
The Best Textbooks on Every Subject - olalonde
http://lesswrong.com/lw/3gu/the_best_textbooks_on_every_subject/
======
patricklynch
Before everyone starts posting their Amazon affiliate links, look at the
requirements that makes the LessWrong thread so valuable:

    
    
      2.  You must have read at least two other textbooks on 
          that same subject.
      3.  You must briefly name the other books you've read on
          the subject and explain why you think your chosen
          textbook is superior to them.
    
      Rules #2 and #3 are to protect against recommending a bad
      book that only seems impressive because it's the only
      book you've read on the subject.

------
egypturnash
I'm too sleepy to figure out how to comment tere. So you guys get this.

The best text on learning how to draw is a copy of Preston Blair's book(s) on
drawing for animation. However that's only half the equation, because it lacks
exercises. So you need to go to
[http://johnkcurriculum.blogspot.com/2009/12/preston-blair-
le...](http://johnkcurriculum.blogspot.com/2009/12/preston-blair-lessons-
fundamentals-of.html) and do what he tells you to. They will seem stupid at
first. But trust John; a significant percentage of the talent in the Hollywood
tv animation scene learnt their craft under his harsh tutelage.

Other textbooks on drawing I've read: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain,
Figure Drawing for All It's Worth, The Vilppu Drawing Manual, The Animator's
Workbook.

The combination of Preston Blair (long considered THE classic text on drawing
for animation) and John K's exercises will VERY RAPIDLY teach you how to look
at things,mbreak them down into simple shapes, and draw them convincingly.
Other texts teach this but few start with the super-solid, super-simple
cartoon art found in 1940s cartoons; you're immediately thrown into trying to
break down a human body, or a car, or whatever, into shapes you don't
understand yet. The simple characters wear their construction on their
sleeves, so it's easy for you to understand it and learn.

~~~
dayvid
I think we're hitting into a possible issue with these book recommendations.

Recommendations on learning/understanding something logically, and
recommending a book based on how to learn how to do something can be very
different.

I've read all of these art books (except Vilppu's), and I DON'T think the best
text on how to learn how to draw is a copy of Preston Blair's books.

For me personally, I got the most advancement through Loomis' Figure Drawing
For What It's Worth. I spent a lot time going over diagrams in the book. It
transformed the way I approached drawing Other people, (especially people who
get into art with no prior experience) swear by Drawing on the Right Side of
the Brain.

In this case, a lot of what you think the best text would be depends on which
way you prefer to draw. I like figure drawing mostly, so I learn towards
Loomis and Hogarth. Someone who likes general life/possibly painting would
prefer Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. Someone who prefers animation,
would definitely love Preston Blair's books (and possibly Fun with a Pencil).

I think not only a good book recommendation is useful, but a good useful
explanation needs to go hand in hand with it.

~~~
egypturnash
Note the important caveat to my recommendation of the Blair: it is the best
text on drawing IF YOU USE JOHN K'S EXERCISES. By itself it is a good book on
cartooning; with the addition of John's exercises it becomes an awesome power
tool for building skill.

(And honestly the real value here is John's exercises; you can get almost as
much value out of them by freeze-framing great cartoons and drawing off of
them. In fact I know for a while he was trying to package his course into a
book, copiously illustrated with examples from the classic cartoons to work
from, but ran into rights issues.)

Loomis is awesome too, I learnt a hell of a lot from him. I also learnt a lot
from Bridgman's "Constructive Anatomy". But I feel the simple starting point
of John's exercises for the Blair book really make it a great place to begin,
and work up from.

(Of course I may be biased, as as I'm a cartoonist who's passed through
Spümcø.)

------
dangrossman
I've always found a good way to pick text books and other reading material for
a specific course is to find the university with the leading department for
that subject, then find the syllabus for a class in that course taught there.
My experience has been that it's rare to find a top university where you can't
find syllabi (if not full course sites with powerpoints and assignments)
online with some Google sleuthing.

