**spoiler alert** Woow , what a great book ! What a read ! I knew from the start this is great having been written by a couple of PHD's
So much interes**spoiler alert** Woow , what a great book ! What a read ! I knew from the start this is great having been written by a couple of PHD's
So much interesting information on why women have sex, the way they use sex to get what they want , how they can use it as a weapon for bonding, fending off poachers (rivals) , revenge, spiritual ....
Probably the most interesting chapter was the first explaining how women can actually smell good genes in a man. How their senses are way more developed than men in order to get "honest signals" of mates with good genes for reproduction and how there is always this compromise they must make: - a very good mating partner would ensure good genes for offsprings but would not use all his reosurces on them and the mother , he will likely cheat and find other females, while a good father would be a provider and ensure comfort but would not give the best genes.
Add to this the really interesting fact that women are attracted to the superior gene men while nearing ovulation after which they prefer the providers.
If i had this book wheh i was first starting out my career, i would've considered it a must read. Its like going back in time a bit, seeing first hand If i had this book wheh i was first starting out my career, i would've considered it a must read. Its like going back in time a bit, seeing first hand how the author disembowels legacy monster code - providing both C++ /Java code snippets examples (the monster+ the solution). I really enjoyed the chapters on slaying sticky singletons, blocking I/O static calls to databases and untested concrete hierarchies of classes.
The lesson of this book for me was: as soon as you get into a brown project, start writing tests, start putting your classes into test harnesses and see how deep you have to dive into the guts of the underlying system.
Once you do that you'll get a fairly good idea of the difficulty of your task
On the negatives: I found the examples in this book too focused on C++ (i got an iffy feeling when a book is too focused on a single programming languge).
I totally recommend this book for people that have to deal with legacy code or are not yet accustomed with the "modern approaches" (DRY, SOLID - which aren't that modern anymore anyway) or junior just starting out....more
Supet carte ! Cititi asta inainte sa va puna naiba sa cumparati un apartament. Cartea trateaza fiecare camera a unui apartament cu tepele tipice. Te tSupet carte ! Cititi asta inainte sa va puna naiba sa cumparati un apartament. Cartea trateaza fiecare camera a unui apartament cu tepele tipice. Te trece prin tot ce poate fi de kkt fie ca vorbim de baie in care deschiderea usii sparge closetul, apartamente "vin turcii" fara vestibul, sufragerii in care nu ai cum sa circuli si sa ai si masa cu televizor...etc.
Must-read si must keep cand va cumparati un apartament !...more
**spoiler alert** Great book covering the life of the junior british officrs in WW1 from their public schools draft, the journey from Britain to Franc**spoiler alert** Great book covering the life of the junior british officrs in WW1 from their public schools draft, the journey from Britain to France and Flanders , the entrance in the trenches, trench life , troop composition , morale, trench dangers, death , cammarederie, injury, billets , fun on leave and the eventual end of the war, getting back to civiliam life, wounds phisical and psichological and adendum.
This book is about the young britsh generation which was lost in WW1; young lords, knights, barons which attended the public schools like Eton, Oxford, Cambridge, imbued with the valors of honor, courage, fairplay , the creme a la creme, the most patriotic, and with high ideals part of the British society , THE ones that died in the largest proportion in WW1 compared to any other military rank.
They were the ones in the first line, the ones who had to jump over the trench parapet and run towards the noman's land straught into german machine guns and shelling, to inspire the regular soldiers to follow them .
The germans were prioritizing them over any other rank since they represented the core of the british doggedness and valor.
A whole generation of elite boys wiped out in just 4 years. It is said by many , this was a reason Britain lacked the skill to navigate the turbulent politics of the 30's.
Awesome read, penetrating all aspects of these young men short but glorious life....more
**spoiler alert** My experience with Faulkner's books so far has been like the sawtooth , a great book followed by a total garbage blabbering.
First bo**spoiler alert** My experience with Faulkner's books so far has been like the sawtooth , a great book followed by a total garbage blabbering.
First book was Light in August which was awesome, cut to the point, murder of black upon white neatly packed with southern atmosphere.
