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Education

Texts for Autodidacts? 25

Posted by Cliff from the reading-up-on-LOTS-of-subjects dept.
RestiffBard asks: "I'm in a bit of a learning slump and was wondering what books or websites Slashdot readers would recommend for learning anything. I'm looking more for general starter texts on physics, math, chemistry, electronics, etc. I'm not too interested in computer texts as I have that mostly down now. I'm more interested in the sciences that I've neglected in the last few years."
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Texts for Autodidacts? More

Texts for Autodidacts?

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  • Along a similar thread, I'd be interested in some good links for Calculus tutorials and other "upper highschool, early college" math and beyond. I'm now out of highschool and wish I would have paid attention in my PreCal and Cal I classes. I passed, but didn't learn a thing. The calc websites I've run across thus far seem to be geared towards someone currently getting classroom instruction. It's funny... I didn't like math in highschool and now that I'm out I think I could really enjoy it or at least enjoy learning a bit more. At any rate, some good links would be appreciated. Until then, I think I'll hit google s'more and try to find some better sites.

  • Physics (Score:2, Insightful)

    by rakerman ( 409507 )
    The Feynman Lectures on Physics.
    see http://www.aw.com/product/0,2627,0201500647,00.htm l [aw.com]

  • Asimov! (Score:2, Informative)

    by sysadmn ( 29788 )
    Anything written by Isaac Asimov. The physics will be a bit dated, but the chemistry and engineering haven't changed as much. And the history of science hasn't changed at all :-) Even his guide to the Bible and the Homeric epics are good intros to those periods of history. I'm not to sure about that psychohistory stuff - check again in about 3000 years.

  • Mathematics (Score:2, Informative)

    by sohp ( 22984 )
    Here are a couple of sites I have in my bookmarks for learning about math. Hope this helps!
  • This site [lib.va.us] is one of my favorites.

  • Project Gutenberg (Score:3, Informative)

    by PhilHibbs ( 4537 ) <snarks@gmail.com> on Monday October 22, 2001 @11:00AM (#2459850) Journal
    http://promo.net/pg/ [promo.net]
    Useful for older texts, so no cutting-edge genetics or nanotech here, but this collection would round off your education in general, especially the classics if you're that way inclined.
  • You mean, PC's aren't everything? *grin* Actually, I am also part of that group who is finding out that there's a whole lot more interesting stuff out there than our little niche world of PCs, operating systems, etc. And my favorite textbook right now is...

    The web. Seriously. I have learned more about more science in more subjects in two or three years by researching online than I have ever been able to get out of a textbook. I have also found mentors in various knowledge areas, on-line tutorials and tools that are also far superior to the textbooks. The end result is that I am taking a couple of textbook based classes, namely Calculus and Thermodynamics, (because they relate to my specific interests.

    So my best suggestion is for you to figure our what you'd really really like to know more about, and then jump out there on the web and start learning, and when you discover a specific knowledge base (like Calculus) for which there is a good textbook available, go ahead and get it.

    • By the way, a tool I have found useful in my online studies and research (but so far available only for WinXX machines AFAICT) is the Copernic 2001 [copernic.com] search aggregator.

      It's a cool tool because not only does it get and prioritize links from a bunch of the top search engines, it also has a mode that will go through the list that it returns and get rid of any dead links.

      I'd be interested in anybody's experiences with similar software, btw.

      • I found Copernic to be interesting but in the end not worth it at all. Google comes through for me everytime. I barely ever hit dead links and then there is the Google cache of course so?
  • Look at Mathematics : From the Birth of Numbers by Jan Gullberg for an excellent introduction to math, up through calculus and a bit of differential equations. Written by a physician who pursued math as a life-long hobby, it is quite accessible to the interested student, and brims with the author's obvious enthusiasm for the material. My father-in-law (a math professor) loved it, I loved it (a software guy with a couple of engineering degrees), and my 11 year old homeschooled son loves it. You could spend many moons profitably working through this material.
  • Machiavelli's 'The Prince' [promo.net] is a happy favorite. Or Adam Smith's 'Wealth Of Nations' [promo.net] is a fascinating (and useful) read.
  • Ibiblio hosts some online textbooks:

    http://www.ibiblio.org/obp/electricCircuits/ [ibiblio.org]

    Here is a partial list of books published online, that I happened to like enough to bookmark. I find that reading a book on the computer screen is tedious, I mostly use the online version as a reference.

