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The Sparrow (1996), by Mary Doria Russell
This strange and sad book chronicles what happens when the Catholic Church sends missionaries to a planet where astronomers have discovered life..... Hope there are no sex scandals

http://www.mixerman.net/

I bought the book.Its hillarious on so many levels. You can read almost 50% on the website.

braincell wrote:http://forums.planetz.com/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=28114

Read that, couldn't put it down!

- Iain Banks' latest, "Transition", Alex Ross "The Rest Is Noise", Sonar manual. All recommended highly

Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O'Malley. Just finished Vol 5 - looking forward to the last book next year. Anyone else got any good graphic novel reccomendations.

Woken Furies by Richard Morgan - some of the best sci fi I've read in years, particularly Altered Carbon & Black Man

Head First Java by Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates.

Generating Social Capital
-civil society and institutions in comparative perspective
Marc Hooghe and Dietlind Stolle

A collection of papers on social capital. It's one of the most important bodies of work in social capital research. Has a paper from our own Eric Uslaner of Maryland Univ, recently prolific writer on the topic. Good to have a different perspective from Robert Putnam. Understanding and harnessing the power of social capital will be more and more important as groups of people become more and more decentralized.

Fluxpod wrote:http://www.mixerman.net/

I bought the book.Its hillarious on so many levels. You can read almost 50% on the website.

That's interesting, I read this when he was just writing this as forum posts on prorec, and then he suddenly stopped midway and switched everything to a book. Most of the people following the forum thread felt...a bit cheated and I didn't get around to getting this book until recently. I have several manuals and a stack of magazines next to it to read as well but I should get around to finishing that (since I've only read a bit more than what is avail on the site.)

Just finished 'Genesis' by Bernard Beckett. A very interesting fictional exploration of the Turing test.

The Unfolding of Language by Guy Deutscher. A fascinating explanation of the processes behind the constant evolution of languages. Really well written, and very interesting.

Planet Z

Seriously: The Timewasters Letters by Robin Cooper. A collection of pointless funny letters to various organisations and the resulting correspondence.

Just been reading mixerman - like it! Thanks for that Fluxpod

+ 1 for the Timewaster letters. Absolutely hilarious.

currently reading: Terry Pratchett: The colour of Magic.
I hadn't read anything of Pratchett before but I'm loving this so definitely gonna check out more of his books.

I enjoyed many of Pratchett's books, the discworld is a great parody of the niven/pournelle ringworld...and his jokes draw from a wide variety of topics.

rolo wrote:The Sparrow (1996), by Mary Doria Russell
This strange and sad book chronicles what happens when the Catholic Church sends missionaries to a planet where astronomers have discovered life..... Hope there are no sex scandals

Yes, I can already think what Catholic Church would do to a brand new society: indoctrinate the shit out of them!


Check out Project Gutenberg for free e-Books in txt or pdf formats. Read Crime and Punishment if you haven't already or many others...
Expand your horizons

* The Secret Doctrine (Helena Blavatsky), the mother of all esoteric and occult books..

* North European Mysteries and their traces till now (F.E Farwerck) , about the "lost" religious rites and habits of the old german tribes and which similarities they have with roman christianity who later conquered this area, and also how it links to freemasonry.

Lots of hidden knowledge here

and lots of cool sounding made-up gobbelty-gook that is really no help at all. the point of the occult is not to give it all away. no harm done unless you take them seriously, or think that the authors intended to be helpful, especially in Ms Blavatsky's case....

Simplicius Simplicissimus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplicius_Simplicissimus
http://rbsche.people.wm.edu/teaching/grimmelshausen/

Most probably the inspiration for Defoe's Robinson Crusoe...
It really helps to have a 'clearer' view on this crazy world

garyb wrote:and lots of cool sounding made-up gobbelty-gook that is really no help at all. the point of the occult is not to give it all away. no harm done unless you take them seriously, or think that the authors intended to be helpful, especially in Ms Blavatsky's case....

of course they wont tell you everything untill you're initiated in one of the mystery schools, and it would also be logical to put one on a wrong track.. I dont see these books as the "ultimate truth", just some tools for expanding my horizon. It's just very interesting to compare this kind of knowledge with stuff you learn at school and watch or read in the media..

RP_001 wrote:

garyb wrote:and lots of cool sounding made-up gobbelty-gook that is really no help at all. the point of the occult is not to give it all away. no harm done unless you take them seriously, or think that the authors intended to be helpful, especially in Ms Blavatsky's case....

of course they wont tell you everything untill you're initiated in one of the mystery schools, and it would also be logical to put one on a wrong track.. I dont see these books as the "ultimate truth", just some tools for expanding my horizon. It's just very interesting to compare this kind of knowledge with stuff you learn at school and watch or read in the media..

sure! just remember the first rule of the mystery schools, "i will conceal ever and reveal never". initiation is just the study of the onion.

The Axiom 25 owners manual