The best Applied Mathematics books: Reddit reviews

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

In terms of war, corruption, oppression, unnecessary deaths, and overall human well-being, this is by far the best time to be alive in human history.

It’s really not even close.

For those that are actually interested:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250107814/ref=cm_sw_r_oth_api_i_ujXXDbDQ5PDWJ

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143111388/ref=cm_sw_r_oth_api_i_0nXXDbKSSRGA7

You’re not wrong. Even in developing countries it’s better than at any time in history. Check out the book Factfullness if you like to read. It’s pretty amazing.

Read the book "A mind for numbers" by Barbara Oakley and take the course "learning how to learn"

Link to course: https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn

Link to book: https://www.amazon.com/Mind-Numbers-Science-Flunked-Algebra/dp/039916524X/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?keywords=a+mind+for+numbers&qid=1570212770&sr=8-1

Edit: if I remember correctly, you don't have to pay for the course if you're not able to. Hope this helps you :)

That came from data pulled off OkCupid and you can read more about this and other findings in Dataclysm, which was written by OkCupid founder Christian Rudder. It's actually a very interesting read and it covers trends in behavior beyond just that which applies to dating or attractiveness.

It's worth noting that the same data showed that a vast majority of men find women most attractive between the ages of 18 - 23 or so whereas women were pretty consistently attracted to men with a few years of their own age. There are also a lot of variables that affect what metric they're using to gauge "attractiveness" so I would take that figure with a grain of salt.

A large percentage of men don't even put much effort into their baseline appearance, either because they don't want to, don't have to, or don't think to. If we're talking about looks and looks alone, then I'm not entirely surprised. Maybe it's not 80%, but if you're comparing one group of people who have been conditioned to put a little extra effort into their appearance, to another that hasn't, or has even been discouraged from doing so, then I could see why perceptions of attractiveness would skew in one direction more than the other.

Basically, don't take a line from an OkCupid blog to heart.

> "Collectively, the world is more stressed, worried, sad and in pain today than we've ever seen it,"

I would contend that this statement from the article is contentious. Was the world less stressed during the major wars that have plagued it? What about the cold war?

Here are multiple counterexamples of things going better: https://www.amazon.com/Factfulness-Reasons-World-Things-Better/dp/1250107814

Scroll down and have a look at the graphs

Lastly, this is a short time-span. Movement upwards could simply be regression toward/away from the mean

If you want to understand the thinking behind this, I highly recommend reading the book that Bill Gates just gifted to every person graduating college this year: Factfulness https://www.amazon.com/Factfulness-Reasons-World-Things-Better/dp/1250107814

In fact, I recommend reading it anyway, if for no other reason than for the good tips on improving your critical thinking skills.

The attraction graphs look very similar to ones that I saw in a book I read recently -- Dataclysm: Love, Sex, Race, and Identity--What Our Online Lives Tell Us about Our Offline Selves. It's written by the co-founder of OkCupid, so loads of the data came directly from there. That's what the OP graphs look like to me. You can use the "look inside" feature and search for "attraction"; page 47 has one of the graphs I'm referring to.

I try to shut off the hysterics as much as possible. NEVER watch tv news and especially none of the dedicated news channels.

Also read and think about things like this book.

https://www.amazon.com/Factfulness-Reasons-World-Things-Better/dp/1250107814/

A lot are clearly copy and pasted. If it doesn't reference or ask about something in my profile, I don't bother responding.

If you're interested in this sort of thing, you should read Dataclysm.

Check out the book A Mind for Numbers. Really insightful for CS majors IMHO.

I had a highschool math teacher who always told us to be warry of statistics and even had a book he shared.

How to Lie with Statistics https://www.amazon.com/dp/0393310728/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_mfP4DbK80WD65

This process (called the diffused mode of the brain) is discussed in depth in a book I read a few years ago called A Mind For Numbers: How to Excel at Math and Science (Even If You Flunked Algebra).

Would highly recommend if anyone is interested in how your brain learns things - especially abstract concepts like mathematics and programming.

> Nei selvfølgelig ikke. Og det er jo fordi det er politikken til folk som Obama-Biden og forgjengerne deres helt tilbake til Reagan som er grunnen til at en karakter som Trump i det hele tatt kom på banen og vant valget.

