Jeff's Lunchbreak

The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible was written by A.J. Jacobs. As the name suggests, for a year, he attempted to live his life by following the Bible literally, from observing the Sabbath, to not wearing mixed fiber clothes, to stoning an adulterer (he threw a pebble), to all the other myriad rules. The first 3/4 of the year were dedicated to just the Old Testament, since Jacobs is (nominally) Jewish (he described himself as "Jewish in the same way the Olive Garden is an Italian restaurant. Which is to say: not very."), and the latter part of the year to adding in the New Testament rules.

In the following paragraphs, I'll discuss quite a few things from the book where I disagree with Jacobs, but don't let that bias you from reading the book. This is a blog, so it's my duty to disagree and be vocal about it, so I've focused on the areas of the book that I disagree with the most. But overall, the book is very good, and very thoughtful.

Jacobs did seek advisors in his quest, people to help him understand the meaning of different passages. He explained in several parts what some of the more traditional, non-literal interpretations were of different passages (which, of course, he didn't follow, since his quest was to follow a literal interpretation). He also explained how people got around some the contradictions in the Bible, and a bit of the rationale many Christians use for no longer following Old Testament rules. It wasn't simply one long running joke about how silly Biblical literalism is - it was in many ways a sincere attempt to understand Judaism and Christianity.

I do question Jacobs' motivation somewhat. Consider this passage from when he went to Jerusalem.

As I wander over to a café near the hotel for a bagel, I realize something: Walking around Jerusalem in my bilbical persona is at once freeing and vaguely disappointing. In New York - even though it's home to the Naked Cowboy and gene Shalit - I'm still unusual enough to stand out. But in Israel I'm just one of the messianic crowd. A guy with strange outfits and eccentric facial hair? Big deal. Seen three dozen today. Jerusalem is like the Galápagos Islands of religion - you can't open your eyes without spotting an exotic creature.

It seems as if Jacobs relished in the attention he was getting, so I think that vanity might have had a bit to do with his quest, and not just attempting to understand the religious mindset.

There's almost always a church youth group at the soup kitchen. I have yet to see an atheists' youth group. Yeah, I know, religious people don't have a monopoly on doing good. I'm sure that there are many agnostics and atheists out there slinging mashed potatoes at other soup kitchens. I know the world is full of selfless secular groups like Doctors without Borders.

But I've got to say: It's a lot easier to do good if you put your faith in a book that requires you to do good.

Jacobs included the appropriate disclaimer, but doesn't seem to have really given it the weight it deserved. Us atheists and agnostics don't form atheist/agnostic charity groups because it's a bit superfluous. If you want to help feed people, you don't start an atheist soup kitchen, or an agnostic food drive. You start a plain old soup kitchen, or a plain old food drive. Or, more often, you go volunteer at one of the the charities that's already been founded.

As far as youth groups, hasn't Jacobs ever heard of the Scouts or Campfire? I know, technically Boy Scouts have to be religious, but it's mostly a secular organizations, with little focus on religion. I know that as a kid I did a lot more charity work with my Boy Scout troop than with my church youth group. My daughter is in Girl Scouts, which in their policy officially declares the organization to be secular ("Our movement is secular and is founded on American democratic principles, one of which is freedom of religion.") My daughter has done quite a bit of volunteer work through Girl Scouts.

As another anecdote, my wife and I volunteered a few times to go on a medical mission trip to Guatemala. And I'd say that 1/4 to 1/3 of the volunteers were non-believers, which is about what you'd expect if Christians and non-believers were helping equally (actually, us atheists were over represented compared to the general population, but that's not all that unexpected for such a small group size).

Jacobs can say that it seems easier to do good if you put faith in the Bible, but I'm not sure that reality agrees with him.

At one point, he described his reaction to attending an atheist meeting.

Ken has, in fact, boosted the group's membership and started some programs. But go to an atheist meeting, and you'll see why the religious lobby doesn't have to worry about the atheist lobby quite yet. You'll see why there are no soaring atheist cathedrals and why hotel room night stands don't come with a copy of Why I Am Not a Christian by Bertrand Russell in the top drawer. It's hard to be passionate about a lack of belief.

Well, yeah. The only reason why atheists are so vocal is because of the pernicious influence of religion in our society. As soon as religion stops being such a problem (i.e. outlawing homosexual marriage, trying to get creationism taught in schools, the de facto requirement that political candidates are religious, etc.), we atheists won't have so much to complain about. Like Thomas Jefferson said, "It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

Now that I'm an atheist myself, I have no desire to go to a building just to celebrate my non-belief. I'd rather be productive. I like going to museums to learn more about the world, going to parties to enjoy time with my friends, going to my daughters school pageants. It seems silly to even think about atheist cathedrals.

In another section, he described his aunt and uncle becoming religious for the benefit it would give their children, and contemplated it for himself.

They explored several religions, including Hinduism, but ended up diving into Orthodox Judaism, since they were born Jewish.

They didn't become ultrareligious because of a charismatic leader or the truth of the Bible - they did it for the structure. And now their kids have grown up into responsible young adults...

Would I rather have Bart Simpson or one of the Flanders kids? A couple of years ago, I would have chosen the loveably spunky Bart. No question. But nowadays, now that I have my own three-dimensional son, I'm leaning toward the Flanders progeny. Yes, they may be a little creepy, they may sing loud songs about Noah's ark, but at least you know they won't spend their free time burning down the cafeteria or skateboarding off a canyon. I'd sacrifice some individuality for the knowledge that my son will outlive me.

Perhaps it's because I place such high value on truth and honesty, but this is one of the reasons I hate most for being religious. If you think God is real, and you believe all the consequences spelled out in the Bible, then it makes perfect sense to go to church and raise your children in that environment. But if you don't believe, why would you raise your kids to believe in falsehoods? It's such an intellectually dishonest position.

Besides, this is a false dichotomy. Not being religious doesn't mean behaving like Bart Simpson. You can raise your children to think about other people, and think about the consequences of their actions, without ever bringing up religion.

Attempting to follow all the rules of the Bible includes the first commandment. Jacobs tried to pray to God, which is understandably difficult for an agnostic. He had varying levels of success, depending on the day. In one passage discussing his prayer, Jacobs made a very good point.

I even find myself being skeptical of those times when my heart was near to God in the last few months. Perhaps it was an illusion. If I prayed to Apollo every day, would I start to feel a connection to Apollo?

This is a line of reasoning that I don't think enough people explore. I noticed it especially the last time I went to a mass - how much reinforcement there was to continue believing, and how hard it would be to break that cycle when you do it every week.

At the back of the book, there was an interview with Jacobs. I'm assuming that this interview was only in the paperback edition, and not the hardcover.

It was a life-changing and perspective-changing year. In the end, I became what a minister friend of mine calls a "reverent agnostic," which is a phrase I love. Because whether or not there's a God, I believe in the idea of sacredness - that rituals can be sacred, the Sabbath can be sacred, and there's great importance to them. So I'm still agnostic, but a deeply different kind of agnostic.

In some ways, I can appreciate this view. The universe is an awesome place, and we're such tiny parts of it. There are a great many things that inspire me, or fill me with a sense of reverence. However, you have to be careful when it comes to 'sacredness'. Too often, when people put something in the category of the sacred, it becomes beyond reproach, above criticism, unassailable. Nothing deserves that level of immunity, because it's possible that we could be wrong about anything.

It also risks taking those concepts to extremes. Jacobs may consider the Sabbath sacred, but others have taken it so far to where they worry about whether or not they can flip a light switch, and whether the spark that might happen should be considered lighting a fire.

As for lessons I learned, perhaps the biggest was 'Thou shalt not stereotype.' Every preconception I had was smashed when I actually spent time with these groups. I had some very narrow notions about evangelical Christians before the year. But I found it's such a varied movement that you can't make a sweeping gneralization about it. For instance, I met an evangelical group called the Red Letter Christians. Instead of focusing on, for instance, homosexuality, the Red Letter Christians stress the literal words of Jesus and his teachings on compassion and peace.

This is a very good lesson, I think, for two reasons. First, taking Jacobs at his word, it shows the dangers of stereotyping. I have friends with all different types of religious beliefs, from atheists like myself to young earth creationists. People can get so caught up in religion that they forget that it's just one aspect of our lives. There's so much more that we do, that defines who we are, that it's easy to get along with someone while still disagreeing over religion.