The next was Absalom a total trash , waiting 400 pages without any hint , and getting the whole story in the last 20 pages, full of useless southie blabber.
Then The Mansion was a total masterpiece happening in Mississippi...
And now behold the rule stands, another trash !
300 pages of useless southie negro blabber with hints here and there, add to this the fact that we have a Quentin female and a Quentine male , whose arcs overlap (similar to what Vargas Llosa does with multiple timelines) and you get a total shit show of trying to understand what the fuck happens there.
I didn't understand the plot completely , hell i didn't understand why Quentin was sometimes called as 'he' and sometimes as 'she'.
The ending was something along the lines of "shit happened , we move with our life"
Hemingway was right when he said to Faulkner he doesn't need 100 complicated to write a good story....
If i would've read this book first and only , i would've probably ditched Faulkner forever, now i feel like every book of his is like a tossing of a coin. Heads for masterpiece, tails for utter garbage.
And this shit book gets so much attention , unbelievable !...more
**spoiler alert** When you send a picture or some text over the internet, or you record your voice or some video , you make a call with someone, or wh**spoiler alert** When you send a picture or some text over the internet, or you record your voice or some video , you make a call with someone, or when DNA is replicated all of this can be seen as information and can be efficiently translated into a sequence of 0 or 1, that is BITS or binary format
This is what Claude Shannon gave to the world , a unified way of viewing , encoding , compressing information and sending it over a communication channel from the sender to the receiver. It was a blast, it changed the world as we know it. He was the ancestor of the digital age, the father of information theory , the theory upon whose shoulders lies the world we see today.
The second ground breaking theory was that Shannon solved the issue of noise. A sender encodes a message using a tranceiver , sends it over a channel, arriving at a receiver that decodes it. The channel is ALWAYS noisy , it will always distort your message. When you talk with someone over the phone , or on the street there is noise. When DNA is replicated , there are always faulty mutations that can lead to cancer , that is noise. When you send morse code , it can be distorted...etc.. So Shannon proved that there is a formula between the channel capacity, bandwidth and the ratio of noise to signal.
This second theory changed everything since it proved that if you can send messges with very high accurancy that are not affected by noise IF you keep your payload UNDER the channel's capacity.
But Shannon was not a man of ego or fame, what defines him was a brilliant playful mind always tinkering at some interesting mathematical-engineering problem. He had a brilliant intuition and he would first use his hands to tackle a problem (build a prototype) and then write the math to back it up. He didn't have time to fool around prizes , medals , fame glory ...he wanted to play , and played he did , monocycles , juggling , building robots , rat labyrinths.
What a book and what a man Claude Shannon was , and to think that he met and befriended, Alan Turing , Von Neumann , and many other collosus of his age in the 1940s and 1950s.
**spoiler alert** Am inceput anul cum nu se putea mai bine cu povestea primei mari expeditii de explorare a Antarcticii.
La 1898 baiietii astia, o adun**spoiler alert** Am inceput anul cum nu se putea mai bine cu povestea primei mari expeditii de explorare a Antarcticii.
La 1898 baiietii astia, o adunatura pestrita de belgieni, norvegieni , al nostru Emil Racovita si altii , pornesc spre Antarctica la bordul vasului Belgica, si ajung sa ramana blocati pe banchiza de gheata in iarna emisferei sudice trecand prin chinuri groaznice datorate lipsei de lumina , a lipsei de mancare proaspete, a fricii continue ca nava va fi spulberata de gheata.
Vedem efectele devastatoare ale scorbutului, insomniei , fricii , depresiei , nebuniei , singuratatii si disperarii asupra mintii umane atunci cand este prinsa un cusca. Suspansul este prezent in fiecare capitol, fie nava este in pericol sa fie spulberata , fie marinarii in pericol sa cada in apa antarcticii , fie cineva innebuneste si fuge in noapte....o casa de nebuni...asa este denumita corabia in timpul incastrarii sale in gheata.
Vedem si setea de aventura, ideile nebunesti care se dovedesc eroice in acele momente (ex: taierea a unui poligon de 1.7 km lungime de gheata si 100m latime spre a elibera vasul din gheata ) .
