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  1. #261
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Northwest NC
    Almost finished with Slavery by Another Name by Douglas A. Blackmon. In a word, horrifying. As a kid and young adult I never thought much about what happened to the black population after the civil war. It was almost like they were freed and life was better, albeit still completely unfair as segregation became the norm. I never gave much thought to it until I started reading about the civil war a couple years ago and began to realize their existence would become much worse before it even thought about getting better.

    After the civil war white men of the south slowly began to figure out they could still enslave the black population by different means and not call it slavery. The short version is they arrested blacks in droves for completely bogus or trumped up charges, fined them knowing they couldn't pay their debt and sold them to corporations and later individual farmers to work off that debt. The problem was now they were disposable. I feel horrible for even typing that but it was true. Before emancipation slaves were not cheap and their owners couldn't afford to replace them for any reason. With law officials arresting blacks to meet whatever demand was needed made them cheap and therefore their new owners had no reason to treat them well at all. In fact, they treated them like animals and I won't go into the details but it was absolutely barbaric.

    It still astonishes me that this happened in our country at all but even more so that it was only a little over 100 years ago. Truly sad.
    "The future ain't what it used to be."

  2. #262
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Walnut Creek, California

    Podcast with Spy Novelist Jason Matthews

    Jason Matthews is the author of several spy novels, most notably Red Sparrow and Palace of Treason. I've read both and they are very good. Matthews is a former CIA operative and therefore has some special insight to the genre.

    I thought our reading group here at the DBR, particularly our spy novel aficionados, might be interested in this podcast found in the current New Yorker. It's less than 15 minutes long.

  3. #263
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    St. Louis
    I have been reading "Conducting Business" by Maestro Leonard Slatkin. It has been fascinating, both to read about his life growing up, and about the ins and outs of being a conductor of an orchestra. Calling Throatybeard; have you read this?

  4. #264

    Quantum Computing Since Democritus

    by Scott Aaronson

    It's a bit difficult, but good. It's not your run-of-the-mill pop-science book by any means; this book is for people with a decent background in several disciplines. Frankly, it's just a bit over my head, but I'm enjoying it nonetheless. It deals in part with (I'm not sure exactly how to phrase this idea properly) limits of information and knowing based on physical laws and how fundamental and encompassing those limits are. Actually, most of the reason I'm reading the book is so that I can express some ideas about that last sentence better to other people, since I usually don't have much luck in that regard and can barely express them to myself.

    Anyway, if you have some background in physics, engineering, computer science, information theory, and maybe some philosophy, I recommend it.

  5. #265
    Quote Originally Posted by BLPOG View Post
    ... limits of information and knowing ...
    So that would involve understanding that there is a known unknown?

  6. #266
    Quote Originally Posted by Reilly View Post
    So that would involve understanding that there is a known unknown?
    There are known knowns.
    There are known unknowns.
    There are unknown unknowns.

    There are also unknowable unknowns, which might or might not be known to be unknowable.

    There are also knowable costs to converting unknowns to knowns, and infinitely large costs to converting unknowable unknowns to knowns, which I would summarized by saying that there ain't no such thing as a free known.

  7. #267
    Quote Originally Posted by BLPOG View Post
    There are known knowns.
    There are known unknowns.
    There are unknown unknowns.

    There are also unknowable unknowns, which might or might not be known to be unknowable.

    There are also knowable costs to converting unknowns to knowns, and infinitely large costs to converting unknowable unknowns to knowns, which I would summarized by saying that there ain't no such thing as a free known.


    2hdxhdh.jpg

    The Cloud of Unknowing
    The University of North Carolina
    Where CHEATING is a Way of Life

  8. #268
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Norfolk, VA
    I just finished The Admirals: Nimitz, Halsey, Leahy, and King - The Five-Star Admirals Who Won the War at Sea by Walter R. Borneman. It is an excellent read. The book left me with a newfound respect for the performance of Leahy and King during World War II.

    King was an adamant proponent of pushing the offensive against the Japanese even though the official strategy was Germany First. He was steadfast in his quest to secure assets to throw against the Japanese but he never shied away from winning in the Atlantic and deserves a great deal of the credit for defeating German U-Boats in The Battle of the Atlantic.

    Leahy was military adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman during and after the war. He was invaluable during the multitude of strategic conferences between the Allies.

    The book briefly discusses Admiral Raymond Spruance and the fact he did not receive a fifth star. In my opinion, this was a great mistake. Spruance was in command at The Battle of Midway and The Battle of the Philippine Sea, two huge naval victories for the United States. He deserved to be recognized as a Fleet Admiral.

    Nothing in the book changes my opinion that Halsey acted recklessly during The Battle for Leyte Gulf and the United States dodged a huge bullet when Japanese Admiral Kurita Takeo reversed course and disappeared back through the San Bernardino Strait. Had Kurita pushed forward there is a good possibility he would have smashed the transports and MacArthur's beachhead at Leyte.

    Nimitz understood people. In Borneman's words, "He possessed a shrewd ability to evaluate people and bring out their best."

    I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in World War II history.
    Bob Green

  9. #269
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Thomasville, NC
    " You Never Give Me Your Money", by Peter Doggett. An inside look at the breakup of the Beatles. Interesting stuff.

