A bit deep. I have been interested in the Fermi Paradox lately. Also have been studying Evolution and Astrophysics.

I'm very much fond of reading space and Astro related topics. Could you please advice some Astro related topics to read?

Introduction to Astrophysics by Dr. Winn. There are also at least two courses in Expplanets and several Astronomy courses. Great Courses Plus is $10/mo. with a free intro period. Scientific American usually has 4-6 interesting articles a year. For the Fermi Paradox, 75 Answers by Stephen Webb (If the Universe is Teeming with Life). Author Isaac has an excellent YouTube channel. There is also Paul Michael Goudier and PBS Spacetime YouTube channels. From my library - The Crowded Universe by Boss, The Inverted Bowl by Cole and The Eerie Silence by Davies (last three are a bit old).

I'd guess a Great Dane.

But that's only a guess. As a cat owner, I'm not the best at distinguishing dog breeds

At World Con in Kansas City in 2016 there was a panel on Campbell, and various of the older writers there had known Campbell. I recall Jim Gunn in particular expressing dismay at how incredibly racist Campbell had gotten towards the end. I gathered towards the end he had almost no friends.

laughing out loud at some of his stuff!

Bill Bryson is a fantastic writer.

And how old men can't give directions w/o sticking a finger in their ear

Another outstanding piece of work by Lewis.

Literature and the Postwestern"

After watching the whole HBO series 10 years later (what can I say - I don't keep up!) and being so impressed with it, plus the news that a movie is being made featuring most of the original cast, I decided to buy this book that I found on-line.

I'm having a great time working my way through it and it does give a greater understanding of the dialog and events that took place in the series. And, yes, a ton of "dirty words!"

It's about loyalists during the American Revolution. I'm not very far in, but it's fascinating so far.

BTW, I LOVE Bryson. I read "Short History..." when it first came out. In fact, I got an autographed copy when I saw him at a local book store. Such an amazing writer. If you've never read "A Walk in the Woods" you must.

I have a scribd membership and Bill Bryson well represented, including "A Walk in the Woods".

A movie based on this book is coming out in mi-2019, starring Robert De Niro as Frank Sheeran, the main character.

Sheeran was a close friend and confidant of Jimmy Hoffa. The book centers on Hoffa's disappearance, and you learn Sheeran knows lots about it. You'll learn Hoffa had lots of enemies, and most of them were not the kind of guys you'd want to be crossways with.

It was hard to put down. If you like books about the mob, you'll love this one.

I am reading this essay titled "A Study in Blue: trauma, affect, event" by Andrea Long. In the author's words, the essay aims to "ask what happens when an event doesn't." More particularly, it aims to establish ways of talking about "ordinary affective life," and this includes talking about this in the public sphere. Which is to say, the essay is also about the American public sphere and public discourse and what it excludes.

Second, I'm reading Howard Abadinsky's "Drug Use and Abuse: A Comprehensive Introduction." A highly multidisciplinary book, it draws from law, sociology, public policy, and psychology. Although it doesn't openly deal with how drug use and abuse is dealt with in the public sphere, there is plenty in it that allows the reader to probe this question. I'd say both readings are quite related, and give many fresh insights.

Interesting big picture, basic factor approach to history. Enjoyable read so far.

I stumbled on a good deal on it when I was checking out a recommendation for his Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World.

Unoffendable.

I always have at least one book going, and my reading is heavily non-fiction.

Currently reading: "The Fight to Vote," by Michael Waldman (about halfway through - fascinating American history).

Last few:

"Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth," by Sarah Smarsh. It's very well-written, and it's the kind of book I was hoping for when I picked up "Hillbilly Elegy" a few years ago (JD Vance's clear right-wing point of view was irritating and disappointing). Ms. Smarsh came from a different part of the country, but grew up in similar circumstances, i.e. an already poor area with diminishing economic opportunity, a family with addictions and domestic violence, etc. But she has (in my opinion) a much broader and more analytical mind and more empathy than Vance.

"How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States," by Daniel Immerwahr. This book provided me with details about episodes of American history that I was only faintly aware of, and introduced me to a number of facts I didn't know at all. I highly recommend it.

"Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World," by Anand Giridharadas. It's a book about the network of foundations, think tanks, and philanthropic organizations and their impact on public policy, which the author believes is sometimes helpful, but usually not, and pretty much always in the interest of the already-powerful. Although I was already in agreement with the author's point of view, the details were interesting.

"The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming," by David Wallace-Wells. The book opens with the statement "It's worse, much worse, than you think." The author explains that the climate system has already been disrupted and that we've already been experiencing some of the impacts, and that there is more to come. He provides details about the range of possibilities, which depend in part on what we do going forward. The information in the book is terrifying and I've been encouraging everyone I can to read it.

I just finished listening to Blitzed, by Norman Ohler. Drug use in Nazi Germany and, more specifically, Hitler's drug use/addiction.

