Grand unified books thread

[fhdz]

fhdz and others mentioned Antifragile the other week;  is it a continuation and should Black Swan be read first, or is Antifragile a work on its own?

You definitely can read it on its own.

Seedy, you'll especially like the folks he chooses to froth at.

[crazy canuck]

Currently reading amongst other things "Through the Eye of the Needle"

http://www.amazon.com/dp/069115290X

Its a detailed look at the formation of the Latin Church 350-550 with particular emphasis on the role of elite in society.  Some interesting insights are the transformation of the early Church under Constantine as the ministry of social services for the poor funded by grants from the Emperor to a self funded organization through gifts from wealthy donors to elites within the Church which in turn gave those Elites significant power and influence over the formation of Church doctrine.  The story of Ambrose is particularly interesting from this perspective.

I wish he would have spent more time with the conflict with the Eastern Church which also had a significant influence on the formation on the Latin Church but I suppose that would have required that the book be written in multiple volumes.

[Malthus]

Once again, Malthus pulls out a solid.

35$ for an Ebook, I don't think soooooo, no.

That's absurd - the book in book form (paperback) costs $22. 

[ulmont]

Reading Vanished Kingdoms: The History of Half-Forgotten Europe by Norman Davies. So far, it's very, very good.

I was thinking of picking that up.  Thanks for the recommendation.

I got bored halfway through.  Your mileage may vary.

[ulmont]

Once again, Malthus pulls out a solid.

35$ for an Ebook, I don't think soooooo, no.

That's absurd - the book in book form (paperback) costs $22. 

It's only $19 at US Amazon.

[Grey Fox]

Once again, Malthus pulls out a solid.

35$ for an Ebook, I don't think soooooo, no.

That's absurd - the book in book form (paperback) costs $22. 

It's only $19 at US Amazon.

Kindle edition is 15$ on Amazon Canada.

Kobobooks was the 35$ one.

[Barrister]

Timmy has been just loving a big book of classic fairy tales I dug out the other day.  When we were playing outside he started randomly yelling "not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin!"  And tonight he wanted me to read "The Three Bears".

[crazy canuck]

I was thinking about picking this one up

Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea by Mark Blyth

http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Politics/?view=usa&ci=9780199828302

JR or others any comments?

[Josephus]

Finished Ender's Game. Just realized that my previous book was World War Z. And what do both these books have in common...hmmmm

[The Minsky Moment]

Currently reading amongst other things "Through the Eye of the Needle"

http://www.amazon.com/dp/069115290X

A new Peter Brown book!
Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

[crazy canuck]

Glad to be of assistance.  What do you think about Blyth's book?  See my post a couple posts up.

[The Minsky Moment]

Haven't read the Blyth book.  There have been a number recently on the subject.  Lately I keep up by following the blogs and reading interesting papers. 
Last econ related book I read was this: http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Mechanical-Markets-Asset-Swings/dp/0691145776/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1368211913&sr=1-1
Interesting but definitely more on the theory side.
I recently took out a book on Market Monetarism through the kindle lending library but I am just a few pages in.

[Syt]

I've started reading the (ebook) version of the Perry Rhodan series.

I grew up with the audio play versions of the first 19 or so episodes (audio plays on tape for kids and young teens were a very popular medium for German boys and girls in the 80s), but reading the series always gave me a serious case of archive panic: since 1961, there's been a new 60 page episode every week. So they're at episode 2698 at the moment.

The concept:

The story line starts in 1971 with the first manned moon landing by U.S. Space Force Major Perry Rhodan and his crew, who discover a marooned extraterrestrial space ship. Appropriating the alien technology, they proceed to unify Terra and carve out a place for humanity in the galaxy and the cosmos. (The concepts for two of the technical accomplishments that enable them to do so—positronic brains and starship drives for near-instantaneous hyperspatial translation—are direct adoptions from Isaac Asimov's science fiction universe.)

As the series progresses major characters, including the title character, are granted relative immortality. It is Relative in the sense that they are immune to age and disease, but could suffer a violent death. The story continues over the course of millennia, including flashbacks thousands and even millions of years into the past, and the scope widens to encompass other galaxies, extremely remote parts of space, parallel universes and weirder cosmic structures, time travel, paranormal powers, weird/cute/aggressive aliens and bodyless entities (some with sheer god-like powers).

I've always been fascinated by this rather elaborate history the series created for itself, covering 3000 years by now, not to mention that it reflects 50 years of development in the field of science-fiction (even though the original series still retains a certain "retro" style, from what I hear.

There's also a fan published "time lapse" series which condenses the plot of the weekly editions into the bare facts - it stands at 4000+ pages so far.

Anyways, I'll see how far I get before I get bored/collapse/skip large sections.

[The Brain]

What the fuck, America? How the hell can almost half of you give Mein Kampf 5 stars?

[Josephus]

Even if you were a Jew hating war monger, and who among us isn't, Mein Kampf is unreadable rubbish.