What Books Are You Currently Reading?

[greyhame]

I've been alternately reading Jerry Coyne's "Why Evolution is True," Michio Kaku's "Physics of the Future," and Christopher Moore's "Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff."
It looks like I'll finish Moore's novel first, though.

 

[Borek]

Darwin's On the Origin of Species.

 

[zoobyshoe]

A Tour of the Calculus by David Berlinski. I have previously read this guy's biography of Newton. His writing style is refreshingly insane, as if he's on Coke or having a manic episode. No dry, tedious math here. In Berlinski's hands Math is an emotionally charged subject, full of storm and stress or lyrical, romantic beauty; calculus if Beethoven had invented it.

 

[BobG]

A Tour of the Calculus by David Berlinski. I have previously read this guy's biography of Newton. His writing style is refreshingly insane, as if he's on Coke or having a manic episode. No dry, tedious math here. In Berlinski's hands Math is an emotionally charged subject, full of storm and stress or lyrical, romantic beauty; calculus if Beethoven had invented it.

I've read that book. That was a good read.

 

[OmCheeto]

Pretty Shield

along with 1000 other books I've purchased and not gotten past the first 2 pages.

TIME!

The next book I will buy and probably not read is by Farley Mowat; "The Boat Who Wouldn't Float". Recommended to me by someone that saw me pumping my boat out 3 weekends ago.

 

[Evo]

I just read a play adaptation of Medea. Took about 10 minutes. Talk about giving women a bad name.

 

[Pythagorean]

My own writing, over and over (and over) again

 

[FreeMitya]

Right now I've got Don Quixote, Crime and Punishment, and the Sound and the Fury on the go.

 

[Crake2]

I'm reading "Stranger in a strange land", by Heinlein. Not the english version tho.

 

[Hessa]

I'm reading "Stranger in a strange land", by Heinlein. Not the english version tho.

I read the Arabic translated version, it's an amazing story!
but it's too depressing!

currently, I'm reading The Eye of the Wizard, by Daniel Arenson

 

[Pythagorean]

I know the lyrics from Iron Maiden's "stranger in a strange land" by heart. They like turning novels into metal.

 

[Curious3141]

I know the lyrics from Iron Maiden's "stranger in a strange land" by heart. They like turning novels into metal.

And poems. Don't forget "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner".

The difference is that "Stranger" is lyrically unrelated to the Heinlein book, while "Mariner" is very much based on the Coleridge poem.

 

[uneasyrider]

I just finished Moby Dick and now I'm on here searching for something new. If you've never read it it is still something special. Melville can be a little dry at times and a little long winded but it's just a beautiful story in the end. :) It's as close as we can get to going on a whaler in the 1800's. A fantastic book! :)

 

[uneasyrider]

Right now, I'm reading Roger Collins' "The Arab Conquest of Spain, 710-797".

Did like it?

I didn't read through all the page to see if you commented again upon conclusion, forgive me.

 

[Pythagorean]

And poems. Don't forget "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner".

The difference is that "Stranger" is lyrically unrelated to the Heinlein book, while "Mariner" is very much based on the Coleridge poem.

And history/mythology lessons (Alexander the Great, Powerslave, Flight of Icarus) and Brave New World was tailored after Aldous Huxley's novel.

I've never read any the novels, only really know about them through Iron Maiden. I think the last fiction book I read was The Physiognomy by Jeffrey Ford. I stopped reading fiction during my undergraduate physics degree; never went back.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

I've been reading the US Federal Code (all the Federal laws and regulations in force in the USA). I started in 1982 and I'm currently on page 214,988. I read it because I know everything I read in it is true (by definition).

 

[AnTiFreeze3]

I've been reading the US Federal Code (all the Federal laws and regulations in force in the USA). I started in 1982 and I'm currently on page 214,988. I read it because I know everything I read in it is true (by definition).

That sounds like quite the project. How much of it do you think you have retained?

 

[SW VandeCarr]

That sounds like quite the project. How much of it do you think you have retained?

I don't know. I don't really care. It's a Zen thing. The knowledge that everything I read is absolutely, unconditionally true is all that matters. I started when I worked for Federal Government and I saw that it brought me great respect. Some worshiped me, but I told them I was a mere mortal seeking enlightenment. Some read the Bible, some read the Koran or Hindu scripture. I read the US Federal Code.

