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Are you enjoying Gleick? I've been considering it, but other books keep jumping the queue.
by manicbovine 15y ago
Are you enjoying Gleick? I've been considering it, but other books keep jumping the queue.
- mkrecny 15y agoI'm enjoying it a lot. Sometimes I think he spends too much time on historical context rather than information theoretic concepts...but that's a subjective preference of course.
- JabavuAdams 15y agoYes. I get wrapped up in it for a bit, then put it down to read other books. I like the historical context, but at times I get impatient to jump ahead because it feels like I'm on the verge of understanding something significant. One benefit of the historical sections is that I now want to go back and read some of the original sources. Esp. Shannon and Turing.
- heydenberk 15y agoI recently read Gleick's _The Information_. It's a quick, interesting read, although I suspect people who don't share my combination of interest in the OED and Babbage's difference engine may find one of those sections to drag. Like a lot of good science writing, it strives to make scientific and technical concepts palatable through the conceit of a historical narrative, and it's largely successful. As a hacker and a geek, I naturally wish it were more technical and less biography.