So I'm about halfway through A Beautiful Math and it's interesting so far, but I'm not in love with it or anything. I have four books lined up to read after it that I'm pretty excited about (three I got from the library, then another Jeeves book I ordered), so I'm looking forward to finishing it. But something pretty great happened last night: I'm reading a chapter on evolutionary psychology and I come upon this:
"One of the more interesting critiques comes from philosopher David Buller, of Northern Illinois University in Dekalb."
My alma mater! NIU! It's not a big enough school (like UW Madison) that seeing mention of it is common-place. One of my friends got an M.S. in philosophy there, so I bet he even knows this guy. And I forgive Tom Siegfried, the author of the book, for not knowing we capitalize the "k" in DeKalb.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Library, part two
I never used to like getting books out of the library. Sure, they're free, but when I love a book I want a copy of it that I can read over and over and lend out to friends. But lately I've been using the libraries at the colleges where I teach, and I'm digging it. Reasons why:
- This is obvious, perhaps, but it allows me to read books I'm not sure if I'll like or not - to take more chances, in other words, since my money isn't involved.
- I can read short, skinny, quick books without feeling like I'm wasting money (I like a lot of pages per dollar, generally).
- I can check out We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, which my friend Brian just bought, but wants to read before he'll lend it to me even though he still has two other books he wants to read first. Now I'll have it finished before him. Ha.
- I can read less-serious fare that will entertain me. I will enjoy it, but I won't get a lot of re-reads or recommendations out of it, so there's no need to own it.
- I can read red books. OK, this is a bit of joke, but seriously: my books are organized by color on my bookshelves, and you have no idea how many books have red spines!
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Why didn't this happen when I was there?
I'll just quote the whole article here:
Giant Lego man found in Dutch sea
1 of 1Full Size
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A giant, smiling Lego man was fished out of the sea in the Dutch resort of Zandvoort on Tuesday.
Workers at a drinks stall rescued the 2.5-metre (8-foot) tall model with a yellow head and blue torso.
"We saw something bobbing about in the sea and we decided to take it out of the water," said a stall worker. "It was a life-sized Lego toy."
A woman nearby added: "I saw the Lego toy floating towards the beach from the direction of England."
The toy was later placed in front of the drinks stall.
Library
Here is what I want in a room: Big windows and a comfortable chair to sit in. The chair upholstered in some beautiful, colorful fabric. Shelves and shelves of books. A pot of oolong tea to pour steaming into my favorite clear glass mug (bought at HEMA in Amsterdam). This is my perfect reading situation.
I have this now, sort of - I want to reupholster my chair (or at least sew a slip cover), I want more bookshelves (that will have to wait till I move somewhere bigger), and I want a couch that isn't godawful ugly and covered in dog hair (and dogs). But the dream library is not an impossible sort of dream.
With a good book, though, those things don't really matter. A favorite reading experience: sitting on my mom's couch as a kid, reading 101 Dalmatians (the original novel, not a novelization of the Disney movie), eating piece after piece of buttered toast and drinking cup after cup of sugary black tea. Another: sitting at a picnic table in a campsite for two hours, tearing through the last several hundred pages of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Another: laying on a lounger in the sand by the North Sea in the Dutch city of Zandvoort, sipping Coke out of a glass, eating paprika-flavored potato chips, and reading Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros.
So while the library described above might be ideal, I truly only need an engaging book and a quiet space carved out for myself. Snacks, clearly, don't hurt either. Ingredients for a fantastic evening: a great book, no grading to do, and some paprika chips.
I have this now, sort of - I want to reupholster my chair (or at least sew a slip cover), I want more bookshelves (that will have to wait till I move somewhere bigger), and I want a couch that isn't godawful ugly and covered in dog hair (and dogs). But the dream library is not an impossible sort of dream.
