Archimedes’ Revenge
I thought this book was alright. It contained a bunch of interesting topics in pure mathematics. It seemed almost like a tour through the author’s personal interests since it felt quite diverse. It goes through perfect/prime number theory, Penrose tilings, cryptography, and even quantitative political science.
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Archimedes: What Did He Do Besides Cry Eureka?
This book was more mathematical than I expected. It is really just a condensed and highly simplified translation of Archimedes more famous works. There are some genuinely good ideas found in his methods, however one can usually see quickly the modern replacement that is more effective. His study on levers was very insightful, but the […]
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Infinity and the Mind
Rudy Rucker, though often known for his science fiction, has compiled an impressive entertainment/education type book about the nature of infinity. It offers the predominant views on the subject with explanations for why they are accepted in such a way. There is significant focus on the understanding of infinities and formal systems that use infinities. […]
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Spacetime and Electromagnetism
Although this is a philosophy book, it is also a physics book. I was particularly amazed with the first chapter, it gives a lot of information in just the right way. However, I would recommend skipping Chapters 3-5, and 9-10. This will cut the 300 page book in half and make it much more bearable. […]
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Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution
The style of this book is amazing. Levy is a high quality story teller. All the big names in productive hacking are found in this entertaining exposition. This book began the common use of the term hacker, before it took on the connotation of malevolent intrusion. Emphasis is placed on the Hacker Ethic and its […]
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Dealers of Lightning
One will be amazed at how much progress towards a home computer hinged on the work of the employees of Xerox in the Palo Alto Research Center. It seems that any major component of an interactive computer was developed at this one hub of creation. This book introduces the key players and tells the tale […]
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C & UNIX
A good introduction to the unix/linux environment. The common programs and commands are explained with high detail. This will get you very fluent in using the operating system, but won’t help too much in becoming a crack programmer.
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Excursions in Geometry
Geometry is a bit harder to read since you must refer to diagrams frequently, making it much slower. The spirit of this book was fairly good still, and it flowed pretty smoothly, though not as well as Excursions in Number Theory. Some of the topics that are looked into are not obviously important, so it […]
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Excursions in Number Theory
I must say that this is one of the best books I have ever read. It is rare that an author of a mathematical book can make the text flow so smoothly and have all the math be so clear. There are explanations of complex ideas that are so clear they barely even cause you […]
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Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla
Seifer presents a wealth of information on Nikola Tesla in this biography. There is enough detail to make it quite boring at times, but there are enough interesting events in Tesla’s life to keep the reader awake. Interesting facts are found intermittently, making it difficult to say what parts are the best to read. This […]