 

[FreeMitya]

I don't know. I don't really care. It's a Zen thing. The knowledge that everything I read is absolutely, unconditionally true is all that matters. I started when I worked for Federal Government and I saw that it brought me great respect. Some worshiped me, but I told them I was a mere mortal seeking enlightenment. Some read the Bible, some read the Koran or Hindu scripture. I read the US Federal Code.

But there is both objective truth and subjective truth, in my view. To each his own, I guess.

P.S. I did the boldfacing.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

But there is both objective truth and subjective truth, in my view. To each his own, I guess.

P.S. I did the boldfacing.

Well I don't want the thread locked by getting into a philosophical discussion. It's clear the content of the Federal Code has the force of law and governs large aspects of the lives of those who live permanently or temporarily, or who do business in the US. The words of the Federal Code have real objective consequences. Ask the IRS. My big problem is they keep changing the truth.

 

[uneasyrider]

I don't know. I don't really care. It's a Zen thing. The knowledge that everything I read is absolutely, unconditionally true is all that matters. I started when I worked for Federal Government and I saw that it brought me great respect. Some worshiped me, but I told them I was a mere mortal seeking enlightenment. Some read the Bible, some read the Koran or Hindu scripture. I read the US Federal Code.

I love it! How cool! It makes me want to do it too. I don't have the patients. The Bible and Moby Dick are on the outer edge of the envelope for me. I can't imagine taking on a project like that! Have fun! I totally understand the understand the reasoning behind this. I've read reference material for the same reasons but nothing that BIG. Cool! :) Think of it! This is actually shaping your mind! There's no way reading all of that can't. There's so much there even if you only hang onto a small fraction it will be a large mass of information. :D

 

[SW VandeCarr]

I love it! How cool! It makes me want to do it too. I don't have the patients. The Bible and Moby Dick are on the outer edge of the envelope for me. I can't imagine taking on a project like that! Have fun! I totally understand the understand the reasoning behind this. I've read reference material for the same reasons but nothing that BIG. Cool! :) Think of it! This is actually shaping your mind! There's no way reading all of that can't. There's so much there even if you only hang onto a small fraction it will be a large mass of information. :D

I think a lot of people actually took me seriously! Yes I did read the parts that pertained to the FDA when I worked there. And yes, it did give me a big edge because no one seem to know the "regs" like I did. The idea just came to me when I looked over this thread. The Zen thing is true. I don't have to try to read the some 55 volumes of the full Federal Code to know that reading it will clear the mind of all thought. This is precisely the object of Zen. Now you are ready for enlightenment. Think about one hand clapping. You can't. Read the Code for a while and your mind will become empty (not your memory, just all your stray thoughts). If it doesn't, better seek professional help.

Actually I do read it once in a while. It puts me in trance-like state called sleep. Old army field manuals work too. Try reading 14 pages on how to make a tent peg.

 

[FreeMitya]

I think a lot people actually took me seriously! Yes I did read the parts that pertained to the FDA when I worked there. And yes, it did give me a big edge because no one seem to know the "regs" like I did. The idea just came to me when I looked over this thread. The Zen thing is true. I don't have to try to read the some 55 volumes of the full Federal Code to know that reading it will clear the mind of all thought. This is precisely the object of Zen. Now you are ready for enlightenment. Think about one hand clapping. You can't. Read the Code for a while and your mind will become empty (not your memory, just all your stray thoughts). If it doesn't, better seek professional help.

I didn't take you seriously!

 

[AnTiFreeze3]

I think a lot of people actually took me seriously! ...

Judging from the crowd that stops by here, having read the entirety of the Federal Code wouldn't actually seem that odd.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

Judging from the crowd that stops by here, having read the entirety of the Federal Code wouldn't actually seem that odd.

 

[cobalt124]

Plenty of people read an encycleopedia from cover to cover when they were eight years old, and frequently spent the odd hour or two reading dictionaries. Didn't they?

 

[FreeMitya]

Plenty of people read an encycleopedia from cover to cover when they were eight years old, and frequently spent the odd hour or two reading dictionaries. Didn't they?

I didn't do that, but I've had some bizarre reading habits. When I was younger I went through a stretch (maybe even a couple of months) during which the only thing I read was the Grand Inquisitor. I whispered it to myself almost every night.

However, friends of my parents do read dictionaries (they participate in Scrabble tournaments).

