What non-fiction books are worth reading?

The good and interesting non-fiction books are actually darkness, we just hear little about them. Personally, I can distinguish several of them, of varying degrees of scientificness and popularity. I'll start, perhaps, with those books that will be closer to engineers and programmers.

Tim Wu, “The main switch. The heyday and death of information empires from radio to the Internet ”

We know that the telegraph supplanted mail in due time, radio in the field of information dissemination defeated newspapers and telegraphs, television became wildly popular, and the Internet was able to tear people from the TV. But what intrigues, clashes of lobbyists and paid prohibitions were behind all this – this is a separate story, which Tim Wu tells in the format of a spy-detective novel. Corporate wars of the scale of the classics of cyberpunk. Thanks to this book, I was finally able to understand why the quality and speed of Internet connection in the States is the worst in the world (among countries where there is Internet access at all).

Greed, bribery, playing on the feelings of voters and consumers, fraud and cheating, takeovers and mergers, the sole purpose of which is to crush competitors – in general, I recommend.

Stanislav Lem, “Sum of technology”

The great Polish science fiction won my teenage heart with his books about the adventures of Iyon the Pacific. And then he blew my brain with his futurological treatise on where technology development could go in the next hundred years.

In 1963, Stanislav Lem published a huge work, where he tried to understand the issues of the possibility of predicting the future and possible ways of developing technological civilization.

Most of all I remember the chapters on Intellectronics and Phantomology. Here it is worth making a remark – due to the fact that this book was written in the sixties, most of the terms for describing future technologies had to be invented. And since the author is a Pole, you have to come to terms that not all terms are similar to modern ones.

Part of the predicted in the "Sum of technology" and remains something of the field of science fiction – but something has long been in our lives. Good ideas about telecommunications and technology – what could be better?

Next, I’ll talk about the scientific study that I remember.

Asya Kazantseva, "Who would have thought! How the brain makes us do stupid things. ”

Have you ever been explained the work of drugs on the example of a donkey and carrots? Welcome! A certified biologist explains the processes in the brain, the work of instincts and the biochemistry of dependence so that even a person with a triple in biology (for example, I) will understand this on the fly. The only explanation of why a person turns into raspberry syrup during falling in love is much more interesting than the story about pistils and stamens.

Good presentation, colorful examples, and a sense of humor that I liked. In general, the “Easy Way to Quit Smoking” is never easy, and Asya Kazantseva explains why.

Alexander Panchin, “Sum of biotechnology. Genetic Modification Myths Guide "

"GMOs were created by alien artificial intelligence to destroy us – and other myths and legends of modern society." This is if you describe this book very briefly. A wonderful work by bio-engineer Alexander Panchin on how genetics actually works.

It is extremely useful for those who understand that the hysteria around GMOs has gone too far, but cannot understand why and how to deal with it. Book in hand and type arguments against statements like “only GMO products contain genes” (77% of respondents think so).

What is genetic engineering, how does DNA work – in an accessible, but not primitive language (remember about the top three in biology?). The manner of narration is similar to the previous book, so for a couple of evenings you can finally figure out: why your son is still not from a neighbor, why the natural is not always the best, who are the chimeras and how to draw up a non-aggression pact with GMOs tomatoes in your fridge.

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