With a good book, though, those things don't really matter. A favorite reading experience: sitting on my mom's couch as a kid, reading 101 Dalmatians (the original novel, not a novelization of the Disney movie), eating piece after piece of buttered toast and drinking cup after cup of sugary black tea. Another: sitting at a picnic table in a campsite for two hours, tearing through the last several hundred pages of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Another: laying on a lounger in the sand by the North Sea in the Dutch city of Zandvoort, sipping Coke out of a glass, eating paprika-flavored potato chips, and reading Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros.
So while the library described above might be ideal, I truly only need an engaging book and a quiet space carved out for myself. Snacks, clearly, don't hurt either. Ingredients for a fantastic evening: a great book, no grading to do, and some paprika chips.
Monday, March 22, 2010
The Prisoners' Dilemma and Google Search
I'm about a third of the way through A Beautiful Math. I just read about the Prisoners' Dilemma, which I've certainly heard about before but never really understood. Here's the setup:
Two people are arrested for bank robbery, and interrogated by the police separately. If they both rat on each other, they get 3 years each. If one of them rats on the other and the other says nothing, the rat goes free and the quiet one gets 5 years. If both of them keep their mouths shut, they each get 1 year.
My first thought is that they both have to both keep their mouths shut; it seems like the best thing to do. But A Beautiful Math (which, for the record, is kind of a stupid name) is making a point about equilibrium. Each of them keeping their mouths shut is not a stable situation. Maybe they'll each do it this time, and next time, but at some point one of them is going to want to rat on the other, and that guy could end up doing 5 years. The stable decision (and therefore the best one) is to always rat on your partner, because regardless of what your partner does, your situation is optimized.
Let's look at it from one prisoner's perspective. Say Person A rats Person B out. If B also rats A out, A gets 3 years, and if B doesn't rat A out, A goes free. However, if A stays quiet, he's taking a risk that B could rat him out and get him 5 years. Maybe B will stay quiet and things will work out for A, but maybe it won't. Ratting your partner out is the stable, sustainable solution.
My second point today: looking at my google search history is somewhat amusing. I think I will share it from time to time. Here's my current one:
Two people are arrested for bank robbery, and interrogated by the police separately. If they both rat on each other, they get 3 years each. If one of them rats on the other and the other says nothing, the rat goes free and the quiet one gets 5 years. If both of them keep their mouths shut, they each get 1 year.
My first thought is that they both have to both keep their mouths shut; it seems like the best thing to do. But A Beautiful Math (which, for the record, is kind of a stupid name) is making a point about equilibrium. Each of them keeping their mouths shut is not a stable situation. Maybe they'll each do it this time, and next time, but at some point one of them is going to want to rat on the other, and that guy could end up doing 5 years. The stable decision (and therefore the best one) is to always rat on your partner, because regardless of what your partner does, your situation is optimized.
Let's look at it from one prisoner's perspective. Say Person A rats Person B out. If B also rats A out, A gets 3 years, and if B doesn't rat A out, A goes free. However, if A stays quiet, he's taking a risk that B could rat him out and get him 5 years. Maybe B will stay quiet and things will work out for A, but maybe it won't. Ratting your partner out is the stable, sustainable solution.
My second point today: looking at my google search history is somewhat amusing. I think I will share it from time to time. Here's my current one:
- What are some common verbs?
- Translate spoorloos
- Dutch conjugate bark
- words that rhyme with liz
- mad rollin dolls [the local roller derby league]
- is fred schneider gay? [he is.]
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Game Theory
I finished my re-read of I'm a Stranger Here Myself and I'm on to a new book: A Beautiful Math by Tom Siegfried. It's about game theory, particularly John Forbes Nash's work (the mathematician who A Beautiful Mind was written about, hence the title). I don't know much at all about game theory. It's one of those things I heard math majors talk about in college but never actually found out what it was. At some point I established that the "game" in game theory doesn't have anything to do with actual games.
Turns out I was wrong about that, that one thing I knew prior to starting the book. It's mostly an economic theory, used for predicting how people (and other systems, it turns out) will behave. It was developed by looking at simple, specific situations with clearly defined rules - things like a game of chess or checkers.