On a more cynical side, though, Jacobs' observation reveals how people who do bad things aren't the evil villains of comic books. He discussed his visit with Jerry Falwell, and how friendly the man was in person, and how mundane the church service was. But don't forget that Falwell founded Liberty University, and co-founded the Moral Majority. The people in those organizations may have good intentions, but look at all the harm they've caused. To quote a religiously themed cliche, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions."

Q: Are you going to raise your sons differently?
AJ: After the year, my wife and I decided to join a synagogue in our neighborhood. Granted, it's a reform temple and we don't go very often. (But I do pay the annual fees. Which, from the letters they send, is a very important part). We're going to send our sons to Hebrew school. I don't care whether they become Hitchens-like atheists or believers. As long as they're good people, I'll be happy. But I thought it was a good idea to give them a basis in religion, so they'll know what they're accepting or rejecting.

I already discussed above why I don't think you should raise your children to be religious if you're not a believer yourself. It's dishonest. But that's not exactly what Jacobs is saying here. It sounds like he's trying to expose his children to religion so that they can make their own choice. But, as I'm sure is glaringly obvious to anybody reading what he wrote who isn't Jewish, he's given them a pretty limited view on religion by sending them to a Hebrew school. Why not send them to Catholic school, or a Protestant school, or a Hindu temple, or a madrasah? That's one of the problems I've noticed with many people. When they say they want to expose their children to religion so that their children can have their own choice, those people usually mean their own religion, or the religion of their ancestors if they're no longer particularly religious themselves. It's hardly ever meant to expose them to the full spectrum of religious views.

On the other hand, given how important religion is in contemporary society, it's probably not such a bad idea to expose children to it in some form, so that they'll have some type of understanding of that mindset.

So, after the whole year was over, what was Jacobs' conclusion on following the Bible literally?

Q: How did it change your view on religion? AJ: In several ways, I feel I better understand some of the great things about religion and have incorporated many of them into my life. I also learned that interpreting the Bible too literally can be dangerous. I learned that you can't follow every single rule in the Bible. There is a certain amount of picking and choosing. And fundamentalists call this cafeteria religion and they mean it as an insult. But I say: What's wrong with cafeterias? I've had some delicious meals at cafeterias. It's all about choosing the right parts of the Bible, the ones about compassion and helping your neighbor. I also learned that even the rules that seem crazy at first can have a deeper meaning.

So, after actually reading the entire Bible, and trying his best to follow it literally, he concluded that it just wasn't possible. I don't think that's much of a surprise to anyone else that's actually read the Bible.

His approach of picking the best parts sounds reasonable to anyone who's not religious themselves, but it kind of removes the whole authority of the Bible, doesn't it? Especially considering how he's contemplated using the Bible as a rulebook for his kids so that they grow up with some structure - how can you justify using it as an authoritative source when you throw out all the rules you don't like?

Anyway, as I said at the beginning of this review, I've focused on the parts of the book that I disagree with the most. Overall, it's an interesting look at just what it takes to follow the Bible literally, along with some thoughtful discussion on religion in general.

Further Reading:

• Debating The Year of Living Biblically - A dialogue on Slate
  
• Interview with A.J. Jacobs by The Friendly Atheist
  

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Jul 30 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent upon each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and direct action of the conditions of life and from use and disuse: a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

So ends Darwin's Origin of Species, giving the inspiration for the title of Carl Zimmer's latest book, The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to Evolution. It is described as a textbook on evolution for non-biology majors, and it is very good.

The term, 'evolution', is pretty broad. In general, when people talk of biological evolution, there are two broad categories they're referring to. The first is the concept of common descent with modification - that all life on this planet is related, and that populations of organisms change over time. The second is the theories describing how that works, with natural selection being the most famous. Pretty much every book that covers evolution will cover both areas to some extent, but often times they will focus on one area over the other. The Tangled Bank covers more of the latter subject. Of course, it uses examples, but it is more about how evolution works rather than a fossil by fossil account of the evidence for common descent (for that type of book, read Donald Prothero's Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters - also, realize that there's much more evidence for evolution than just fossils).

Let me give an example of one of the concepts I learned about - Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium. This term is probably familiar to biology majors, but it's not something us non-biologists generally read about in most popular books or magazine articles on evolution. The concept has to do with allele frequency. As a refresher, an allele is a variation of a gene. Think back to your high school biology class, and the genetic experiments of Gregor Mendel. For example, Mendel discovered a certain gene* that controlled pea color - one version would make them green, while the other would make them yellow. Each version is called an allele. Remember further, that us eukaryotes carry two copies of a gene (actualy, at least two - it can get a bit more complicated than this). So, individual plants in a population of all green peas might all carry two copies of the green allele - GG, and individual plants in a population of all yellow peas might all carry two copies of the yellow allele - YY. Now, if you were to bring those two populations together, the alleles woud start mixing, and you'd end up with three different combinations that the plants could have - GG, YY, and GY (GY and YG are the same thing). What Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium tells us, is that according to just random mating and chance distribution, these allele combinations should all be present in certain ratios. In this example, half of the plants would likely be GY, one quarter would be GG, and the remaining quarter would be YY. But what if you checked up on your pea population, and found that it didn't match the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium? What if less than a quarter of the plants were GG, and more than a quarter were YY? Well, then we could conclude that something about the Y allele was advantageous to the plants, and that natural selection was pushing the population to have more plants with the Y allele.

This concept of Hardy Weingberg equilibrium can be applied to more complicated scenarios. It doesn't have to be just two alleles, and the initial distribution doesn't have to be 50/50. However, for any combination, the Hardy Weinberg equilibrium is the distribution you'd expect if there weren't any natural selection, and measuring how much the actual distribution varies from the Hardy Weingberg equilibrium is a measure of how strong the selection is.

To me, that's a pretty interesting concept, and it wasn't something I'd given much thought to before reading Zimmer's book. However, the book didn't go into much more detail than what I just gave in my summary. If you're not of a technical bent, that may be all you need. I realize that Zimmer's goal was to provide a book for non-biology majors, so maybe that's all the detail he felt was necessary. However, to someone like me, who may not be a biology major but wouldn't mind seeing a little light math, Zimmer's explanation was a little too superficial. I mean, if you follow that Wikipedia link I provided and read the explanation of Hardy Weinberg equilibrium, the math isn't all that hard. It's just a bit of algebra. Maybe as an engineer who works with equations all day long I'm a bit biased, but it's not as if you need to understand any calculus or differential equations to follow the basics of Hardy Weinberg equilibrium.

I can't discuss this book without mentioning the illustrations. Practically every page of the book has a figure or a graph. I'm sure that the printing cost associated with this contributed to the $50 price tag for the book, but it really makes it easy to understand certain concepts that would be difficult to get across with just words.

This book was published right around the same time as Richard Dawkins' The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, so there were inevitably comparisons. But the truth is that they're just not the same kinds of books. In my discussion above on the broad meanings of evolution, I said that Zimmer's book covered more the theories of evolution. Dawkins' book was more of a look at the evidence itself. Zimmer's book was a textbook with color illustrations on each page, while Dawkins' book was a popular book with few illustrations. Comparing the two is comparing apples to oranges.

If you'd like to get more of a taste of the book, I've found two excerpts available for download online. Chapter 1, Evolution: An Introduction is availabe from Carl Zimmer's own site. Chapter 10, Radiations and Extinctions is available from the National Center for Science Education. You can also read Zimmer's announcement of the book on his blog, to hear his intentions in his own words.

All in all, The Tangled Bank was very good. It was a nice broad introduction to many of the theories and mechanisms of evolution, but without getting too technical for those of us that don't plan to go into careers in biology. Unfortunately, being a textbook, it's a bit pricey. You may try going to your library to check it out, find it used, or maybe be lucky enough to be able to borrow it from a friend. However you manage to get your hands on a copy, I definitely recommend this book.

*Mendel's insight was that there were units of heredity, now known as genes, as opposed to the prevailing concept at the time of blending inheritance, but he didn't actually know the mechanism responsible. It wasn't until later that other scientists discovered that genes were contained on chromosomes, and later yet that scientists discovered that chromosomes were made of DNA.

Posted by Jeff on Thursday, Jun 17 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies is a Pulitzer Prize winning book by Jared Diamond. To quote from the book itself, it is "A short history about everyone for the last 13,000 years." Diamond has attempted to explain why world history has taken the course it has. But he's more interested in large scale trends and causes, as opposed to battle by battle or even war by war tracking of history. Or, to put it another way, he was taking a more scientific approach to history, as opposed to just stamp collecting. Wikipedia has a good overview of the book, so I'll only present a brief summary here.

