March Books

We're off on vacation tomorrow, so I wanted to get this month's book list up before we left for a circuit featuring the World of Coke and Stax records.

NakedStatistics: Stripping the Dread from the Data

Charles Wheelan

W. W. Norton & Company, Jan 7, 2013 - Mathematics - 302 pages

The best-selling author of Naked Economics defies the odds with a book about statistics that you’ll welcome and enjoy.

Once considered tedious, the field of statistics is rapidly evolving into a discipline Hal Varian, chief economist at Google, has actually called “sexy.” From batting averages and political polls to game shows and medical research, the real-world application of statistics continues to grow by leaps and bounds. How can we catch schools that cheat on standardized tests? How does Netflix know which movies you’ll like? What is causing the rising incidence of autism? As best-selling author Charles Wheelan shows us in Naked Statistics, the right data and a few well-chosen statistical tools can help us answer these questions and more.

For those who slept through Stats 101, this book is a lifesaver. Wheelan strips away the arcane and technical details and focuses on the underlying intuition that drives statistical analysis. He clarifies key concepts such as inference, correlation, and regression analysis, reveals how biased or careless parties can manipulate or misrepresent data, and shows us how brilliant and creative researchers are exploiting the valuable data from natural experiments to tackle thorny questions.

And in Wheelan’s trademark style, there’s not a dull page in sight. You’ll encounter clever Schlitz Beer marketers leveraging basic probability, an International Sausage Festival illuminating the tenets of the central limit theorem, and a head-scratching choice from the famous game show Let’s Make a Deal—and you’ll come away with insights each time. With the wit, accessibility, and sheer fun that turned Naked Economics into a bestseller, Wheelan defies the odds yet again by bringing another essential, formerly unglamorous discipline to life.

Notes

Very readable look at the use and capabilities of statistics—with the formulas in the appendices. Recommended.

TheBook of Disquiet

Fernando Pessoa

Fiction - 356 pages

Sitting at his desk, Bernardo Soares imagined himself free forever of Rua dos Douradores, of his boss Vasques, of Moreira the book-keeper, of all the other employees, the errand boy, the post boy, even the cat. But if he left them all tomorrow and discarded the suit of clothes he wears, what else would he do? Because he would have to do something. And what suit would he wear? Because he would have to wear another suit. A self-deprecating reflection on the sheer distance between the loftiness of his feelings and the humdrum reality of his life, The Book of Disquiet is a classic of existentialist literature.

Notes

Like nothing I’ve ever read before. Dreamy and at the same time precisely insightful into the beauty and emptiness of everyday life.

Why We Write: 

20 Acclaimed Authors on How and Why They Do What They Do

Meredith Maran

Penguin, Jan 29, 2013 - Reference - 256 pages

Twenty of America's bestselling authors share tricks, tips, and secrets of the successful writing life.

Anyone who's ever sat down to write a novel or even a story knows how exhilarating and heartbreaking writing can be. So what makes writers stick with it? In Why We Write, twenty well-known authors candidly share what keeps them going and what they love most—and least—about their vocation.

Notes

Very enjoyable, if a little thin. Apparently writers—even the successful ones—don’t make money. But that’s not what drives them anyway.

Big-TimeSports in American Universities

Charles T. Clotfelter

Cambridge University Press, Mar 7, 2011 - Sports & Recreation - 313 pages

For almost a century, big-time college sports has been a wildly popular but consistently problematic part of American higher education. The challenges it poses to traditional academic values have been recognized from the start, but they have grown more ominous in recent decades, as cable television has become ubiquitous, commercial opportunities have proliferated, and athletic budgets have ballooned. Drawing on new research findings, this book takes a fresh look at the role of commercial sports in American universities. It shows that, rather than being the inconsequential student activity that universities often imply that it is, big-time sports has become a core function of the universities that engage in it. For this reason, the book takes this function seriously and presents evidence necessary for a constructive perspective about its value. Although big-time sports surely creates worrying conflicts in values, it also brings with it some surprising positive consequences.

Notes

The whole thing doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it’s not going anywhere anytime soon. Hard to quantify, but most universities don’t make any money from athletics.

