Books that I read in September!

The almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson

This is truly a modern day wisdom book. Its a very short book but is very deep in the messages it conveys. The foreword is by Tim Ferriss, one of my favourite podcasters. The book is not written by Naval but it captures insights from all his communication (twitter, blogs, speeches, etc.). The book is about wealth and happiness and the author has done a fantastic job in conveying the true intention and spirit of Naval - and the rest is for us to interpret and apply to our lives. I would highly recommend this book for everyone, it allows for a perspective that will ensure a better, peaceful and a more happier future.

What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe

This book had been on my “to read” list for quite a long time. Randall Munroe is ex-NASA and runs a site knows as xkcd.com which is a pretty simple website and has a tagline “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.” The book is collection of Randall’s attempts to scientifically answers weird hypothetical questions. You would love the book if your elementary science was strong in school. Mine wasn’t, none of those concepts were foundationally absorbed by me. But I had so much fun reading the questions and the amazing explanations by Randall. The book is filled with cartoons and infographics with a great level of detail, humour and sarcasm. He definitely is one of a kind.

Some of the weird questions include: “Is it possible to cry so much you dehydrate so much?”, “What is the probability that if I am stabbed by a knife in my torso that it won’t hit anything vital and I’ll live?”

One of my most favourite and mind boggling questions was: If someone’s DNA suddenly vanished, how long would the person last?

This was very nicely answered especially in a world of our understanding that DNA makes each human unique. The answer to the question is that it will cause a slow and (unbearably) painful death.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

My fiction pick for the month! I picked this novella from Tim Ferriss’s 5-bullet Friday. It was a great find and an even amazing read. I followed Tim’s notes to not read the plot beforehand or check for reviews/goodreads prior to reading the book and it helped me. My mind went into a different world altogether as the plot was so cerebral. It is a fairly short story but is densely packed with intricacies. I kept thinking about the different meanings, interpretations and visuals as I read it. Once I finished, I jumped onto reddit to see how others interpreted it. I hope they make this into a tv series and make it a series of novellas. I would highly recommend giving this a shot.

The demon in the machine by Paul Davies?

The book starts off with a “what is life?” chapter. It opens you up to the inner workings of organisms from physical, chemical and biological perspectives. The scientific research and studies are so interesting.. imagine this - if a cell is able to store and recall the information about its form and objective and is also able to?adapt to stress and rewrite it’s functions and is also able to “know and be aware” of what’s happening to it - think of the analogy to modern day psychology and apply it to humans as entities. Aren’t we all headed there to fully function? I loved reading this in tandem with the next book in the list. The coincidence was random but the randomness created a passionate and beautiful entropy in my mind. It’s also interesting to see the parallels between how a cell functions and how all the imagined realities around us function - there is a code of practice, there is a regulatory body to govern the adaption, there is a group to police it etc. A breakdown of the contract could cause cancer or corruption…

This was a complex book to read and to be honest, many of the concepts were beyond my grasp. I skimmed through them.?

The book of life by Jiddu Krishnamurti

I read this book and the prior one in parallel. While the previous one focussed on explaining life from a scientific perspective, this one gave insights from the philosophical lens. More than a year ago, I suddenly started receiving YouTube recommendations on some lectures given by Jiddu Krishnamurti. I particularly liked his style of delivery, his speech and his words of wisdom. While I may not necessarily agree with all of his sharing, I love how his learnings have transcended the realms of the organised religions and beliefs that we see around us in our daily life. From topics ranging from spirituality, meditation, relationships, sex, etc. the book brings a lot of meaning to life. The book is written in a lecture style with one section for each of the 365 days in a year. The last day of every month is deliberately left blank for us to ponder and synthesise. I read one month’s worth of content in every sitting as the topics were thematically arranged.

I’ll leave you with a few quotes that I liked:?

“The ability to observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence.”

“You can only be afraid of what you think you know.”

Seven and a half lessons about the brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett

Lisa Feldman Barrett is a neuroscientist who tries to help us understand why we have a brain. The book is a very easy read and you can cruise along in a few hours. There is not a lot of scientific explanation in the book (a portion of it is in the appendix, rest on her website) but it has scientific depth. Think of it as an executive summary for all of the work Lisa would have done. The brain is out personal life management assistant which runs a “budget” for our body.?

Here are a few of her quotes about our brain:

“A brain that’s so complex that we describe it by metaphors and mistake them for knowledge”

...like comparing it to a large tree with roots, branches and leaves that are interconnected.?

“A brain that’s so skilled at rewiring itself that we think we’re born with all sorts of things that we actually learn.”

...the time we’re infants is so important for how we would evolve as individuals during the major part of our lives?

“A brain that regulates other brains so invisibly that we presume we’re independent of each other”

...we need other brains (i.e. people) for us to make meaning of our brain and to survive in this world?

“A brain that’s so good at believing its own inventions that we mistake social reality for the natural world”

...needless to explain, everything around us is made by us, society, borders, governments, laws etc.?

The appendix of the book was pretty interesting to read as well.?

I'll be back next time, thank you for reading and Happy Reading!