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neek
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PostSat Sep 02, 2017 6:46 am 
Speaking of Dennett, I'm currently reading his latest, From Bacteria to Bach and Back. For me it's the continuation of a conversation I started eavesdropping on in college (Hofstadter, Penrose, etc.) and I hope will lead to a better understanding of consciousness, which I've always considered to be somewhat of an illusion. And while I'm here, might as well list some other nonfiction I've particularly enjoyed recently: I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life by Ed Yong. A fascinating and surprising look into microbial ecosystems that makes you think deeply about how interconnected all life is. Solitude: In Pursuit of a Singular Life in a Crowded World by Michael Harris. An easy to read meditation on the necessity of spending time alone, written by a young guy with a sophisticated and almost poetic command of straightforward language. Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design by Charles Montgomery. What I want to throw at all the crusty bike and bus infrastructure haters in this country.

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lookout bob
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lookout bob
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PostThu Sep 07, 2017 10:36 am 
"The Forest Unseen- A Year's Watch in Nature" David George Haskell cool.gif

"Altitude is its own reward" John Jerome ( from "On Mountains")
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zephyr
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PostFri Sep 15, 2017 7:38 pm 
Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans by Admiral James Stavridis, USN (Ret.) Published by Penguin Press in 2017. Illustrated with black and white images of old charts and current maps. From the book jacket: “…a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy who spent more than 35 years on active service in the Navy. He commanded destroyers and a carrier strike group in combat and served for seven years as four-star admiral, including nearly four years as the first Navy officer chosen as Supreme Allied Commander for global Operations at NATO. After retiring from the Navy he was named the dean of The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in 2013. He has written articles on global security for the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Atlantic.” This is a book of geography and history—particularly naval history. It’s organized in sections per ocean. The fascinating part is that he recalls each ocean and what it was like when he first sailed there. His career has taken him across the globe interacting with his military and diplomatic counterparts. It’s a great read—especially for those of us who have gone down to the sea in ships or boats and know the feeling of the limitless horizon for weeks on end. ~z

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Mike Collins
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PostThu Sep 21, 2017 11:21 am 
Neil DeGrasse Tyson hooks the reader with the opening paragraph of "Astrophysics for People in a Hurry." In the beginning, nearly fourteen billion years ago, all the space and all the matter and all the energy of the known universe was contained in a volume less than one trillionth the size of the period that ends this sentence. The author has predicted that the reader will be uncomfortable and writhing like a slug on salt with the mind-boggling effect of that statement. To assuage the unease he prefaced those words by writing "The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you." DeGrasse Tyson is an expert at bringing lofty thoughts down to the armchair that I enjoy reading books in. He will bring a few rays of light to illuminate the existence of dark matter and dark energy. He is successful at blowing away some of the fog preventing an understanding of the celestial landscape.

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gb
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PostFri Sep 22, 2017 2:51 pm 
Amelia Earhart: The Truth at Last by Mike Campbell. This is a publish on demand book I got from the U Bookstore. The book is a very professionally researched book that covers and documents actual previous research on the subject from interviews and document research over the years dating from 1944 to more recent interviews by Campbell. All information is footnoted. There is no doubt that Amelia Earhart landed on the lagoon side of Barre Island in the Mili Atoll group on July 2nd, 1937, was picked up by a small Japanese fishing boat after about three days, was transferred to Jaluit by a larger coal burning Japanese ship where she and Noonan arrived on July 13th (most likely date) and was taken To Kwajalein and Truk Islands on the way to Saipan via seaplane. Earhart probably survived until at least 1941 (according to a Chamorro woman who did her laundry while she was in a prison at the Japanese Garapan base), but was eventually executed. Her Lockheed aircraft with a broken wing was taken to Jaluit on a barge behind the ship and taken on the weekly barge to Majuro island before eventually being taken to Saipan's Alito Field where it was stored in a hangar before being destroyed by the US military on higher orders as Marine's conquered Saipan on June 23rd in 1944. Guarding, and seeing the aircraft was documented by numerous interviewed Marines as early as 1944. Interviews were conducted and additional Marines came forward upon placement of a blurb on two occasions in the appropriate Marine rags beginning in the 1970's. The US Naval Office of intelligence researched the matter of Earhart's existence on Saipan in the early 1960's, declassifying the document in 1967. The document cited Chamorro natives that had seen Earhart (and Noonan) in it's official report. Considerable additional support for this news came from former Japanese interpreters and police who remained on Saipan or in the adjacent Japanese mandated islands.

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Mike Collins
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PostSun Sep 24, 2017 10:11 am 
Isabel Wilkerson is a gifted writer who won the Pulitzer Prize while writing for the New York Times. In The Warmth of Other Suns-The Epic Story of America's Great Migration she chronicles an evocative tale of the decades long migration of African-Americans from the south to a better life in venues across America. Her recounting of atrocities committed against negroes (her word) is gripping to read and one is given a deeper understanding for the genesis of this diaspora.