To use an example, we all learned in school of the European conquest of the Americas, even though the Europeans were vastly outnumered. We've been taught many of the factors that lead to that result, most notably the superior weapons technology of the Europeans, horses, and the diseases that Europeans brought with them. Diamond noted all these proximate causes (and a few others), but then moved on to ask why the Europeans had developed those advantages, and not the other way around. Why hadn't Motecuhzoma sent ships to conquer Spain?

According to Diamond, much of the advantage of certain regions was a result of geography and the indigineous plants and animals. To help support his case, Diamond looked at native plant species around the world, how nutritious they were, and how easily they could be domesticated. Wheat, for example, is a very nutritious crop, with a fairly high protein content for a plant. It required only a single mutation in wild wheat, inhibiting the seeds from falling off the crop when ripe, to make it suitable for agriculture. Teosinte, by comparison, required many more mutations to become domestic corn (maize), which isn't as nutritious as wheat. As it turns out, Eurasia has a greater number of nutritious, easily domesticated plants than any other region.

Eurasia also had a higher number of potential livestock candidates. In many regions of the world, the Pleistocene extinction event killed off most large mammals at the end of the last ice age (there is debate over the cause of this extinction, but that's largely irrelevant to Diamond's hypothesis). If you don't have large wild mammals, you can't domesticate them into livestock. But you can't just domesticate any large animal. In this section of the book, Diamond quoted Tolstoy, "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." There are many traits an animal has to have to make it suitable for domestication (diet, behavior, lack of aggression, social structure, etc.), but missing any one of them would make an animal unfit for domestication. Diamond used this reasoning to show why, for example, zebras weren't domesticated in Africa like horses were in Eurasia, or why bears or rhinos weren't suitable to domesticate for food or as draft animals.

Diamond went on to argue how differences in geography allowed agriculture and domestic animals (referred to collectively as food production) to spread more easily in some regions than others once they had been developed. Eurasia, without any great barriers such as deserts, and with an east-west axis that meant the climate was more similar along its breadth, facilitated this spread more so than other regions.

Once regions had developed food production, they could maintain higher population densities. Initially this gave them a military advantage just through shear numbers. But eventually, by providing for an artisan class that didn't have to grow its own food, it led to technological advantages, as well. The high population densities, along with domestic animals, also contributed to those regions having endemic diseases that didn't exist elsewhere.

As an example of how Diamond was attempting to explain the grand patterns in history over tens of thousands of years, he pointed out that someone could ask why, out of all the areas of Eurasia, Western Europe currently dominates the world stage, and not Eastern Asia. He stated that this simply might be a short term 'blip', and not part of the long term trend (just look at the resurgence of modern China).

As I said, this is only a brief summary of the book. Diamond had many more reasons and examples that he used to support his hypothesis.

Some parts were more convincing than others. It also didn't help that in a few examples he brought up that I already knew a bit about, I saw some mistakes. For example, when discussing ancient human history, he compared the Out of Africa hypothesis to the multiregional hypothesis. The weight of evidence strongly favors the 'Out of Africa' hypothesis, but Diamond seemed a little more ambiguous in the book. In another section, discussing why cultures might be resistant to adopting certain technologies, he brought up the old QWERTY/DVORAK controversy, claiming that DVORAK is clearly superior to QWERTY, but market forces have kept it from being adopted. This is an old urban myth that isn't true. There haven't been many actual studies comparing the two keyboard layouts, and the studies that have been done don't show a very big advantage of one design over the other (certain advantages of each layout are offset by different advantages of the other layout).

Overall, I thought the book was very interesting, and that Diamond did a good job of presenting his case. I'd definitely recommend it.

Update 2010-03-29 - Slightly revised wording in 4th from last paragraph.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Mar 26 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Here is the second part of my review of the books I read in the last year. Part I was an analysis of my reading habits, while this entry will give a brief review for each book.

In year's past, I've made a point to mention my favorite books of the year. The problem this year is that I liked so many of them, that it was hard to weed this list down. Anyway, my favorites from fiction were Anne of Green Gables and Luncheon of the Boating Party. My favorites from nonfiction were Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters, Microcosm: E. coli and the New Science of Life (Zimmer is one of my favorite authors), and Death from the Skies.

Continue reading "Books, A Year in Review - 2009, Part II" »

Posted by Jeff on Wednesday, Nov 25 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A couple years ago, I read an article about an AP-Ipsos poll on people's reading habits. Among other things, it pointed out that around 1 in 4 adults in this country hadn't read any books at all in the previous year, and that among those that had, the average number of books read was 6. (Yes, that last sentence is copied verbatim from an older entry).

Since then, I've kept track of the books I've throughout the year, to compare my habits to the population at large. I've had two previous yearly reviews, one in 2007, and another in 2008.

Like last year's review, I'm breaking this one up into two parts. This first part will be an analysis of my reading habits, and probably won't interest anyone much other than myself, while Part II will give a brief review for each book.

Here are the books I've read between October 2008 and October 2009, though not in the order that I read them.

Children's & Young Adult Fiction

1. House of Stairs
   
2. Coraline
   
3. Anne of Green Gables
   
4. The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 1)
   
5. The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 2)
   
6. The Titan's Curse (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 3)
   
7. The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 4)
   
8. The Last Olympian (Percy Jackson & the Olympians, Book 5)
   
9. Brisingr (Inheritance, Book 3)
   
10. Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1)
    

Adult Fiction

1. Luncheon of the Boating Party
   
2. Angels & Demons
   

Non-Fiction

1. Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters
   
2. GOD - OR GORILLA : How the Monkey Theory of Evolution Exposes Its Own Methods, Refutes Its Own Principles, Denies Its Own Inferences, Disproves Its Own Case
   
3. Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
   
4. The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution
   
5. Microcosm: E. Coli and the New Science of Life
   
6. Death from the Skies!: The Science Behind the End of the World
   
7. The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Papyrus of Ani in the British Museum
   

So, that's 19 books altogether - a bit less than last year (23), but still better than the year before that (13), and certainly better than the national average.

As far as genres, as in previous years, I'm still a bit biased towards children's & young adult fiction. This is partly due to reading some of the same book series that my daughter's reading, partly due to trying to catch up on classics, and partly just because I happen to like some of those stories. At least as my daughter's getting older, the series she reads are getting more mature, and I no longer have to read books like Junie B. Jones.

I did happen to get in two adult fiction books, one of which was very good (hint - it's the one that hasn't been made into a major motion picture).

Looking at my non-fiction reading, I'm heavily biased towards biology, particularly evolution. I need to expand my topics a bit, but to be honest, I expect to keep reading about evolution because I find it so darned interesting. It probably is time to get away from general evolutionary books, and more into those on specific topics (such as Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo and the Making of the Animal Kingdom). On the other hand, there are a few general evolution books that I'd really like to read (such as Why Evolution Is True and The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to Evolution).

I did manage to check off at least one book from this list. If I manage to read at least one book from that list per year, I'll have it all taken care of by the time I'm 124.

I have to admit to starting a book and not finishing it - The Myth of Sisyphus: And Other Essays. This is only the 3rd book from my entire life that this has happened with (technically, I've had false starts on The Hobbit, Robinson Crusoe, and Moby Dick, trying to start them when I was still a bit too young, but I did go back and finish all three of them eventually - and it was worth it for all three, by the way). The other two are The Age of Innocence and A Tale of Two Cities, and I still plan on finishing A Tale of Two Cities. Camus lost me early on, using personal anecdotes as evidence, and expressing a kind of contempt for science (as Wikipedia summarizes it, "true knowledge is impossible and rationality and science cannot explain the world.") Science is the best method we have for answering questions with objectively true answers. Any philosophy that ignores objective truth, particularly in a book focusing on a real phenomenon, is one that I don't feel like wasting my time on.

Anyway, I still need to try to expand my reading habits, but at least I'm not doing too bad. And if you've read my previous two yearly summaries - I still haven't finished all the books on my night stand, and I've actually added a few more to the stack.

Oh, and for those interested (since I use these links in a shameless attempt to earn money through my Amazon Associates account), I've earned $2.28 from book sales in the past year. Even if I find a book that cheap, the order still won't be eligible for super saver shipping.

