and off for about 6 months and I can see results, but I have not bothered to check the theory behind it at all.
If anybody would like to recommend some books on nutrition, body aging and general health regarding food, bring it!
The review of Fung's "The Obesity Code" on Red Pen Reviews [2] details some serious flaws in the scientific claims in the book related to calories, insulin, and fasting, and their relation to obesity and fat loss.
Relating to nutrition/health/longevity, they aren't books, but I've found the podcasts, blogs, YouTube videos, and even tweets by Rhonda Patrick (FoundMyFitness), Peter Attia (The Drive), Stephan Guyenet, and Chris Masterjohn quite enlightening.
[1] https://peterattiamd.com/jasonfung/ [2] https://www.redpenreviews.org/reviews/the-obesity-code-unloc...
I just finished reading Siddartha, which is a really short book, but I'd like to read more that are similar to this, any suggestions?
I see Designing Data-Intensive Applications quite a bit in this thread, might have a go at that one too.
Currently I'm reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_History_of_the_Standard_Oi... which is fascinating!
- Database Internals (https://www.databass.dev/)
After that I'll probably read Walden again.
Demons and Wizards, the metal band, made a song called The Gunslinger, through which I learned of this book.
- "Debt: The First 5,000 Years" by David Graeber
- "Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief" by Lawrence Wright
- "The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves" by Matt Ridley
- "Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life" by William Finnegan
It is a well written textbook with clear learning paths for readers with different backgrounds and learning objectives.
1. Ancien Regime and the Revolution by Alexis de Tocqueville
2. Interpreting the French Revolution by François Furet
3. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution by Simon Schama
4. Twelve Who Ruled: The Year of the Terror in the French Revolution by R. R. Palmer
5. New Regime: Transformations of the French Civic Order, 1789-1820s by Woloch Isser
Just ordered the first one!
[1]: https://fivebooks.com/best-books/french-revolution-lynn-hunt...
Anyway, it's been 15 years since I first really learned about the revolution in high school and after hearing the quote I've been skimming the wikipedia page every now and then and it just seems like one of the most fascinating events in the history of the western world.
In the span of 30 years:
- The french kill their king
- They're the first monarchy to convert into a republic
- Most of the early leaders of the revolution die, apparently because they're so brutal
- The whole thing ends with Napoleon becoming emperor and conquering half of Europe.
[1]: https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/978019182...
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/648063.The_Anatomy_of_Re...
25% of people are going to hit 0 again. 1-2 is huge for most people
* The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs: A New History of a Lost World by Stephen Brusatte
* Machine Platform Crowd: Harnessing the Digital Revolution Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson
* Kiss The Ground Josh Tickell
* The Future of Humanity: Terraforming Mars, Interstellar Travel, Immortality, and Our Destiny Beyond Earth by MichioKaku
* * * My other 95 Books I am going to continue re-read in 2020:
One of the best books I read in 2019. :)
I also tend to and try to re-read quite a few books from before. I never have any specific books lined up for a year but I'm sure, I won't be able to finish my current wishlist.
The comment thread on this post is going to be another good source for my book wishlist.
I wish to be rich enough to have all the time to read so many books. :-)
On the list for next year:
The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language
Essays of Montaign
Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers
Higher Speculations: Grand Theories and Failed Revolutions in Physics and Cosmology
The Enigma of Reason
Surfing Uncertainty: Prediction, Action, and the Embodied Mind
Impro
Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China
Invisible Cities
Collapse of Complex Societies
--
Favorites from this year:
Death's End
One Man's Meat
Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons
Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery
Cosmicomics
Why Quark Rhymes with Pork
The Unfolding of Language
A Sand County Almanac
High Output Management Grove, Andrew S.
7 Habits Of Highly Effective People Covey, Stephen R
Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship,(Robert C. Martin)
Clean Architecture: A Craftsman's Guide to Software Structure and Design (Robert C. Martin Series)
Building Evolutionary Architectures: Support Constant Change by Neal Ford, Rebecca Parsons, Patrick Kua
If you have read any of them and you would like to share your thoughts, I will be truly happy to listen!:)
Happy reading
I plan to re-read Descent and The Restoration Game, at the least.
Haven’t made yet a list of new stuff to read, I’ll pick stuff is it comes.
- The Art and Craft of Problem Solving
- Div, Grad, Curl and all that
- Visual Complex Analysis
- Ordinary Differential Equations
- Mathematics and Its History
- Geometry and the Imagination
- Introduction to Electrodynamics
- Penrose's Road to Reality
I’m also listening to various audiobooks, but these are much easier to get through in bulk than books I’ve actually got to sit down and read for like the above.
