Books read in 2024
Runhang / 2024-04-04
- 重温了《哲学-科学-常识》- 陈嘉映. Rate:10/10. It was not until that I revisited this book for the second time, I realized why some reads are worth reading a thousand times. I cannot say how much resonance I had when I was reading this book. If you want to have global and philosophical views of pursuing truth, discovering unknowns, and later developing into modern science. You will also appreciate why the highest degree in science is called a PhD, Doctor of Philosophy.
- 读了四分之一,由于时间有限和不想阅读pdf,再加上其实我读到的部分仅仅是对苏格兰近代史的一个详细记载,以及它与英格兰的爱恨情仇。最后弃之。
A matter of degree - Gino Segre. Rate: 10/10. A book that I was waiting for years to come across. Born in Florence in 1938, Segre lived his earlier childhood in the US because of the anti-semitic laws enacted in Italy. He later went to Havard and MIT for education. His uncle Emilio Segrè is a Nobel laureate physicist. From page to page, I was frequently amazed by how much knowledge Prof. Segre had, ranging from physics to biology. The most fascinating part of this book is that he successfully combined all of the realms in STEM and discussed them under one aspect - temperature!
经典费曼 - Rate: 10/10. This book vividly revealed the personalities of this great American physicist, artist, and mathematician Dr. Feynman. Interesting and amazing personal stories and unique life experiences all made this person well-rounded in many aspects such as building the atomic bomb in the Manhattan Project, playing drums in Brazil during his one-year sabbatical, sketching live nude models in Pasadena, winning a Nobel prize, inspecting NASA’s 1986 Space shuttle Challenger accident, picking up Las Vegas showgirls… Anyhow, his life cannot be copied. I believe it is a kind of life that many people would envy while he probably created many enemies on the road of finding the truth (the NASA disaster case). He said that “nature cannot be fooled”. He thinks “being-unknowing is better than knowing a wrong answer” because scientific knowledge has different levels of certainty. Some are uncertain, some are largely certain, but nothing is completely certain. Again, when I was reading this book I was often surprised by how wide were his interests and how acute was his intellect.
- 新药的故事 - 梁贵柏. Rate: 8/10. 像是一本默沙东(Merck)的中国宣传书。读到默沙东无私的把乙肝疫苗技术转让给中国这个乙肝大国时,我还是挺感动的,讲好了默沙东的“中国故事”。When we talk about big pharmaceutical companies, there are so many negative impressions of their overpriced drugs, corruption (bribery and kickbacks), availability, side effects/drug addiction, and so on. However, in this book, I learned that Merck was almost a charity during the early times. In the 40th, Merck (led by George W. Merck) kindly released all the patents for producing streptomycin after discussing with Rutgers and Waksman, which means it gave up its monopoly over streptomycin. In 1987, the later Merck CEO (P. Roy Vagalos) continued Merck’s spirits and donated Mectizan to anyone who needed it across the world. The donation was estimated worth $3.7B. That is the golden age when scientists felt proud to be in big pharma. When big pharma cares not only about competition and revenue but also about making a healthier world, it is playing an irreplaceably positive role in this world. Unfortunately, the old-time is gone because of out-of-control capitalism and I hope the old mode can be resumed.
- Model of my life - Herbert Simon. I found it hard to focus on this book. Maybe it is because I have not read any of Dr. Simon’s scientific thesis or papers.
牛棚杂忆 - 季羡林. Rate: 8/10. 看书名还以为是描写的是一本关于乡土人情的回忆。殊不知是季先生那惨痛的十年,只不过用幽默略带自嘲自贬的手法描写出来了。他能做到“唾面自干”,忍受曾经尊敬自己的学生对自己的批判,忍受极苦的生存条件,放弃了吃安眠药的“自觉于人民”,最后对自杀也麻木了。这场革命不应该是起因于一篇对于《海瑞罢官》的评论,京剧受众太小了。从文字可以看出季先生写的相当克制,其千疮百孔的心在对任何事情的时候都产生了可左可右的看法。无论如何,我给的8分是因为这是一段非常珍贵的历史研究资料。不忘却那段历史,揭开它的真面目,才能极大的避免重蹈覆辙。我欣赏季先生的大度,在平反后,他并没有选择报复曾经整他的那些人。季先生还希望看到另一方的声音,尽管这是一个不切实际的期待。他奢望那些当年把无数学者折磨至死的那批人(现在也古稀耄耋之年了,有的官居要津),也可以发表下自己折磨人时候的心态,因为现存的这样的资料为零。
国富国穷 - 兰德斯. Rate: 7.5/10. 印象最深并且论证最有道理的应该是开篇的第一章节:讨论了地理位置导致的气候对经济发展的影响。富裕的国家基本处于温带或者海洋性气候,而非洲、拉美地区贫穷图景与热带气候有关。后面的长篇大论倒是像一本近代简史,横跨五大洲,跨时五百年,令人失望的是较少的正面讨论了到底什么是导致以西方为中心的“国富”和大多数被殖民者的“穷”(日本、韩国除外)。作者旁征博引,宏大的叙述了那段殖民时期的全球贸易、国家兴衰、经济史,对知识的体系的扩充有一定意义。这本发表于2000年的书,译者称本书基本观点师承于亚当斯密1776年的国富论。我下一步得去拜读,考证一下。
那些忧伤的年轻人 - 许知远. Rate: 8.5/10. 通过电视节目《十三邀》才了解到许老师,他通过与各行各业的嘉宾进行深层次的对话,去寻找人生的真谛和智慧,在观看的过程中我受益非浅,问题的尺度以及对于性的开放讨论在我看来是中国电视节目里前所未有的。因为我印象中的70后,60后的长辈们对很多事情都是缄默不言的。于是我打开了这本许在25岁那年出版的书。不得不感叹,许是少见充满了人文关怀的理科生,对人生的思考充满着古希腊的浪漫主义色擦以及受美国迷惘的一代作家影响的放浪形骸。我认为看人的思想要看他年轻的时候说了什么,于是我选择读许老师年轻时候写的书,这个时期是最青涩,也最敢讲的。他毫不掩饰自己对中国当时的教育体系的失望和悲观,憧憬着象牙塔的回归,如果二十年过去了,许写的问题不仅还在,还一群急功近利的推动下变得更加严重了。互联网如此发达,大学其实正在失去对知识的垄断权,知识更新迭代快得惊人,我也不再需要跑到图书馆找一本被淘汰了的脑神经学书籍。许引发我的对”大学为社会扮演了一个怎样的角色“的思考。从西南联大谈到德国洪堡大学,许老师无时无刻不透露出忧国忧民的心态。
你不可不知的人性2 - 刘墉. Rate: 9/10. 就冲这本书名,我是起初是非常不情愿去看的。反思自己怎么会也掉入这样的俗套,开始“入世”了起来。确实,就想刘老师书里说的,只有做到“入世”才能“出世”。这本书并不是一碗碗冷冰冰的鸡汤不带勺子,丢给你。它更像是一个老爷爷给你讲一个个非常真实的小故事,然后领悟出为人处事之基本原理,即commonsense。
不安之书 - 费尔南多·佩索阿.
Getting to Yes - Roger Fisher and William Ury.