Stay tuned for Part II, where I'll give a brief review of each of the books.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Oct 30 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Book Review - The Egyptian Book of the Dead

The ancient Egyptians, as almost everyone knows, believed in an afterlife. It's why, for example, they put so much effort into mummifying the dead. Their conception of the afterlife, though, was a bit different than the Christian one that most people in this country are used to. There wasn't a simple, one time judgement, after which the deceased either went to heaven or hell. The afterlife was more like a parallel world, and the dead would have to know how to get around. Fortunately for them, their religion knew all about the afterlife, and so could give them advice.

In early periods of Egypt, this advice was appeared as inscriptions in the deceased's tomb. As time wore on, these inscriptions were transfered to papyri, and the collection became known as 'The Book of Going Forth by Day.' When modern Europeans discovered the collection in the mid 1800s, they dubbed it the Egyptian 'Book of the Dead.' The book was not canonical, in the same sense as most of use are used to with the Bible. A few passages were included in nearly every copy of the Book of the Dead, but for other passages, it was up to the whimsy of the scribe or his customer.

In 1888, a British Egyptologist by the name of E.A. Wallis Budge acquired a papyrus, which upon closer inspection, turned out to be a very well preserved copy of the Book of the Dead, originally intended for a scribe named Ani. Subsequently, it became known as the Papyrus of Ani. In order to make the papyrus easier to work with, Budge had it cut into 37 approximately equal length sheets, and had these sheets glued to boards. He also commissioned a detailed facsimile. Unfortunelty, his 'preservation' method took a toll on the original papyrus, but fortunately the facsimile did preserve what it looked like.

Budge set to work translating the papyrus, and in 1895 published his translation. The book consisted of three parts. The first was an extensive introduction, giving the reader a great deal of information on Egyptian religious beliefs. The second section showed a transcription of the heiroglyphics, along with a transliteration and a word for word translation. For each line of heiroglyphs, the transliteration and word for word translation appeared directly underneath. The third section was a 'plain' English translation of the entire collection (actually, written very much in the style of the King James version of the Bible). The first and third sections were extensively annotated, with some pages having more footnotes than body. Budge wasn't afraid to show multiple translations of a few passages, where other Egyptologists disagreed with him. He also included translations from other copies of the Book of the Dead when the Papyrus of Ani left out passages, or when the Papyrus of Ani differed significantly from the norm.

Going backwards in my review, I'll review the third section first. It was interesting, but I have to admit that I got bored reading it, and it turned into a bit of a slog to complete. Just imagine trying to read something like the Bible, including all the 'begat' sections, when it's a foreign religion that nobody at all even believes in anymore. Still, I have to say that it was worth reading at least once.

The second section I only glanced at. I don't know how to read heiroglyphics, nor how to speak Egyptian, so there really wasn't much point in studying those. I did figure out the symbols for 'your' and 'gods,' but that's about it.

The first section was great. I know now that it wasn't entirely accurate, but it was still very interesting to read. I've already mentioned it briefly in a previous blog entry, but this first section is where Budge related a bit of Egyptian mythology to us modern readers. Reading the legend of Osiris was very interesting (he was the god who had been killed and resurrected, and it was through him that Egyptians hoped to attain eternal life). But what I found especially interesting was just how much more complicated the Egyptian concept of a human was than I'd ever realized. Coming from a Christian perspective, we're used to the concept of a material body being a container for a soul. It's a simple, two part system. Not so with the ancient Egyptians. Just consider these quotes from Budge (the ellipses can be over a page in this quote):

There is, however, no doubt that from first to last the Egyptians firmly believed that besides the soul there was some other element of the man that would rise again. The preservation of the corruptible body too was in some way connected with the life in the world to come, and its preservation was necessary to ensure eternal life; otherwise the prayers recited to this end would have been futile, and the time honoured custom of mummifying the dead would have had no meaning. The never ending existence of the soul is asserted in a passage quoted above without reference to Osiris; but the frequent mention of the uniting of his bones, and of the gathering together of his members,[3] and the doing away with all corruption from his body, seems to show that the pious Egyptian connected these things with the resurrection of his own body in some form, and he argued that what had been done for him who was proclaimed to be giver and source of life must be necessary for mortal man.

The physical body of man considered as a whole was called khat, a word which seems to be connected with the idea of something which is liable to decay...

But the body does not lie in the tomb inoperative, for by the prayers and ceremonies on the day of burial it is endowed with the power of changing into a sahu, or spiritual body. Thus we have such phrases as, "I germinate like the plants,"[3] "My flesh germinateth,"[4] "I exist, I exist, I live, I live, I germinate, I germinate,"[5] "thy soul liveth, thy body germinateth by the command of Ra himself without diminution, and without defect, like unto Ra for ever and ever."...

In close connection with the natural and spiritual bodies stood the heart, or rather that part of it which was the seat of the power of life and the fountain of good and evil thoughts. And in addition to the natural and spiritual bodies, man also bad an abstract individuality or personality endowed with all his characteristic attributes. This abstract personality had an absolutely independent existence. It could move freely from place to place, separating itself from, or uniting itself to, the body at will, and also enjoying life with the gods in heaven.This was the ka,[1] a word which at times conveys the meanings of its Coptic equivalent {Coptic kw}, and of {Greek ei?'dwlon}, image, genius, double, character, disposition, and mental attributes...

To that part of man which beyond all doubt was believed to enjoy an eternal existence in heaven in a state of glory, the Egyptians gave the name ba, a word which means something like "sublime," "noble," and which has always hitherto been translated by "soul." The ba is not incorporeal, for although it dwells in the ka, and is in some respects, like the heart, the principle of life in man, still it possesses both substance and form: in form it is depicted as a human-headed hawk, and in nature and substance it is stated to be exceedingly refined or ethereal...

In connection with the ka and ba must be mentioned the khaibit or shadow of the man, which the Egyptians regarded as a part of the human economy. It may be compared with the {Greek skia'} and umbra of the Greeks and Romans. It was supposed to have an entirely independent existence and to be able to separate itself from the body; it was free to move wherever it pleased, and, like the ka and ba, it partook of the funeral offerings in the tomb, which it visited at will...

Another important and apparently eternal part of man was the khu, which, judging from the meaning of the word, may be defined as a "shining" or translucent, intangible casing or covering of the body, which is frequently depicted in the form of a mummy. For want of a better word khu has often been translated "shining one," "glorious," "intelligence," and the like, but in certain cases it may be tolerably well rendered by "spirit."...

Yet another part of a man was supposed to exist in heaven, to which the Egyptians gave the name sekhem. The word has been rendered by "power," "form," and the like, but it is very difficult to find any expression which will represent the Egyptian conception of the sekhem...

Finally, the name, ren, of a man was believed to exist in heaven, and. in the pyramid texts we are told that

nefer en Pepi pen hena ren-f anx Pepi pen hena ka-f

Happy is Pepi this with his name, liveth Pepi this with his ka.

Thus, as we have seen, the whole man consisted of a natural body, a spiritual body, a heart, a double, a soul, a shadow, an intangible ethereal casing or spirit, a form, and a name. All these were, however, bound together inseparably, and the welfare of any single one of them concerned the welfare of all. For the well-being of the spiritual parts it was necessary to preserve from decay the natural body; and certain passages in the pyramid texts seem to show that a belief in the resurrection of the natural body existed in the earliest dynasties.

That's a whole lot more interesting than a simple binary belief.

One thing that Budge's translation didn't have were any images of the papyrus, itself, which made it very frustrating when he was describing the vignettes. I read that this was because he intended the translation to be a companion to the facsimile, and not a stand alone volume. Fortunately for us in the digital age, we can find images of the original papyrus online, for free. The highest quality images I could find were from The British Museum. You can search their online database, and then request high quality versions of the images, which they will then e-mail to you. You have to sign up for the service, and it's a bit cumbersome when you're used to the Internet providing instant gratification, but it does give the opportunity to see very high quality scans with only an overnight wait. To find the images, go to the following page, and search for 'Papyrus of Ani:'
http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database.aspx

As far as the rest of the book, there are many sites where it can be found online if you want to read it for free. As always, Project Gutenberg has the book in multiple formats.

I enjoyed the book quite a bit, particularly the introduction, which was actually more of a history lesson in ancient Egyptian religion. However, after doing more research on the book, it appears that Budge made several mistakes. This is understandable, of course, considering how much we've learned since Budge performed the translation. However, if one were interested in getting the most accurate picture of ancient Egyptian religious beliefs, there are probably better sources out there.

For more information on the Book of the Dead, I found the following pages to be pretty informative. These pages are from the website of a modern translation.