Expeditia compusa din 18 oameni, ii are ca protagonisti pe: - Adrian de Gerlache , taticul misiunii cel care incropeste prima expeditie internationala , si care bazandu-se pe valorile patriotice ale tinerei republici belgiene reuseste sa stranga fonduri pentru calatorie. In cinstea sa Stramtoarea dintre America de Sud si Antarctica ii poarta numele. - Amundsen - norvegianul legendar care in ultima decada a lui 1800 cocheta cu cucerirea polului Nord , se antrena in nordul Norvegiei innoptand in pesteri. Pentru el aceasta calatorie reprezinta "boot camp"-ul pentru un sir legendar de cuceriri printre care si Polul Sud - Cook - doctorul american fara de care expeditia s-ar fi transformat in tragedie. El este primul care studiaza efectele lipsei soarelui si a luminii pe perioade indelungate asupra omului , primul care intuieste terapia cu culori , cel care ii tine in viata pe ai sai , si tamaduieste lipsa vitaminei C care provoaca scorbut (din lipsa de alimente proaspete) dandu-le colegilor sai sa manance carne de pinguin si foca cruda, tot el face design-ul cortului de tip conic , cort cr va fi folosit ani mai tarziu de Amundsen in timpul calatoriei cuceririi Polului Sud. Il avem si pe Lecointe capitanul , Emil Racovita care descopera sute de noi specimene de paraziti, plancton , si care in numele stiintei omoara zeci de specimene de pinguini , le diseca si le impaiaza (specimene ce se gasesc si astazi la muzeul de zoologie in Belgia) si multi alti savanti.
Pe langa faptul ca misiunea a fost superb descrisa , am apreciat foarte mult faptul ca am fost iluminat cu privire la istoria finalului de secol XIX si prima decada a celui urmator. Anii 1890 si 1900 sa acum impresia unei forfote neintrerupte , a unei curse intense intre exploratori pentru a cuceri cele mai inalte varfuri , cele mai indepartate tinuturi , cele mai neospitaliere puncte de pe pamant , si populatii intregi care alimentau aceaste curse, cumparand-le revistele, finantand-le expeditiile si totul in numele patriei, a gloriei si a stiintei.
Spre deosebire de Arctica unde corporatiile petroliere au acaparat regiunea su nu exista cooperare intee natiuni , Antarctica datorita lui de Gerlache si a urmasilor sai a ramas un loc pasnic , un loc al cooperari intre natiuni.
**spoiler alert** This book sparked my interest for travelling to the North Far East region of Asia especially along the border with Russia.
Erika does**spoiler alert** This book sparked my interest for travelling to the North Far East region of Asia especially along the border with Russia.
Erika does a terrific job adding geopolitic facts regarding the relationships of Russia with its neighbouring countries across the centuries.
I loved the chapter about the region of Manciuria and its uneasy history with both Japan and Russia.
Probably the most interesting was the Chinesse city of Harbin , city build mostly underground in case the nuclear holocaust would start , a city where one could spend its entire day underground and not see the light of day , also the city where japoanese had done Mengele-style experiment just before WW2.
I definetly want to visit the chinese far west province of Xianjiang , the home of Uighurs, turcik people getting discriminated and sent to concentration camps and their resistance via muslim apartenence.
I also enjoyed Erika-s journey in Kazakhstan , i understood the intricate ethnic composition of the population (russian minority in the north and Kazakh in the south) hence the leader moved the capital from Almaty to Astana to better oversee the russians. Also important sites like the Russian cosmodrome of Baikonur where Yuri Gagarin took off an Sputnik satelites made history.
I now have a more clear understanding of which regions are populated by turcik ethnical groups and where do the chinese start.
The Caucasus chapter was incredible , Georgia's fight and resistance against Russia , and how its border gets moved by a few meters everyday in the province of Abkhazia, or how Suhumi was a leader worldwide in medicine , having thousands of monkeys for testing. Armenia is also covered with its Nagorno Karabakh troubles
Ukraine is covered very well including the Donbass region (from both Russian and Ukrainian side).