 

[ImaLooser]

My Year of Meat by Ozeki. Excellent novel.

The Elixir and the Stone, a history of Hermeticism.

The Weather Makers by an Australian climatologist.

 

[ImaLooser]

I've been reading the US Federal Code (all the Federal laws and regulations in force in the USA). I started in 1982 and I'm currently on page 214,988. I read it because I know everything I read in it is true (by definition).

The awning regulations on page 164,245 are truly classic.

 

[uneasyrider]

I think a lot of people actually took me seriously! Yes I did read the parts that pertained to the FDA when I worked there. And yes, it did give me a big edge because no one seem to know the "regs" like I did. The idea just came to me when I looked over this thread. The Zen thing is true. I don't have to try to read the some 55 volumes of the full Federal Code to know that reading it will clear the mind of all thought. This is precisely the object of Zen. Now you are ready for enlightenment. Think about one hand clapping. You can't. Read the Code for a while and your mind will become empty (not your memory, just all your stray thoughts). If it doesn't, better seek professional help.

Actually I do read it once in a while. It puts me in trance-like state called sleep. Old army field manuals work too. Try reading 14 pages on how to make a tent peg.

LOL! I've read some pretty dry material myself just to have the knowledge so this just sounded like the ultimate in DRY, boring, mind numbing, reading. lol

Now you have to do it. It's like a gauntlet be thrown, the idea has been laid on the table. RUN WITH IT! YOU CAN DO IT! lol :P

 

[Infinitum]

So...my younger cousin happened to drop by, and introduced me to 'Diaries of a Wimpy Kid' by Kinney. I can't believe it.

I'm hooked.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Jennie by Douglas Preston. A novel exploring the phenomenon of people raising chimps in the home. Apparently Preston researched 4 real life cases in preparation for writing this. There's an interesting comic twist: the minister who lives across the street from the family that is raising Jennie is so impressed by the human-ness of the chimp child, he decides to convert it to Christianity.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

Jennie by Douglas Preston. A novel exploring the phenomenon of people raising chimps in the home. Apparently Preston researched 4 real life cases in preparation for writing this. There's an interesting comic twist: the minister who lives across the street from the family that is raising Jennie is so impressed by the human-ness of the chimp child, he decides to convert it to Christianity.

Convert a chimp to christianity

I'm currently on After Summerhill by Hussein Lucas. It follows the lives of several ex-students of Summerhill School, a near-century old free school in England where students learn what the want when they want and decide on a curriculum (as well as rules for the school) in consensus decision making meetings. Teachers existed to advise, teach when asked and prevent physical violence but that is all. So far all the students seem to be exceptionally well rounded people although some admit lacking in knowledge of specific subjects or focus which they think could have been improved with a bit more prodding.

 

[uneasyrider]

Jennie by Douglas Preston. A novel exploring the phenomenon of people raising chimps in the home. Apparently Preston researched 4 real life cases in preparation for writing this. There's an interesting comic twist: the minister who lives across the street from the family that is raising Jennie is so impressed by the human-ness of the chimp child, he decides to convert it to Christianity.

I don't doubt it can be done...

 

[trueo]

I just bought "Programming in Objective-C" by Stephen G Kochan 2 days ago. I will try to finish the first 17 chapters till tomorrow, bhuhahahahh

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

The Wandering Jew by a boy name Sue. Sappy, but I keep reading it anyway.

 

[Evo]

I am reading "Welcome to Medicare" by the Department of Health & Human Resources and Reader's Digest "Instant Medicare Answers". Now I need to hire a consultant to explain to me what it all means.

No, I'm not old enough to qualify, I qualify because I am on SSDI thanks to botched stomach surgery.

Bathroom reading - just started "Changeling" by Roger Zelazny.

 

[turbo]

I'm in the same boat, Evo. Since my wife is still working, and has coverage for me under her health-insurance plan, I'm confused. Every year, I get a Medicare manual, and it never clears up (in simple terms) the little things like coordination of benefits, when I have to get Medicare drug coverage, etc. I can't honestly say that I'm still reading that book because it is so poorly written that I have set it aside.

Maybe I should stick it in the basket near the throne and try to absorb it in small doses.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Mount Dragon. Science fiction by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. A real page turner about genetic engineering in a remote lab in the desert southwest. Young Guy Carson is tapped to engineer a cure for the flu, but slowly uncovers the horror behind the "nervous breakdown" that forced his predecessor on the project into the looney bin. Excellent dramatic tension and vivid, interesting characters.