Så det at autoritære, populistiske politikere på høyresiden er på fremmarsj over hele verden, det er tilfeldig? Det er Demokratene sin feil?

>Et av endeløse problemene for liberalere som støtter den uendelige akselerasjonen til den globale teknokratiske kapitalismen er at jo raskere en økonomi endrer seg jo større del av befolkningen er det som blir kastet på dynga

Dette er fundamental feil. Det er lavere fattighet på verdensbasis i dag enn det noen gang har vært før. Globaliseringen har, uten sammenligning, gjort verden (både lokalt og verdensomspennende) bedre.

>de menneskene som blir kastet på dynga har dessverre for liberalerne fortsatt stemmerett.

Det er ingen som blir kastet på dynga. Du hadde hatt godt av å lese Hans Roslings bok <em>Factfulness</em>, det er mye du kan lære der.

Rosling's last book, Factfulness, tackles 10 common myths (or urban legends, if you wish) concerning the state of the world and how it is majorly improving, directly countering the majority view in the developed world.

Buy it at Amazon or Bookdepository (with free shipping worldwide).

Smart-aleck reviews for the book A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates Paperback from Amazon and Goodreads:

> I bought two copies of this book. I find that the first copy perfectly predicts what the numbers will be in the second copy. I feel cheated.

and

> "A Million Random Digits"? HA! They only used 10, and just kept repeating them in different combinations! Don't be fooled!

and finally

> After reading the book a while I started seeing a pattern. I did extensive research to prove my theory. After hours of mathematical modeling I conclusively proved that there is a set of numbers in this book that it not only a pattern, but is outright sequential!

> The top corner of each page (left corner on the left side pages, right corner of the right side pages) was a list of sequential numbers from 1 to 628, all in a row. No numbers are skipped. Even the prime numbers are included! At first you don't notice this because there is only 1 number on each page. But as you advance through the book you notice that the numbers keep advancing by 1 every time you turn the page.

A million random digits.

Lähteeksi on mainittu Hans Roslingin tuore kirja Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World--and Why Things Are Better Than You Think

People have always been treated like shit, though. As I understand it, what's changed is our exposure. With 24/7 media/internet, we're just seeing things we wouldn't have seen before. They were still happening before. We just didn't see them. It's also much easier to focus on specific types of discourse and information and that can make it seem like such information is increasing in amount. It's not. We're just exposing ourselves to more of it. If I started following r/Malta, it'd be tempting in a couple months to slide into the thinking that shit is "suddenly" heading south there. All the bad stories. All the abuses. In reality, it was always there because people are dicks regardless. Collectively, from what I understand, though, things are overall getting better in a lot of ways. I don't know how much bias is in it, but someone recommended the book Factfulness the other day. Haven't ordered it yet, but I'm going to because personally I'd like a little positivity in my geopolitical forecasts for once.

Hey man we all get discouraged when learning something new.

You should check out this https://www.amazon.ca/Mind-Numbers-Science-Flunked-Algebra-ebook/dp/B00G3L19ZU

The author was terrified of math throughout high school and joined the army after graduating. When she was ~25 she realized the work she was doing was not going to provide her a great future, and she went back to school for an engineering degree. During this time she learned how to overcome her issues, and she's now doing a PHD.

I really liked the book, I got it on Audible but wouldn't be surprised if the library had it :) She covers strategies to deal with solving new problems and also procrastination.

Skiena's Algorithm Design Manual - It gives you an overview of what classes of problems exist and how real world problems can be expressed as instances of them. It doesn't always give you the step-by-step directions of how certain algorithms work, but it gives you enough of an overview to understand the problem and points you towards existing implementations.

It's certainly one of the most useful books I used when preparing for interviews (and comes in handy in the real world as well). As an anecdote, in one interview at a big-N company, I was presented with a problem, said "based on these factors I'd treat this as a network flow problem by doing X", and that was the only buzzword needed - rather than watch me try to write a solution to a known problem, we were able to move on to other questions. Without knowing that term, I probably would have spent the remainder of the interview trying to optimize a solution to the problem instead.

If every republican read how to lie with statistics -Darrell Huff (1954) Fox viewership would drop. Hell, Democrats or anyone for that matter should read this. It makes trusting a news source a lot harder when you immediately pick out devious tricks to engineer partial truths.