• http://www.bookofdead.com/ulc.htm
  
• http://www.bookofdead.com/history.htm
  

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Mar 13 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In honor of Darwin Day, I figured that I'd post an entry related to evolution. Here is my review of Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters, written by Donald Prothero, Ph.D. Let me say right at the beginning that the book was very good, and that I recommend it.

The title of the book is a bit misleading, in that it leaves out a major theme that was covered. A good portion in the beginning of the book is spent debunking creationism. Perhaps some readers are aware of Duane Gish's Evolution? the Fossils Say No!, and so notice the play on words and realize that Prothero's book was partly in response to Gish. For others (such as me before I read the book), the allusion isn't so obvious. In any case, Prothero devoted a good bit of space to pointing out the errors in many creationist arguments, including a detailed explanation on how the Grand Canyon was formed through slow geological processes and not through a catastrophic flood, along with the evidence on how we know this.

Also in the beginning of the book, Prothero spent some time explaining science & paleontology, which is what you'd expect for a book intended for a lay audience. His explanation of cladistics was very good.

Finally, on page 145, Prothero started Part II, which presented the evidence and explanations of the history of life on this planet. He started right from the beginning, with a few theories on abiogenesis. Consequently, his first chapter from Part II didn't really have any fossil evidence. As soon as he progressed in time to when organsims developed hard parts that could fossilize, the book finally lived up to its name. He tried to cover a little bit of everything, from pre-cambrian single celled organsims, on up to very recent mammalian evolution. Obviously, with a 400 page book trying to cover that much territory, he couldn't go in depth into any particular topic, but he did give a very good overview. He did tend to cover vertebrates in more detail than any other lineage, but I suppose that's because that's what most readers would be most interested in.

Since the book was about fossil evidence, it included a great deal of photos and drawings of fossils. To give a sense on what was in the book, below is one of my favorite figures, illustrating the transition from seal-like mammals to walruses. (I apologize for the poor quality of these images, especially along the edges, but I wasn't about to ruin the binding on my book just to make it lay flat in the scanner.)

Another good example of the way fossils were presented is the figure below, showing the homology between non-avian dinosaurs and birds.

As would be expected in a book about evolution, there were many cladograms (family trees). They were almost all well illustrated with representative members of each lineage, such as the one below.

The center of the book contained several pages of color plates. These included some nice color photos of fossils, as well as some artistic renderings of what the animals might have looked like in life.

I did have a few reservations. For one, I would have liked to have seen even more photos & illustrations of fossils. In some sections, Prothero mentioned fossils in the text, but had no illustrations to show the reader what they actually looked like. In several sections, Prothero made statements to the effect of, a highly trained paleontologist can see that... I realize that expertise is important, but Prothero came off as a bit condescending in several places. I would have preferred to have seen wording like careful observation shows that...

Overall, it was a very good book, and very informative. I'd already read a few books on evolution prior to this, but they had dealt with much more specific topics, such as the transition from sea to land, or human evolution. This was the first book I'd read that covered such a wide range of transitions, with so many photos and illustrations to support it. If you're already familiar with the creationist arguments, or have a good lay understanding of how evolution works, Part I can be a bit of a slog, although I can see how those chapters would be very informative to people without that background. But once you get to Part II, it's a very informative, fun to read book.

Posted by Jeff on Thursday, Feb 12 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Here is the second part of my review of the books I read in the last year. Part I was an analysis of my reading habits, while this entry will give a brief review for each book.

There were three books I read this past year that I really, really liked: The City of Ember (the first of the Books of Ember), The Jungle Book, and At the Water's Edge : Fish with Fingers, Whales with Legs, and How Life Came Ashore but Then Went Back to Sea. I would strongly recommend all three of these books.

Continue reading "Books, A Year in Review - 2008, Part II" »

Posted by Jeff on Monday, Oct 13 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Just about a year ago, I started the books section of this blog, with an entry called Books I've Read in the Last Year. It was originally prompted by an article about an AP-Ipsos poll on people's reading habits. Among other things, it pointed out that around 1 in 4 adults in this country hadn't read any books at all in the previous year, and that among those that had, the average number of books read was 6. So, I wrote up the entry to compare my reading habits to the general population.

Well, it's been about a year since that entry, so I thought I'd take a look at how I compared this year. First, here are the books I read, which I've tried to group by subject (as oppposed to chronologically, alphabetically, or any other order):

1. The Frog Princess (Tales of the Frog Princess)
2. Dragon's Breath: (Tales of the Frog Princess)
3. Once Upon a Curse (Tales of the Frog Princess)
4. No Place for Magic (Tales of the Frog Princess)
5. The City of Ember (Books of Ember)
6. The People of Sparks (Books of Ember)
7. The Prophet of Yonwood (Books of Ember)
8. The Diamond of Darkhold (Books of Ember)
9. Once Upon a Time in the North
10. The Spiderwick Chronicles
11. Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
12. The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul
13. Peter Pan
14. The Strange Case of Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde*
15. Gulliver's Travels
16. The Jungle Book
17. From the Ground Up: The Autobiography of an Aeronautical Engineer
18. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
19. Tao Te Ching
20. The God Delusion
21. The Voyage of the Beagle: Charles Darwin's Journal of Researches*
22. Dinosaurs
23. At the Water's Edge : Fish with Fingers, Whales with Legs, and How Life Came Ashore but Then Went Back to Sea
24. The Parrot's Lament : And Other True Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity
25. Great Mythconceptions: The Science Behind the Myths

*-indicates that the Amazon link is to a different edition than the one I actually read.

Now, on to the analysis.

Continue reading "Books, A Year in Review - 2008, Part I" »

Posted by Jeff on Monday, Oct 6 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I just read The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book (they were both collected into a single volume). The Jungle Book was first published as a book in 1894, while the short stories it contains were originally published in magazines from 1893 to 1894. The stories in The Second Jungle Book were also first published in magazines, from 1894 to 1895, with the book first being published in 1895. Both were written by Rudyard Kipling.

For anyone unfamiliar with the stories, they largely center around the inhabitants of an Indian jungle, and then largely around Mowgli, the "man-cub" raised by wolves. However, not all of the stories were about the jungle, as the title would imply. For example, there was the tale of Kotick, the white seal of the arctic, and that of Kotuko, the Inuit and his sled dog. The non-human characters were anthropomorphized to a degree - they could speak to each other (and to Mowgli), they were more intelligent than in real life, and there was a bit more organization and "Law" than really exists, but to a large degree, the animals in the book behaved like they really would in the wild.

I really enjoyed reading this book. You may think that of course I would, because it's a classic, and there's a reason why books become classics - but that's not always the case. Consider that a few months ago, I posted my review of Gulliver's Travels, and I wasn't too fond of that book. And I also recently read Peter Pan (I don't post reviews for all the books I read), and although it was enjoyable to read, I was a little disappointed. Just being a classic doesn't guarantee that everybody will like that book. But with The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book, I can definitely see why they've been popular for so long.

The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book are usually marketed as a children's books, which they are. But the stories in them, presented as fables, are not the tepid affairs that some Amazon reviewers seem to think children's stories should be. They have some violence, characters are killed, some characters are mean and intolerant, but non of it is overdone. Those are issues that, presented properly, children can and probably should deal with. Though, as far as being children's books, according to the Wikipedia entry, at least some "readers have interpreted the work as allegories of the politics and society of the time." As any book, The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book do reveal something of the mindset of the time when they were written. Kipling was a British man living in Imperial India, and the racism of the time does surface in some parts of the books.

I'll admit, I've always been fascinated with the characters from The Jungle Book thanks to a Disney cartoon called TaleSpin. TaleSpin was a 1930s era aviation fantasy - a hero that flew a flying boat, an island bar that you could only get to by plane, villains that had a flying base always on the move, air races, experimental airplanes... You can see why a kid like me would have liked it. Anyway, the characters from TaleSpin were loosely based on the characters from Disney's version of The Jungle Book, which themselves were only loosely based on the characters from Kipling's The Jungle Book. So, in the end, the TaleSpin characters that initially got me intrigued with the The Jungle Book really didn't share any more than names with the originals. But it did make it a bit hard to read Baloo's lines and not hear the voice from the cartoon.

One note on the particular edition of the book that I read - it's part of a series called "Unabridged Classics" put out by Sterling Publishers. All of the books in the series are affordable, hardcover editions of stories that have survived the test of time (the edition of Gulliver's Travels that I read was part of this same series). The publishers have added a handful of footnotes to explain things that might be lost on the modern reader, as well as a series of questions at the end of the book to stimulate thought or discussions (the end of book questions are targeted to a young audience). You could read all the stories in the series free on Project Gutenberg, but if you're looking for a good hard copy to put in a home library, this series is a good choice.

