Vegetarian, European, Stoic, Humanist, Developer, hard sci-fi fan, observer of frogs and stars, AFOL, patched back together and replumbed by the NHS...
Interests include astronomy, books, open source software development, LEGO, Linux, Nintendo, JRPGs, hard science-fiction, Stoicism, and anything technical and shiny.
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The average human lifespan is absurdly, outrageously, insultingly brief: if you live to 80, you …
I read this in 2022, but plan to read "The Antidote" and then read "Four Thousand Weeks" (which was written nine years later) again.
I read "The Daily Stoic" every year, but I have a love-hate relationship with it. Tim Ferris once described Stoicism as a "personal operating system", but to me, it is more like a toolbox of techniques for attaining your good life, and this is a good reminder of the tools available.
"The Daily Stoic" has 366 sections, each starting with a quote from a Stoic philosopher and then some commentary putting the sage's advice into a more modern, often American, context. This works well and provides a structured overview of Stoic thinking. The quotes are mainly from the best-known late-Stoic figureheads - Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus.
While most of the quotes come from works intended for publication, Marcus Aurelius's contributions are from his journal, which was not intended for publication - he often entertains contradictory views or approaches at different times. So cherry-picking quotes for a book like this …
I read "The Daily Stoic" every year, but I have a love-hate relationship with it. Tim Ferris once described Stoicism as a "personal operating system", but to me, it is more like a toolbox of techniques for attaining your good life, and this is a good reminder of the tools available.
"The Daily Stoic" has 366 sections, each starting with a quote from a Stoic philosopher and then some commentary putting the sage's advice into a more modern, often American, context. This works well and provides a structured overview of Stoic thinking. The quotes are mainly from the best-known late-Stoic figureheads - Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus.
While most of the quotes come from works intended for publication, Marcus Aurelius's contributions are from his journal, which was not intended for publication - he often entertains contradictory views or approaches at different times. So cherry-picking quotes for a book like this can be problematic.
The modern context provided is heavily skewed to recent American examples and often has an unspoken assumption that the reader is well-off, which can be rather grating.
If you have a basic understanding of Stoic philosophy, this book is a great daily reminder of tools and exercises that can help your everyday life. However, if you are new to Stoicism, then there are better books for learning about the basics and gaining an overview of how the philosophy can help you - for example, "A Guide to the Good Life" by William B. Irvine.
If Agatha Christie ran Unix cons
The BSD North conference draws some of the smartest …
I saw Marcus mention this book below in the feed and was immediately intrigued. I had not heard of it or the author before, but the plot's premise immediately appealed. I feared that the author only had a superficial understanding of the open-source movement, and I'd be grinding my teeth in pedantic frustration instead of enjoying the plot. However, a quick scan through the reviews suggests the author knows his stuff. Copy purchased and added to my tsundoku pile.
Night Watch is a fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, the 29th book in …
Continuing my re-read of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, I've reached the "Night Watch", the 29th novel and part of the "City Watch" series. I last read this book twenty years ago and remember nothing about it. However, the "City Watch" subseries is up there with the "Witches" as my favourites, so I know this will be an enjoyable book.
Winner of the 2001 Carnegie MedalOne rat, popping up here and there, squeaking loudly, and …
Soon after "The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents" was first published, I read it to my daughter. She so much enjoyed the characters that she dressed up as Sardines (one of the ensemble cast of rats) for her school's World Book Day celebration. She emailed Terry Pratchett to tell him how much she had enjoyed the book and was thrilled to get a lovely reply.
Re-reading "The Amazing Maurice", I'm surprised by just how dark a book it is, given the nine-year-old plus demographic. For example, there are no holds barred when it comes to the short and uncomfortable lives that rodents sometimes lead, and a couple of plot points rely on how cruel humans can be to their squeaky neighbours.
The book includes a thought-provoking exploration of different kinds of consciousness and self-awareness, and there is much pleasure to be gained from the large cast of characters - …
Soon after "The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents" was first published, I read it to my daughter. She so much enjoyed the characters that she dressed up as Sardines (one of the ensemble cast of rats) for her school's World Book Day celebration. She emailed Terry Pratchett to tell him how much she had enjoyed the book and was thrilled to get a lovely reply.
Re-reading "The Amazing Maurice", I'm surprised by just how dark a book it is, given the nine-year-old plus demographic. For example, there are no holds barred when it comes to the short and uncomfortable lives that rodents sometimes lead, and a couple of plot points rely on how cruel humans can be to their squeaky neighbours.
The book includes a thought-provoking exploration of different kinds of consciousness and self-awareness, and there is much pleasure to be gained from the large cast of characters - rodent, feline, and the occasional human.
Winner of the 2001 Carnegie MedalOne rat, popping up here and there, squeaking loudly, and …
Started the next book in my complete re-read of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.
Defeated, crushed, and driven almost to extinction, the remnants of the human race are trapped …
I greatly enjoy Brandon Sanderson's fantasy novels. His world-building and magic systems always have an interesting logic - balancing a power's advantages against its limitations or disadvantages. I always feel that those rules would translate directly into a well-tuned RPG.
"Skyward" is the first Sanderson science fiction I've read, but it won't be the last. It's a hard sci-fi YA adventure with a teenage girl protagonist who makes mistakes and embarrasses herself but has you cheering her on every step of the way.
The technology and action scenes are convincing, and I enjoyed the way Sanderson went into some detail about how the spacecraft and their weapons worked.
Overall the plot was a little predictable but didn't detract from the fun of the story, and the final revelation was a good surprise and set-up for the sequel.
An illustrated storybook.
I'm currently re-reading the whole of the Discworld collection on Kindle. I used to have, that rare thing, a complete collection of Discworld titles on dead tree unscathed by a single Pratchett signature. But household space limits dictated a move to bits rather than books.
When I finished "Thief of Time", I found that the next tome was unavailable on Kindle as a real ebook. Instead, it was PDF which was inadequate on eInk and pretty hostile on a tablet.
So I've had to switch back to traditional media to fully appreciate Paul Kidby's artwork.
How do we continue living once we have lost our reason to live?
Rami and …
I'm not sure when I started to read "Apeirogon". The structure is fascinating, and the writing is excellent, but the subject is so tragic that I find it difficult to read much at once.
Nearly two thousand years after it was written, Meditations remains profoundly relevant for anyone seeking …
Having read and enjoyed the Penguin Classic edition of "Meditations" recently, I am interested to see how much difference this new translation of Marcus Aurelius's jottings will make. Initial impressions are that the book is almost worth it for Gregory Hays' introduction alone.