Hypnotizing Maria
by Richard Bach, 2009

“Every man’s perception is his own reality” is something Bryan Wallace, high school friend, used to say. This book takes that to the extreme, telling a story that suggests that our own perceptions are the sum of the auto-hypnosis that we have performed upon ourselves. The book equates hypnosis to suggestions accepted. While it is a little “out there”, it is a good reminder to put yourself in the most positive state of mind possible.

A quick story about the library: I reserved this book at the library and Maria went to pick up my holds. She grabbed two, and What Every Body Is Saying was on top. She flipped through that as she walked to the checkout, thinking “that’s interesting”. A few feet from the checkout, she finally checked the second book in the pile. She stopped cold when Hypnotizing Maria was the title. I think she half-expected me to be watching her and laughing, somewhere in the library. Yes, I did pick the book half for the chance to say that I can now hypnotize Maria (spoiler alert though: I could do it before, as well).

What Every Body is Saying
by Joe Navarro, with Marvin Karlins, Ph.D., 2008

An interesting view into nonverbal behavior. Only about half of the book is obvious, which is impressive. Lots of interesting tidbits to look for in everyday interactions. Quick read.

The Ghost War
by Alex Berenson, 2008

Written 7 years ago, talks about growing tension over Chinese aggressive actions in their nearby maritime waters. Talks about foreign governments sponsoring terrorists in Afghanistan. Talks about our limited intelligence assets in China. Sounds very familiar.

It’s a follow-up to “The Faithful Spy”. The series seems to be pretty good spy novel stuff, though it does have the CIA relying to an unreasonable extent on the main character. I listened to it on tape.

Mining the Sky: Untold Riches from the Asteroids, Comets, and Planets
by John S. Lewis, 1997

This book provides a fascinating account of the material wealth of our solar system. From mining asteroids for metals to searching for water for rocket propellants to pulling helium-3 from the outer planets for fusion material, there are profitable opportunities for mining the sky. Relying upon launched material from Earth will always limit our ability to explore and colonize outer space, as the launch costs are prohibitive and lead to limiting the weight of payloads. To continue manned exploration past the moon, we will need to start pulling raw materials from other rocks in the solar system with smaller costs. The book goes through the geology of asteroids, moons, comets, and planets and describes the chemistry necessary to profitably extract valuable materials. Very interesting; I found myself reading many passages out loud to Maria. Follow-up books by Lewis appear to be “Rain of Iron and Ice” and “Asteroid Mining 101”.

The Winner-Take-All Society
by Robert H. Frank and Philip J. Cook, 1995

A 1990’s primer on increasing economic inequality and the rise of markets in which small relative differences in ability lead to huge differences in income. Things have only gotten more extreme. It’s written from an academic point of view, so there are more data and facts than the typically business book.

While many of the trends in this book are worrisome, I don’t see many ways to counter the proliferation of winner-take-all. With easier access to the best in the world in most fields, the demand for the best has skyrocketed while the demand for “good enough” has fallen off. “Arms Control Agreements”, the topic of Chapter 9, describe ways that various fields try to dampen competition for the top spot (e.g. salary caps and tests for performance enhancing drugs in sports), but most of these agreements are terribly hard to patrol. There is always incentive to deviate from the agreement to gain a leg up in obtaining top ability/talent, similar to the incentive to deviate in the prisoner’s dilemma.

Mrs. Parkinson’s Law: And Other Studies in Domestic Science
by C. Northcote Parkinson, 1968

At the business library at school, I was looking for “Parkinson’s Law”, which is a fairly famous book that includes the adage that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” What I found, instead, was “Mrs. Parkinson’s Law”, by the same author. Flipping through the pages, the book seemed to mesh humorous descriptions of domestic behavior with complex mathematical formulas: a combination I found worthy of a checkout.

I started reading the book to myself on our recent road-trip to Montana. By the 3rd chapter or so, I was reading out loud to Maria as she drove, the book being so funny. It has incredibly apt descriptions of the silliness of some aspects of life. The title “law” comes about in chapter seven:
Mrs. Parkinson’s Law: Heat produced by pressure expands to fill the mind available from which it can pass only to a cooler mind.

This law basically means that the complications and perceived slights of daily life can fester and frustrate an individual. At which point they will become madder and angrier until they can relieve the pressure by complaining to a less-harassed person. The book implies that the husband-wife combo is not usually the best outlet for the pressure release. It goes on to give a silly, but intricate, mathematical expression to the pressure and temperature experienced by an individual.

A particularly funny chapter deals with “Hosts and Guests”. A 4-8 page derivation describes the fact that the optimal cocktail party should “invite fifty-five people on the assumption that those actually present will number about fifty.” Goodness.

Very funny, with interesting takes on everyday trivialities, this book is highly recommended.