    Handbook of applied cryptography: http://www.cacr.math.uwaterloo.ca/hac/ [uwaterloo.ca]

    Underground: (I actually haven't read this yet) http://www.underground-book.com/ [underground-book.com]

    Netizens: (only partly read this) http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/ [columbia.edu]

    http://www.und.nodak.edu/org/crypto/crypto/army.fi eld.manual/ [nodak.edu]

    Big Breach: http://www.antioffline.com/bigbreach/ [antioffline.com]

    The Prof's Book: http://frode.home.cern.ch/frode/crypto/Turing/inde x.html [home.cern.ch]

    I have a lot of other links also, but my bookmarks have become so nested and folderized that many are lost in there, I really need bookmarks for my bookmarks . . . Anyway, I would suggest that if you find yourself looking for interesting reading online, you will find plenty. If you choose you can find scanned in pdf's of various works on newsgroups and in freenet, etc.

    However, my advice is to use the 'net primarily as a way to figure out what to read, and become familar with the local public library. Almost all libraries have inter-library loans which give you access to huge amount of stuff. When I can't get a work that way, I fall back upon checking databases of used bookstore inventories -- http://abe.com/ [abe.com] and http://powellsbooks.com/ [powellsbooks.com] are the places I generally go to.

  • There's a series of books coauthored by Larry Gonick called The Cartoon Guide To . They're excellent overviews of a subject in language/pictures that make them easy to understand without dumbing it down. Topics range from statistics to genetics to the History of the Universe. I've read several of them; I personally own The Cartoon Guide to Genetics and The Cartoon Guide to Physics; the former I absorbed before a summer internship in a genetics lab, and the latter got a friend through Classical Physics. Definitely recommend them as good introductory texts.

  • Six Easy Pieces, Six Not-So-Easy Pieces, and QED, both by Feynman, are excellent reads (all of them are oriented towards the layman, rather than the physics student, I'm afraid).

  • You might look at the first text offered here [physicsforfree.com], which is an introduction to advanced physics for freshmen modeled after the corresponding course at Yale. You're going to need a good calculus background to get the most out of it, but many sections should be quite interesting without it. A good bridge between physics at the advanced high school or introductory college level and the really fun (fun?) stuff.
  • I do recommend Feyman's books, (which aren't really textbooks) as mentioned by others, as a good introduction to advanced physics. Before that, I recommend "Fundamentals of Physics" by Halliday, Resnick, et al, which is imo the best textbook I've ever used. I don't vouch for the problem sets, however. The book TAUGHT me everything, but the prof was the one TESTING me.

    If you don't know calculus, learn calculus. Very basic trig is useful, advanced trig is arcane. Basic calculus makes life much clearer (The first two semesters, involving derivation and integration) After that it becomes arcane too. I can't recommend a book, as I haven't been able to find the one I used in HS.

    I strongly recommend "Don't Shoot the Dog" by Karen Pryor. This is a behaviorist book, but not a textbook. But it teaches you a lot about how life works. (Note: conventional psychologists tend to consider behaviorists insane, and vise versa. Engineers side with the behaviorists, and buildings rarely fall down. YMMV) Ishmael is another highly recommended behaviorist book, but I haven't gotten to it yet.

    The other books I strongly recommend for the experience you gain are Go Rin No Sho by Miyomoto Mushashi (sp?); Robert Pirsig's books, particularly Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance; old hardcore science fiction writers, particularly Asimov and Heinlein.

    I have a bunch of engineering texts I liked at various levels...

    I'll see if I can think of anything else to add later.
    • [in no particular order]

      The Lucifer Principle by Howard Bloom
      It explains how we humans are really still just acting like a bunch of mammals. Part history, part biology and a lot of sociology. A very concise treatment of why the world is so violent.

      Tao Te Ching
      The Art of War
      The Book of Five Rings (it's Musashi, if I remember correctly)

      The entire Dune series

      The entire series of books by Carlos Castaneda, from start to finish (must be read in order).

      The Qu'ran
      [Very interesting science references in there, beyond the powerful message]

      The Inner Meaning of the Bhagavad Gita, by Roy Eugene Davis. It is the ancient Indian description of the layers of the universe and the struggle to become human told through a parable; Mr. Davis's translation and commentary are facinating.

      anything on Linguistics, though I've only read a tiny bit about it, it is a facinating science, especially for someone who has learned many PL's.

      {just my 2+cents}
  • the major bookstores (B&N, Borders) carry review guides for all kinds of topics like Japanese Grammar, Electronics, and Calculus, to name just a few. They're really concise and contain quizes at the end of each chapter to test your knowledge, so they appear to appeal to my terse method of learning a subject - perhaps they would appeal to yours.
  • It's an entire site dedicated to Autodidactics.

    Here's the link [autodidactic.com].

    HTH,

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