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Mike Collins
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PostSat Sep 30, 2017 2:30 pm 
Talking about race is a thorny matter. Michael Eric Dyson takes it on with no holds barred in Tears We Cannot Stop-A Sermon to White America. He does deliver his words as if he were giving a sermon to a congregation and his audience for this book is definitely white America. You will gain an appreciation for the background that led Colin Kaepernick to kneel on one knee during the national anthem which has only broadened in its intensity since then. If you are genuinely concerned about racial relations then this book will undoubtedly assist you. For those who are interested the author is speaking at the Mount Zion Baptist Church in Seattle on Friday, October 13 at 7:00 PM. Admission is free.

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olderthanIusedtobe
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PostFri Oct 13, 2017 9:22 pm 
Reading Pierce Brown's "Red Rising" for the second time. Really really good, enjoying it as much as the first time. This time I can plow through the trilogy one after the other rather than waiting about a year between books. Supposedly in development for a movie, but it's been that way for several years w/ no apparent progress being made.

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zephyr
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PostSat Oct 14, 2017 12:17 pm 
Destined For War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap? by Graham Allison. If you enjoy history and follow geopolitics then this book is for you. It is highly readable, rather like a page-turner. The author has impressive credentials and the book has a lot to offer though not everyone agrees with him entirely and there has been some controversy. Quote: Reviewing cases from the Peloponnesian War to the Anglo-German rivalry, Allison mines history for lessons on managing great power rivalry and preventing the outbreak of conflict. The end product is a book rich in scope and even magisterial in its execution. Unfortunately, Allison’s fundamental argument is also problematic: in its total emphasis on the security dilemma, it fails to recognize the important role status is playing in shaping Sino-American relations that Allison understates. At any rate, I still found the book interesting and thought-provoking. ~z

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Mike Collins
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PostSun Oct 15, 2017 9:52 am 
It is hard to imagine that at a time in the recent past blacks had to sit at the back of the bus and weren't allowed to use restaurant bathroom facilities. I May Not Get There With You-The True Martin Luther King Jr. by Michael Eric Dyson brings you back to that shameful era and reveals the life of the giant civil rights champion who died in the pursuit of equal rights for all Americans. MLK was the catalyst for change in racist America and his deserved accolades are developed in this biography. I had the pleasure of hearing the author speak at the Mt Zion Baptist Church last Friday and he delivers his message with same riveting power that MLK tapped into.

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PostThu Oct 19, 2017 4:51 pm 
Other minds: the octopus, the sea, and the origins of consciousness / Peter Godfrey-Smith My octopus is smarter than your dog. The house of owls / Tony Angell So is my barn owl. What should we be worried about? : real scenarios that keep scientists up at night / John Brockman If nothing in this book worries you, you should probably check into rehab. On tyranny: twenty lessons from the twentieth century / Timothy Snyder. Ditto. The Nordic theory of everything: in search of a better life / Anu Partanen How far could BPJ and MG get in this book before their respective heads exploded? The jazz of physics: the secret link between music and the structure of the universe / Stephon Alexander The people on this site who are fans of what used to be called avant-garde jazz (e.g., Coleman, Coltrane), and are also interested in astrophysics, may both enjoy this book; although a glaring omission is the lack of mention of Sun Ra. Embryos, galaxies, and sentient beings: how the universe makes life / Richard Grossinger It is unlikely that we are alone, but it is unlikely that it matters. What the f: what our swearing tells us about our language, our brains, and ourselves / Benjamin Bergen From information in this book you can get a lower-limit estimate of my age, given that I have friends from high school named Richard who go by the nickname Dick. Barkskins / Annie Proulx Proulx has obviously done her usual thorough background research for this novel, even treeswarper might find something she doesn’t already know about logging.

First your legs go, then you lose your reflexes, then you lose your friends. Willy Pep
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olderthanIusedtobe
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PostThu Oct 19, 2017 6:27 pm 
Interesting list cc. Please tell me you aren't reading all of those concurrently! I sometimes work on two books at a time, but that's about all I can handle.

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cascade curmudgeon



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PostFri Oct 20, 2017 10:34 am 
olderthanIusedtobe wrote:
Interesting list cc. Please tell me you aren't reading all of those concurrently! I sometimes work on two books at a time, but that's about all I can handle.
I read them in last couple weeks, but there is an explanation: I got a knee replacement, and we don't have TV.

First your legs go, then you lose your reflexes, then you lose your friends. Willy Pep
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olderthanIusedtobe
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PostFri Oct 20, 2017 11:19 am 
Best wishes for a speedy recovery from your surgery. At least you're keeping yourself entertained.

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Backpacker Joe
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PostMon Oct 23, 2017 9:00 pm 
Viral Misery. Thomas A. Watson

"If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide." — Abraham Lincoln
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