The baltics were impresive , especially Lithuania and the utopia that the russians in Latvia are living.
Another very interesting part of the book was Finland complex history with Russia and also with Germany right before and during WW2. Being first under swedish rule , then its borders moved around , fighting Russia , then declaring itself friend of Russia.
A well made book full of juicy details, plenty of dialogues with the locals around the main subject of the book : how do you view Russia, how has Russia shaped your mentality and how has Russia influenced the state of affairs of your country along the centuries.
Its really incredible and many times shizophrenic how Russia's former subjects see its former big daddy.
Wonderdul book, well researched, i recommend it wholeheartedly !...more
**spoiler alert** Great book on understanding the demographics, politics and geopolitics of the Horn of Africa , the migrant routes as well as the Red**spoiler alert** Great book on understanding the demographics, politics and geopolitics of the Horn of Africa , the migrant routes as well as the Red Sea.
Eritrea with its strategic location with ports at the Red Sea, was first under the Ottomans, then used by the Italians as springboard for attacking Ethiopia as well as under British.
Eritrea has muslims in the western lowlands bordering Sudan and Christians in the mountains at the east which is also a tension generating factor.
There has always been issues with the border demarcation between Ethiopia and Eritrea. The Tigray population is living in both countries. While the Tigray living in Ethiopia historically wanted more autonomy from Addis Abeba, the ones in Eritrea wanted independence. The two actors worked together until they faced off into a bloody war.
Starting with the 70's Eritrea went through a 30 year long war against Ethiopia for independence.
The central figure that emerged was Isaias Afwerki , the soon to become dictator who is still in control to this day , known to many as leading the most repressive regime in the world, a regime so repressive that it exacts a 2% tax from its diaspora all over the world, in order to keep contact with their families or be provided consulate services !
Eritrea is a country locked in a no-war ,no -peace situation where youth are conscripted to the army for indefinite periods , some serving for 20 years. Women are raped and treated as slaves. Every month thousands of Eritreans flee the country , knowing all too well that the border guards have "shoot to kill" orders.
I didn't know that approximately 25% of migrants every year flooding Europe are from Eritrea ! From 157000 illegal migrants arriving in Europe in 2015 , 39000 were Eritreans.
The book does a great job detailing how Eritreans run to Sudan , then cross to Libya , then try to take dingies and get to Greece or Italy. Or they go to Sudan and from there try to get to Sinai and into Israel.
The regime in Eritrea is a destabilizing factor in the horn of Africa , running a covert economy , financing terror groups like Al Shabaab in Somalia in order to destabilize Ethiopia , mingling in interior affairs of Sudan , and even assisting the Emirates and Saudi Arabia against the Houthis.
Despite numerous attempts by USA , Europe and China to lead the country to a better future Isaias keeps a tight leash to this day on his subjects.
**spoiler alert** Great book to familiarise yourself a bit with the politics of Indochina of the last century.
I didn't know much about the Khmer Rouge**spoiler alert** Great book to familiarise yourself a bit with the politics of Indochina of the last century.
I didn't know much about the Khmer Rouge , just that they massacred people in Cambodia. I wasn't expecting a regime so criminal to kill, enslave and work till death and have no pity for its own youth. The savagery portrayed in this book displayed upon children of all ages was beyond what i was expecting. Torturing children as young as 8 for not being able to work the ricefields, letting them die of starvation, malaria. This is mostly a drama about a generationt which was almost wiped out by the Khmer Rouge.
I also appreciated the chapters of the liberation, when Vietnamese military ('PARA' troops) entered Cambodia to free the population of oppressors, the same Vietnamesse which fought tooth and nail a bloody guerilla war against the Americans just a few years earlier. For americans the vietnamesse were the boogeyman, for the cambodians they were saviors.
I also enjoyed the regufee camps chapters on the border with Thailand, the cruelty and usury of Thai soldiers upon the poor Cambodian refugees.
This book was a another picture of Indochina for me besides the Vietcong movies and the Thai hookers/drugs stereotypes....more
Loading...