I'm early thirties, and left a controlling ex a couple years ago myself (still married because they keep "accidentally" dropping the ball on their end, but that's another story). I had a discouraging experience going back to school while we were still living together, and it made me nervous about trying again. But this time has been totally different. I'm graduating from CC this spring with a 4.0!

We adult students have a lot of things going for us. There's the benefit of life experience and a fully developed brain. We tend to be more organized and driven, too. You may even find that material you struggled with as a teen comes more easily now.

However, I still get panicked every semester that I'm going to lose focus and flunk. Recently I've started having nightmares that I'm going to fail a class and not get to walk for graduation. I'm also worried because I'm starting STEM "weed out" classes next semester, so the difficulty is about the ratchet up significantly.

I'm managing by keeping my focus mostly on my current semester. I also bought a book called <em>A Mind For Numbers</em>, which is recommended for folks who aren't so confident in their math skills. It focuses on strategies for studying more efficiently and reducing the time you feel like you're grinding away but not getting anywhere.

I know it's scary, but school won't be as bad as your fear is telling you. Community colleges are very supportive places, with lots of resources to help you succeed. Take advantage of advising, free tutoring, and disability services (if panic attacks continue to be a problem). Don't let fear stop you from getting that degree! You can do it!!

One of the best books I ever read was "How to Lie With Statistics". Although the examples are dated, the basics are still very valid.

Estaba Leyendo Factfulness, y en verdad doy gracias a personas como el Doctor Monckeberg que lograron con su trabajo erradicar la desnutrición, combatir la falta de estimulación a edades tempranas, y en general disminuir la mortalidad infantil. También por impulsar un programa de salud que estuviera enfocado a suplir las necesidades de salud básicas más inmediatas de la población, además del programa integro para madres, lactantes, niños.

En las propias palabras del Doctor: Es el avance más trascendente en la historia de este país.

I used to be a dealer too! I ended up dealing blackjack, roulette, craps, bacc, Pai Gow, and many poker variants. I recommend that you read the book Secrets of Mental Math or watch the dvd. To practice, look at getting an app called Anki and make flashcards for yourself. Good luck and have fun!

It's not an oxymoron. You can have two sets of true facts about a situation, which depending on which things are emphasized, gives you an entirely separate narrative of how things are going.

One could say, for instance, "Murders in Chicago are up 1200% this year! Highest number of deaths on record!" And that would be one set of facts.

One could also say, "There were 12 murders in Chicago, compared to 1 last year. The 10 year average is about 10 murders per year, so this isn't outside of the expected range of deaths. Also, it's a city of 3 million, so this is in fact a fairly low amount of murders on a per capita basis."

Those are two sets of facts reporting on the same incident, both true but you can tell they paint entirely different narratives about how to feel about the situation.

What this shows is that you cannot simply say, "Well, just report the facts, and everything else will work itself out." There is a meta element to this, where you choose which things to emphasize, and which to de-emphasize, and by this choice of emphasis you inevitably are shaping the way things are understood, because humans understand events not by a bulleted list of facts, but as a narrative, a story.

These things you have to take into consideration when you're talking about media and the spread of information, especially political information.

For more fun like this, check out How to Lie with Statistics.

Did it once. Won't do it again unless there is a purely paper benefit (ex right now I can't visit my boyfriend's family in France with a US passport and COVID. I could if we were married). I'd revisit the idea if I had kids but here's what changed my mind...

I realized its something you need to do if your country isn't at income level 4 (according to factfulness) where your population is still growing and you need community to help provide basic needs.

However, once your country is rich enough, then babies have lower infant mortality rates. Everyone (even religious people) reproduce less. Population growth stops. Everyone has access to things that support the first 2 steps in Maslow's heriarchy of needs (shelter, healthcare, food, parental leave). All of a sudden you realize you don't need the marriage to help you or your kids survival.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250107814/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_25qxFbNDQ8XRM

Read a book by Hans Rosling called Factfulness

That's what's shown on the news, because that's what news do, i.e. they're not going to report "Here we are at a stable country with no war in 100 years."

In most metrics that you can measure we're doing very well in the world.

Here's a book about it

Possibly the worst set of graphs I've ever seen

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https://www.amazon.com/How-Lie-Statistics-Darrell-Huff/dp/0393310728