Books
I wouldn’t call myself a true bookworm, but I’ve always found that I learn and comprehend much faster through reading. While fiction rarely catches my interest, I spend a lot of time reading articles, blogs, newsletters, and specific book chapters on a variety of topics. I’m not much into podcasts or YouTube for learning—it’s just not my style. Even back in university, I preferred textbooks over lectures because they were a more efficient way for me to grasp concepts.
This page is my commitment to reading more consistently and documenting what I come across. It’s a space to capture interesting quotes, thoughts, and insights, as well as my understanding of the material. It’s not meant to be a complete log of everything I’ve ever read, but I’ll also try to highlight some standout books from the past.
2024
The Art of Doing Science and Engineering - Richard Hamming
If you have ever done some Mathematics or Data Science, then last name Hamming should be familiar (Hamming distance). I found this book through Stripe Press, an amazing list of books labeled as Ideas for Progress.
- Education is what, when, and why to do things. Training is how to do it.
- In science if you know what you are doing, you should not be doing it. In engineering if you do not know what you are doing, you should not be doing it.
- Is programming closer to novel writing than it is to classical engineering? Yes.
- Think before you write the program.
The Comfort Crisis - Michael Easter
The idea that the modern life is too comforting and it is beneficial to go out of comfort zone both mentally and physically: "Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self".
I especially liked idea of importance of nature in life. In the Japanese movie "Perfect Days" (2023), the main character, who works as a public toilet cleaner in Tokyo, every day spends time in the park, sitting among the trees.
- In today's economy, where people can't detach from work emails, nearly a quarter to half of all employees say they're burned out. Nature may be the best recovery tool for the condition.
- Having plants in your office can increase your productivity.
Another great thought was related to curiosity.
- Creating impressions in your scrapbook. If you are seeing and doing all the same things over and over, your scrapbook looks pretty empty when you take inventory of your life. So we need to do more novel things to start creating more impressions in our scrapbooks, so we don't feel like the years are flying by.
Technopoly, The Surrender of Culture to Technology - Neil Postman
A concept of a "technopoly", which is defined as a society where technology is king and culture seeks its authorization, satisfaction, and direction from technology.
Apparently some tutor named William Farish from Cambridge University in 1792 pioneered to grade students' papers. A little idea that changed the way we live and see things now:
- Yet his idea that a quantitative value should be assigned to human thoughts was a major step toward constructing a mathematical concept of reality. If a number can be given to the quality of thought, then a number can be given to the qualities of mercy, love, hate, beauty, creativity, intelligence, even sanity itself.
- To a man with a pencil, everything looks like a list. To a man with a camera, everything looks like an image. To a man with with a computer, everything looks like data. And to a man with a grade sheet, everything looks like a number.
- A new technology does not add or subtract something. It changes everything.
- New technologies alter the structure of our interests: the things we think about. They alter the character of our symbols: the things we think with. And they alter the nature of community: the arena in which thoughts develop.