Literate Scientist

I bought a handsome hardcover Richard Evans’s Third Reich history trilogy recently and started reading the first volume in parallel to Michael Burleigh’s The Third Reich: A New History. I would say it is a very smooth historical narrative, in a simple and clear language and it is very detailed and not Hitler-centered like Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich. It has plenty of maps and this is very important to me because I can’t always recall where a rive or a region is located. Looking forward to reading next volumes when I finish this one. I put a link to the paperback edition of the first volume here because bounded hardback trilogy is very expensive and hard to find:

The Coming of the Third Reich

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Interested in Stalin and Stalinism since Perestroika I bought this as a hardback as soon as it were published and then last year I got the same book in paperback as a present. The pressure of two books forced me to make a decision to start reading and now I’m more than two-thirds through it. I must say this is a very interested read. In Russia, during Brezhnev era, before Perestroika, I only heard whispers about Stalin epoch and, of course, didn’t now anything about Stalin youth and his involvement in the revolution, for example, the fact that most of all officials in 1917 - 1953 were his friends and acquaintances, and historical and personal factors that contributed to the development of Terror, like Conspiratia, banditry and murky world of double Okhrana agents. I also have the book by the same author “Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar” that seems to be the follow-up although was written published earlier and I’m looking forward to reading it as soon as I finish “Young Stalin” book.

Young Stalin (Vintage)

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These two volumes I bought a few years ago, started reading the first chapter and then other books got reading priority, for example, Rosen’s “Life Itself”. A few weeks ago I picked up the first volume again and started reading from the beginning. I’m was really amazed how I understand it better after reading Rosen’s books. These volumes are highly recommended to learn about models of reality and mathematical modeling itself. The first chapter that discusses the relationship of models to observation is awesome. The book requires an undergraduate engineering level of mathematics: linear algebra, calculus and a bit of mathematical analysis. You will also learn about catastrophe-theoretic models, chaos, cellular automata, geometry of human affairs, patterns, fractals, and many other things. There is even a discussion about controversies in catastrophe theory involving Rene Thom. I think the first volume of this book set is a prerequisite reading before starting with classic Structural Stability And Morphogenesis.

Reality Rules, 2 Volume Set

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

OpenTask plans to publish the extended and edited version of this blog as a book:

Literate Scientists and Their Books: An Independent Guide to Understanding Reality (ISBN: 978-1906717520)

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

I bought this book (as used, it seems no longer available in print) after reading Fashionable Nonsense which refers to it. Highly recommended to anyone starting to write on non-technical subjects to avoid inventing new jargon and repeat obvious as well as to anyone trying to get a (self-)education in social sciences like me and be suspicious to excessive verbiage. I like his formula V = A / K - 1, where V is the amount of produced verbiage, A is the amount of ambition and K is the amount of knowledge on the subject and related disciplines.

Social Sciences as Sorcery

I don’t have its cover jacket with me today but I’ll take a picture of it later and put here.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

I finished reading Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich a few weeks ago and started reading this book. Because it was written 40 years after William Shirer’s book it provides fresh insight and analysis into why things happened certain way. The book is not focused on Hitler but more on a Nazism as a political religion in a totalitarian society. I’ve read about 140 pages so far and still not disappointed. I have a few books on the same topic to read after I finish this book next year.

The Third Reich: A New History

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

I remember from my school days during Soviet Union times about pollution in dying capitalist societies. I came upon this book a few years ago while preparing for my environmental study assignment in University. Being curious about diverse reviews I bought this book. I started reading it a few months ago during my lunch time and I would recommend it to everyone to learn how to do statistics right.

The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

After reading The Hundred-Year Lie I proceeded to a more balanced book:

Is it Safe to Eat?: Enjoy Eating and Minimize Food Risks

The author advocates risk vs. benefit approach throughout the book and now I started to apply the definition of risk as “hazard * exposure” to other areas as well. Explanation about how and why GM food was developed as well as the story of BSE (mad cow disease) was very interesting because I knew very little about them. I studied chemistry in university and liked that the author included organic formulae to illustrate important chemicals and their mechanisms, for example, estrogen disrupters.

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

I was always interested in the history of Nazi Germany and I bought this book almost 8 years ago. This was one of my first history books written in English. However, only this month I began reading it when commuting to work in the morning. In two weeks I already finished more than 200 pages and I would say this is very interesting read about mass and party politics in general. Some people say in their reviews that this book has too may adjectives because it was written in 50s-60s just after the war but I would say that adjectives make this book a non-stop reading experience.

Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich

- Dmitry Vostokov @ LiterateScientist.com -

Being born and lived in Russia during Communist era I inherited the sense of heroic achievements of the Soviet Army during the battle for Berlin. One of my co-workers recommended me this book and I read it last summer. It really shows the other side of the this battle like disorganization and chaos on the Soviet front and horrors committed by them on German civilians. Since then I buy and read revisionist history books to see different or not officially approved views on the same historical and political events.

The Fall of Berlin 1945

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