Book Talk

Which formats do you use? Which is your favourite? Which won't you use, and why? Let battle commence!

Let's start a list of the popular (and unpopular) science books you recommend. Perhaps we can all get some worthwhile reading material out of this. I'll start: Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene: good intro to modern physics Anatomy of an Epidemic by Robert Whitaker: a look at modern psychopharmacology and the effects of psychiatric medicine. Well-written and researched. Why People Believe Weird Things, by Michael Shermer. Engaging, amusing, and enlightening. The Last Man on the Moon, by Gene Cernan. Cernan landed on the Moon on Apollo 17, and this book is his memoir of the entire Gemini, Mercury and Apollo programs. Great if you like space exploration. Wha…

What books are you reading now? Doesn't matter what kind, what subject, whatever. It'll just be fun to see what everyone's reading. I'd certainly like to get more reading material in. I'll start: I'm currently starting The Blind Watchmaker, by Richard Dawkins, as I'm currently writing a report discussing evolution and I spotted it in the library while doing research.

Hi. I read The Selfish Gene in 2014, now I'm planning to re-read it together with The Blind Watchmaker and The Extended Phenotype. What would be the best order to read those two books in and what other books of Richard Dawkins would be a good addition to these three, not counting The God Delusion obviously?

Hi everyone, first of all I am nothing to promote here just looking for honest advice. I am trying to get into science fiction books but I am not sure where to start. There are so many titles and authors, and honestly I feel a little overwhelmed. I tried doing some research on reddit sci-fi threads, Quora answers, and also read a few blogs on NewYorkTimes, Tor.com and Goodreads. But still I am confuse because every site recommend different books. I am looking for something that is engaging, not too hard to read for a beginner but still has interesting ideas, maybe futuristic or space related. So far I found these options that people suggest a lot: Science Fiction Before S…

I am longing to read some book about sweet love.When i am appliciating it's like reating spicy food but can't stop.

this is a good book also a good movie.make me cry

I purchased this book back in December. There was online five star review. It had an equation with a Python program. Not difficult to understand but only brief explanations. It turns out Chat GPT wrote the entire book. There are no references or bibliography. But the rip off is there is an entire series of books written this way. They sale for $40 and are printed on demand. I don’t know how this turns a profit but there are 6 books in the space series and more in the mechanical engineering series. This spoils the field for legitimate authors. And readers. If you believe that foreign actors can influence the election or TikTok influences teens, is this …

Sorry the video is just a screenshot, I can't embed this one. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/cz6l1qw71jyo The library where books are kept under lock and key The library where books are kept under lock and key Step inside the library where books are kept locked to the shelves with chains. The chained library at Wells Cathedral in Somerset is home to a collection of books that are older than America. The majority are Latin transcripts and religious tex…

We frequently recommend papers. Here is a good book on how to extract useful information from them. I know it was produced for the medical sciences but the lessons are universal. A further tip for students. If you know how the Professors are reading the papers before marking them, it helps in their preparation.

Some Professors are noted for the wide understanding of their subject and how it all fits together and combine this with the ability to present an understandable and coherent picture. This ability picks out important insights. Firstly the 2022 book 'Elusive' by Frank Close, Professor of theoretical physics at London University offers a remarkably clear account of 'Higgs Theory' and its connection to Quantum Theory, Relativity, and particle physics, in plain English in the body of the text and in Mathematics in the appendices. Secondly the 2012 book '17 Equations that changed the World', Professor of Applied Maths at Warwick University is equally worth …

Has anyone ever read this series of books? Or even better, has anyone ever heard the amazing Sir Ian McKellen reading this on audiobook? This series has been on my mind a lot recently. It's set in pre-hunter gatherer times. Very primal. Sometimes makes me wonder if modern technology was a mistake.

I was first impressed by this phrase seen in the status of one of my friends, and the I only get to realize today that it is a name of a book. Do you recommend this book? Where to buy? By the way, where do you guy buy books? Is Amazon Kindle already the best source with the best book reader?