Speaking of Project Gutenberg, here are the relevant links for these books:
The Jungle Book
The Second Jungle Book

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Sep 26 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The Tao Te Ching is a classic Chinese text, the foundation of Taoism, and also important to Chinese Buddhism. Tradition holds that it was written by Lao Tsu around the 6th century B.C., although there is some debate as to the actual date it was written, and even whether Lao Tsu was an actual, historical person. There have been numerous translations of the text into English. The particular translation I read was that of Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English, which I've learned was the translation favored by Alan Watts. (Depending on the romanization of Tao Te Ching and Lao Tsu, or the attempt to express those words with the Roman alphabet, they can be written many different ways, with some of the most common being Dao De Jing for the text, and Laozi or Lao Tzu for the man.)

The text is poetic. It's fairly short, so you could read it pretty quickly if you wanted to, although it's probably better to take your time so you can reflect on what's being said. There are many parts of the text that make you stop and think, like the following passage from Chapter 2. This method of contrasting opposites was repeated throughout the text.

Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty only because there is ungliness.
All can know good only because there is evil.

Therefore having and not having arise together.
Difficult and easy complement each other.
Long and short contrast each other;
High and low rest upon each other;
Voice and sound harmonize each other;
Front and back follow one another.

The text also makes a point about not always having to do things. Sometimes, inaction can be the best path.

Movement overcomes cold.
Stillness overcomes heat.
Stillness and tranquility set things in order in the universe.

And another passage with a similar message:

Keep your mouth shut,
Guard the senses,
And life is ever full.
Open your mouth,
Always be busy,
And life is beyond hope.

Though at times, I think the text went to far in this regard. There was one passage in particular that struck me as being rather counter to Enlightenment ideals (though I'm sure some student of Taoism will come along and tell me I could interpret this passage differently). You can't learn about the world simply by sitting inside and meditating - you need evidence, which you can only get through observation.

The five colors blind the eye.
The five tones deafen the ear.
The five flavors dull the taste.
Racing and hunting madden the mind.
Precious things lead one astray.

Therefore the sage is guided by what he feels and not by what he sees.
He lets go of that and chooses this.

Here's another passage along the same lines, which seems even more explicitly counter to scientific observation.

Without going outside, you may know the whole world.
Without looking through the window, you may see the ways of heaven.
The farther you go, the less you know.

Thus the sage knows without traveling;
He sees without looking;
He works without doing.

There were other passages describing what Tao is. A less charitable review might call them "mystical mumbo-jumbo," but this review wouldn't go that far.

Look, it cannot be seen - it is beyond form.
Listen, it cannot be heard - it is beyond sound.
Grasp, it cannot be held - it is intangible.
These three are indefinable;
Thereore they are joined in one.

From above it is not bright;
From below it is not dark:
An unbroken thread beyond description.
It returns to nothingness.
The form of the formless,
The image of the imageless,
It is called indefinable and beyond imagination.

Stand before it and there is no beginning.
Follow it and there is no end.
Stay with the ancient Tao,
Move with the present.

Knowing the ancient beginning is the essence of Tao.

Aside from the text itself, the book I read was also filled with beautiful photographs on every page. Considering the price I paid to buy the book used, these photographs would have been worth the price in and of themselves.

Given that the Tao Te Ching is fundamental to some of the world's major religions, and given that it is so short, it would definitely be worth reading if just to gain a deeper understanding of how a substantial portion of the world's population thinks. However, the text stands on its own accords as well, even if you don't agree with everything it says. It will at least make you think.

There are many translations available for free online. There is also a Wikipedia entry on the text, for those interested in learning more.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Aug 1 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I just finished reading Gulliver's Travels, which was written way back in 1726 by Jonathon Swift. I'm sure that just about anybody reading this blog has heard of the book, and knows the basic story. A doctor, Lemuel Gulliver, has several adventures in distant lands. In one, he is a giant among the Lilliputians and the Blefuscudians. In another, he is among the giants, the Brobdingnagians. In a third adventure, he visits the lands of Laputa, Balnibarbi, Glubbdubdrib, Luggnagg and Japan, inhabited by intellectuals, a magician who can conjure the dead, and one land with a class of people who couldn't die. And in his final voyage, he visited the land of the Houyhnhnms, a race of intelligent horses, which was also inhabited by Yahoos, a race of humans with practically no intelligence or reason. (Here's the Wikipedia entry, for a few more details of the story.)

First, for a bit of trivia, for anyone familiar with the concept of endianness in computing (byte order), this is where the term comes from. A long standing rivalry between the Lilliputians and Blefuscudians existed over which was the proper way to open an egg, whether from the big end or the little end. Hence, there were Big Endians and Little Endians. And here I always thought it was some technical term.

To be honest, this wasn't one of my favorite books. Perhaps that was partly to do with the fact that it was a political satire, and I didn't get the jokes. I suppose it's a bit like when my daughter watches The Daily Show. She understands the sillier bits of humor, but just doesn't get the parts that require an understanding of our political climate, or the personalities involved. The edition of the book that I read did have footnotes to explain some of the references, but as everyone knows, a joke's not funny once you have to explain it.

The book also satirizes an area that I personally find very intersting - science. This occurs when Gulliver is in Laputa and Balnibarbi. Basically, the people are all intellectuals, who go to the extreme of relying entirely on theory instead of practical knowledge. I'm sure Swift wrote this in response to the Enlightenment, and to the then not so old Royal Society. However, this attitude of questioning the reason for doing science when there's no clear practical application irritates me. Knowledge for its own sake is good enough. In the same way that some people may find beauty in a painting, others can find beauty in a deeper understanding of the mysteries of our universe. I've written about this previously so I won't go on about it anymore here.

The section on Glubbdubdrib was on another subject that irritates me. The king of Glubbdubdrib had the power to bring people back from the dead (but only a day at a time, and no more than once every three months). It was basically one long section on how things were so much better back in the good old days, when the kings were nobler, the generals braver, the philosophers smarter. I've written about the good old days before, too, and they weren't always so good.

Finally, the book was just so negative. It didn't start off too bad, but became increasingly pessimistic as time wore on. In reading other people's reviews online, I've seen many of them characterize it as misanthropic, and I have to agree. You definitely don't put down the book and walk away with a skip in your step.

I guess that there's probably a reason that a book's still in print almost 300 years after it was first published. To quote the Wikipedia entry on Swift:

Gulliver's Travels is an anatomy of human nature, a sardonic looking-glass, often criticized for its apparent misanthropy. It asks its readers to refute it, to deny that it has not adequately characterized human nature and society. Each of the four books--recounting four voyages to mostly-fictional exotic lands--has a different theme, but all are attempts to deflate human pride. Critics hail the work as a satiric reflection on the failings of Enlightenment modernism.

Perhaps my main problem is that I just happen to like Enlightenment values.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Jun 6 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

City of Ember is a young adult/children's book written by Jeanne DuPrau, which I'd highly recommend. Without giving away any more of the plot than what you'd pick up in the first couple chapters - Ember is a city with no natural light. All the illumination in the city comes from street lights and lamps. The city gets its electricity from a giant generator driven by and underground river. But the generator keeps breaking down, they're running out of light bulbs, and there's nowhere to go - indeed, the people of Ember think their city is the only city there is.

Long ago when the Builders constructed the City of Ember, they had an important secret that the people were supposed to learn in 220 years. They enclosed the secret in a box with a mechanism that would open at the appropriate time, and entrusted the box to the mayor, who was supposed to hand it down to the next mayor, who was supposed to hand it down to the next mayor, etc., until the box opened and the citizens of Ember learned the secret. Unfortunately, one of the mayors broke the chain, and the box with the secret was lost.

Now, the two main characters, Lina and Doon, must figure out a way to solve the city's problems.

I really enjoyed reading this book. To give an idea of how engaging the story is, I read the book in two days, my wife read it in three, and our eight year old daughter read it in two. It's written in a style that sucks you in, so that you really want to just keep reading to see how it's going to end. Granted, it may not be perfect. It's a little predictable, and I definitely have a few unanswered questions (which may be resolved in the sequel or prequel, which I haven't read, yet), but those slight shortcomings are more than made up for by the story telling. I'd recommend this book to anyone, young and old alike.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, May 23 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

From the Ground Up Buy it from Amazon

Fred Weick is probably not a familiar name to most people, even those involved in aviation, despite the significant contributions he's made. He's probably most well known to Ercoupe pilots - Weick designed the plane back in the '40s, and is spoken of almost reverentially on Ercoupe forums (such as the fly-in and tech groups on Yahoo). My great uncle and I share an Ercoupe (and by share - I mean he keeps it in Pittsburgh and flies it, while I get to dream about it while I'm down here in Texas). It was when I first started following along on those Ercoupe discussion groups that Weick became a name that I would remember.