Back in college, there were a few courses where my own professor's lectures
were difficult to follow. I almost always was able to find additional material
and often full PowerPoint decks from equivalent courses at other universities
to help out.

~~~
plinkplonk
"I've always found a good way to pick text books and other reading material
for a specific course is to find the university with the leading department
for that subject, then find the syllabus for a class in that course taught
there."

This is a great way to find good texts. A wrinkle I add is to check the
prerequisites for a course and repeat the process for each prerequisite till
you have an ordered list of texts. Working through a text is _much_ easier if
you have _nailed_ the pre requisites.

~~~
osivertsson
I used to do this too, ordering a big box of books from syllabus of
prestigious universities at a level that was often way beyond me.

I usually flipped through them, and picked up a few things, but in the end I
realized I had to really understand linear algebra, or number theory, or
whatever, to really grok what was going on.

Now _I_ knew I needed these prerequisites and why, not that someone just told
me so. This motivated me a lot more to get through (or nail) the
prerequisites.

------
alecdibble
Subject: Linear Algebra Recommendation: Introduction to Linear Algebra by
Gilbert Strang Reason: Strang presents the subject so clearly and intuitively
that you feel like an expert on the subject after reading each chapter. It is
by the far the best textbook I have encountered. He is also an excellent
teacher and offers the lecture notes to the corresponding MIT class online.

Book: [http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Linear-Algebra-Fourth-
Edi...](http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Linear-Algebra-Fourth-
Edition/dp/0980232716/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332655225&sr=8-1)

Lecture: [http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-06-linear-
algebra-...](http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-06-linear-algebra-
spring-2010/)

~~~
cop359
Strang's hand-wavy teaching style in my opinion kinda falls apart towards the
later part of the course. I feel like the whole second half is kinda half
baked. I didn't come away really having a good intuitive understanding of what
the SVD was or why I should care about eigenvalues. I definitely think it's a
good place to start though, but if you want something a little more organized
I'd really recommend.

"Matrix Analysis and Applied Linear Algebra"

[http://www.amazon.com/Matrix-Analysis-Applied-Algebra-
Soluti...](http://www.amazon.com/Matrix-Analysis-Applied-Algebra-
Solutions/dp/0898714540/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332659212&sr=8-1)

It's very clearly written and all the proofs are not too long nor too short.
It pretty quickly goes through all the stuff Strang covers and moves on to
more difficult things.

~~~
gphilip
Thank you for that recommendation; I had not heard about the book before.

An extra nice thing: the book's chapters are available for free --- for
downloading and viewing, and not for other uses --- from the book's website:
<http://matrixanalysis.com>

------
dunk010
One of my professors once related a quote from an author of one of the course
texts. The author declared that you should "make my book the third book you
read on this subject", because the third book you read on a subject is always
the one that enlightens you on it :-). There are many paths to understanding,
and I hope that the third book is still as relevant without the preceding two
already digested.

------
evoxed
Perhaps relevant to some other HN users...

This list has a recommendation for Introduction to Tonal Theory over Piston's
Harmony. I am not familiar with the former, but I found Walter Piston's books
to be fascinating and generally very good. It's an older book and so, as I've
found with most textbooks from its time, it is somewhat lacking in
explanations of certain examples– but then, the internet will supply you with
more than you need if you're already reading the material.

~~~
pygy_
From the Amazon reviews, it appears that the posthumous editions (4th and 5th)
depart from the spirit of the earlier ones, and have become unpalatable.

Edit: One reviewer who has used the 3rd to 5th editions prefers the fourth
one, which is less terse than the 3rd one.

~~~
evoxed
Just checked my shelf– I have the third edition of Harmony and 4th of
Counterpoint, terse is a fair judgement. I'll have to give the later editions
a look, but judging by the reviews (and the Revised by MARK DEVOTO tag...) I'm
not going to like what I see.

------
konstruktor
This is so much better than all the links to free Ebooks. Considering the time
it takes to learn anything of substance, the constraining factor is rarely the
price of a textbook, but time wasted on poor writing. Life is too short for
bad textbooks.