Genady posted a passage from a book I read 50-odd years ago, and I recognized the source instantly. It's a book with no political or philosophical significance whatsoever, and at the time, I was intensely political and philosophical - who isn't at 21? So why did Three Men in a Boat (to say Nothing of the Dog) leave a life-long impression? I read Stephen Leacock, Mark Twain, Thurber, Mikes in that same decade, and can't recall much from any of those books - not even Connecticut Yankee. Humour generally doesn't leave a deep impression. Why this particular story? Do you have any books like that? Unimportant, non mind- or life-altering books that, nevertheless beca…

I remember reading a long time ago what I'm pretty sure was an excerpt from a book by Feynman in which he talked about being part of a frat in college and about how in the frat there were nerdy guys and there were jocks and the jocks were teaching the nerds how to deal with girls and the nerds were helping the jocks with their school work. Does anyone know which of his books this is from?

Years ago, I remember hearing about a book about problems that are either unsolvable or so difficult that it would take a supercomputer millions of years to work through. I think one problem mentioned in the book is the traveling salesman. Does anyone happen to know the title, as I can't recall it.

I have a memory of a sci-fi short story I read as teenager in the 1960s, in which, after a spacecraft crashes on an alien world, 4 members of the crew regain consciousness to find their bodies, apart from the brain and spinal cord, have been consumed by a sort of protoplasmic organism. The organism however supports and hosts the brain and spinal cord, as it is useful to its existence to have a directing mind. All four are in one blob and are able to communicate telepathically within the blob. The blob is shape-shifting and can take on forms instructed by the brains it hosts. So they can "make" arms, for example, by a process of mind control. The 4 crew members argue, figh…

Can anyone recommend a good philosophical book to read?

I dunno if you've seen this one episode where spongebob, patrick, squidward etc all MERGE into one entity. Now that wouldn't be possible because of simple logic, in a given time space continuum, you can't be in two places at the same time, or in other words, no two objects can occupy the same time space continuum sphere at the same time. So how could a situation like (fig 2) occur in the real world? It can, if parallel dimensions overlap. Imagine point A, or object A, encountering it's identical self in time space continuum B. In both time space continuums, there would be TWO objects occupying one space at the same time. i.e an overlap of time/space…

If you have the opportunity to borrow money without providing collateral or going through a credit check, then I believe that you should take advantage of that opportunity. There are a lot of people in this world who have poor credit and have a difficult time obtaining loans. The possibility of borrowing money without having to put up any collateral is a fantastic opportunity that should not be passed up. What do you think about this topic?

The author Sir Salman Rushdie 75 has been attacked on stage at a literary festival being held in The Chautauqua Institution in New York USA https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-62524833 He is reported to have been stabbed in the neck by an attacker who rushed the stage. Rushdie was subsequently airlifted to hospital in a helicopter, and the attacker was taken into custody immediately by the police. Sir Salman Rushdie has been living under the threat of a fatwa calling for his death pronounced by the late Iranian cleric Ayatollah Khomeinei in 1989 in response to Rushdie's novel The Satanic Verses (1988).

Something that doesn't make sense to me is the size of textbooks and technical books. If you look at technical books from the mid-1900s, they were human friendly sizes. For example, the 2nd edition of University Physics by Sears & Zemansky which was published in the 1950s is split into 2 volumes and it's lighter and smaller than the modern editions. (However, the content remains mostly the same.) Unlike it's modern version, it was clearly meant to be held by a human. Any speculations on why this trend occurred?

Can anyone recommend some sci-fi books involving black holes. In particular I'm looking for stories that involve someone, or something, going into a black hole and what they experience. I've looked around and found plenty of books, but usually they feature black holes as navigational obstacles, or power sources, or weapons, or even as sentient beings - but i'm only interested if it explores the experience of being in (or even around) a black hole. Also, not interested in films/TV shows - unless based on books.

Have there been any good novels based on people's experience when they are woken up in the future after being frozen in one of the Freezer banks in the 21st century? Imagine the (horrifying") setting It is 2420 and they have reached a cure for the disease that prompted you to go down this route in 2020. Gradually they wake you up from the coma ,all the while treating your illness and then you are awake. What would be the first thing you would see? Would your new doctors bear any resemblance to the last people you saw before going under? What would be their attitude to you? A guinea pig ? A freak show? …

Anyone else read this book? Vernor Vinge does a great job making you believe in an apocalypse brought about by a private contractor working for Livermore Labs. A great read, I'll discuss his premise if anyone is interested.