Later on, after I'd started working as an aeronautical engineer, and was just getting started doing design work on propellers, while doing some research on the subject, I came across an interesting paper, Propeller design I: practical application of the blade element theory, by none other than Fred Weick. That lead me to pay even more attention to his name, and it began popping up all over the place.

Continue reading "Book Review - From the Ground Up" »

Posted by Jeff on Friday, May 9 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From the Ground Up Buy it from Amazon

Fred Weick is probably not a familiar name to most people, even those involved in aviation, despite the significant contributions he's made. He's probably most well known to Ercoupe pilots - Weick designed the plane back in the '40s, and is spoken of almost reverentially on Ercoupe forums (such as the fly-in and tech groups on Yahoo). My great uncle and I share an Ercoupe (and by share - I mean he keeps it in Pittsburgh and flies it, while I get to dream about it while I'm down here in Texas). It was when I first started following along on those Ercoupe discussion groups that Weick became a name that I would remember.

Later on, after I'd started working as an aeronautical engineer, and was just getting started doing design work on propellers, while doing some research on the subject, I came across an interesting paper, Propeller design I: practical application of the blade element theory, by none other than Fred Weick. That lead me to pay even more attention to his name, and it began popping up all over the place.

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Posted by Jeff on Friday, May 9 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The full title of this book is At the Water's Edge : Fish with Fingers, Whales with Legs, and How Life Came Ashore but Then Went Back to Sea. It was written by Carl Zimmer, and as the long title suggests, is all about those two dramatic transitions of life evolving into such distinct environments. This book was great - one of the best non-fiction books I've read in a while. It was just the right blend of story telling, concepts, and evidence, and made for a very compelling read. In fact, I think I finished it in less than a week.

When I reviewed another book by Zimmer, the Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins, I commented that it wasn't very in depth. At only 176 pages, much of them filled with photos and illustrations, it was a little light on commentary. At the Water's Edge is very different in this regard. It's 304 pages, filled with small print, with only enough diagrams as are needed to illustrate a few key points. It's not a tome, by any means, but it certainly provides Zimmer with enough space to do this subject justice.

The book is divided into basically two halves - the first dealing with the transition from lobe finned fish to early tetrapods, and the second half dealing with the transition from mesonychids to dolphins and whales. As would be expected, both halves deal with the specifics of each of those cases - transitional forms that have been discovered, environmental pressures that would drive the transition, etc. However, mixed throughout the entire book are also sections on general theory. There's a nice section on development in the beginning, covering such topics as Hox genes and non-genetic factors; he describes exaptation; there's another section on cladistics; as well as sections on many other concepts related to evolution.

I learned quite a bit by reading this book. Even though I was already familiar with much of the general theory, Zimmer presented it in ways that made me think of things differently. He also introduced a few concepts, such as the evolutionary "quit point," that I hadn't thought of much before. Still, where I learned the most was in those specifics of the transitional forms between fish and tetrapods, and land mammals and whales.

I'll give one example of something very interesting I learned from this book. (In fact, this was the very first passage of the book that I read, when I first got it and was just thumbing through to see what it was like.) At some point, our ancestors must have developed lungs to breathe air, obviously. When we look at the world around us, most fish today cannot breathe atmospheric air - they rely on their gills to get oxygen from water, but also have organs similar to lungs called swim bladders, which they use to regulate their buoyancy. From that observation, you may be tempted to think that lungs are a modified swim bladder, which perhaps evolved to allow fish to survive in swamps or other oxygen poor environments. After all, what need would an ocean going fish have of lungs? I know that's what I had thought, but as it turns out, it's almost certainly wrong.

Continue reading "Book Review - At the Water's Edge" »

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Mar 7 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I already posted a brief review of this book in my review of the Lucy's Legacy Exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. I don't really have much to add, but I thought I ought to at least give that review some closure, since I'd only read 2/3 of the book when I wrote it. I also figured this would give me a good chance to get the review into my Books section.

The book is the Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins, by Carl Zimmer. I liked it. It's not very in depth - it only took me about one weekend to read the whole thing - so if you follow science news, you probably won't learn a whole lot from it. That's not to say you won't learn anything - I certainly did learn a few things from this book, but most of the information was a review of what I alread knew.

But, it does have lots of pretty pictures that make it worth the price. And I mean that in the best possible way - paragraphs are all well and good, and it would be impossible to teach evolution with nothing but glossy pictures, but it can be nice to have a page full of pictures of fossil skulls, to see with your own eyes the similarities and differences. Sometimes pictures do show things more clearly than words ever could. Plus, if you don't follow science news as much as I do, or happen to know a person who doesn't know much about human evolution, it makes for a very good overview. If someone doesn't want to read the whole thing, but they're willing to listen to you explain something to them, you can still use the book, and open it up to some of those pretty pictures to help illustrate your point.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Feb 22 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In honor of Darwin Day, I figured I'd post a review of The Voyage of the Beagle, which I just recently finished reading. The edition I read was actually the one from The Folio Society, given to me as a gift, and not the one pictured at right from Amazon. The book is also available as a free download from Project Gutenberg as a text only version, or as html with pictures, or from The Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online.

There are many reasons to like this book. One can't ignore the historical importance, since this expedition gave Darwin much of the insight that would lead to developing the theory of evolution, but this book would still be interesting even if Darwin had gone on to do nothing after sailing on the Beagle. The book is basically the journal of a young man on a round the world voyage, visiting much of South America, Tahiti, Australia, and a few other places, describing all the different cultures, geographies, and animals that he encountered.

For this review, I'll quote heavily from The Voyage of the Beagle, letting Darwin speak for himself, to give the reader a better idea of the language of the book. But first, let's get the somewhat confusing background out of the way. Darwin went along on the second survey expedition of the HMS Beagle. The first expedition, begun in 1826, consisted of two ships, the larger HMS Adventure, captained by Phillip Parker King, and the smaller HMS Beagle, captained by Pringle Stokes. Stokes committed suicide near the end of the first expedition, and 23 year old Flag Lieutenant Robert FitzRoy was named as temporary captain of the Beagle. On the second expedition, begun in 1831, only the Beagle returned, and as FitzRoy had proven himself well enough as temporary captain on the first expedition, he was given command of the ship for this second expedition. Worried about becoming depressed and suffering the same fate as Stokes, FitzRoy invited Darwin along for the journey so that he could have someone to talk to. As survey expeditions, the main purpose was acquiring data to produce nautical charts. Darwin had a slightly different agenda, as a naturalist, collecting many samples of the flora & fauna and taking many notes along the way. After the expeditions' completion, a four volume account was published, titled, Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle. The third volume of this narrative was written by Darwin, and titled, Journal and Remarks, 1832—1835. Darwin's volume proved to be so popular that the publisher, Henry Colburn of London, decided to publish it as a stand alone book, renamed, Journal of Researches into the Geology and Natural History of the various countries visited by H.M.S. Beagle. The book was published several more times under several different titles, but is most commonly referred to today as The Voyage of the Beagle.

Continue reading "Book Review - Voyage of the Beagle" »

Posted by Jeff on Tuesday, Feb 12 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

At my daughter's request (read begging), I recently read The Frog Princess, by E.D. Baker. The book is the first of a series, and I've already promised my daughter that I would read the whole series, so I will post a full review then, and this entry will only be a short review. (Maybe - depending on how the rest of the series shapes up, the final review might not be all that detailed, either.)

This is definitely a children's book - between the Harry Potter, Eragon, and Golden Compass series of books, I've been reading quite a bit of young adult fiction recently, and this book is nowhere close to the level of any of those books. So, don't expect too much. Personally, I thought it was predictable, the characters rather one dimensional, the story not too well developed, and some parts just plain corny, but it was still entertaining, had a few humorous parts, and at least it didn't take very long to read. BUT, I'm not the target audience. My eight year old loves it, and has gone on to read the other books in the series. She's just finished Once Upon a Curse, and started on No Place for Magic. But, keep in mind that she's not reading it entirely voluntarily. For school, she has a weekly reading log, and must read for at least 100 minutes a week for full credit. Still, a few weeks, especially when she was nearing the end of Once Upon a Curse, she's read for longer than she's had to, just to see what was going to happen in the story. I've also heard her laugh out loud a few times while reading the books, and a few times she's liked a passage so much that she's asked me to read it.

