R
Roy Smith
When you're done with that, try Ed Yourdon's "Death March".
When you're done with that, try Ed Yourdon's "Death March".
P
Patrick Useldinger
"Zen [...]" is definitely on my list ;-)
Regards,
-PU
J
Juha Autero
Patrick Useldinger said:
Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid. It may not be the best
book I read and not very useful, but I'd recomend reading it anyway.
J
John J. Lee
Peter Hansen said:
Why? Honestly, I don't understand. You do understand our negative
responses to weren't meant as a personal attack?? I certainly
consider both positive and negative comments about books (or whatever)
to be useful, especially when they come from from people (like you!)
whose opinion I respect or when they give an illuminating argument.
And, in fact, even when they don't even deign to give any reasons --
since that may tell you something in itself ;-)
Sorry for ticking, but certainly not sorry for expressing an opinion.
John
M
Michael Peuser
Peter Hansen said:
I think you are right! In fact I enjoy all the other suggestions, 20% of
which I did not know of before...
So I should contribute another clasical book:
Hofstadter: Goedel Escher Bach
which probably everybody of our age has read but maybe not the younger
generation ;-) And it is still entertaining, especially in a hospital...
Kindly
Michael P
M
Michael Peuser
Juha Autero said:
I made the same recommendation some minutes ago, but without your
reservation. In fact I might even come to the conclusion it *is* the best
book I have read ;-)
Why do you think it is not very useful? What do you think of Shakespeare by
the way?
Kindly
Michael P
P
Peter Hansen
John J. Lee said:
I'm probably just being over-sensitive. Somehow it felt like the
kind of question that deserved merely openly enthusiastic suggestions
from everyone without worry about being ridiculed for their strange
ways, to give Patrick the best chance at finding some interesting
stuff to while away the hours while he has a tube up his but anyway
I know you didn't mean any offense, so I'll happily drop the issue
and go back to recording all the other excellent suggestions (thanks
Patrick for starting a thread with such great responses!) so I can
add to my own reading list.
Cheers, ;-)
-Peter
J
John J. Lee
Michael Peuser said:
Even better hospital reading material: Metamagical Themas. Fantastic
stuff. It's a collection of his Scientific American articles (he took
over Martin Gardner's column, "Mathematical Games" for a while,
anagram-izing the name in the process), with very worthwhile added
notes that weren't in the original columns.
I'm still waiting for his book "How to judge a book by its cover".
Perhaps it will include a chapter on extracting information from
unsupported negative opinions in USENET groups. ;-)
Q. Why did Douglas Hofstadter cross the road?
[SPOILER SPACE]
[SPOILER SPACE]
A. In order to make this joke possible.
(joke credit: Eric Drexler, apparently)
John
J
John J. Lee
Michael Peuser said:
[not directed at me, but I'll answer anyway...]
Well, it dazzles you with all sorts of fascinating stuff, and succeeds
at being something wonderful purely in its own right, but it fails to
actually solve any problems. Of course, nobody can really tell him
off for that, since his subject matter revolves around what appears to
be the biggest unsolved mystery in human knowledge.
John
V
Vepxistqaosani
Patrick said:
Patrick,
I very much enjoyed one of Hofstadter's other books: Le Ton Beau de
Marot: In Praise of the Music of Language. It is tangentially related to
IT, since it's about languages. And language is worth thinking about,
even by those of us who are reputed not to be able to use (human)
languages well. (This last observation courtesy of my wife.)
Fred
N
Nick Vargish
Patrick Useldinger said:
The Python Cookbook is the best technical book I've read in a long
time. Python in a Nutshell is excellent, but lacks a certain narrative
flow which the Cookbook does posses. I think the Cookbook also has
better character development. The Cookbook really opened my eyes not
just to some of Python's abilities, but also to some programming
paradigms that I just hadn't gotten around to assimilating.
I just read Matt Ruff's new book _Set_This_House_In_Order_ and was
blown away. Brilliant, though not technical.
Nick
N
Nick Vargish
Michael Peuser said:
Good god, man! The guy's already going to be in the hospital. GEB is
something that should be tackled at full health.
