Books

A live shelf. What I'm reading, what I've finished, and what's queued up next.

  • Currently reading
    TB

    The Beginning of Infinity

    David Deutsch · ★★★★★

    Philosophy

    Deutsch's claim that explanatory knowledge is open-ended is the most optimistic thing I've read in years. Slow going, dense, worth every page.

  • Currently reading
    Ra

    Reasons and Persons

    Derek Parfit · ★★★★★

    Philosophy

    Personal identity, ethics, future generations — Parfit asks the hardest questions in the calmest voice. The thought experiments rewire you.

  • Finished
    GE

    Gödel, Escher, Bach

    Douglas Hofstadter · ★★★★★

    Science

    The book that turned recursion into a metaphysics. I keep coming back to the dialogues — they're the rare popular philosophy that actually does the work, not just narrates it.

  • Finished
    TS

    The Selfish Gene

    Richard Dawkins · ★★★★★

    Science

    Reframed how I think about agency at every level — from cells to firms to ML training runs. The 'gene's-eye view' generalizes shockingly well.

  • Finished
    Ia

    I and Thou

    Martin Buber · ★★★★★

    Philosophy

    A short book that took me months. Buber's distinction between I-It and I-Thou is the cleanest articulation I've found of why purely instrumental relationships feel hollow.

  • Finished
    A

    Antifragile

    Nassim Nicholas Taleb · ★★★★★

    Finance

    The convexity framing — systems that gain from disorder — is now a default lens for me. Taleb is occasionally insufferable; the ideas are worth it.

  • Finished
    BS

    Bulleh Shah: The Mystic of Punjab

    Bulleh Shah (trans.) · ★★★★★

    Poetry

    Sufi poetry that does in eight lines what most philosophy does in eight chapters. Read the Punjabi if you can — translation loses the music.

  • Want to read
    PT

    Probability Theory: The Logic of Science

    E. T. Jaynes · ★★★★★

    AI/ML

    Long on my list. The Bayesian gospel, written by someone who clearly thought the frequentists had stolen the cathedral.