------
michaelfairley
There's a similar list at <http://bestintrobook.com/all> that includes most of
the same, as well as introductory books for less academic topics.

------
wickedchicken
The. Art. Of. Electronics.

I bought this as a sophomore in high school and was completely blown away by
it. The chapter on PLLs alone is worth the price of the book.

~~~
cop359
I dunno. That book is really dense and terse. It's a good reference book, but
not something you'd read cover to cover.

~~~
DanBC
But you should read it cover to cover. You should buy a notebook; and some
basic electronics equipment (and there's probably free simulation that's good
enough online now) and work through it.

Draw the diagrams (freehand!), do the math (on paper, not with a calculator!),
do the examples.

It's dense because it's complete (for the time, there's a lot of stuff that's
missing for modern world) and it's terse because you're supposed to be doing
the work at the same time.

And, if you really want to get in depth understanding you buy the AoE Lab-book
and build stuff while you're reading the main text.

------
DavidSJ
See also: [http://ask.metafilter.com/71101/What-single-book-is-the-
best...](http://ask.metafilter.com/71101/What-single-book-is-the-best-
introduction-to-your-field-or-specialization-within-your-field-for-laypeople)

------
Jabbles
I don't think this is something that can be crowdsourced. The arguments here
rest on authority (and in this case, it's well justified). You want the
opinion of someone who has surveyed the field and has studied further than the
respective textbooks take you. There may be some authorities whose replies are
worth listening to, but these are difficult to distinguish.

For instance, a user recommending CLRS over TAOCP is an odd piece of advice,
since TAOCP is distinctly not a textbook. The user purports to have read
TAOCP, an assertion with a low prior-probability.

Unfortunately, I do not think we can rely on the advice of anonymous internet
contributors. With no way to enforce the rules, LessWrong fails to do due
diligence and is merely spreading the opinions of those that reply.

So, to remedy that, I would add a 4th rule: You must state where your
authority on the subject, and on the choice of textbooks comes from.

~~~
kunj2aan
I agree with your sentiment that recommending textbooks to a beginner is a
very hard problem and crowd-sourcing may not be the best idea, but I do have
questions for the example you provide to prove your assertion and some of the
claims you make.

First of all, why would'nt you consider TAOCP a text book on algorithms? Are
you trying to discredit discredit the recommender by supplying your own
biases? If TAOCP is not a textbook and CLRS is and you provide no arguments
against CLRS, why would you come to the conclusion that the contribution is
poor? "LessWrong" has it's faults but the disclaimers that it provides is
pretty clear and wouldn't you consider it worse if it interjected with it's
own opinions?

If we need to listen to an authority "who has surveyed the field", would Knuth
be such an authority and his recommendations contained in TAOCP be something
you would recommend?

------
nullflux
While slightly off-topic, do read more of lesswrong.com if you are new to the
site. I personally find the site to be a solid repository of useful/thoughtful
content.

~~~
konstruktor
Have you found a good heuristic for determining whether you are really
learning something useful or just randomly browsing lesswrong? Not having that
is my reason for avoiding it after quitea few hours spent on the site.

~~~
rms
Some parts of Less Wrong are more concrete and less esoteric than others.

I quite like the Quantum Physics sequence.
[http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Sequences#The_Quantum_Physics...](http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Sequences#The_Quantum_Physics_Sequence)

------
why-el
It might be unrelated, but I followed the link to the critique of Bertrand
Russell's history of Western Philosophy. The author claims its inaccurate, and
proceeds to say anything about it but why its inaccurate. For instance, it
says that the book ignores the role of Eastern Philosophy, well dah, the book
is on Western philosophy. Russell is an admirer of Eastern Philosophy and has
bee arguing that more of it needs to be consumed in the west (For more info,
check Bertrand's The Problem of China). Then there is the claim that russell's
logic lead him to believe that Rousseau led to Nazism, again no evidence of
that whatsoever.

The piece was extremely unfounded, writing off at the beginning of the article
because of that critique was a bad idea.

------
niels_olson
Isn't this what Amazon reviews are for? Because I seriously doubt this less
wrong list is going to dive deep, to, say, graduate level hematopathology or
modern factor analysis. But reviews of such items are readily available on
Amazon.

------
olalonde
Would be interesting to get some additional textbook recommendations from HN.
I'll start with mine:

Subject: Startups

Recommendation: The Four Steps to the Epiphany by Steven Gary Blank

Reason: It's a highly practical guide/blueprint on taking new startups to
market.

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steven-
Blank/dp/...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steven-
Blank/dp/0976470705) & first three chapters:
[http://www.stanford.edu/group/e145/cgi-
bin/winter/drupal/upl...](http://www.stanford.edu/group/e145/cgi-
bin/winter/drupal/upload/handouts/Four_Steps.pdf)