NotesFrom Underground

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Canongate Books, Oct 25, 2012 - Fiction - 160 pages

I am a sick person. I am a spiteful person. An unattractive person, too . . . In the depths of a cellar in St. Petersburg, a civil servant spews forth a passionate and furious note on the ills of society. The underground man's manifesto reveals his erratic, self-contradictory and even sadistic nature. Yet in Dostoyevsky's most radical and disturbing character, there is the uncomfortable flicker of recognition of the human condition. When the narrator ventures above ground, he attends a dinner with a group of old school friends. It is here, paralysed by his own social awkwardness, that he carries out extraordinary acts and cements his status as a true and original outsider.

Notes

Picked this up because I remembered it as similar to the Book of Disquiet. It wasn’t. Passionate as only the Russians can be. Simultaneously poignant and ridiculous.

TheHobbit: 

The Enchanting Prelude to The Lord of the Rings

J.R.R. Tolkien, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien

Random House Digital, Inc., 1982 - Fiction - 304 pages

The adventures of the well-to-do hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, who lived happily in his comfortable home until a wandering wizard granted his wish. A new edition to Tolkien's classic, the prelude to the Lord of the Rings saga, is available just in time for "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, " set for release in theaters in December 2002. Illustrations. In this fantasy, a prelude to The Lord of the Rings, the reader meets Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit, in a land filled with dwarfs, elves, goblins, and dragons. The Greatest Fantasy Epic of our Time, Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who wanted to be left alone in quiet comfort. But the wizard Gandalf came along with a band of homeless dwarves. Soon Bilbo was drawn into their quest, facing evil orcs, savage wolves, giant spiders, and worse unknown dangers. Finally, it was Bilbo-alone and unaided-who had to confront the great dragon Smaug, the terror of an entire countryside . . . This stirring adventure fantasy begins the tale of the hobbits that was continued by J.R.R. Tolkien in his bestselling epic The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien are the movie tie-in editions to The Fellowship of the Ring, the first of the three New Line Films based on the classic epic fantasy, which opens December 19, 2001. A saga of dwarfs and elves, goblins and trolls in a far-off, long ago land. 

Notes

Second reading (with the BG’s group). Didn’t wow me the way it did 35 years ago; the plot was much thinner than I remembered. Eagles swooping down to the rescue. How convenient!

TheEconomy of Prestige: 

prizes, awards, and the circulation of cultural value (Google eBook)

James F. ENGLISH,

Harvard University Press, Jun 30, 2009 - Art - 409 pages

This is a book about one of the great untold stories of modern cultural life: the remarkable ascendancy of prizes in literature and the arts. James F. English documents the dramatic rise of the awards industry and its complex role within what he describes as an economy of cultural prestige.

Notes

Awards are a business unto themselves, and often tainted by politics. Not sure you need 400 pages to make that point.

DC Rambling

Yesterday, I was in Washington for an event at the Ronald Reagan building, a giant structure now filling the hole in the ground that sullied the view of Pennsylvania Avenue when I moved to DC in the summer of 1990.

When I arrived in the city, one of the first things I did was open an account at the Citibank at the corner of 14th and G streets NW, the site of my office. They had an arrangement with my firm that provided low fees and some other perks. The bank secured my loyalty, when, a couple of years later, they offered me $50 to start paying my bills online using a little something then known as the Internet, which looked like it might actually be something.

There was a Citibank in Thessaloniki we used when we were in Macedonia, and there was one at the grand mall in Maadi. Their online services have continued to grown and remain satisfactory, so we haven't seen a need for a local bank in the Triangle, depositing our cheques either by photographing them and doing it online, or, for higher value items, sending them off via mail.

But thanks to G Lo's generosity and prudent estate planning, we have recently come into a cheque that we felt uncomfortable putting it into the mail, so I brought it with me, to deposit at the home branch yesterday.

In the early 90s, banks were doing away with people, and there were never more than one or two in the building, so I was astonished to find two people on the floor, one of whom greeted me effusively.

When I explained my errand, he pointed me toward the teller window, and, not seeing any deposit slips, I got in line. When my turn came, I handed the teller the cheque and my ATM card. She promptly returned the latter to me, showing me the reader on the counter where I was supposed to swipe it.

As the system retrieved my information, the teller looked at me incredulously. "You were last here in 1993," she told me. "Um, yeah," I told her, channeling Luther in 48 Hours, "I've been busy."

We chatted about the changes to the neighbourhood, and, as I was leaving, I asked if the book store on F street was still there, and she assured me that it was.

