This was a very interesting book, and I especially like the mystery that they have around the Ringworld. The approach of not having an advanced race still living on the advanced world I found to be what build up the mystery the most. I like how the local lore and religions around the creators was built up, with a secondary race coming in to claim the Ringworld later. The concept of Teela being bread for Luck seemed a little far fetched, but it made for an amusing plot device. It reminded me a lot of Matt from Wheel of Time, such that if he was in a tough spot there would be a random occurrence which would give him exactly what was needed, for him or for the better of everyone. I found the Kzin character to be a little underwhelming, and I was surprised his advantages weren’t used more. The Puppetiers were also an interesting race, and I was surprised at the way they handled things. There were some parts that they did things that wouldn’t be the safest thing to do, like every having the outsiders land on their home world, or go there.
This was a very good book, and very different from Ender’s Game. The mystery part of it was very nicely done, but the part I like more is the ethical parts. The way they talk about the cultural differences and how to get around many of them is very interesting. It is assumed the other race is very close to human, but there are still many major differences.
This book was very interesting. It naturally didn’t solve what the meaning of life was, but instead it laid down a number of views based on world traditions. Many of these views overlap in many ways, but there is a defining characteristic about each of them that makes it incompatible with some of the others. I can see my world view a little bit in almost all of the traditions. Some of them choose to focus on one thing and then follow that to it’s final conclusions, like the value of life in Jainism. Some focus on a very broad aspect of if we can even say that reality is real. All of them were nice to learn about, and the arguments for each position were good ones.
This book was good, but didn’t contain as much information and detail as Lifelong Health. I’d say if you had to choose one to listen to, choose Lifelong Health. I have the same problem with this book; that they didn’t support the claim of eating a whole foods diet. This issue most likely arises since there aren’t any good studies on diet (self reporting errors and long term stable groups and whatnot). I also like that both books stressed the importance of working out, something that I should do more often. I get off a bit easy since I bike everywhere, but that still doesn’t excuse the lack of vigorous workouts and weightlifting.
This book was very informative on the goods and bads of health. There was a lot of science based evidence and good advice. The only issue I have is the lack of science based evidence for the whole foods diet that is continually recommended. I’m not saying that the diet is bad, and I agree with the logic they use (in most cases, i don’t care about fooling mother nature), but they don’t support the claims with evidence in this case. I do like the rest of the evidence that is provided, and the caveats they give to each study they mention. I am pretty sure I’m going to give up drinking alcohol altogether for the foreseeable future, as well as cutting out most meat.
This book was a great overview of the basics of economics. It covered really well microeconomics, macroeconomics, and the players in economic policy. If you want a full overview of economics I would strongly recommend this book. It has a lot of really well done examples and thought experiments.
This was a fantastic listen for both the storytelling aspects of the lectures themselves, and for the information they convey. The ways in which one can captivate an audience are very well explained and demonstrated. Even without seeing her you know that she is really into the story and making it come alive. That is the biggest thing that she stresses constantly is that the story should be alive to the person telling it so that it can be alive to the people hearing it. There are many ways that you can make it more alive like adding voices, and the pacing you choose at specific points, breaking into character dialog instead of explanation, and visa versa. I’ll have to listen to this one again when I find the time before I tell a story in front of a large group.
This person has a very different view of science than most scientists I’ve known. I think this is because he likes including more of what he does in the category of being science. By his definition a lot more of art can be put into the category of science than I believe should be. Working in the ‘soft’ sciences will do this, as much of what is trying to be shown is not universal laws, but instead deal with conventions and labels. It is hard to describe the difference in a hard way, but politics would be another good example of something that follows a method, but isn’t science. Same can be said for law and ethics.
The book is fantastic at breaking down the history of psychology and how some of the different theories are flawed when you take them to their ultimate conclusions. This is very similar to what can be done with many ethical positions. Even though I don’t agree with everything said in the book, I agree with most of what it implies. I like to think that thinking has more to it than an electro-chemical process. I like to think that I am; not that I am just a mass of mainly carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen, with other things mixed in, that happens to be doing what I’m doing.
This lecture series I finished a while ago and never got around to posting about it since I was getting busy and distracted. I enjoyed most of what was said in this book. The series of books I’ve read have built up well, with logic, argumentation, and communication. There was a lot of repitition of concepts from the other books in this one, but it was taken in a new light. Instead of trying to win arguments you were trying to steer conversations. I like this approach much better than the previous ones, and I think it is more applicable in everyday situations. A lot of what is described can be summmarized as just talking to persons, not talking to people.
It's an Exciting World 