|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 8, 2021 17:32:29 GMT
Books that changed the way you think, that had a lasting impression on you.
Colin Wilson wrote a book about his influences, based on a book by Henry Miller.
What are the Books in Your Life?
|
|
|
|
Post by ripper on Dec 9, 2021 11:53:25 GMT
I think the books that had the greatest impact on me were two that we read at secondary school as part of English studies:
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
1984 by George Orwell
Lord of the Flies shocked me as to how thin the veneer of civilised behaviour can be when groups of people are put into arduous situations.
1984 is simply a masterpiece and probably my favourite novel of all time. I don't know if it is still read in schools, but I think it ought to be.
|
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 9, 2021 13:01:40 GMT
The real "Lord of the Flies" - explorersweb.com/the-real-lord-of-the-flies/Golding also made a schoolboy error - if Piggy was shortsighted, then his glasses couldn't be used to start a fire (because they would have had diverging, not converging, lenses). |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 13:04:13 GMT
The real "Lord of the Flies" - explorersweb.com/the-real-lord-of-the-flies/Golding also made a schoolboy error - if Piggy was shortsighted, then his glasses couldn't be used to start a fire (because they would have had diverging, not converging, lenses). You are quite wonderful at Science. Have you considered debunking the Moon landings? |
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 9, 2021 13:12:30 GMT
As for a book that has had some lasting impression on me, I think I would have to say Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut. Although it has been a while now, I must have read it about 5 or 6 times - and I can't think of any other novel that I have read more than twice. I am (was, will be) quite taken with Tralfamadorian philosophy.
|
|
|
|
Post by Middoth on Dec 9, 2021 13:38:48 GMT
I have had many books in my life. To give preference to one book is dishonest towards others. Let's start from the morning hours of life, in a completely miserable bookstore - to my surprise it still exists - I discovered a 2-volume book by Meritt he brought a lot of magic into my life competed in my heart with Howard for a long time but now I can only look at pictures to the works of Howard, while I remember Meritt with love |
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 9, 2021 13:41:24 GMT
You are quite wonderful at Science. Have you considered debunking the Moon landings? Definitely in my top 10 best-ever books is Carl Sagan's The Demon-Haunted World (1995). |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 14:15:23 GMT
The real "Lord of the Flies" - explorersweb.com/the-real-lord-of-the-flies/Golding also made a schoolboy error - if Piggy was shortsighted, then his glasses couldn't be used to start a fire (because they would have had diverging, not converging, lenses). It was a Dutch spectacle maker that invented the first telescope. Isn't it interesting to think of how he must have one day decided to experiment with a couple of lenses in his workshop. Maybe it was just by accident he came up with it. |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 14:30:20 GMT
The real "Lord of the Flies" - explorersweb.com/the-real-lord-of-the-flies/Golding also made a schoolboy error - if Piggy was shortsighted, then his glasses couldn't be used to start a fire (because they would have had diverging, not converging, lenses). It was a Dutch spectacle maker that invented the first telescope. Isn't it interesting to think of how he must have one day decided to experiment with a couple of lenses in his workshop. Maybe it was just by accident he came up with it. I do like reading about early science and the people who discovered and invented things. Can people recommend books to read with this in mind? Someone like Leibniz seems very modern in outlook, very rational, but Kepler seems to still be straddling the modern world and that of a more supernatural explination for things. His mother was accused of witchcraft, and he defended her himself. He was, of course, a superman. |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 14:40:30 GMT
The real "Lord of the Flies" - explorersweb.com/the-real-lord-of-the-flies/Golding also made a schoolboy error - if Piggy was shortsighted, then his glasses couldn't be used to start a fire (because they would have had diverging, not converging, lenses). It was a Dutch spectacle maker that invented the first telescope. Isn't it interesting to think of how he must have one day decided to experiment with a couple of lenses in his workshop. Maybe it was just by accident he came up with it. Maybe it was the improvement in grinding lenses that finally allowed this. I suppose there were practical reasons no one had done it before. |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 15:40:57 GMT
Leibniz seems more modern than Newton too. Newton obsessed over Alchemy and particularly religion, trying to calculate the end of the world from the Bible. He calculated a date, but I've forgotten it. He wrote far more on that than scientific ideas.
Leibniz invented modern calculus independent of Newton, though Newton claimed he stole from his unpublished work, but it is simply not true. We have his notes as proof of how he came to create it. He was actually influenced by Isaac Barrow, though he claimed it was Pascal who was the major influence. Interestingly Barrow was Newton's tutor, so he must have influenced him profoundly too. Newton was the ultimate egoist, removing others, like Hooke, from the history of ideas so he got more glory. We use the notation Leibniz created, Newton called his calculus Fluxions, and he was so secretive that Leibniz published his first. before people think "she doesn't know what she is talking about" Leibniz's notes have been published and, amazingly, I've actually read them! You can see where Leibniz gets things wrong. It's very interesting. John von Neumann called calculus "the first achievement of modern mathematics". What astonishing men Newton and Leibniz were, and also Barrow and many others, as it did not spring from nowhere.
|
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 15:47:45 GMT
It was a Dutch spectacle maker that invented the first telescope. Isn't it interesting to think of how he must have one day decided to experiment with a couple of lenses in his workshop. Maybe it was just by accident he came up with it. Maybe it was the improvement in grinding lenses that finally allowed this. I suppose there were practical reasons no one had done it before. When you think of the influence this had, it's a great achievement, but we don't really hold these people who do practical things in the same regard as others like Galileo, who used the telescope to unlock the heavens. But their influence is as great isn't it. |
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 9, 2021 16:57:09 GMT
I do like reading about early science and the people who discovered and invented things. Can people recommend books to read with this in mind? Someone like Leibniz seems very modern in outlook, very rational, but Kepler seems to still be straddling the modern world and that of a more supernatural explination for things. His mother was accused of witchcraft, and he defended her himself. He was, of course, a superman. I also enjoy reading about the early history of science, and I would strongly recommend Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything by Philip Ball (2012) to you. His 2006 biography of Paracelsus, The Devil's Doctor, is also a very interesting account of a time when there was no clear distinction that could be made between "science" and "natural magic". |
|
|
|
Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Dec 9, 2021 17:06:51 GMT
I do like reading about early science and the people who discovered and invented things. Can people recommend books to read with this in mind? Someone like Leibniz seems very modern in outlook, very rational, but Kepler seems to still be straddling the modern world and that of a more supernatural explination for things. His mother was accused of witchcraft, and he defended her himself. He was, of course, a superman. I also enjoy reading about the early history of science, and I would strongly recommend Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything by Philip Ball (2012) to you. His 2006 biography of Paracelsus, The Devil's Doctor, is also a very interesting account of a time when there was no clear distinction that could be made between "science" and "natural magic". Thank you. |
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 9, 2021 17:18:35 GMT
John von Neumann called calculus "the first achievement of modern mathematics". I don't know, but maybe the invention/discovery of logarithms by John Napier of Merchiston (1550-1617) has a claim here. Napier was often accused of dabbling in the black arts by his neighbours, though he probably didn't help himself by using a ritual involving a black cockerel to correctly identify a thief amongst his servants. (He told each of his servants to go into a darkened room and pick up the cockerel, informing them that it would crow if they were guilty. What the servants didn't know was that Napier had dusted the cockerel with coal dust. The guilty servant was the one with clean hands, who had been the only one who was afraid to pick up the bird.) |
|
