Identities are popular

Amartya Sen's Identity and Violence argues basically against identities. I like a lot, given that I have previously expressed some distrust in personalities, too (they are obsessions). Interesting tidbits: WTO towers were designed by a devout moslem, curry powder is actually a British invention.

More rants about identities in the fictional blog.

Books by people I know

Jean-Yves LeMeur: Faux Pas. An amazing true story about .. mountaineering among other thing. Special bonus: computers are not even mentioned in the book, though Jean-Yves is a computer scientist.

Roy Garner: East Asia Live. Travels in places that are changing rapidly.. Roy is an excellent photographer as well, but there are not that many photographs in this book. Eagerly waiting for a sequel.

Trouble with Physics

Lee Smolin's Trouble with Physics has many interesting components: a presentation of string theory and its alternatives; philosophical discourse based on the author's discussions with Paul K. Feyerabend; and discussion about what could be wrong with science politics and academic practices.

Smolin mentions that Feyerabend was actually very worried about science.. he seems to have thought it is a great "activity" and could go wrong. This was a bit surprising to me, since based on "Against Method" I only saw his iconoclastic side. There, he welcomed political involvement in science, wanted "more Lysenko cases", and thought we could decide which theory to support simply based on which sounds better when read aloud accompanied with a guitar.

Oh, now I know

In a previous entry I mumbled that after reading Foucault, the world does not feel the same any more. I remember the same feeling after reading Freud's Totem and Taboo (actually the only book I've read by him this far). Is there a connection? Yes. Louis Althusser, Foucault's mentor, who in "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses" wrote about sciences establishing their own method and object. He specifically mentions Freud.

Measuring the world

D. Kehlman's Measuring the World is a fascinating book about Gauss and von Humboldt. Kehlman writes fluently (I think, it's a translation, after all) and the subject matter is simply great. Gauss travelled to Konigsberg to meet Immanuel Kant, but I.K. was already too senile to appreciate Gauss's invention of non-Euclidean geometry? Gauss's son was involved in German nationalist/republican movement and escaped to the U.S.? Maybe. Never mind, very good stories, even if not verifiable.