Recent comments in /f/books

Immediate-Worth9994 t1_je12fql wrote

For general introduction to any subject, I use 2 resources. Wikipedia and Dummies. Both are relatively well sourced and checked, and good general overviews on a subject.

Reading either gives you an overview on how the subject operates, and what it's specialities are.

Neither are perfect.

Once you have done reading them, looked at the sources, understood how they fit in with other subjects you may know and the timelines of knowledge, then its time to deep dive or move on.

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However, at least by now you have an understanding, not only of the questions to ask, but also the terminology specific to the subject. Those questions, and that terminology can lead you to other sources, that either Wiki or Dummies both can lead you to.

You comment wanting to know if K12 can increase the uptake of carbs.

By this point you are so deep into a subject that the only source, is either specialists you can contact, or Google Scholar articles.

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I was in debate with someone recently who I disagreed with. The linked me to an NIH published scientific article that proved their point. I had no choice but to accept that the conclusions of the article where based upon the methodology of the research.
However, I pointed out several fundamental flaws with the research and methodology and so I could not accept that paper as the be all and end all, and that is where your bias experience comes in.

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Vaccines are 'settled' science, in we understand the aim of what they do, what we see on how the human body interacts with them, and the resulting benefits, but there is no guarantee that the use of them will be exactly the same in 10 or 100 years. Our ability to peer into biology improves everyday and there may come a time when we understand that the conceptual idea we hold today, does not ring true in the future.

Climate change is a political term for what is considered Anthropogenic climate modification. It's 'settled' science, we have measured co2 and other gas emissions in the past, seen how the climate reacted then, and make predictions based on our current emissions and see if those predictions match current conditions.

Is this settled status going to change, absolutely, it has between COP 1 and the latest (primarily due to political pressure). Is it going away, no, is it going to modify in the future, yes.

All you can do, unless you are looking to be a specialist, is understand how we come to the conclusions that make 'settled' science settled.

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As a bit of a geek, I love popsci books, but reading the one star reviews on good reads and Amazon can be very enlightening, that most publications miss or get wrong what some people consider fundamental problems in what is supposed to be covered.

Searching the references indicated in these negative reviews can also help you understand if the person leaving the bad review knows what they are talking about, or unfortunately has some political reason for doing so.

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I recently purchased the 'New York Public Library - Science Desk Reference' (978-0028604039) as a broad overview of scientific theory and facts and the interrelated nature of information. I would consider this to be a well researched and upstanding publication, printed in 1995.

But the science has moved on, and even to an untrained eye there are fundamental glaring issues not with the copy, but based upon our 30 year updated understanding of our reality, and this was at the time probably close to the best of the best book.

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No book can ever be perfect, no one can know all. Science changes, knowledge changes, philologia is all there can be.

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emerg_remerg t1_je125g6 wrote

I get this too! My mom does too, I remember as a teen I had to tell her to stop reading romance novels because it was making her super snarky to dad.

I have to be careful what I read and what I watch, I will adopt the mood of the story and it will legit impact my ways of interacting with people around me.

I found the crash after finishing the Silo series pretty rough. It was 2 or 3 years ago and I haven't read really anything since.

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dennyfader t1_je11cs3 wrote

Kids/teens in the mid-2000s would say "that's gay" all day long. They were not all homophobes, they were just saying a word that, in their world, was not a problem. I refuse to believe that every single person that said "gay" or "fag" in 2005 is a homophobe, because culture changes and context matters. It is so tremendously humbling to realize how much society can change in so little of a time... Hell, in 80-years, people might look back on those of us who eat meat as the lowest of the low, saying, "how could you defend someone who ate MEAT? The body of a LIVING creature!" It would be unfathomable to them to even consider it. I get your perspective, that racism is racism, and I agree with it, really, but it just goes deeper than that when considering different time periods. OP is definitely well within their rights to state how weird it is to read in today's context, though. Don't know why people aren't giving them that.

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gnatsaredancing t1_je0zj9a wrote

>I don't give books passing marks or cut them slack just because they're old

Weird but okay.

>It's very important to address books by today's standards and criticize them.

So you can feel smug by doing something silly and irrelevant?

>Expecting today's people to react favorably to very problematic plot points

That's not at all the expectation. But it's good to cultivate reading comprehension by means of judging stories in a context where they make sense. You might as well stop reading if your intent is to intentionally fail to understand books so you can misrepresent the stories.

>(we literally have a pedophile here in the story) is absurd

Because that helps prevent ridiculous statements like this one that do nothing but demonstrate your failure to understand the definition of the word and the context of the book causing you to misapply the word.

>Critiquing a book by today's standard is the healthiest thing to do,

Considering how many problems with that way of thinking you managed to demonstrate in a single paragraph, I'd say that's a laughable statement at best.

You're basically advocating intentionally misunderstanding and misrepresenting stories for no clear gain.

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lil_chunk27 t1_je0yetx wrote

A lot have mentioned Gay's The Word, Skoob and the Gower Street Waterstones - if you are hitting these then it is absolutely worth taking a trip to Housman's in King's Cross, too. A great radical bookshop, great selection.

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Camreth t1_je0y44p wrote

I read the first sequel and it was trailer trash bad, the characters where changed massively and the story made very little sense. I loved the original three so much that they are the only books I have ever read in the original Swedish (i had already read through in Norwegian once and the language is close enough that i could read without too many problems). I would heartily recommend not reading those so as to preserve the memory of the originals.

The sad part is that Larsson apparently almost finished a book 4 but due to family drama surrounding his death the draft seems to be stuck in limbo.

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