Posted by dan-bailey 9 hours ago
Ask HN: What are you reading?
As someone who fled the desolation of the rust belt this book spoke to me and I found it credible and compelling. My book club spent 4 hours discussing this book.
Austin worked for British Intelligence during World War II, running the Martians section and helping assess possible invasion sites for D-Day. After the war, as a philosopher of language, he helped bring ideas such as performative utterances and speech acts into the discussion.
A fascinating overlap between intelligence work and philosophy of language.
And because the Brewers are in the playoffs, "Catcher in the Wry" by Bob Uecker. Despite being a Cleveland fan, I have to admit the book is amazingly fun. Uecker was Uecker long before he became everybody's favorite baseball storyteller, and he was the Cleveland announcer in Major League.
He has a knack for being critical and optimistic at the same time. Funny too!
Done: QED, Richard Feynman. Lectures on explaining quantum electrodynamics but with no more math than geometry.
Currently: One Good Turn: A natural history of the screwdriver and the screw, Witold Rybczynski. The discourse goes into his references in depth. It has yielded an excellent list of museums to visit.
On deck: Impossibility: The limits science and the science of limits, John Barrow. A re-read for me. Barrow discusses what we can never know in a way that’s like P vs NP but for the physical world.*
I’m specifically talking about the New Testament.
I’m currently reading Hebrews 6.
I'm 50% of the way through and it's good but I don't entirely see the hype. Brontë is more atmospheric, Austen funnier and more incisive, Dickens more immersive. But I've still got a way to go.
Dungeon Crawler Card - Not for me but I might give it another chance
Bukowski - Post Office - Worth reading, Gen-Z might get triggered
Sadly found I could have been reading a better abridgement, which I'll get for the 2nd reading now.