~~~
Ecio78
He has just released a new book that should be the evolution of the one you
cited. It should be called 'the startup's owner manual' and he said it
contains what he has learned in the past ten years. you can find it on amazonn
and on his site

------
Quizzy
Please also take into consideration the importance of peer discussion and
debate. Just reading the books without an intense follow up discussion and
debate makes it less likely that you can apply this new found knowledge. So
maybe we can create a peer discussion Hangout API to go with these
recommendations such that people can attend a common platform and coordinate
small (3-5) discussion groups for elaboration and discussion.

------
9diov
This reminds me of this part from 'The Count of Monte Cristo' when Dantes met
abbe Faria for the first time:

"I had nearly five thousand volumes in my library at Rome; but after reading
them over many times, I found out that with one hundred and fifty well-chosen
books a man possesses, if not a complete summary of all human knowledge, at
least all that a man need really know. I devoted three years of my life to
reading and studying these one hundred and fifty volumes, till I knew them
nearly by heart; so that since I have been in prison, a very slight effort of
memory has enabled me to recall their contents as readily as though the pages
were open before me. I could recite you the whole of Thucydides, Xenophon,
Plutarch, Titus Livius, Tacitus, Strada, Jornandes, Dante, Montaigne,
Shakespeare, Spinoza, Machiavelli, and Bossuet. I name only the most
important." -- Abbe Faria, Chapter 16. A Learned Italian.

~~~
olalonde
Romantic quote, but it comes down to 1 book/week which seems quite unrealistic
for 150 modern scientific textbooks. I challenge anyone to go through
"Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach" in a week!

~~~
jackfoxy
While that volume belongs on the 150 books for the well-read hacker, I
wouldn't put it on the list for the well-read gentleman. We live in such a
world of specialization, appreciation of true general education has suffered.
In the age of Romance the 150 books would have been largely classical and
philosophy. I think you could put together an awe-inspiring list of 150 that
everyone with a bachelor's should be familiar with. Then we would actually
live in an intellectually inspired society.

~~~
bhb916
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a
hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a
wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act
alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a
computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization
is for insects."

-Robert A. Heinlein

------
tmrggns
This is an interesting start. I would say that the next (and possibly easier)
step is compiling the reference books associated with these subjects, the
original sources and their best versions (such as comparing translations and
editions). I think starting to add these in other companion lists could also
prevent people from suggesting original sources and reference books in lieu of
textbooks. One good thing about a list of textbooks is that it shows just
where market opportunities exists for potential authors, and also where the
bar is already set high. I have observed perfectly authoritative books being
"replaced" for no good reason. This may be encouraged by publishing companies
due to the way copyright works. However, changing textbooks every few decades
does not help the process of imparting understanding. Something like this list
might help prevent that.

------
Drbble
One thing to watch out for is that sometimes the third book you read is a your
favorite, because you have a background familiarity created from the first
two. For that reason, it can be not less wrong to reject recs from single book
readers.

------
mailshanx
Digital communications by Bernard Sklar. A close second is Wayne Tomasi's
book. Both books provide great intuition into the matter with just about the
right detail.

Once you have both of those down (and have the requisite linear algebra /
probability background), read the texts by Proakis and Gallager. They are very
math heavy, (but also very precise and thorough) and though often recommended
by university professors, definitely not a good introduction to the subject.

 _recommendation on the basis of grad-level studies and research on
communication / signal processing._

~~~
bhb916
I second this recommendation. Proakis was my undergraduate text. I read both
Gallager and Sklar at grad school and would highly recommend the later over
the other two.

