BHUGA WOOGA

Everything is going to Kill Everybody

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:44:59 -0800

By Robert Brockway

A collection of existential threats to the human race, more or less a collection of cracked.com articles.

It was pretty cute. Not sure what else there is to say. It's exactly what you expect.

Good Calories, Bad Calories

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 16:54:04 -0700

By Gary Taubes

This changed my life, in all seriousness.

I had no idea how long this was because I had an ebook. Thank god for that. I'm utterly changed by this. It reads like the exposition of a conspiracy theory. It's ridiculous how much simply incorrect information I was basing my nutrition on.

It's all here, a summary of nutrition from the mid-19th century to now. The answer is always 'carbohydrates are bad', but exactly how bad, and why, has not been understood until fairly recently. But it's not just obesity. It's diabetes. It's heart disease. It's cancer. It's everything. And I got told my whole life that it's calories in, calories out, and that saturated fat is bad for me, and a bunch of other garbage. Not that the people who told me that knew differently, or something--it's hard to know what to think when the government prints flatly incorrect information--but I'm a changed man.

Now, I am completely empowered by information to feel guilty for every beer ever. Nuts.

The Red Queen

Sat, 26 Mar 2011 18:04:15 -0700

By Matt Ridley

Excellent.

Ridley does a great summary of a lot of modern evolutionary theory. He takes special care to discuss the Red Queen effect, namely that certain genes become more desirable the rarer they are, and thus wax and wane in popularity over time. This part was new to me. Certain tidbits, such as humans and cows sharing the same 8 variations of a particular gene, are pretty incredible.

He can be a little wordy. There's not much else to say. Other parts of the book are re-treading old ground that I've covered in other evolution books, but the Red Queen effect? Ton of bricks, sir. Ton of bricks. It has profound implications for my understanding of human intelligence, going all the way back to Hawkin's On Intelligence.

But those understandings are too long for a book review, unfortunately.

Sperm Wars

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 04:18:37 -0800

By Robin Baker

Fantastic. I thought this would be a little boring, as this one is a few years old, I've read a fair bit of game theory at this point, and the pop science books tend to repeat each other. Not so. There's a lot more biology here than I expected, most of it quite interesting, and there's a lot more sex than most popular science books. It was kind of win in every direction.

And it was maybe the best introduction to mating game theory I've seen. I could easily recommend the book to anyone. It makes it obvious how male and female reproductive interests are often quite at odds, and does an even better job explaining how conscious and subconscious goals can be miles apart. Very approachable and very good.

Unlike most pop science, Baker meticulously removes any trace of judgement from the work, which is quite important here. He breaks the pattern only when taking the time to point out, specially, that when he uses the word 'successful' in regards to rape, he means reproductively successful, not something to condone. The result is excellent, with well-supported arguments, the kind of book that has to be refuted not by attacking the information in it, but by adding more information that outweighs it.

Highly recommended.

The House of Morgan

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 12:06:34 -0700

By Ron Chernow

I didn't finish this book. I have to give a recommendation either way.

Long story short, it wasn't what I thought it was. It's a bio of the bank JP Morgan, of a partnership turned corporation. I thought it was more about the Morgans personally. It's not bad at what it is, it's just not pulling me in.

I noticed I am not reading anything because I didn't want to read this, and I realized the review was going to be...I don't know. It's just not exciting and nothing is popping out at me. So I'm putting it down.

Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality

Sun, 22 Aug 2010 21:49:57 -0700

By Christopher Ryan, Cacilda Jetha

I changed my mind on some things while reading this book, but not because of this book. This book is terrible.

The book attempts to prove the idea that humans evolved in a more or less willy-nilly sexual environment, and that modern ideas of monogamy are basically ridiculous. The book is awful; I did not finish it. The first third or so that I read contains ad-hominem attacks on Darwin (a straw man attack for this topic if there ever was one), pointless, rambling surveys on other areas of evolutionary psychology with little relevance or effort to tie it to the topic at hand, and vague, unscientific jabs at various members of the self-proclaimed moral establishment. They make some points, but the methodology is so bad that it's entirely by accident.

At any rate, I would not trust the book's main point based on the book's examples of pre-agricultural tribes, because of the aforementioned methodology problems. But it's true that most pre-agricultural societies are organized around fierce egalitarianism, with lots of communal child rearing. The 'standard narrative' of a providing father and paternity-certainty-providing mother doesn't work there.

Now, we've had 10 thousand years or more to evolve cognitive responses to agriculture, so I do not agree with the premise that nobody is wired for monogamy. However, the book made me think about how we treat people who are not (and I would definitely grant that surely, some people are not).

It would be worse than being gay. Society views polyamorous folks as damaged and self destructive; courts routinely take their kids away. One needs a partner to self-actualize, as its put, and failing at marriage is a personal flaw. And I admit that I kind of held this view before, but in retrospect, it's profoundly unfair to people who are not cut out for, biologically or otherwise, taking relationships seriously.

Further, it made me think about how I feel about jealousy. Not that it's ever been an issue; I haven't had a 6 or 7 year relationship to itch over. But is monogamy like a 'hidden cost' economics problem? Namely, much like the government bailing out a car company saves a few jobs, creating an unseen cost of what that money could have done had it created new companies and hired new workers, perhaps that's what relationships are doing. Perhaps monogamy prevents the short-term cost of jealousy, but it's creating a long-term, hidden cost of folks feeling stifled. I'm not going to make sweeping generalizations like this book did, but its something to think about.