Fascinating, though you do have to keep a few things in mind. Ohler is not a historian. That said, he does seem to have done a deep dive in archives that others have either overlooked of discounted. He also tends to generalizations. At times you realize that he's creating dialogs that he can have no way of knowing. That said, he also refers to his research and so you tend to believe that the gaps he might fill are at least feasible. As a reader, you want to believe him, but he clearly has an point to make, and he's not going to let anything stop him from making it.

To the extent that he is on to something, it is a fascinating listen.

I read that recently and it's amazing.

I'm currently reading Earl Babbie's The Basics of Social Research. It focuses on both the quantitative and the qualitative method. Which means it also focuses on the merits and drawbacks of the scientific method. Also very glossary-like in its approach to jargon from the quantitative side, which sort of demystifies the process. Quite interesting so far.

by Cathy O'Neil. It's about how data is used and mostly misused these days. Scary. But I recommend it.

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The First History of American Paleontology, by Robert West Howard

I read this book *many* years ago, but remember the contents in only the most general way, so I'm re-reading it. I'm finding it to be a truly rewarding read, esp. re. the 18th and early 19th century scientists who paved the way BD (before Darwin). We've all heard about the great Scopes "Monkey Trial" and all the opposition by reactionary religionists, but it was fascinating to see how the study of fossils, from shells in the high mountains to elephantid bones in New York bogs to giant lizard teeth in English quarries, and the growth of the then-infant science of geology, nursed by stratigraphy, made the whole idea of a recent Creation increasingly untenable -- yet to declare the Earth to be older than 6000 years was considered anti-Christian blasphemy, and not to be risked in too public a fashion. Even acknowledging that some animals might have gone extinct was to take too great a risk of controversy for some.

Controversy aside, it's interesting to read how hungry people once were for practical knowledge, and how popular public lectures and lyceums were, and how much they contributed to the growth of trade and industry and the expansion of the country. There's some interesting overlap, at least as I see it, with Paul Johnson's "The Birth of the Modern", although covering events both preceding and following the era in that discussion.

The following excerpt, which follows a lengthy quote from the diary of Charles Lyell, is worth reflecting on:

I'm reading Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34 right now. It is about the depression era bank robbers -- people like John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly and Ma Barker. It is incredibly well researched and detailed, yet runs at the page of a gripping fiction thriller.
Highly recommended.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001UUJ62M/

Rev. Eugene Cho. It subtitle is A Christian's Guide to Engaging Politics. I will start reading it this evening.

It's pretty interesting

Finished "Peril" by Bob Woodard and Bob Costa. Loved it. Before that it was "I Alone Can Do It," which disappointed me. Not enough revelations. Most recently, I finished Adam Schiff's "Midnight In Washington," which is tremendous. Trying to decide to read Raskin's book. Any reviews?

Thinking about getting it but wondering if it's just a repeat of Schiff's, which I read and really liked.

Grim and comical memoir; insights into treatment of women by medical establishment. Recommend!

I'm just about to start on this. I watched an interview with Andrew and what he has to say is pretty interesting. He's also a civil rights lawyer.

I've loved reading, and re-reading, his historical fiction over the years, as well as his memoir, This House of Sky, so I'm continuing that enjoyment with this book about his mother. She died when he was only six and he's reconstructing her life through her letters to her brother that he' recently been bequeathed upon his uncle's death.

I just posted about this over in the Fiction group, but as I've been reading, I came across this line he wrote about his mother first meeting his father, and it reminded me why I so love his writing:

"Boundaries of dream take human shape, there when our bodies begin their warm imagining."

I had to re-read that line several times, not because I didn't understand it, but because the prose is so amazing. And he doesn't spare it for his fiction only.

He's one of my favorite authors and I'd put his work up there with Wendell Berry's, whom I absolutely adore.

Susan, Linda, Nina & Cokie: The Extraordinary Story of the Founding Mothers of NPR

https://shop.npr.org/products/susan-linda-nina-cokie-the-extraordinary-story-of-the-founding-mothers-of-npr-by-lisa-napoli

Confronting the Legacy of Lynching in the Twenty-First Century by Sherrilyn Ifill

still reading "Road to New Canaan: the War for America's Soul"

The Underground Railroad went all the way to Canada -- it had to.

>"New York was once home to the largest number of slaves of any state in the North—more than Georgia, until the late 18th century. The heaviest concentration of them was on plantations in the Hudson Valley, many owned by the prominent Livingston family. At times, slaves had made up as much as 10% of the population. Slavery was cruel here as it was anywhere in the South...."<

http://www.fergusbordewich.com/blog/?p=38

Storytelling Animal made many good points but way too many obvious examples and the book was heavily padded with pictures of things like a rat in a section about an MIT study -- to make sure we know what a rat looks like I guess. I got the sense that he had a strong thesis but had to stretch to get 200 pages out of it.

its POV is not one that many people - especially white people - can easily grasp. I'm familiar with the language and goals from my Peace Studies days, working with Black community groups and churches on various social justice projects: housing discrimination, antiracism, etc. It's the way we oriented towards the work that had to be done. I read this book for the antiracism committee at work, and no one else could really wrap their heads around it. (The group was 100% white.) I also enjoyed Brown's book after this one, called We Will Not Cancel Us. Same themes, but seemed to be presented more simply than Emergent Strategies.