Non-fiction:
The Upstarts: How Uber, Airbnb, and the Killer Companies of the New Silicon Valley Are Changing the World
Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity
Bad Science
I'm Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day: How to Use Behavioural Design to Create Change in the Real World
Fiction:
This Is How You Lose the Time War
Catch-22
The Wanderers
I could definitely use some more fiction. Any suggestions?
At first I thought "wow that's a crazy book title", but then I realised that this is just markdown shenanigans.
- On the Genealogy of Morality, Nietzsche
- Simulcra and Simulations, Jean Baudrillard
- The Ruling Class, Gaetano Mosca
- Finish off the Enchiridion and Shobogenzo
For work:
- Envisioning Information, Edward Tufte
- Antifragile, Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Among the jewels you’ll find in such a reading are things like the seed of Nietzsche’s thought being placed, imo, in The Birth of Tragedy, with the line:
> It is only as an aesthetic phenomenon that existence and the world are eternally justified
Other Nietzsche related recommendations: Pre-Nietzsche: Plato, Schopenhauer Post-Nietzsche: Camus - maybe?
I've thought about reading Schopenhauer as I understand he's a great complement to Nietzsche's work - I'll see where I get to with Nietzsche first. Camus is somewhat related as an absurdist compared to Nietzsche/Schopenhauer's existentialism, but a bit more optimistic about the possibility of meaning.
I'm tempted to dig into Plato as the problem of universals is a philosophical topic that I value greatly, and his theory of forms is basically its origin story.
I enjoyed Camus due to it being an attempt to move beyond Nietzsche and offer something more digestible, but I never moved past the Nietzsche/Plato combo for my personal philosophies (with a heavy dash of stoicism)
Re forms: I find that Plato’s forms are one of the most used mental models I engage with - especially working with software.
I'm roughly familiar with Camus' ideas as presented in the Myth of Sisyphus, and I like the idea that one can make the fight against suffering the source of meaning - it resonates with my understanding of the role of dukkha in the four noble truths in Buddhism. I personally use a mix of Zen Buddhism and stoicism, which seems very similar to you.
The main mental models I use day-to-day are those derived from systems theory, and I believe that patterns of emergence and recursion described by systems theory are the underlying mechanism that brings about abstract properties. I believe I have a copy of "The Human Use of Human Beings" by Norbert Wiener on the way for Christmas, which is meant to be a great book on the topic of cybernetics which is essentially a sub-category of systems theory.
Do you have good recommendations for Zen Buddhism and systems theories?
I have touched on both, but never got deep enough to know what are the main works I should be working off of.
Yeah that makes total sense. How do you respond to a meaningless universe? By imagining up our own meaning and putting value in that.
> I think that is something that resonated with me - that _my_ philosophy does not need to be yours, but that we can still find some common ground to survive with one another.
Yeah I totally agree, and I think we could benefit from more people who viewed our existence in that way.
> Do you have good recommendations for Zen Buddhism and systems theories?
Unfortunately I'm not generally that bookish - a lot of the knowledge I have on these subjects, I've picked up from thinking and practicing the ideas within, odd sources on the internet and in conversations rather than reading books. However, I can recommend Alan Watts' "The Way of Zen" and Donella Meadows' "Thinking in Systems", which I have read and both of which are fantastic.
Unfortunately sometimes systems theorists get caught up in the fine grained details such as "stock and flow" and "causal loop" diagrams and specific types of loop structure, which happens in Donella Meadows' book - the wiki page for complex systems (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_system) is a good entry point for the high level concerns in systems theory.
[edit] I'm also told that Godel Escher Bach is an interesting book for approaching systems concepts like self-reference and emergence in a more esoteric, example-driven way.
Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity
https://www.amazon.com/Precipice-Existential-Risk-Future-Hum...
Domain Modeling Made Functional - Scott Wlaschin
---
Stormlight Book 4 - Brandon Sanderson
The Doors of Stone - Patrick Rothfuss (fingers crossed?)
Culture series - Iain Banks
- A decent refresher on DDD.
- Applicable to other functional languages, both strongly typed and dynamic.
Regarding non-fiction, I think I will read some books about algebraic geometry and Lie groups. Haven't yet made a plan.
"The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula Le Guin
"This Is How You Lose The Time War" by Amal El-Mohtar
"Priestdaddy" by Patricia Lockwood
"Black Leopard, Red Wolf" by Marlon James
"Consider Phlebas," and maybe the rest of The Culture series of novels, by Iain Banks
Oh man, this will start a shitstorm, because it's so subjective, but Consider Phlebas isn't the best intro to the culture series. I would start with Either Player of Games or Use of Weapons.
