The economist writers are like chatGPT of journalism. It all sounds fine and you think it's great right up to the point it's on a topic you know /anything/ at all about. Suddenly every single time, just on the topics you know just something of it has no depth, no understanding and has no idea what facts it just made up.
The writers are clearly intelligent and literary it's just they genuinely don't care to understand the subject of their writing. Try it for yourself. Pick anything you know a bit about then read the economist on it. It's a partial crib sheet at best.
I pick investing above and think that list is shallow. Any takers for Florida, poker, Scottish independence, banned books?
> It all sounds fine and you think it's great right up to the point it's on a topic you know /anything/ at all about. Suddenly every single time, just on the topics you know just something of it has no depth
These are related facts -- journalism for general audiences will always come off shallow to experts. Experts are better off seeking niche publications catering to their expertise, and just supplementing that with some general audience material.
Even the experts recognize they layperson vs expert audience distinction -- if you look at Andrew Gelman's five book recommendations, none of them are going to transform you into an expert. At best they are the 5 books that got him excited about the _idea_ statistics.
You're conflating two things and that is probably my fault.
The list of books here is shallow. Asking a few investment professionals would have got them to a better list, IMHO. If they don't care about investment, why write it?
Separate to that. The economist is flipping terrible. Beyond, shallow, actually very, very wrong in obvious ways on anything you know about - that kind of lack of depth of understanding. Someone here asked me why I think the economist worse than other news and I guess its because I take it more personally how messed up they are because in the broadest possible sense they accord to similar politics and ideology to myself. A lefty friend of mine, who is intelligent and sensible put me onto it with respect their incessant drum beating for every possible war. Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, Libya, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq - all of them and more. It was suggested to me to look at one current event in a small amount of depth, the kind you'd expect a journalist to be able to match. Eg, join twitter [1], follow some people who seem to know things, read their links critically, anything good you find, follow the author, cull that list of anyone you later decide is not up to much. Then go read the economist on it with a view to just finding the number of salient and important facts that you would use yourself to form a view and think it ridiculous to leave out that the economist somehow manages not to note at all. It didn't make me a lefty but I sure changed my ideas on the economist dramatically.
Try it yourself one day. There's shallow because depth is impossible in x hundreds words and there's deeply misleading in beautiful language.
Pick A.I. or Microchips fabs, or Julian Assange, or Electric Vehicles or end to end encryption or anything you want to know a little more about. Do the work for a few evenings first then go to the economist's take.
YMMV of course it may. Mine sure suddenly did.
[1] Never post, delete the a/c when you're done - keep it focused on finding things out.
It's true that the writers of the economist are frequently glib. This is compounded by their very strict style guide and editors. Everything sounds paradoxically very distinctive and generic, and it reads like it's all written by the same person. So I can relate to your GPT comment too.
But they very rarely get the big picture wrong. Geopolitics, global economic trends, American politics from a distance, etc. I don't think 5 books on this or pop science that are why most people read it.
So I agree with you, but I also like the paper a lot.
Do you think the Economist is unusual here? Journalists are overwhelmingly dilettantes even about subjects they have covered as a beat, with limited knowledge. That’s what journalism is.
Sure there's always Gell-Mann amnesia [1] And we put less stock in USA Today or Yahoo! news stories than the NYT. Or at least used to.
The thing that is particularly bad with respect to the economist is that there are many intelligent, thoughtful, educated people who haven't spotted just how terrible it is. The economist is also particularly bad given they push an agenda then fit the reporting they plagiarise to match that agenda with no references and no byline.
"Chat GPT write me an article with respect domestic politics of country X that supports the next possible war between the west and country Y." Chat GPT doesn't write as well as the economist oxbridge grads however the actual content is no worse.
I was recently recommended the sci-fi space opera "A Fire Upon the Deep" by Vernor Vinge. That was an absolute blast to read. If you're into computer science, you'll really dig it.