But it wasn't. The Olsson's was long gone, but there was a giant Barnes and Noble around the corner, whose existence was news to me.

I finished at the bookstore, and, with time for lunch, was delighted to see that Ollie's trolley, one of my favourite lunch spots, was still there. I was too full for an Ollie Burger or a gyro, and they had added table service at some point, but I am glad to report that the fries are as delicious as ever.

It's sad that some things are gone, nice that so many things have changed, and delightful that some remain. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Where is the Invisible Gorilla?

If you are looking for business books, I recommend the excellent Farnam street blog, which has pointed me to a number of excellent titles in the last couple of years, many concerning the workings of the brain, a topic very much of the moment. Today, he reviews Brain Rules, which I stumbled on a year or two ago in the 612 section of the library, the place to find these types of books.

In a ridiculously reductive act of precis, I've summarized his summary of the rules; but they're good to keep in mind, so at the very least, typing this will help set them in my own long term memory.

1. Exercise improves brain power;
2. The brain evolves (it is a survival organ);
3. Every brain is wired differently;
4. We can only focus on one thing at a time;
5. Repetition improves memory;
6. Sleep is key to development and maintenance;
7. Long term stress damages memory, executive function and motor skills;
8. All of the senses assist memory, but vision is strongest.

Of all the books I've read on this topic, the ones I would most highly recommend are Thinking: Fast and Slow and The Brain That Changes Itself. The others are sprinkled throughout my library, and I can't think of one that I didn't enjoy.

The Late Show

Since we've been in the Triangle, the Gs and I have had a show that we watch every night before they go to bed. The list tracks pretty consistently with their development. We started with Rocky and Bullwinkle, moved on to Fat Albert, followed by the Cosby Show, and most recently Chopped, which the BG--who does not love the NBA with the same passion as her older sister--especially enjoys.

But after a year or so, I think we've seen them all, and every night involves a host of "seen its" as we scroll through the available options, often followed by the recognition that the episode we thought was new is also familiar.

I've fished around for some new candidates, and recently, I thought the Simpsons might fit the bill. I can remember when it premiered; it was must see tv at our house in South Bend, along with Twin Peaks.

Anyway, the Gs were reticent, but, almost out of desperation, not wanting to endure another rerun, they agreed the other night, and, ladies and gentlemen, we have a hit on our hands--just the right blend of slapstick, pop culture and cynicism to make everybody happy. And with over 500 episodes in the can (it's the longest running scripted television series ever), it ought to get us to the point where I'm going to bed before they are.

3.14

Happy Pi Day!

"Come Over to the Nerd Side. We Have Pi."

I would have baked something but the middle school eschews the dangers of homemade food, reportedly due to some apocryphal pranks involving 4 and 20 ex lax, or something like that.

OG can recite PI to 50 digits, yet harbors no hope of winning the contest at school today.

A New Modest Proposal

A little tougher than normal to get up this morning, thanks to the time change. As we were walking to the bus stop, the BG had an idea: "Why don't we start everything an hour later during Daylight Savings Time? School, Tae Kwan do? Everything? Then it wouldn't be so hard to get up."

It's crazy, but it just might work.

The Internet of Things

This week's Economist, in addition to leading with an article about how technology will allow us to optimize efficiency by renting everything (cars, dogs, tools, etc), has a piece about the Internet of things. The story is about the Nest, a thermostat that tries to do for climate control what the Ipod did for music.

Um, right. But I bought one anyway a few months ago. It was easy to install and connect to our wireless network, and I can program it with my phone or Ipad anywhere I am. We've settled on 65 degrees as our daytime temperature and 50 at night, and so far that has been comfortable, aside from a couple of colder days, where someone has needed a little more warmth.

The, ahem, coolest thing about the device is that every month we get a report on how "green" we are. A lot of recent research shows that information like this (what, we use 28% more electricity than our neighbors? 78% of guests use their sheets for a second night.) is a very good way to spur desired behavior.

Our report for an unseasonably cold February, shows that we used more energy than last month, but that, compared to our peers, we're still doing well:

A look at your Leafs:

You get a Leaf when you choose an energy-efficient temperature. And now, see your Leafs add up all year long. This month, the Nest average is 15 Leafs. Here’s how many you earned:

In February you earned: 28 That’s a Leaf every day!