The blurb says Brown was inspired to write this from Octavia Butler's book, Parable of the Sower (fiction). She was also inspired by Margaret Wheatley's book, Leadership and the New Science (nonfiction). I've also read these two books, and think they complement Emergent Strategy exceptionally well. (Or is it that Emergent Strategy compliments those books?)

I just finished reading Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism by Amanda Montell. Good food for thought, though it was more a book about cults and the people who follow them. The "language" part of the subtitle refers to the jargon developed and used by "cultish" groups, such as CrossFit, Jonestown, QAnon, and SoulCycle.

recently were the ebook editions of:

A Way Out of No Way: A Memoir of Truth, Transformation, and the New American Story by Raphael G. Warnock

Zero Fail: The Rise and Fall of the Secret Service by Carol Leonnig

Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee by Casey N. Cep

Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era by Jerry Mitchell

Recommend them all.

WAR IS A RACKET by Smedley Butler.

Also Saved America from the Bankster/Nazi coup and takedown of FDR. Precursor of Jan06.

Last edited Fri Jan 27, 2023, 09:23 AM - Edit history (1)

just started and now I know how I'll spend this weekend.

I was at a thrift store and found it in the $3.00 bin. It's paperback but has an aside on the cover "Museum Edition"

It appears to not been opened til this morning as throne reading material.

It's Londons' look at England in 1902 from the perspective of a working man. It appears the gilded age never ends for some while the rest just get covered in crap.

Highly recommend.

Excellent so far.

I'm not much on non-fiction. I tend to go through "spells" where I'll read a bunch of it, then burn out.

The last NF I read was White Tears, Brown Scars by Ruby Hamad, about the ways white women exercise DARVO whenever they're accused of racism. You know, crying to get sympathy whenever a brown woman tells them don't touch my hair, or speaks up when they're being racist. The tears are used to turn themselves into the victim, to get fellow whites to take their side and ostracize if not torment the brown person.

An infuriating read, but one that needed to be written.

Previously finished in the past week and a half, and both of which I very highly recommend to anyone who loves reading about medical history and science:


The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human, by Siddhartha Mukherjee

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Song-of-the-Cell/Siddhartha-Mukherjee/9781982117351


The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History, by John M. Barry

https://www.johnmbarry.com/the_great_influenza__the_story_of_the_deadliest_pandemic_in_history__133171.htm


Just started this morning:

An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us, by Ed Yong

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/616914/an-immense-world-by-ed-yong/


I keep forgetting this group is even here since people rarely post.

is an amazing book. It really needs to be thought of as the basic one about influenza.

by Dennis Prager. He began with Exodus and then Genesis. I am reading Genesis.

Prager is a known liar and moron.

He doesn't have the first clue about rationality. This is the guy who presents slavery as a good thing for fake history courses that the right wing pushes.

I wouldn't use anything he wrote as toilet paper, for fear it would contaminate my bum with toxic stupid.

I have three I'd like to get to, if possible:

Bully Pulpit, by Doris Kearns Goodwin, about the rise and fall of the friendship between Teddy Roosevelt and William Taft. It's Goodwin, so the 923 page count turned out to be not-so-scary once I remembered that at least 1/4 of the count would be citations and indexes, LOL.

Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman, memoir about a young woman who broke free of her Hasidic upbringing in Brooklyn.

The Men with the Pink Triangle by Heinz Heger, a recent release about gays sent to Nazi death camps.

Yeesh. I think I'll steer clear of the oven and sharp objects this week...just to stay on the safe side.

Just read Meghan O'Gieblyn's God, Animal, Human, Machine - a fantastic account of the metaphors we use to talk about progress, AI, ML, and the neural in general. It lays bare the data-enchantment at the heart of this Big Data push. Also examines Kurzweil's arguments concerning "spiritual machines." In general, it aims to show that our present is far from an era of disenchantment. We are, the book shows, deeply enchanted by machines. Other than that, I'm also reading about functionalism--which also drew its validity from its scientific leanings, its enchantment with the positivist tradition. Interesting in the context of Meghan's book, especially since she treats science itself as metaphor.

I read Velvet Rope Economy by Nelson Schwartz, about how the rich buy convenience and amenities that end up costing the 99% in loss of, well, everything, and contributes to increasing inequality and divisiveness in the country.

Infuriating read.

The last third of the book was a page turner. It was fascinating to read how she evolved from such a Trump supporter to one of his biggest detractors.