I think A Deepness In The Sky is actually better, especially for people on here. The story takes place on spaceships thousands of years in the future, but the characters are still using code based on Unix timestamps, and still complaining about legacy software.
100 percent. I read deepness before fire, and was terribly disappointed by the latter, even though it was a perfectly great book - just didn't measure up.
There is a deeper story. The realistic technical details are the bones; the flesh is the relationships between two human civilizations and a less-advanced alien race that doesn't know humans exist.
His "True Names" is everything you need to know about "cyberspace", written in 1981 but still seems modern today:
> True Names is a 1981 science fiction novella by American writer Vernor Vinge, a seminal work of the cyberpunk genre. It is one of the earliest stories to present a fully fleshed-out concept of cyberspace, which would later be central to cyberpunk. The story also contains elements of transhumanism, anarchism, and even hints about The Singularity.
> True Names first brought Vinge to prominence as a science fiction writer. It also inspired many real-life hackers and computer scientists; a 2001 book about the novella, True Names: And the Opening of the Cyberspace Frontier, included essays by Danny Hillis, Marvin Minsky, Mark Pesce, Richard Stallman and others.[1] It was awarded the Prometheus Hall of Fame Award in 2007.
The thing I found amazing when I found Verner Vinge was that there were still sci-fi authors of his calibre that I had never heard of, given I have been reading sci-fi since I was 8. There are more things in this world etc etc.
A Fire Upon The Deep belongs on any sci-fi cannon and is probably top 10.
I’m still looking for the next such author. Sadly I think I have expired the list since I haven’t found any new great ones in the past six years. I’ve read pretty much all the classics though.
Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time trilogy is in that window, and it's fantastic. They might have been a one-off; his Shards of Earth book is not on its level.
I find this to be simplistic pop intelectual nonsense. This is not how to learn anything.
It's way more meaningful to understand and pursue your own actual interests than to humble brag by ticking the "correct" readings.
Not to mention that talking about the best anything is basically meaningless, except for very tightly constrained achievements (e.g. we can talk about the best sprinter, but who's the best philosopher? or the best mathematician?)
You don’t learn anything by reading books? So if you have an interest in astronomy you don’t learn by reading books on astronomy? How do you learn, then? Must one go study to become an astronomer as the first step? Won’t you have to read a book on it at some point?
> It's way more meaningful to understand and pursue your own actual interests
What does this mean in practice, and how does it invalidate reading? Can’t you understand and pursue an interest in philosophy by reading philosophy books?
> than to humble brag by ticking the "correct" readings.
Who’s talking about humble bragging? Wether you brag or not it’s up to you, I don’t see anything on the website encouraging you to do so.
> Not to mention that talking about the best anything is basically meaningless, except for very tightly constrained achievements
The website is very upfront about how it works:
> We ask experts to recommend the five best books in their subject and explain their selection in an interview.
Seems like a good way to begin exploring. If you’re interested in a subject the website points you to someone they consider to be knowledgeable of the field, that person has recommendations to get your started, and they explain why they picked each one.
Maybe I missed something about the reason you oppose the website, but on the face of it I don’t see what’s so wrong as to justify such vehement disapproval.
> Maybe I missed something about the reason you oppose the website...
It sounds like you took the primary criticism in the parent comment to be about reading in general.
I took it to mean that the best way to learn say economics is not to read one of "the top 5 recommended books on economics" but rather start by googling a specific aspect or question about economics that interests you and then following the thread.
Granted, reading one of the top 5 books may be a great entry point for many people but I think there's also a false promise of knowledge offered by sites like this.
> It sounds like you took the primary criticism in the parent comment to be about reading in general.
I took it as being about this website or something the website represents. I do hope no one is against reading in general.
> I took it to mean that the best way to learn (…) start by googling a specific aspect
People learn different subjects in different ways. Perhaps googling fits some people and some subjects, but if you don’t know anything about a field you don’t know which questions it makes sense to search for or which websites to trust.
> but I think there's also a false promise of knowledge offered by sites like this.