The Diamond Age

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 09:16:37 -0700

By Neal Stephenson

A classic.

I re-read this in Mexico recently. What can I say--it's a classic. A nanotech vision that is just totally awesome: books that do the teaching, sexually transmitted map-reduce functions, complete with the reducer spontaneously combusting, synthetic 'governments', free everything, temporary birthday islands with centaurs and enchanted caves, implantable weaponry, just whatever, really. An excellent sci-fi romp, well written, funny, and just generally good, as Stephenson is wont to be.

I noticed one thing, this time, that I had not before. There's a brief mention in there, somewhere, about hypocrisy, and the meaning thereof. One of the greater 'governments', which is not really the right word, but no matter, are the neo-victorians, who are, well, victorian. There's a conversation in which a few members discuss the merits of the concept of hypocrisy, namely, the lack thereof. By their standards, it's better to have real values, be flawed, and break them, than to have no values and attack someone for being logically consistent in their own. What is hypocrisy but a way to morally condemn someone when you have no grounds for condemnation? Very good food for thought.

Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 16:42:51 -0700

By Randy O. Frost and Gail Steketee

Excellent.

Written by a psychologist for both psychologists and the rest of us, this was an excellent read. It is a collection of case studies and underlying theory for compulsive hoarders, which the author is attempting to make clear is a psychological condition unto itself. The book lays out treatment paths, success rates, and differentiates between some different kinds of hoarders.

Those are interesting, but the stories are easily the best. Rich twin hoarders, clogging the top floor of a hotel with priceless art. A family controlled by a violent nephew, who literally brings trash into the apartment daily. They live among vermin. A few success stories, which often begin only after a divorce based on the clutter. It's fantastic.

Life histories, telling conversations. It's very strange--it's all very deep. Watching as people who cannot make decisions (the author posits that hoarding is an information processing deficit, being unable to determine what is unimportant) churn through stacks of paper, 'sorting' them, until they have put them all on top of a pile. Its a very intimate and non-judgement look at some people with real problems. I really enjoyed reading them--excellent non fiction.

Not much else to say when I don't have complaints, is there?

Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 16:31:09 -0700

By Harvey A. Silverglate

Pretty interesting.

This one wasn't what I expected. I figured it was going to be something along the lines of a criminalization of everything tome, where the author laments the ridiculous growth of zoning rules and driveway corner angle restrictions. Not at all the case.

It's written by a defense lawyer who has defended a number of white-collar clients. They include politicians, businessmen, accountants, lobbyists, and spies. Some of the cases are an interesting read.

Some of the cases in the book are pretty clear-cut, with no real issues to speak of--its just bullshit that these people got convicted. Coerced testimony (i.e. 'cooperation') and district attorneys that eventually become governors are a common reoccurrence. On the whole, he makes some good points. In particular, those points are that DAs are twisting existing laws to get people arrested for things that are not explicitly prohibited, and thus it's impossible to know what's illegal. In particular, 'wire fraud' and the 'denial of honest services' seem to include just about any conceivable act done by anyone with a certain amount of authority. People even get indicted for shredding documents with no summons issued. It's pretty nuts.

I agree with the book on the whole; it has an aura of 'defending the undefendable', such as sleazy politicians and fantastically wealthy accountants at big firms. He does a good job of pointing out that some politicians get re-elected after being convicted by the feds--does the federal government have business arresting politicians that seem to be doing things acceptable in their communities?

That being said, there's a hint of objectivism in the book that I dislike. I'll grant that I agree that substantially all of the examples in the book represent cases where no reasonable person could have known what they were doing is illegal. But I also feel that no ethical system can be completely objective--our minds are not wired for it. If it's 100% objective, there will be loopholes for what is strictly speaking legal but morally speaking, for most people, okay, and vice versa. But I concede that I could only draw the line of what's subjective or not in a far worse place than a lot of people.

Thus recommended with mild reservations. I do appreciate that it was written--it's a point of view one does not hear much of these days.

Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes: Life and Language in the Amazonian Jungle

Sat, 05 Jun 2010 12:12:10 -0700

By Daniel Everett

A great read.

Half memoirs, half linguistics, this book is the personal story of Daniel Everett, who lived amongst the Parahã amazon natives. His original mission was to convert them to Jesus, and his work was sponsored by some or another missionary group, but in the end, they converted him to atheism.

About 1/3 of the book is fairly involved linguistics, although dumbed down enough for a layman. The Pirahã language is unique in that it does not exhibit recursion; there are no relative clauses, articles, or things like 'Jane or I'. It kind of flips off all of the existing linguistics stuff, because Chomsky's universal grammar says that recursion has to exist in every language. It's cool stuff if you are a nerd about this, and I am.

The book is good otherwise. It's got a lot of good anecdotes about living in the Amazon, which rather made me want to visit.

The only disappointing part of the book is the author's story of flailing faith. The peculiar nature of Pirahã culture, and its language, are somewhat incompatible with the idea of Christianity--the language requires verbs be appended with a suffix which denotes how one obtained information (direct witness, heard from an eyewitness, or hearsay). This feature exists in other languages, but unlike other languages, there is no way in Pirahã to correctly say what a man 2000 years ago did--no eyewitnesses exist. The chicken-egg question between culture and language is not something I'll go into here, but it's a cool way to look at things. Anyway, this portion is brief, probably because it is painful--I imagine the guy had no stateside friends left after becoming an atheist, what having spent his life working for missionary organizations. But as an atheist myself, I kind of wanted more here.

But its a tiny quibble--and a good book.