What I Just Read

The last book I read that was as intriguing and intellectually provocative as this one was Douglas Hofstadter's great "Godel Escher Bach" and I suspect if you're the type of reader who didn't really "get" G.E.B. you probably won't like this book either.  The rest of you, read on. :)  This book is (obviously) about motorcycles, but it's also a unique, cross-domain book, covering psychology, the interaction of humans and machines, the co-evolution of humanity alongside our (also evolving) tools, and how our bodies and brains adapt and adjust to our tools to the point where they become physical and sensory extensions of ourselves.  As such this book intersects with many, many subject domains, extending far beyond just motorcycle riding: biology, evolution, neurology/neuroplasticity, physics, cognition/epistemic humility, mindfulness, meta-awareness. And I'm only scratching the surface.  There's also a fascinating strategy layer involved in ...

Readable, harmless. Solid run-through of most of the generally cited innovation examples, plus some new ones I hadn't heard of before, and written in a breezy magazine-article style.  Group with "Prophet of Innovation," Thomas K. McCraw's excellent biography of Joseph Schumpeter, and George Gilder's book "Spirit of Enterprise." There are some examples here and there where it seems the author lacks command of the topic at hand yet still speaks breezily and authoritatively about it. But also the author offers readers some truly interesting historical examples as well as ways of conceptualizing innovation generally that really get you thinking about the topic. See for example the unusually interesting way of thinking about innovation as an enhanced form of improbability, a type of evolution on steroids. Or considering the steam engine "autocatalyzing" improvements in itself : as steam engines drained coal mines of water, it cut the cost of coal, w...

 An uneven and at times repetitive book, but yet a book that absolutely must be read by anyone who wants to learn about Bitcoin and why Bitcoin matters.  Some chapters sing out with a compelling bull case for Bitcoin and offer lay readers an excellent rendering of monetary history. In other chapters the author gets bogged down in repetitive economic hand waving, while blaming everything bad about modernity (and I mean * everything * up to and including Miley Cyrus's twerking) on leaving a sound money standard.  Most reasonable readers--and certainly anyone who's at least ankle deep in learning about Bitcoin--would agree on the value of sound money and the value of holding monetary authorities to a sound money standard. But for Saifedean the lack of a sound money is a hammer in his hand... and the entire world is a nail. I've found this to be a problem for many Bitcoiners, especially Bitcoin maximalists, hence the often used phrase "Bitcoin solves this" used...

Broad and interesting survey of the use of military advancements and technology as a power vector across history. Starts with the bronze age and trade-based advancements in both weaponry and metallurgy, and runs all the way to the 20th Century's full industrialization of war under centralized command and control. The bronze age (circa 3500 BC) was history's first verified instance where trade was performed over great distances because tin and copper deposits were never near each other except in rare cases. Also interesting to see the (albeit frequently forgotten) civilizational discovery that instead of extracting a one-time benefit from plundering conquered lands, you can get long-term, sustainable annuity benefits by exacting annual tributes. This produces a lot more value--and a lot less suffering--for both victor and vanquished. Note the spontaneous ordering of a merchant class to invent and produce iron/steel (and as a result arms) in China, and how this discovery, along w...