I don’t get that at all from this particular website. They’re quite open that they’re presenting “the best books as recommended by X”. The person doing the recommendation is an integral part, they are interviews.
Yep fair points. I should say, given this is hackernews there's every chance you might know the person who made this and if you are coming at it from something like this angle, I can understand your frustration.
The site is a nice idea and does what it says honestly and well. I certainly don't have anything bad to say about the people who like it or who made it.
My feeling towards these sites is more of a personal frustration I have with the advertisement of books in general - whether that be through good reads, best seller lists, book stores etc.
I often find myself making lists of books to read like this but all it ever results in is me beating myself up for never getting around to them. On the other hand, the way I have actually learnt things has always been through googling an interest and following the thread. Often the thread leads me to reading a book or two. But rarely does the thread lead me to needing to find the top 5 books on x.
For me these sites mostly just create a sense of guilt for not having read the relevant "must read" books.
I suspect this is what's behind OPs frustration at the idea of "ticking off" books on a list.
Not OOP but - they sell you pop science (or economics or what have you) and make you think that after reading 1 book you'll be an expert in that field.
Most people haven't studied any single field deeply, and they don't know how many hours of commitment it takes, how much practice, how much failure, how many projects & validated hypotheses it takes to actually understand something.
Reading a book written for non-experts is barely going to give you a sense of what you don't know, nothing more.
They're implying, "read this and you'll become an expert." Again try to read this through the eyes of someone who hasn't become an expert at anything. That's the target audience. Anyone who has, would never read the most popular book on a subject to learn from it, They'd read the introductory books meant for people who are planning to go on to study that subject.
> they sell you pop science (or economics or what have you) and make you think that after reading 1 book you'll be an expert in that field.
No, they do not. I picked one interview at random and one from the homepage:
The interview about food books¹ has one solely about cheese which is praised for the photographs. On three of them the story of the people is the focus.
The interview on perfume² has two fiction books.
> They're implying, "read this and you'll become an expert."
This is demonstrably not the case. These are books on specific subjects that certain people familiar with the fields find interesting and worthy of your time. No one is selling you the idea that you’ll become an expert if you read them. You might be assuming they are, but the content tells a different story.
> Must one go study to become an astronomer as the first step?
Ideally yes, but failing that you learn from textbooks. Popsci books, at their best, get people interested and maybe manage to convey a few only moderately distorted factoids. They don't teach anything of substance.
Perhaps the “Best textbooks on every subject” thread[1] at Less Wrong will be more to your liking?
(I have found good popsci books to sometimes be better at conveying historical context, though, simply because textbooks may consider that context to be out of scope, and in a formal settings your professor’s asides would compensate for that. Then, of course, there are textbooks disguised as popsci ones, like Aaronson’s quantum computing one.)
I think part of my point was covered by nathansherburn's sibling comment
> It sounds like you took the primary criticism in the parent comment to be about reading in general.
> I took it to mean that the best way to learn say economics is not to read one of "the top 5 recommended books on economics" but rather start by googling a specific aspect or question about economics that interests you and then following the thread.
I think my reaction was a bit vehement because it's not the first time I've encountered (albeit well intentioned) lists of "great books" on HN. In general I've grown to dislike ticking lists of things, be they books, "things to do before you die" etc. I just feel like this is too simplistic of an approach to anything in life. In my experience, the things that I learned best or the most meaningful experiences I've had were self-guided, often extemporaneous, almost always not matching neat prior expectations.
> Who’s talking about humble bragging? Wether you brag or not it’s up to you, I don’t see anything on the website encouraging you to do so.
True. This was mostly conjecture on my part as I've seen many people having neat lists of read books on their private sites/blogs (or links to goodreads etc.).
Addressing specifically the content on the website, I can say that the lists often seemed arbitrary, too granular or simply besides the point. I won't go into details, but I find all/most of the following to be confused, confusing, cutesy pop-intellectualism:
https://fivebooks.com/best-books/nicholas-higham-applied-mat... (recurring theme, well exemplified here, is of books about smth, not something books. You're not gonna learn maths from these books. You're not even gonna start learning maths from these books.)