Nick
M
Michael Peuser
May be not! I had been in hospital last year and I remember how my thoughtsNick Vargish said:
were spinning around. I think it is a good oportunity to dig into
self-referential matters where our brain is not made for in its healthy
state ;-)
Kindly Michael P
M
Michael Peuser
Absolutly true. But I have the feeling that whenever anyone will explain theJohn J. Lee said:
reason ofor everything to us in 1000 years it will be absolutly useless as
well.
In fact I had the vision of some multimedia event, laying in a hospital bed,
connected to artificial nutrition, wearing headphones, listening to Bach's
music and reading Hofstadter. Excuse me for being such hillarious.
Kindly
Michael P
J
Juha Autero
Michael Peuser said:
It is just too hard to say what is the best book I've ever read. Or
even best book on subject of IT or Python. That's why I didn' dare to
suggest that GEB was the best book.
Poor choise of words. I was just trying to say that it's not as
practical as other books suggested here like Python Cookbook or
Mythical Man-Month.
P
Patrick Useldinger
To tell you the truth, one book on my list is also "The Tibetan Book
of Living and Dying" ;-)
Did I mention that it was *nothing* serious (unless the surgeon runs
into an uncatched exception...)
-Patrick
P
Patrick Useldinger
I agree, but I've read that one already.
-PU
A
Aahz
On a lighter note, a fantastic book that I really enjoyed reading (for
leisure) was
Kil'n People, by David Brin.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/tg/used/-/1841491381/
It's nothing less than a masterpiece of modern sci-fi. IMHO
Ugh. It's not a bad book, but while I like David Brin in general, his
quality has slipped in recent years and I'd recommend something else,
depending on the taste of the reader:
Military SF: David Weber (start with _On Basilisk Station_) or Lois
McMaster Bujold (start with _Shards of Honor_, but don't read _Barrayar_
yet if you pick up the _Cordelia's Honor_ omnibus).
Social SF: anything by Ursual K. LeGuin, _Courtship Rite_ by Donald
Kingsbury
General SF: _In Conquest Born_ by C.S. Friedman; _Sundiver_, by David
Brin; _Pride of Chanur_, C.J. Cherryh; _The Mote in God's Eye_, Larry
Niven & Jerry Pournelle
Fantasy: _Godstalk_ by P.C. Hodgell (available in the omnibus _Dark of
the Gods_)
High fantasy: _Riddlemaster of Hed_ by Patricia McKillip
These are just a few that I pulled up with a couple of minutes thought;
I've got many, many more.
T
Terry Reedy
anyway.
One of its virtues as a hospital read is that it is written and best
read in relatively small chunks, with periods of possibly eyes-closed
contemplation in between. On the other hand, it is a bit heavy to
hold up while laying on one's back. Perhaps OP can give a report on
what he actually reads when the ordeal is over.
Terry
One of its virtues as a hospital read is that it is written and best
read in relatively small chunks, with periods of possibly eyes-closed
contemplation in between. On the other hand, it is a bit heavy to
hold up while laying on one's back. Perhaps OP can give a report on
what he actually reads when the ordeal is over.
Terry
M
Martin Maney
At the risk of ticking someone, I'd have to suggest that the
Metamagical Themas columns are his slightest work. Or perhaps we
aren't disagreeing if you wanted to suggest something lighter as better
for the circumstances.
GEB remains my favorite Hofstadter as a book to sit down and read from
end to end. For something that's a weightier distraction, his _Fluid
Concepts and Creative Analogies_ is a fascinating look at the reaserach
work he and his co-conspirators were engaged in all those years.
Branching out to nearby places in meme-space (and books I have at hand
so as to cite correctly), Hofstadter and Dennett's _The Mind's I:
Fantasies and Reflections on Self & Soul_ "explore
self and consciousness through the perspectives of literature,
artificial intelligence, psychology, and much more." Hey, how can you
not love a book that includes pieces by Jorge Luis Borges, Raymond Smullyan,
Stainslaw Lem, and John Searle... and many more?
Thinking of and fetching those titles made me think of Dennett's
_Consciousness Explained_ and _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_, about which I
will say little but that I found them both engrossing, stimulating, and
provoking; they are also somewhat relevant to programs and systems
design, perhaps most directly for the vision of the true _vastness_ of
design-space.
Hmmm. Guess I won't need to go to the library this weekend after all
unless those CDs are due back...