Here's one neat thing I learned so far: If I like A more than B, and I like B more than C, it follows that I like A more than C. But how much more? How can you quantify how much you prefer one thing over another? John Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern (mathematicians in the first half of the 20th century) determined a way to do this.
The example the book uses involves Let's Make a Deal (statisticians love examples involving Monty Hall, I've learned that, too). You're given a choice between a BMW, a new TV, and an old tricycle. Let's assume you want the car. You're told you can either have the TV, or you can have a 50% shot at the BMW. Maybe you pick the TV. Well, what if it was a 60% chance of getting the car? 70%? The method is to find at what point you would decide to choose the chance at the BMW over the sure thing of the TV. That percentage is a measure of how much more you prefer the BMW to the TV. Cool!
I feel like rating tons of stuff like that now. If I can get a new pair of earrings or a 50% chance of having a sheep live next door that I could go visit... Hmm....
Turns out I was wrong about that, that one thing I knew prior to starting the book. It's mostly an economic theory, used for predicting how people (and other systems, it turns out) will behave. It was developed by looking at simple, specific situations with clearly defined rules - things like a game of chess or checkers.
Here's one neat thing I learned so far: If I like A more than B, and I like B more than C, it follows that I like A more than C. But how much more? How can you quantify how much you prefer one thing over another? John Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern (mathematicians in the first half of the 20th century) determined a way to do this.
The example the book uses involves Let's Make a Deal (statisticians love examples involving Monty Hall, I've learned that, too). You're given a choice between a BMW, a new TV, and an old tricycle. Let's assume you want the car. You're told you can either have the TV, or you can have a 50% shot at the BMW. Maybe you pick the TV. Well, what if it was a 60% chance of getting the car? 70%? The method is to find at what point you would decide to choose the chance at the BMW over the sure thing of the TV. That percentage is a measure of how much more you prefer the BMW to the TV. Cool!
I feel like rating tons of stuff like that now. If I can get a new pair of earrings or a 50% chance of having a sheep live next door that I could go visit... Hmm....
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
I'm a Stranger Here Myself
I'm remembering why I didn't recall loving this Bill Bryson book as much as others. His short essays, while funny, start to wear on me when read in bulk. I'm sure this is partially because they were originally intended for a weekly newspaper, not to be read in huge chunks at a time. They start to seem like many repetitions of the theme "Americans stupid, British a bit better." Taxes, shopping, driving, cupholders in cars...
His books usually have one topic (Australia, for example, or the Appalachian Trail), and he delves into detailed stories about people and places. Here, he's limited by space and by the lack of continuity - every article must stand on its own. When he wrote these he had just moved back to the States, so maybe his articles having a negative slant is somewhat understandable. But, as an American, after a bit I can only think "hey, that's not true about me!"
One example: in "The Great Indoors" he talks about how nowadays one never sees children playing outside, running around, throwing balls and such. Now they're all inside in the air conditioning. I've heard other people say this. It just doesn't seem true to me. This book was written in 1998, when my sister was 10. I definitely remember her and her neighborhood friends running around the backyard, or putting on plays in the driveway, or playing on the swingset. I was a teenager in the nineties. Today's beautiful weather made me recall how I spent pretty much the entire summer of 1995 on my friend Katie's trampoline, sometimes putting the sprinkler underneath it for relief from the humidity, her stereo always blasting The Offspring or Aerosmith. We occasionally walked to the gas station to buy candy, or to the creek to swim (which in retrospect, looking at that creek, is gross), but we didn't spend much time inside. At night when there were thunderstorms, we'd run outside in our bathing suits.
I know my sister and I, and our respective friends, were not the exceptions. I think adults who came of age before video games and a million TV channels jump to negative conclusions about children and the outdoors. Maybe it's not the same as it was in earlier decades, and maybe it's gotten worse since the mid-nineties, but it's still not as dismal as people make it sound.