Now let's hear from everyone who disagrees with me.
"System Design Primer" https://github.com/donnemartin/system-design-primer
- Antifragile (already started)
- The Black Swan
- Skin In The Game
- (there are 2 more books which I've already read)
- Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman
- Reread: E-Myth, Michael E. Gerber
I am curious; what is your opinion of his works and the man himself? I had read (a long time ago) "Fooled by Randomness" and "The Black Swan" and the thing i remember most is his definitions of Extremistan/Mediocristan (from the latter book) and our inability to understand "random chance" leading to a tendency to see patterns and devise explanations where there are none (eg. Causation vs. Correlation vs. Randomness) I find his writings thought-provoking but difficult to understand (eg. Differences between Randomness, Uncertainty, Probability and Risk) and sometimes quite nihilistic.
* My Family and Other Animals (started, already really enjoying it)
* Albert Einstein: Creator and Rebel (started, enjoying it but moving slowly through it. It's very good, and the author is palpably excited about the subject, I just wouldn't call it a page turner)
I'm currently plowing through David Foster Wallace Infinite Jest (which is enjoyable but taxing!) should be finished in 2020!
- How Democracies Die https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Democracies_Die
- The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_the_Third...
1) Creativity Inc
2) Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice
3) Start With Why
4) Inspired: How to Create Products Customers Love
5) The Hard Thing about Hard Thing: Building a Business When There are No Easy Answers
I only managed to finish ~50% of my planned reading in 2019
I see a lack of leadership -- like a Mandela of the environment. I don't call telling people what to do or spreading facts, figures, doom, and gloom leadership. Nor do I see anyone of renown trying to live by values that would lead us to sustainability and sharing how they create joy, community, and connection. Even Greta promotes panic.
I believe we crave leadership so we can act on our values and overcome the jaded cynicism, shame, guilt, and pointing fingers. We want to take responsibility, to pick up other people's trash, to fly less when we see the compassion and empathy in it, when we can feel the meaning and purpose those who went to jail for other people's freedom did in the US civil rights struggle half a century ago or fighting Hitler a generation before.
My podcast Leadership and the Environment http://joshuaspodek.com/podcast, and my experience acting, have taught me a lot.
Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari - I read Sapiens this year and really enjoyed it. I just started this today one so I may finish that before the end of the year.
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman - I like books that make me think and from what I've heard, this will definitely do the trick. I read Factfulness this year and this was a suggested follow-up.
The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker - I've gotten really into natural languages since I've lived outside my country of origin for the last 2 and a half years and I've heard good things about this book being an entry point into linguistics.
Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski - With the new Witcher show coming out on Netflix I finally went back and beat The Witcher 3 then read the first book, The Last Wish. It was enjoyable enough that I want to keep going with the series.
Educated by Tara Westover - Was convinced by Bill Gate's blog this is worthwhile. I'm a teacher so it wasn't hard to convince me.
Robot Builder's Bonanza by Gordon McComb - I've been asked to teach a robotics course next year and this one seems to be The Book everyone recommends to dive into robotics.
Divided by Partition: United by Resilience by Mallika Ahluwalia - I recently visited the Partition Museum in Amritsar, Punjab, India and purchased this book there to learn about more stories about people impacted by this event.
The Elements of Computing Systems by Noam Nisan and Shimon Shocken - I just read Code by Petzold and it was one of my favorite books. Even though I studied Computer Science in University and most of the concepts weren't new to me, it was such a fun experience mentally "building" a computer from relays/transistors to logic gates and up to assemblers, compilers, and interpreters. I want to keep going with this and jump into the Nand2Tetris online course.
The Annotated Turing by Charles Petzold - Again, I loved Petzold's Code so I looked up other books he wrote and this one looks great. I've never actually read Turing's work so I'm excited to have some background and explanation to help me not just read the words but grasp their significance.
ZACH-LIKE by Zachtronics - I played through several Zachtronics games this year (TIS-100, Shenzhen I/O and Opus Magnum) so I can't wait to dive into some of the thinking behind creating these and similar games.
A very nice introduction of the idea of recursion in linguistics, and a rebuttal of the old dogma that there is in fact such a thing as a language instinct.
Brave New World
Catcher in the Rye (3rd read)
Tom Sawyer
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
War and Peace
Catch-22
Stranger in a Strange Lan
The Hobbit (3rd read)
The Illiad
The Odessey
Walden
Leisure, The Basis of Culture
The Seven Storey Mountain
Confessions
The City of God
Ways of Life St Augustine
Catechism of the Catholic Church
These Truths
Battle Cry of Freedom
The Complete Guide to Fly Fishing
The Lure and Lore of Trout Fishing
The Duck Huntingest Gentlemen
Or something like this, because apparently there's a thing called emotional intelligence, the Doctor says that I have a severe lack of it...