In February you’re in the top: 5% of Nesters

This year you've earned: 59 Nest Leafs

Let me bask in the warm glow of righteous behaviour for a moment, and then think about what other products I can buy to make us more efficient.

Rising Star Safari

In the Economist's view, recent developments in the Dark Continent have reduced Paul Theroux's excellent Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Capetown to a historical artifact. This week's Special Report is brimming with optimism, and though the legacies of colonialism and the Cold War linger on, the future looks brighter for most people. Below are the points from the Report I highlighted:

• Secondary school enrollment grew by 48% between 2000-2008;
• Malaria deaths have declined by 30% and HIV infections by 74% in the last decade;
• The poorest nations are landlocked;
• Bank account holders in Kenya have risen from 1 million to 20 million in the last ten years;
• Mobile phone and Internet access is widespread and growing.

Then again, $4-8 billion of Nigeria's oil revenue is stolen annually (and there are lots of other similar examples--I'm looking at you Mr. Mugabe), so there is still a long way to go. But the population is young and moving to cities in increasing numbers, two good things for future prosperity.

Books of the Month

Short month, short list. Didn't enjoy any of these as much as I'd hoped, but nor would I discourage anyone from reading them. Full list for 2013 available at this link

World War One: A Short History‎

Norman Stone - 2009 - History - Limited preview

The First World War was the overwhelming disaster from which everything else in the twentieth century stemmed. Fourteen million combatants died, four empires were destroyed, and even the victors’ empires were fatally damaged. World War I took humanity from the nineteenth century forcibly into the twentieth—and then, at Versailles, cast Europe on the path to World War II as well.

In World War One, Norman Stone, one of the world’s greatest historians, has achieved the almost impossible task of writing a terse and witty short history of the war. A captivating, brisk narrative, World War One is Stone’s masterful effort to make sense of one of the twentieth century’s pivotal conflicts.

Note: The White Guard led me to this, and, though I did not learn as much as I’d hoped, I am newly appreciative of the role of declining empires and nascent states (including the USSR) in WWI. Not something taught in Canada. Also, improvements in munitions and other technologies changed war forever.

  

What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How successful people become even ...‎

Marshall Goldsmith - 2010 - Self-Help - Limited preview

Your hard work is paying off. You are doing well in your field. But there is something standing between you and the next level of achievement. That something may just be one of your own annoying habits. Perhaps one small flaw - a behaviour you barely even recognise - is the only thing that's keeping you from where you want to be. It may be that the very characteristic that you believe got you where you are - like the drive to win at all costs - is what's holding you back. As this book explains, people often do well in spite of certain habits rather than because of them - and need a "to stop" list rather than one listing what "to do". Marshall Goldsmith's expertise is in helping global leaders overcome their unconscious annoying habits and become more successful. His one-on-one coaching comes with a six-figure price tag - but in this book you get his great advice for much less. Recently named as one of the world's five most-respected executive coaches by Forbes, he has worked with over 100 major CEOs and their management teams at the world's top businesses. His clients include corporations such as Goldman Sachs, Glaxo SmithKline, Johnson and Johnson and GE.

Note: Somewhat self-congratulatory study of how leaders and organizations can improve. Overlong, like most books of this kind, but full of examples and theories with practical utility.

The Moronic Inferno: And Other Visits to America‎

Martin Amis - 2010 - 

At the age of ten, when Martin Amis spent a year in Princeton, New Jersey, he was excited and frightened by America. As an adult he has approached that confusing country from many arresting angles, and interviewed its literati, filmmakers, thinkers, opinion makers, leaders and crackpots with characteristic discernment and wit.

Included in a gallery of Great American Novelists are Norman Mailer, Gore Vidal, Truman Capote, Joseph Heller, William Burroughs, Kurt Vonnegut, John Updike, Paul Theroux, Philip Roth and Saul Bellow. Amis also takes us to Dallas, where presidential candidate Ronald Reagan is attempting to liaise with born-again Christians. We glimpse the beau monde of Palm Beach, where each couple tries to out-Gatsby the other, and examine the case of Claus von Bulow. Steven Spielberg gets a visit, as does Brian de Palma, whom Amis asks why his films make no sense, and Hugh Hefner's sybaritic fortress and sanitised image are penetrated.

