Damn, We Wish We’d Written These 11 Stories | Five...

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The Hydrogen Sonata.

By Iain M Banks.

I always get the feeling that Banks is never really sure how his books will end. There will always be one or two ideas that make their way through the full novel, but much of it feels like it was just made up as he goes along.

Having said that, Banks is a strong writer. There are always passages in his books that I love. My complaint is more that this could have been a great book. Instead it's a good book if you follow the culture series. That's nice.

The Hydrogen Sonata in this case is a bit of music created as satire—difficult to play music written for now other purpose than to mock other bits of music that were only written to be difficult to play. Over time the Sonata, much to the composers chagrin,  becomes the definitive piece of music whose only purpose is to be difficult to play.

The meta joke there—a joke taking over and having consequences when people don't realize it's a joke, is the real plot of the book. In this case what happens when the Gzilt civilization discovers that their Bible was a practical joke sent to them by a neighboring alien species.

 

Sometimes characters come and go for no good reason. I get the feeling that Vyr & Tefwe were meant to be the same character. That Banks discovered that  Vyr had too travel to too many places in too short of a time to be credible, so he created Tefwe.

 

 

 

 

Running

From 538

If we take this research at face value, we learn a few things. First, some exercise reduces your risk of death. Second, the optimal walking/jogging exercise is light to moderate jogging. The optimal speed is between 5 and 7 mph, and if you do 25 minutes about three times a week, you're all set. Nothing in the data suggests that running more — farther, or faster — will do more to lower your risk of death.

Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It)

By William Poundstone

 

Poundstone discuss the many psychological features that impact how we decide a price. The writing is good, he covers many topics, who made the discovery, and the experiments made to test them. Overall, the book is a little disconnected though as there are many short chapters on related themes, as opposed to a few larger chapters that dig deep into a particular aspect of the subject.

 

Some topics…

 

Anchoring—the first price you see affects the price of a final sale, even if the first price you see was a random number.

 

Sliding discounts—Don't raise prices, reduce discounts. Instead of selling something for $99, set it's price at $149, and offer a $50.00 discount. Over time if your costs go up, or you want more profit, then reduce the discount, to $40. Next, raise the price from $149.00 to $159, but also raise the discount from $40 to $50.00. This has the effect of slowly raising prices, without spooking your customers.

 

People don't think absolutely about happiness. They think about it in comparison to other choices.