Read one, take a break digest it. It's enjoyable. There are good accompanying books to read alongside it.
-Politics of Institutional Reform: Katrina, Education, and the Second Face of Power
-The Economists' Hour
-Insurance of Dummies
-Architect of Prosperity: Sir John Cowperthwaite and the Making of Hong Kong
* The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham
* Complications by Atul Gawande
* The Structures of Everyday Life: Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century by Fernand Braudel
We (Y. Zamyatin)
The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper (C. Petzold)
Endurance (A. Lansing)
Economics: The User's Guide (H. Chang)
Oblomov (I. Goncharov)
After that I intend to primarily focus on additional books about communication: written and verbal including listening skills
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information
The Rust Programming Language
Progressive Web Apps
Permaculture: Principles and Pathways beyond Sustainability
Farming the Woods
Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms
Affinity Designer Workbook
The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
Walden
A Guide for Desert and Dryland Restoration
Ernest Hemingway On Writing
The Two Hands of God (Alan Watts)
The Anarchist's Design Book and/or With the Grain: A Craftsman's Guide to Wood
Dune
Some other fiction reading I'll decide on after I finish Dune
Tao of Physics, Web of Life, Systems View of Life, etc. (Fritjof Capra)
^Capra's work has heavily influenced my worldview and ability to think in systems
Designing Data Intensive Applications (just finishing this week)
Permaculture One & Two, Gaia's Garden, Edible Forest Gardens I&II
Black Swan, Antifragile, etc. (Nassim Taleb)
Cloud Hidden: Whereabouts Unknown (Alan Watts, written late in life)
Ishmael, Story of B, etc. (Daniel Quinn)
You are Not a Gadget, Who Owns the Future, etc. (Jaron Lanier)
Goethe's Italian Journey
Vonnegut, Hemingway, Steinbeck
The Wheel of TimeBayesian Statistics the Fun Way - Will Kurt
...I hope!
Writing a Go Compiler
No One Cares about Crazy People
I Heard You Paint Houses
UNIX: A History and a Memoir
Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine
How Asia Works
The Dream Machine
Black Earth
The Fabric of Reality
Behave (tried twice, maybe third times a charm?)
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers
Genius: The Life and Science Richard Feynman
Super Thinking
Man's Search for Meaning
The Cooking Gene
The Vital Question: Why is Life The Way it Is (re-read)
The Case Against Sugar
The 15 Decisive Battles of the World
The History of the Peloponnesian War
The Beginning of Infinity
The Book of Why
- Feed by M.T. Anderson
- The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff
- Equality by Edward Bellamy
- Infinite Jest (already started, will likely finish in early Jan. I love it so far.)
- Quantum Computing Since Democritus (started in November as my nonfiction read, but took a break; I think I want to finish IJ first. Scott is an excellent writer and I was really enjoying this)
- Building Microservices
- The Code Book
- How Cars Work (I want to turn the projection of a car in my brain from a black box to a gray box this year, and I don't mean by purchasing a Cybertruck)
- To Kill a Mockingbird
- The Personal MBA (for years I laughed off caring about the business of business and lived in my fantasy land of being satisfied with just the technical details and being focused on only implementing great software/learning how to do so. With a few years in the workforce under my belt, I realize that such an outlook was of great detriment to me. I'm open to other suggestions on similar "catch me up to speed on general business education" material)
- Designing Data-Intensive Applications
- Island (I have a copy of this but not Brave New World. Multiple friends of mine demand I try Huxley, so here we are.)
- The Annotated Turing
- How to Invent Everything
- Soonish (SMBC is a daily read for me and I'm excited to get to this.)
- How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems (ditto XKCD modulo release schedule)
- Basic Economics
- Thus Spoke Zarathustra
- Seveneves
- The Prince
- Pacific Rims: Beermen Ballin' in Flip-Flops and the Philippines' Unlikely Love Affair with Basketball
- Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-Listening, and Other Moodsong
- Fahrenheit 451
Additionally, to tickle the part of my brain that fancies mathematics (one of my my majors in undergrad), I try to work through a chapter or two of Evan Chen's "An Infinitely Long Napkin" on a quarterly basis. If you don't mind a conversational tone to your math textbooks, I've found this to be an excellent resource for scraping the surface of a wide variety of topics and fields (including, well, topics like fields). I think I'll continue this habit.