I've always viewed these lists as a "starter pack for beginners" - allowing people to dip their toes into fields that they are curious about (or should be dagnabbit!) and giving them an idea of how rich the field is, whilst they should also be encouraging people to dig deeper if they have found something that has really piqued their interests.
Agreed, the first thing I did was look at the categories in which I can argue I have expertise... And the five recommended books in each of these is grade 10 level pop-science at best.
The quantum computing books include at least one undergraduate text (Quantum Computing for Computer Scientists) and a more expansive reference (Quantum Computation and Quantum Information).
The CS books for data science include two undergraduate texts (SICP; Algorithm Design Manual by Skiena).
The regular CS books include two different undergraduate texts (Algorithms by Sedgewick and Wayne; Types and Programming Languages). I actually haven't read the latter, so maybe I will pick it up!
SICP is obviously a bona fide classic of CS and a great top 5 candidate. I also like Skiena's book a lot (and his lectures are available online and quite good).
The first category in the "education" section is a list of the five best novels set in boarding schools. I don't think they're suggesting that reading those books will make you an expert on how to operate/regulate/attend a boarding school.
It's just a bunch of lists of good books for people looking for something to read, arranged by subject. There's nothing wrong with that.
When ever I am getting into a new topic I try to start with OUP's Very Short Introduction series [0]. They generally do not give good understanding but they orient you in the field and provide extensive bibliographies along with the knowledge required to navigate that bibliography and select the sources which will give you the information you desire instead of what someone else thinks you want. Failing that I just go down to the library and talk to the librarian.
They are an invaluable resource just don't get too caught up in trying to understand everything they present, they are introductions and about giving you the tools needed to pursue the study of the field, not about giving you a full education. They only take a night or two to read and the bibliographies are within the scope of the introduction they provide, they don't load you down with books that are beyond the knowledge of the sort who would be reading such a book.
I can't tell if "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" is in there or not. If not, "The Elegant Universe" would be my suggestion for the one to throw out to make room for it.
String theory is not science. Maybe that one could fit somewhere in Religion /s
I would love to see a small, maybe opinionated list of science books, each, in one volume, giving a full overview of the field in an approachable way, like:
It would be a nice collection and a chance to at least get a general overview over all of science, and discover just how patchy my knowledge really is :)
Reviewing some of the books on computer science, there's an English writing book recommended for "Computer Science for Data Scientists", "Thinking Fast and Thinking Slow" for Artificial Intelligence, for Naval History (20th Century) it's two WWI books, one inter war period, one WWII and then one on the British Submarines since then... not a good overall history, and for Ancient Rome "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" which has important significance for understanding the evolution of the study of Roman history, but is not a good source anymore.
In short, this seems to be taking some famous books related to a field without actually selection the five "best" ones.
Curation is solid. Depends on who they pick as the subject matter expert, but for example, their Shakespeare biography recommendations are themselves from one of the best living Shakespeare biographers. [1]
I find "Five Books" picks better than Amazon recommendations, and faster than Google/Reddit searches. Example: search "wine book" on Amazon and it's all wine textbooks and pretty-but-vapid coffee table books. Meanwhile, Five Books will suggests Kermit Lynch's fantastic cult classic wine memoir [2].
Personally, I think Amazon’s recommendation quality has declined precipitously over the last year or so. I find the way they do the recommendations page now to be totally worthless. Often, more than half the books recommended are different formats of books I’ve already purchased from them. The old format, by genre etc., was much more usable. Goodreads does a better job, but it’s far from perfect, e.g., mystery recommendations under science, etc. In reality, I frequently get better recommendations by searching books on Hacker News.
I looked through the sci-fi and fantasy sections and there were some odd choices. For example, Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation was recommended as a "climate change novel" book. It's hard for me to see how this makes any sense.