  10. #270
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Cincinnati, Ohio
    Agree 100% with all your comments. I really enjoyed this book.

    Quote Originally Posted by Bob Green View Post
    I just finished The Admirals: Nimitz, Halsey, Leahy, and King - The Five-Star Admirals Who Won the War at Sea by Walter R. Borneman. It is an excellent read. The book left me with a newfound respect for the performance of Leahy and King during World War II.

    King was an adamant proponent of pushing the offensive against the Japanese even though the official strategy was Germany First. He was steadfast in his quest to secure assets to throw against the Japanese but he never shied away from winning in the Atlantic and deserves a great deal of the credit for defeating German U-Boats in The Battle of the Atlantic.

    Leahy was military adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman during and after the war. He was invaluable during the multitude of strategic conferences between the Allies.

    The book briefly discusses Admiral Raymond Spruance and the fact he did not receive a fifth star. In my opinion, this was a great mistake. Spruance was in command at The Battle of Midway and The Battle of the Philippine Sea, two huge naval victories for the United States. He deserved to be recognized as a Fleet Admiral.

    Nothing in the book changes my opinion that Halsey acted recklessly during The Battle for Leyte Gulf and the United States dodged a huge bullet when Japanese Admiral Kurita Takeo reversed course and disappeared back through the San Bernardino Strait. Had Kurita pushed forward there is a good possibility he would have smashed the transports and MacArthur's beachhead at Leyte.

    Nimitz understood people. In Borneman's words, "He possessed a shrewd ability to evaluate people and bring out their best."

    I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in World War II history.

  11. #271
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Albemarle, North Carolina
    Think I may go get Murder on the Orient Express since the movie is coming out. I've never read it so I wanna do that before I watch the movie.
    "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge" -Stephen Hawking

  12. #272
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Nashville, TN
    Reading 1984 for the first time since high school.
    War is Peace
    Freedom is Slavery
    Ignorance is strength

  13. #273
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Durham, NC
    Quote Originally Posted by JNort View Post
    Think I may go get Murder on the Orient Express since the movie is coming out. I've never read it so I wanna do that before I watch the movie.
    Ditto! I knew I had a copy somewhere. Dug it out of a box of books at my mom's. Still had the RIF stamp in it from my junior high school. Haven't started it, yet.

  14. #274
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Norfolk, VA
    I just finished reading Three Days in January: Dwight Eisenhower's Final Mission. It was an easy read and entertaining but in the end I am glad I checked it out of the public library instead of buying it. The book is advertised as being about the last three days of Eisenhower's administration and how Ike "intensely advised" Kennedy during the transition period. In reality, it is more of a 10,000 foot level overview of Eisenhower's public career and his relationships with Kennedy and Truman among others. I can't say that I recommend it.
    Bob Green

  15. #275
    Join Date
    Feb 2010
    Location
    Colorado
    "How to Read the Bible" by James Kugel. He was formerly a Harvard professor specializing in Classical, Modern Jewish, and Hebrew literature. Well written with great insight. I'm not Jewish and particularly enjoy his view of how Christianity later took some of the Torah passages and interpret the in a different way.

  16. #276
    Join Date
    Apr 2010
    Location
    Seattle
    Finally got around to finishing The Dark Tower series this weekend. Not a fan of that ending.

  17. #277
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Thomasville, NC
    'Killing England", by Bill O'Reilly. Good read..

  18. #278
    Join Date
    Mar 2010
    Location
    Cincinnati
    Here’s a great one for those who like British dry humor: Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog), written in 1889 by Jerome K. Jerome about a trip up the Thames River with some friends. Hilarious. It is on the Esquire list of funniest books ever written, #16 of 23. Also #25 of 100 best novels according to The Guardian.

    Edit: I actually listened to the Audible version of the book and the narrator did an awesome job.
    Last edited by swood1000; 02-05-2018 at 06:42 PM.

  19. #279
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Walnut Creek, California
    Beneath a Scarlet Sky (2017) by Mark Sullivan.

    This is the story of Pino Lella, an Italian teenager who becomes first a savior of Jews in 1943 as he led them to escape across the Alps into Switzerland both during the Fascist regime and later during the Nazi occupation. Mostly true, but necessarily fictionalized, history since there are very few primary historical documents. The author did have access to the elderly Lella and did a great deal of research. As a result of some unlikely circumstances he later became the driver for Nazi general Hans Leyers, reporting the general's activities to the Partisans. Hair-raising. Just now gaining recognition as a savior of Jews and as an (forgotten/unsung) Italian hero. A movie seems to be in the works.

    Mark Sullivan is a fairly well-known author in his own right, but more recently has served as James Patterson's co-author in the Private series. Sullivan does a good job and tells Lella's story with the right amount of suspense.

    Recommended.
    Last edited by Jim3k; 02-05-2018 at 07:32 PM. Reason: syntax, still in progress

  20. #280
    Join Date
    Mar 2008
    Location
    Arlington, VA

    Musashi

    I'm tackling Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa (translated by Charles Terry). Recommended by Jocko Willink on his podcast (Jocko Podcast, which is a fantastic listen btw, especially if you like military history, fitness/health, and/or Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu). I'm about 300 pages into the 900+ page epic. I like it. It reminds me of old adventure books like Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe. Just with samurai instead of pirates.

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