Education
I intended to read this book before going to hear Greg Mortenson speak at my alma mater but I was glad that I heard him before I read the book. Hearing this man speak of his vision for the mountain people in Pakistan and Afghanistan gave me a different perspective in reading the book. I expected a heart-warming tale of humanitarian good deeds, but I wasn't expecting to come away with a new way of looking at the conflict in the middle east. Indeed at the end of reading Greg Mortenson's tale of
Gary Marcus provides an entertaining trip through some of the oddities and weirdnesses of the human mind. The title Kluge reveals Marcus' main premise: the brain is not a wonderfully architected organ but rather a system of subsystems that has been cobbled together by an imperfect process called evoltion to produce a workable but far from perfect solution. Within a few pages of starting the book, Marcus makes it plain that he is a highly educated professor used to spending time around those le
Don Tapscott tackled an interesting topic in the late 90's, "how are children being affected by growing up in a digital world?" Unfortunately when you write on a topic that borders on pop-culture, your writing tends to have a pretty short shelf-life. Most of the material in this 1998 book would have been outdated by 2001 when I began work on my degree in Computer Information Systems. Even so, there is some interesting material in the book.
Jeff Hawkins is the founder of both Palm Computing and Handspring. His lifelong fascination with the brain and how it works led to his study of neuroscience and ultimately to this book. In "On Intelligence", Hawkins presents what he believes is a solid framework for understanding how the brain works. Specifically he explores what it means to "have intelligence." Many of the artificial intelligence efforts underway today focus on ways to mimic the way the brain behaves without regard to how i
Joseph Williams manages to present this textbook information in a very non-textbook-like manner. In Style: Towards Clarity and Grace he quickly covers the complex topic of writing with the ease of someone with a mastery of the subject. Using common sense, plenty of examples and a good sense of humor, Williams conveys his ideas with a delightful variety that makes the book a pleasure to read.
In Five Minds for the Future, Howard Gardner explores the mental capacities that he believes will be crucial to the success of individuals in the future. He explores these five concepts in a multi-faceted manner, looking at not only the educational ramifications but also the continuing improvement of the mind in the work place. Gardner manages to skirt many touchy political issues but his liberal bias comes out from time to time (as in his comparison of Jon Steward to Ralph Nader.) The book i