Other weird suggestions:
* Ender's Game under Best Apocalyptic Fiction
* Parable of the Talents under Best Sci Fi Books on Space Settlement - this is real stretch since the book takes place entirely on Earth, though it does feature a religion that focuses on spreading humanity to other planets.
I mean... I guess the climate did change, but it didn't seem like that had anything to do with anthropomorphic climate change, which is surely the implied idea of the category
Based on my limited perusal of areas I have some familiarity with, I'd say they're pretty good.
Could I bicker? Yes. But it would be in "these aren't quite the top five but they're in my top ten" type as opposed to "why are you recommending Mein Kampf as a cookbook".
Is recommending "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins as a "best book on Quantum Theory" good enough for your taste?
Anyway, any list of "The best books on X, recommended by Some Noname" almost by definition is not going to be very reliable, so that's all I can say. Just another bullshit website to earn commission via Amazon referral links by recommending random bullshit to innocent victims. I recon it might have been more useful if it was entirely generated by ChatGPT.
As a generalization I have to disagree, at least in America for high-school subjects. I looked at both the math and biology texts from recent years. The math texts were written by people who didn't understand math, and the biology text was so focussed on the No Child Left Behind Act requirements that it was rubbish. (Also look for Richard Feynmann's experience reviewing textbooks). Undoubtedly there are good textbooks out there, but they are just as much in need of review and recommendation as non-textbooks.
Would be more interesting/useful to see a meta-list ranking the books that come up more than once in recommendations, sorted from most frequent to least frequent.
I'm one of the founders of the site. We set it up in 2009 and have kept it going by using affiliate links. The affiliate links cover some of the costs, but not all. We interview people who know about a field (often professors) either via Zoom (now, it used to be Skype or phone) or in person, as my background is in journalism.
Feel free to ask questions!
i struggle to find categories on the front page containing falsifiable assertions
where are the best five books on linear algebra, on signal processing, on control theory, on equid phylogeny, on group theory, on energy-efficient architectural design, on civil engineering?
for example, they do have a list of five books on programming. but it includes 'clean code', by that unqualified blowhard bob martin? the cs for data science list looks possibly okay
and their recommendations for philosophy of technology come from... evgeny morozov? are they deliberately trying to get terrible recommendations?
To do better I'd want to sort/filter at least semiautomatically by personal taste/judgement -- that could use a UI along the lines of the one I prototyped for a client for image search in the late 2000s, maybe mixed with ideas from Advogato. That's starting to sound like work, to make a new system and get it to be popular enough to accumulate enough data to work with. I wonder if there's an open-data form of something like this five-books site (not this one: https://fivebooks.com/Terms-of-Service/)
Afrofuturism is a cultural aesthetic, philosophy of science, and history that explores the intersection of the African diaspora culture with science and technology. It addresses themes and concerns of the African diaspora through technoculture and speculative fiction, encompassing a range of media and artists with a shared interest in envisioning black futures that stem from Afro-diasporic experiences. While Afrofuturism is most commonly associated with science fiction, it can also encompass other speculative genres such as fantasy, alternate history, and magic realism. The term was coined by Mark Dery, an American Cultural critic in 1993 and explored in the late 1990s through conversations led by Alondra Nelson.
Afro-futurism isn't a new thing. It's represented by musical oeuvres such as Sun Ra (Space is the place) to writings, oddly as a white author, by Alastair Reynolds in the "Poseidon's Children Universe" (where elephants make it into space).
What is unique about this that warrants an HN submission? These are just highly-opinionated lists. A neuroscience category without Jaak Panksepp? Get real.
- The Scottish Independence Movement - https://www.economist.com/the-economist-reads/2023/05/02/wha...
- Poker - https://www.economist.com/the-economist-reads/2023/04/16/wha...
- Florida - https://www.economist.com/the-economist-reads/2023/04/16/wha...
- Investing - https://www.economist.com/the-economist-reads/2023/04/26/fiv...
- Books you’re forbidden from reading - https://www.economist.com/the-economist-reads/2023/02/24/sev...