So, I guess the verdict is that if you're looking for a book for a child that's graduated from some of the simpler early readers (like the Junie B. Jones series), but isn't quite ready for young adult fiction, yet, then this series may be good for them. It's certainly rated very high on Amazon, and my daughter very much enjoys it. However, it's been so long since I've read any other children's fiction (like one of my favorites as a kid, Edith Nesbit's Five Children and It), that I don't really know how it compares to what else is out there.

Posted by Jeff on Monday, Jan 14 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I took just a little too long in getting to this review - the books aren't as fresh in my mind as they could have been. I apologize for that, but I still think that some people might be interested in my general impressions, especially considering that the first movie will be coming out shortly. Plus, it's not like I was planning on doing a detailed summary of the entire plot.

Something to get out of the way right at the beginning, is to say that if you're a devout Christian, and you don't appreciate criticism of your religion, these books aren't for you. They're a kind of anti-Chronicles of Narnia, and certainly don't present Christianity in the best light. Now, if that sort of thing doesn't bother you too much, and you can appreciate a work of fiction based on a modified version of Christianity, read on...

His Dark Materials is a trilogy written by Philip Pullman. It consists of three books, The Golden Compass (titled Northern Lights in some other countries, notably the UK), The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass. The story focuses mostly on a girl named Lyra Belacqua. She's from a universe very similar to ours, but not quite the same. The most obvious difference is that in her universe, people's souls are tangible, in the form of animal companions known as daemons, that accompany the people throughout their lives. The difference that I personally thought was most fascinating, and which was actually one of my favorite parts of the entire trilogy, is the way events had played out slightly differently in Lyra's world. For example, science and technology had developed at slighly different rates than in our universe, with scientists studying quantum mechanics, but with cars not yet having been invented. These differences also affected political & cultural aspects of the world - for example, the Muscovites living in what we would call Russia, and "New France" still being in use to describe Canada (in fact, there's a Wikipedia entry on some of this terminology).

At the start of the story, Lyra had lived her whole life so far at Jordan College, Oxford, as an orphan raised by the professors. When the Lord Asriel visited the college, Lyra snuck into the meeting where he discussed a strange "Dust" that he'd been studying in the polar regions. Not long after, the beautiful Mrs. Coulter arrived to take Lyra into her custody, to give her a proper education and upbringing. The morning she was to leave, the headmaster of the college secretly called Lyra to his office, and gave her a strange device. Without time to give her proper instruction, all he could tell her was, "It is the Alethiometer. It tells the truth. As for how to read it, you'll have to learn by yourself." Later that day, she left Oxford, and her adventure began.

All in all, I liked the books, but didn't consider them great. Perhaps my expectations were too high. I bought them largely on the recommendation of several commenters on another blog, in a discussion on the last book in the Harry Potter series. Most of those commenters considered the Dark Materials trilogy to be far superior. I also started reading the novels knowing that they were critical of Christianity, and with my recent "deconversion," I really wanted to like a book with that type of theme. Unfortunately, these books weren't the masterpieces I had hoped for. The style of writing took a while to grow on me - the books didn't grab me right from the very beginning. The ending also left me a little less than completely satisfied. I appreciate that Pullman didn't give it a Disney, and they all lived happily ever after, ending. But, it almost seemed to me that he forced some of the negative outcomes. It was as if he had decided from the outset that his story was going to have a bittersweet ending, so he had to invent the plot devices to get it there.

Before you continue reading this paragraph, I should give a spoiler warning. I'll try not to give away anything too big, but this paragraph may give away a little more than some readers would like to know... Probably the biggest thing that bothered me about this story, is that it still set humans as being apart from other animals (and the related sentient beings from parallel universes, but I'll just call them all "human" for this discussion, so I don't have to keep putting that disclaimer). It was only humans that had souls and daemons, and only humans that got to go to the afterlife. Why? Perhaps this had something to do with trying to stay as close as possible to the framework of Christian mythology, or Milton's Paradise Lost, upon which much of Pullman's story is based. But, if you're going to break from that mythology enough to have God as merely the first sentient being, and not the actual creator, it would seem to me that you're pretty free to change the mythology as much as you want. And especially for the purposes of this discussion, if you're going to have humans evolve, why would you show them as being fundamentally different from other animals, when in reality it's just differences of degree. For a story coming from this perspective, I would have liked to have seen humans portrayed as just another animal in the grand scheme of life. As long as I'm in this spoiler paragraph, I'll also point out that I had a problem with Lyra's entire motivation. She had the alethiometer, knew how to read it, and could understand when it wanted her to do something. But, when much of the theme of the book seemed to be to question authority and orthodoxy, why did she naively trust the alethiometer? How was she to know that she wasn't being manipulated by some nefarious entity?

Still, as I said, I liked the books overall, and there were many aspects worth commending. As I've already mentioned, despite the forced feel, I appreciate that Pullman gave it a bittersweet ending, when it seems that too many stories I read are sugar coated. And I very much enjoyed the alternate history that he developed for Lyra's world, and the setting it created. Aside from that, my favorite part was the character development. There wasn't a stark divide between good and evil. Characters did good things and bad things. Some did more good things than others, and some did more bad things than others. Obviously, we were supposed to sympathize with Lyra and her cause, but you could still follow the motivations of those on the other side. And even after the story was over, you're still not exactly sure who to like and who to dislike.

So, in the end, I would recommend these books, and not just because I'll earn money if you buy them through the links I provided. In fact, if you do follow those links, you'll see that all three books are rated at least 4 stars on Amazon (for now, at least - we'll see what happens as they get more publicity due to the movies, and if certain people start giving them poor ratings due to philosophical differences). They tell a pretty good story, and do get you thinking about some interesting topics. Just don't expect too much out of them, and you won't be disappointed.

Posted by Jeff on Friday, Nov 16 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From time to time, I'll receive e-mails from people asking me for advice on some good engineering books to use for aircraft design. Dan Raymer, a well respected engineer, already has a list on his website. It's a pretty long list, though, and would take a while to build up that collection. So, I figured I would recommend the ones that I use most often. The following three books are ones that I use on a regular basis that are generally useful for all aircraft.

Continue reading "Aviation Books" »

Posted by Jeff on Monday, Oct 29 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, I just announced that I was starting a new Books section, so I figure I ought to post a book review. But, I'm going to cheat a little on this first one - I'm going to combine two previous posts, with a little bit of editing, and adding only a paragraph's worth of new content.

The book is the classic, Darwin's The Origin of Species. Long before I picked up the book, I already had a pretty good understanding of evolution - better than most laymen, I'd wager. So I didn't start reading Origin of Species to try to learn anything about the theory. Rather, it was more to do with my interest in history, particularly my interest in the history of science and technology. And it doesn't disappoint.

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Posted by Jeff on Thursday, Oct 18 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

First, a quick announcement. I've decided to add a new section to this blog, Books, and this will be the inaugural entry. I don't "devour" books, but I read enough that I figure I could post little reviews here. I doubt many people will value my opinions more than just going to Amazon and reading the reviews there, and I could always just go to Amazon myself to post my reviews (which I just might end up doing), but a handful of people who know me might actually be interested in what I have to say, and might like to be able to find it all in one place. Plus, it's my blog so I can do whatever I want. Now, on to the meat of this entry...

I came across an article the other day that piqued my interest. The somewhat depressing headline of the article is, "One in four adults read no books last year," according to an AP-Ipsos poll. The rest of the article went on to list the reading habits of the rest of the country, and it got me curious as to how I fared. So first, let's take a look at what I read in the last year, as best as I can recall (this is also a shameless opportunity to link to Amazon - if you happen to buy any of the following books through these links, I'll make a few cents off it - if enough people do it I can save up enough for a gift certificate to buy a new book).

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7)
• Eragon (Inheritance, Book 1)
• Eldest (Inheritance - Book 2)
• The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, Book 1)
• The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, Book 2)
• The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials, Book 3)
• A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court*
• Fahrenheit 451
• Jonathan Livingston Seagull*
• Einstein's Dreams
• The Conquest of Gaul*
• The Origin of Species
• Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins

*-Amazon links different edition from what I read

Continue reading "Books I've Read in the Last Year" »

Posted by Jeff on Wednesday, Oct 10 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)