There can be little that escapes the eye of Martin Amis when his curiosity leads him to a subject, and America has found in him a superlative chronicler.

Note: Series of erudite interviews and book reviews about American personalities, written with the acerbity that only the British can seem to pull off. Not a wasted word, but not much to take away either.

The presidency of Calvin Coolidge‎

Robert H. Ferrell - 1998 - Biography & Autobiography 

Robert Ferrell offers the first book-length account of the Coolidge presidency in thirty years, drawing on the recently opened papers of White House physician Joel T. Boone to provide a more personal appraisal of the thirtieth president than has previously been possible. Ferrell shows Coolidge to have been a hard-working, sensitive individual who was a canny politician and an astute judge of people. Drawing on the most recent literature on the Coolidge era, Ferrell has constructed a meticulous and highly readable account of the president's domestic and foreign policy. His book illuminates this pre-Depression administration for historians and reveals to general readers a president who was stern in temperament and dedicated to public service.

Note: Read this after a review of the new biography, which casts Silent Cal as a conservative hero. From this it looks like Hoover and Mellon were running the country during the roaring twenties, and the president was not much involved.

Pawn of Prophecy‎

David Eddings - 1986 - Fiction - Limited preview

Long ago, the Storyteller claimed, in this first book of THE BELGARIAD, the evil god Torak drove men and Gods to war. But Belgarath the Sorcerer led men to reclaim the Orb that protected men of the West. So long as it lay at Riva, the prophecy went, men would be safe.
But Garion did not believe in such stories. Brought up on a quiet farm by his Aunt Pol, how could he know that the Apostate planned to wake dread Torak, or that he would be led on a quest of unparalleled magic and danger by those he loved--but did not know...?

Note: Standard fantasy, better than some, not as good as others. A gift to Ana (which is why I read it), but I did not move on to Book II, although I briefly considered it.

White Guard‎

Mikhail Bulgakov, Marian Schwartz, E. A. Dobrenko - 2008 

White Guard, Mikhail Bulgakovs semi-autobiographical first novel, is the story of the Turbin family in Kiev in 1918. Alexei, Elena, and Nikolka Turbin have just lost their mothertheir father had died years beforeand find themselves plunged into the chaotic civil war that erupted in the Ukraine in the wake of the Russian Revolution. In the context of this familys personal loss and the social turmoil surrounding them, Bulgakov creates a brilliant picture of the existential crises brought about by the revolution and the loss of social, moral, and political certainties. He confronts the reader with the bewildering cruelty that ripped Russian life apart at the beginning of the last century as well as with the extraordinary ways in which the Turbins preserved their humanity. In this volume Marian Schwartz, a leading translator, offers the first complete and accurate translation of the definitive original text of Bulgakovs novel. She includes the famous dream sequence, omitted in previous translations, and beautifully solves the stylistic issues raised by Bulgakovs ornamental prose. 

Note: Did not really know anything about what happened in the Ukraine during World War I. Learned a little, but did not enjoy the story as much as I’d hoped, especially after the Master and Margarita.

Greenback: The Almighty Dollar and the Invention of America‎

Jason Goodwin - 2004 - Business & Economics

With the wry and admiring eye of a modern Tocqueville, Jason Goodwin gives us a biography of the dollar and the story of its astonishing career through the wilds of American history. Looking at the dollar over the years as a form of art, a kind of advertising, and a reflection of American attitudes, Goodwin delves into folklore and the development of printing, investigates wildcats and counterfeiters, explains why a buck is a buck and how Dixie got its name. Bringing together an array of quirky detail and often hilarious anecdote, Goodwin tells the story of America through its most beloved product.
With the wry and admiring eye of a modern Tocqueville, Jason Goodwin gives us a biography of the dollar and the story of its astonishing career through the wilds of American history. Looking at the dollar over the years as a form of art, a kind of advertising, and a reflection of American attitudes, Goodwin delves into folklore and the development of printing, investigates wildcats and counterfeiters, explains why a buck is a buck and how Dixie got its name. Bringing together an array of quirky detail and often hilarious anecdote, Goodwin tells the story of America through its most beloved product.

Note: So much of monetary policy seems to have been driven by the need to pay for wars, which can be expensive. And at the end of the day, it’s just paper.

Song of the Day

Why do I, suddenly appear,
Every day, up in here;
Just like me
You need to be
Waking up.