------
zem
not read enough other books on the subject to comment "fairly", but morrison
and boyd's "organic chemistry" is one of the best texts i've seen on any
subject. they take a traditionally daunting and information-dense subject and
work out a clear, logical path through it that builds the material up step by
step, explaining the principles behind each step and frequently referring back
to foundational material. if you're struggling with organic chemistry in
college, i'd strongly recommend getting a copy of this book.

~~~
possibilistic
I quite liked Janice G. Smith's text. OChem is definitely one of the more
esoteric courses out there, but she synthesized everything in an incredibly
logical, sensible progression.

Organic chemistry is like a spatial algebra. It's so weird, but it makes a lot
of sense when you really begin to grok it.

------
EdwardCoffin
There used to be a website called CanonicalTomes that allowed people to
suggest and vote on the best books on various topics. It's been defunct for a
long time, but you can still browse (though not search) it through the Wayback
Machine:

[http://web.archive.org/web/20010616232238/http://www.canonic...](http://web.archive.org/web/20010616232238/http://www.canonicaltomes.org/index.cgi)

------
tlow
Why aren't the textbooks used in public education free?

Why aren't there any good recommendations for High School Algebra and Algebra
II, since the CAL college system requires both?

------
wyclif
Heads up: The philosopher Frederick Copleston's name is misspelled on the
entry under philosophy texts. I didn't spot an email address for the project.

------
nrmn
Could anyone make a solid recommendation on a calculus book? Im currently
using Calculus a Complete Course by Robert Adams and Chris Essex.

~~~
billswift
It depends on what you want; I came at calculus mostly from a civil and
mechanical engineering point of view, and I found the Dover reprint of Morris
Kline's _Calculus: An Intuitive and Physical Approach_ , originally published
in 1968, very helpful.

------
Avshalom
_Classical Mechanics_ , John R. Taylor

Its pretty much the best textbook I've ever owned.

------
guard-of-terra
Am I the only one who prefers blog posts, examples and wikipedia to textbooks?
For anything IT related, anyway.

Textbooks are cripplingly sparse. They yak and yak and yak for a few pages on
a concept you're figured out from the first sentence.

I would like a zoomable textbook. One which presents you a list of tl;dr
explanations about every topic covered (one-two pages per book), but you may
click on any topic and get a thorough description of it, and then I can click
on any claim in that and get more specialized information and so on down to
turtles.

I would like articles that way too.

~~~
DanBC
I wish the wikipedia leads were more concise. A two sentence description of
the concept in the most basic understandable language possible.

Then the next paragraph can be a more accurate lead.

The the content list; then the contents.

Your zoomable book idea is a good one. I'd prefer authority with good cites
over crowd-sourced with semi-random citing.

~~~
theoretick
I recommend checking out the "Simple English" wikipedia for more complex
topics. It breaks those sentences down even more and is fantastic for math
articles and the like.

------
flipside
There is no such thing as "the best textbooks", just "best textbooks" for each
person.

[http://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell_on_spaghetti_sauce...](http://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell_on_spaghetti_sauce.html)

~~~
oskarth
While everyone has different tastes and needs, there's no doubt that some
books are better than others. Not to belittle Gladwell too much - I enjoyed
the talk and it's a valuable perspective on market segmentation - but using a
pop science author talking about spaghetti sauce as a source is hardly an
argument to dismiss the _notion of quality_.

~~~
flipside
Quality is important, but still subjective. Not to say this won't be a great
curated list.

Anyways, I should have known better than to just throw that out there. My bad.

