Category: Non fiction

  • The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

    William L. Shirer

    What a fascinating read! The second world war was one of the most defining events of the contemporary era, and The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich provides a fantastic view of what happened in Germany between 1930 and 1945, chronicling the ascendance of Hitler and the Nazi Party and its eventual demise.

    Hitler’s dream was to establish a Reich that would last a thousand years, though it finally managed just about a dozen. But in those few years, he managed to give the world the kind of shock it had probably never experienced before.

    The book actually begins much earlier, and traces Hitler’s early life, his disenchantment with the socio-political environment prevalent in Austria and Germany, and his entry into regional politics. Through smart thinking, astute use of the economic depression, a lot of outmaneuvering of politicians far bigger in stature than him, and quite some luck, he took himself to a position where the nation was practically begging him to seize control. It is amazing to see the number of instances long before he gained power when a small change would have led to a different history than the one we are familiar with.

    His baby steps into expanding Germany’s borders through cunning and then brute force, his affection for the largely ineffectual Mussolini, the poor judgment and horrendous miscalculations exhibited by the European powers, Stalin’s greed, all led to a state of affairs that made war inevitable. Germany dominated the early period, the Blitzkrieg tore through defenses, and it is astonishing to see how close they came to taking over all of Western Europe early in the war, in addition to Scandinavia and Eastern Europe. Through the mid to late 30s, what is also evident is Hitler’s own iron will, determination and political astuteness using which he outplayed his opponents over and over. But in Stalin, he met his match, and he underestimated the man and his country’s military strength. A costly mistake.

    At some point, Hitler’s megalomania took over, and his downfall began. His allies, the Japanese, didn’t help the cause much by drawing the US into the war. He repeated history by disastrously opening two fronts in battle. He also misread the importance of North Africa and the Suez. But it is chilling to note that with a little patience and by sticking to strategic alliances, he might not have lost the war at all. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich also covers the role played by several inept leaders of the German armed forces in bringing and keeping Hitler in power, and their inability to stand up to the dictator, even as they realised that he was leading their country into disaster. Also described in detail are the several plots that were hatched to assassinate Hitler, including Operation Valkyrie.

    This is a commendable piece of work – not just for chronicling an important piece of history, but for the painstaking research that must have gone into it, and the control on a narrative with so many moving parts, all of which are important.

    At 1100+ pages and the smallest possible font, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is not an easy read. But if you have any interest in history, and the war that shaped the modern world, this is a book you should definitely invest in.

    The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

  • The Evolution of Everything

    Matt Ridley

    For a while now, I have believed that Darwin’s theory of evolution is the most paradigm-shifting idea to have emerged from a human mind. On a related thought journey, I have also shifted from determinism to free will and back to determinism, all in a few years. This book connects both these thoughts, and is fundamentally an argument for evolution and against creationism. It argues that change is incremental and emergent and has a momentum all of its own, as opposed to the idea that it is directed by a person or a metaphysical force like God. (more…)

  • Everybody Lies

    Seth Stephens-Davidowitz

    I’m a huge fan of Asimov’s Foundation series. Hari Seldon, the seminal character in the series, develops psychohistory, an algorithmic science that helps him predict the future of large populations, (not individuals) though in terms of probability. As I read this book, I began to wonder if data would actually help us get to that level at some point.

    The premise of the book is that though everybody lies – to their friends, spouse, colleagues and most definitely to themselves, many of their actions – what they search for, what they click on etc – reveal their true nature. With the sheer amount if data that is being generated, data scientists are able to gather insights on our thinking, and potentially use that for the welfare of humanity.

    The book uses a bunch of examples early to show how data can help distinguish between what people say and what they actually do. Trivia: India gets called out early enough for being #1 in people who search for “may husband wants me to breastfeed him”! A large section of the first half is full of p*rn data. Reveals much!

    I not only got some validations about human behaviour, but also realised that some of my perspectives were not really true. For instance, I had thought that the web was now largely getting segregated into filter bubbles. Data shows otherwise! It also shows the clear possibility that many of our core beliefs and attitudes could be explained by the random year of our birth and what was going on the key years of our upbringing. One observation I could not really agree with was “it does not matter which school you go to.” While one study does show that, I can see it play differently around me, and perhaps there are psychological effects that does not come out in a study. Or it could be affected by “the curse of dimensionality” that the author brings up – if you test enough variables, one, by random chance, will be statistically significant.

    The last portion of the book offers a counter balance to the case made for data thus far in the book. The overemphasis on what is measurable, the limits of data, and the ethics of data usage – by private companies or the government.

    But the potential of data to cause a social sciences revolution remains well argued. However, just having data is not really enough, one needs to be curious (what data needs to be looked at) and creative (what’s the best way to frame the data or sets of data, build hypotheses) to make the best use of it. Some of what the author has done in the book is precisely that. Can data be misused? Yes, it can, but that’s the risk with every new science. That doesn’t take away from the exciting possibilities it has to offer.

  • Seven Brief Lessons on Physics

    Carlo Rovelli

    I was reminded of Yoda’s famous statement – “Judge me by size, do you?” after I finished this book. It is all of 79 pages, and yet, it manages to contain an excellent summary of the laws that hold together the cosmos. Or at least, the ones we have managed to understand. From Einstein’s general theory of relativity to the still misty realms of quantum mechanics to a fascinating lesson on thermodynamics, it is an absorbing read!

    I found questions that I have spent a lot of time thinking about. For instance, “Is reality only interaction”? A fantastic idea where science and philosophy meet. I also figured out a possible reason for my fascination for watching waves. There is a vague connection between the surface of the sea and the broad texture of the universe. (more…)

  • Guns Germs & Steel

    Jared Diamond

    One of my favourite books in recent times has been Sapiens – it did a fantastic job of showing how the species ascended to the apex position in evolutionary biology. A vertical journey, so to speak. But why didn’t all humans, spread across various continents, develop equally in terms of civilisation and technology? To use the book’s blurb, “why has human history unfolded so differently across the globe?” In the modern world, why does an Africa or even a large part of Asia have to work hard to catch up with the western world? That’s what the book seeks to answer.

    It does that by asking very interesting questions. For instance, why is it that the Spanish conquered South American empires, and not the other way? The book doesn’t stop at the proximate answers – horses, weapons, germs etc- but keeps asking a series of questions for the answers that come up. Even beyond the time that recorded human history begins. To when the species first made their appearance on the planet – in Africa- and how slowly they made their way to different parts of the globe.

    Primarily, four factors have ultimately caused the disparity in the fortunes of various peoples- how early they started, the difference in the environment and biogeography of the areas they populated (what plants and animals there could be domesticated to scale up food production and create the surplus needed for new skills and ideas to develop), the spread of ideas (the fascinating aspect of how the axis of the continent – except for Eurasia, all continents have a north south axis – plays a large role in why a large number of major civilisations and developments occurred in this part of the world), and the densities of population that allowed competing societies within continents to come up with radical ideas.

    In addition, there are also related interesting ideas. For example, how invention is actually the mother of necessity (examples of how some inventions had been made before, but are credited to the person/s who made the right tweak at the right time for others to adopt it in large numbers) and how some non-intuitive solutions have endured (e.g. the QWERTY keyboard).

    All of this make for a fascinating, if not easy read. Even though it was published a couple of decades ago, I think it is an important book for this time because it shows how evolutionary determinism is not just about genes, but the environment as well.

    P.S. I do wish he had spent some pages on how the British could conquer India. The only clue he does drop is how India’s environment might have created a caste system which prevented the creation and proliferation of ideas it otherwise might have had.