Michael Shermer--

[JitterbugPerfume]

Which of his books should I read first?

He was just on Book TV , and I was very impressed .

I have read his articles in Scientific American , and of course Skeptics magazine , but somehow I never got around to his books.

[lizerdbits]

1. I have "Why people believe weird things"

But that's the only one I've read. It deals mostly with alien abductions, creationism, and Holocaust deniers specifically but there's a good bit about skepticism in general. It's been many years, maybe I should reread it.

[semillama]

2. My mom gave me "Science Friction" for christmas

I haven't read any of his other stuff, but that one was pretty darn good. I didn't realize he was a historian of science - some of his essays on historical science were pretty enlightening. Plus the essay about Roddenberry was pretty good.

[Warpy]

7. Roddenberry was a visionary in a lot of ways

Remember those first Start Trek communicators? We've got 'em. We're almost to the point of getting them reduced to badge size, although dialing is still problematic. Eventually, we'll have programmable, voice activated dialing and we'll all be wearing our phones over our left tits.

Some of the stuff is a little silly, like transporters. However, I read some years ago that someone did manage to create a minute analog of a "warp field" for a picosecond or so.

Now all the medical field needs is a salt shaker and Blackberry combination to wave at a patient to collect all vital data.

[drm604]

8. Voice activated dialing.

Eventually, we'll have programmable, voice activated dialing

This has been available for several years, at least. My several year old cell phone can be trained to recognize phrases spoken by me, associate them with a directory entry, and dial.

Newer phones don't even require training, as long as you say exactly the phrase the number is listed under. For example, "call wife" will dial the number labeled with "wife" in the directory. You can also say "call 123 456 7890" and it will dial that number.

[Warpy]

9. I know that

but we're not capable of miniaturizing the whole thing into a brooch, not yet.

[Silent3]

10. "we'll all be wearing our phones over our left tits"

Great. Then we'll reading all about how cell phones cause breast cancer instead of (or in addition to?) brain tumors.

[JitterbugPerfume]

3. I have both of those on order at Amazon

I can't wait to "dig in"

[immoderate]

4. I read "The Science of Good and Evil"

I also heard him lecture on it. Very good stuff.

--IMM

[Pale Blue Dot]

5. I've heard him talk about his new one, "The Mind of the Market", and frankly,

I've been disappointed. I think in this case he attributes too much to genetics, and to studies with very small sample sizes, and then extrapolates them so that he can make sweeping generalizations about the U.S. Economy. He seems to have very little idea about how things actually work.

However, his book "Why People Believe Weird Things" is an excellent primer on skeptical thinking.

[Imperialism Inc.]

6. He is a libertarian and a randian.

I didn't capitalize either term because he is definitely not the dogmatic form of either of those. Still, he definitely has some things pretty wrong. That he actually knows the latest psychological research in to economic thinking of humans and doesn't understand that it undermines some very basic assumptions of economics leaves me shaking my head.