 

[ImaLooser]

Blood and Banquets by Bela Fromm. She was inside the Third Reich and knew everybody who was anybody. The rumor was that Rudolph Hess painted his toenails red. Why isn't this book famous?

 

[OmCheeto]

Pretty Shield

along with 1000 other books I've purchased and not gotten past the first 2 pages.

TIME!

The next book I will buy and probably not read is by Farley Mowat; "The Boat Who Wouldn't Float". Recommended to me by someone that saw me pumping my boat out 3 weekends ago.

Argh! I have somehow misplaced Pretty Shield and have started on Mowat's book. Mowat is a hoot. Even when describing how two children skinned their dad. Talk about savage innocents!

 

[PeteyCoco]

Nim Chimpsky, The Chimp Who Could Be Human by Elizabeth Hess. Over the last semester I forgot how it felt to read non-technical texts so it's been a good read so far.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Nim Chimpsky, The Chimp Who Could Be Human by Elizabeth Hess. Over the last semester I forgot how it felt to read non-technical texts so it's been a good read so far.

See my post #132 above. I think Preston must have studied Nim for his novel. The question of whether Jennie has actually acquired a real language figures prominently in the book.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Just finished Watching the Dark by Peter Robinson. I want to remember this author's name so I don't pick up any more of his books by accident. Slow paced, understated, murder mystery. Aimed, maybe, at very elderly readers?

 

[Enigman]

The Ellery Queen mystery series. Right now-'The Dutch Shoe mystery'- Ellery Queen.
After this 'The Cuckoo's Calling'- Robert Galbraith.

 

[Drakkith]

Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley.
This book is NOT what I thought it was about.

 

[Borg]

Rich Dad Poor Dad - What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money--That the Poor and the Middle Class Do Not. by Robert Kiyosaki.

 

[AnTiFreeze3]

Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley.
This book is NOT what I thought it was about.

Ha, we actually read that book in my British Literature class last year. I would agree, the book is not at all what I was expecting. The writing style is beautiful, and I can sympathize with the romantic ideology that the beauties of nature can both physically and mentally aid humankind, but I wasn't too impressed with it. I suppose that, for something so well known and renowned, I was expecting a bit more. I had the same issue with Catch-22, unfortunately.

Actually, Catch-22's introduction has made me vow that I will never again read the introduction to any book before reading the book itself, because the introduction of Catch-22 essentially ruined the book for me. Never before have I seen such pandering and praise towards a book, and it put me in the mood to read what I was thinking would be the greatest book of the 20th century, but it only set me up for the disappointment of a book devoid of any plot, simply stringing together random and somewhat humorous anecdotes.

 

[AnTiFreeze3]

Here's the stack of books that I've recently purchased, and hope to read at some point:
- Island by Aldous Huxley
- Greenmantle by John Buchan
- 18th Brumaire of Bonaparte by none other than Karl Marx
- The Unfinished Revolution (Russia, 1917-1967) by Isaac Deutscher
- Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman

Of these five books, I've begun to read two of them; Greenmantle and Amusing Ourselves to Death.

Greenmantle is just an action novel, but I would liken it to an Indiana Jones-esque adventure novel, except that instead of there being one Indiana Jones, there are four of him, teamed up together during WWI. It's been an exciting read thus far.

Amusing Ourselves to Death is an examination of modern culture (the book was written in the 80's, but its message is even more prevalent today than it was then), depicting how our desire and craving for entertainment and amusement has crept into our media, degrading our public discourse by way of turning our news, our politics, our education, and our religion into mediums of entertainment, rather than what they're truly intended to do. This has been brought about primarily through technology, which, Postman claims, is because our primary source of colloquy often determines the quality and effect of our discourse. (Discourse is different in a society where the spoken-word is the primary communicator than it is where the written word is the primary communicator, etc. etc.).

His book includes a bit too much needless philosophy, and he seems to really enjoy referencing Plato, because he do so frequently. Nevertheless, I couldn't agree more with his analysis of modern culture, and I think it's really a book worth reading.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Just finished The Cobra Event by Richard Preston. Very scary. It's a novel exploring a plausible scenario whereby an individual bioengineer gone rogue might grow and release a deadly virus into the world at large.