I do like this book, though. It's quite frequently hilarious, and some of his stories (like his love for garbage disposals and basements) are not complain-y at all. To balance out my previous complaint, I'll excerpt a funny paragraph from his article on ER injury statistics:
"Paper money and coins (30, 274) claimed almost as many victims as did scissors (34,062). I can just about conceive of how you might swallow a dime and wish you hadn't ("You guys want to see a neat trick?"), but I cannot for the life of me construct hypothetical circumstances involving folding money and a subsequent trip to the ER. It would be interesting to meet some of these people."
About the dress I've decided to make: I've cut out all the pieces, I just need to sew them together now. Easy-peasy, right? (haha.)
His books usually have one topic (Australia, for example, or the Appalachian Trail), and he delves into detailed stories about people and places. Here, he's limited by space and by the lack of continuity - every article must stand on its own. When he wrote these he had just moved back to the States, so maybe his articles having a negative slant is somewhat understandable. But, as an American, after a bit I can only think "hey, that's not true about me!"
One example: in "The Great Indoors" he talks about how nowadays one never sees children playing outside, running around, throwing balls and such. Now they're all inside in the air conditioning. I've heard other people say this. It just doesn't seem true to me. This book was written in 1998, when my sister was 10. I definitely remember her and her neighborhood friends running around the backyard, or putting on plays in the driveway, or playing on the swingset. I was a teenager in the nineties. Today's beautiful weather made me recall how I spent pretty much the entire summer of 1995 on my friend Katie's trampoline, sometimes putting the sprinkler underneath it for relief from the humidity, her stereo always blasting The Offspring or Aerosmith. We occasionally walked to the gas station to buy candy, or to the creek to swim (which in retrospect, looking at that creek, is gross), but we didn't spend much time inside. At night when there were thunderstorms, we'd run outside in our bathing suits.
I know my sister and I, and our respective friends, were not the exceptions. I think adults who came of age before video games and a million TV channels jump to negative conclusions about children and the outdoors. Maybe it's not the same as it was in earlier decades, and maybe it's gotten worse since the mid-nineties, but it's still not as dismal as people make it sound.
I do like this book, though. It's quite frequently hilarious, and some of his stories (like his love for garbage disposals and basements) are not complain-y at all. To balance out my previous complaint, I'll excerpt a funny paragraph from his article on ER injury statistics:
"Paper money and coins (30, 274) claimed almost as many victims as did scissors (34,062). I can just about conceive of how you might swallow a dime and wish you hadn't ("You guys want to see a neat trick?"), but I cannot for the life of me construct hypothetical circumstances involving folding money and a subsequent trip to the ER. It would be interesting to meet some of these people."
About the dress I've decided to make: I've cut out all the pieces, I just need to sew them together now. Easy-peasy, right? (haha.)
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
More Bryson
I finished The Inimitable Jeeves (which was loads of fun) and haven't picked up a new book from the library yet. I find that my in-between re-reads (books I must feel comfortable putting down when I've got something new) tend to be light, comic, fast-paced affairs. A book from the Georgia Nicolson series by Louise Rennison is always a reliable choice (they're young adult books and they're hilarious, fitting the bill perfectly). Any David Sedaris is great, as are either of the Bridget Jones novels.
Lately my between-new-books taste has been for Bill Bryson. I'm halfway through a re-read of I'm a Stranger Here Myself, a collection of the columns he wrote about American life for a British newspaper. Each column is about 6 pages long. They're laugh-out-loud funny, well-observed - all are excellent companions to breakfast and good stories to tuck yourself in with at night.
Lately my between-new-books taste has been for Bill Bryson. I'm halfway through a re-read of I'm a Stranger Here Myself, a collection of the columns he wrote about American life for a British newspaper. Each column is about 6 pages long. They're laugh-out-loud funny, well-observed - all are excellent companions to breakfast and good stories to tuck yourself in with at night.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Other Books
I finished another book before reading Middlesex, I just didn't write about it because I read it in about a day and was onto the next so quickly I hadn't had the chance to reflect on it. Grace, Eventually is Anne Lamott's third book of short essays and stories about faith and spirituality and life. I read Traveling Mercies, her first, while in a Women and Spirituality class in college, and loved it. I still remember laughing out loud reading that, upon seeing a small child's pet dog, she told the kid "That is the ugliest cat I've ever seen" to make him laugh.
Grace, Eventually is not quite as substantial as Traveling Mercies. It's an enjoyable read, and I can tell Anne Lamott's words are heartfelt, but it just felt a bit dashed off and flimsy. I don't mean that as meanly as it sounds - it's still a good book. But the everyday tales she tells that remind her of deeper truths seem somehow arbitrary to me, as if she could choose any event in her life and pair with any given truth, and work a story out of it.
I feel like I would like Anne Lamott very much if I knew her. She's funny, deep, and genuine. Grace, Eventually just didn't do it for me as much as I'd hoped. I took it out of the library, and I know I won't bother to buy a copy of it. If I already owned a copy, though, I'm sure I'd occasionally page through it. Should you read it? Yes, but if you're going to buy an Anne Lamott book, buy Traveling Mercies.
Now, on a completely different note, I'm reading The Inimitable Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse. I've recently been watching Jeeves and Wooster, the 1990s British TV show about an idle-rich, dim sort of young man and his clever valet, and I've liked the show enough to seek out the books it was based on. The stories contained in The Inimitable Jeeves are perfect to read while eating or preparing for bed: light, witty, self-contained tales of the foolishness caused by Bernie Wooster and solved by Jeeves. It was written in 1923, and has all sorts of cool Twenties slang. I'm loving it.
Incidentally, Hugh Laurie played Bertie Wooster on the TV show, and if there's ever been a character less like Dr. House, I don't know who it could be.
Grace, Eventually is not quite as substantial as Traveling Mercies. It's an enjoyable read, and I can tell Anne Lamott's words are heartfelt, but it just felt a bit dashed off and flimsy. I don't mean that as meanly as it sounds - it's still a good book. But the everyday tales she tells that remind her of deeper truths seem somehow arbitrary to me, as if she could choose any event in her life and pair with any given truth, and work a story out of it.
I feel like I would like Anne Lamott very much if I knew her. She's funny, deep, and genuine. Grace, Eventually just didn't do it for me as much as I'd hoped. I took it out of the library, and I know I won't bother to buy a copy of it. If I already owned a copy, though, I'm sure I'd occasionally page through it. Should you read it? Yes, but if you're going to buy an Anne Lamott book, buy Traveling Mercies.
Now, on a completely different note, I'm reading The Inimitable Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse. I've recently been watching Jeeves and Wooster, the 1990s British TV show about an idle-rich, dim sort of young man and his clever valet, and I've liked the show enough to seek out the books it was based on. The stories contained in The Inimitable Jeeves are perfect to read while eating or preparing for bed: light, witty, self-contained tales of the foolishness caused by Bernie Wooster and solved by Jeeves. It was written in 1923, and has all sorts of cool Twenties slang. I'm loving it.
Incidentally, Hugh Laurie played Bertie Wooster on the TV show, and if there's ever been a character less like Dr. House, I don't know who it could be.
Books and a Dress
I bought the above pattern - Vintage Vogue, originally made in 1943. I'm doing it in a beautiful white/periwinkle jersey fabric with flowers and birds on it. I would've already started it, but I accidentally bought the pattern for sizes 18-22 and need to exchange it.
I finished Middlesex a couple days ago. It was great - very large in scope. Callie Stephanides grew up as a girl, and found out she was a hermaphrodite when she was fourteen. I thought the book would be solely about Callie, but it actually starts with her grandparents in Greece and works it way forward, to 1970s Detroit. It was great, really rich, and the characters, as far as I'm concerned, are real people living in the world that I could theoretically meet.
I recommend it, if a family drama over several generations sounds appealing to you. It turns out that Pulitzer committee knows a thing or two about good books...
Monday, March 1, 2010
New book, sick again
So now I have a bad cold. I've started Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, which I've been meaning to read for years, but because I'm sick I'm not focusing well enough to make much progress, and am instead just watching TV. Ellen Degeneres is so funny.
My dog is standing on my end table right now. Very weird.
My dog is standing on my end table right now. Very weird.
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