mathoda.com

The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, by Edward R. Tufte.

This book sounds kind of boring, but it’s actually the bible of how to represent data visually.

Okay, that may still sound boring.

However, if you consider that it’s hard to actually know something well without looking at the data, and that we are often far better at seeing data visually then we are at digesting it in tables, you’ll understand it may be helpful to understand when a visual display of data is actually deceiving you, and how to make your own displays of data better.

The core ideas I got from reading this book are: Think about what visual elements can be removed while still representing the data truthfully and in full. Think of how multiple sets of data relate to each other and think through the different types of visual displays to see what fits that best. Make sure to look for causes of exceptions in data patterns because that’s often what matters most.

Next, by Michael Crichton.

This book is about the very strange biotechnology future that is approaching much faster than most people suspect. It is also about how this future may be governed by our current laws, which make little sense. For example, because the law doesn’t recognize your right to own your body parts, major medical institutions have more rights and incentives in your body parts than you do. I couldn’t agree with Mr. Crichton more on either his observations about the technology or the law. Unfortunately, I’m not sure a novel was the proper format for this book, as the story and characters seemed to have been forgotten in favor of the ideas being communicated.

The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008, by Mark Halperin and John F. Harris.

This book’s subtitle notwithstanding, it is actually an examination of how campaign masterminds like Bill Clinton and Karl Rove operate. To its credit the book does delve deeply into explaining the operational techniques and why some seemingly foolhardy policy positions are actually effective at moving a candidate closer to victory. It shows how better insights and superior execution of a campaign can catapult little known candidates over their rivals, to the heights of power.

It also shows in some detail what I’ve long suspected: that although their followers are often motivated by their hate for the leaders of the opposing political party, the leaders of successful campaigns often admire each other and copy liberally from each other whatever works.

The book fails to adequately address the most interesting question about the 2008 campaign: how the Internet effects fund raising, getting the message out, and turning out the vote on election day. The subject matter of the subtitle wasn’t quite addressed.

Rembrandt: the Painter at Work by Ernst van Wetering
Velazquez: the Technique of Genius by Jonathan Brown and Carmen Garrido

How exactly did Rembrandt and Velazquez create their paintings? What choices did they make in how to make their brush strokes, how to mix their paints, how to layer their paints, how to compose their creations?

Sadly, if these books touched on such matters, they did so in a rather oblique way only. What was very helpful in these books was their inclusion of pictures of both entire paintings and of closeups of portions of such paintings. From the pictures I learned alot.

Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath

Richard Dawkin’s The Selfish Gene and Malcom Galdwell’s The Tipping Point compared an idea spreading through a network of people to a virus spreading through a network of people. The idea’s skill at spreading depends on the likelihood of the next person absorbing the idea, the person’s level of connectedness to the rest of the network of people, and the person’s likelihood of persuading other minds to accept the idea.

Made to Stick seeks to answer a related question: what makes ideas unforgettable? It points out that urban legends, which lack value and are often easily demonstrated to be false, are very memorable, spread far and wide, and are hard to stamp out.

Made to Stick argues that to be hard to forget an idea must be simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional, and told through a story. The book dissects a great number of ideas to illustrate each of these elements in greater detail.

Simple means the core intent/idea/point is told in a prioritized/compact/profound manner.

Unexpected because a surprise gets attention. It’s best if the unexpectedness is related to the Simple idea, and if there is a lack of information that keeps things suspenseful. The best unexpected ideas are the ones that set up achievable but audacious goals.

Concrete means related directly to human action or sensory information. The book makes an interesting point that novices perceive concrete details, while experts think of concrete details as symbols of higher abstract insight and thus naturally avoid concrete communication. It points out in passing that novices and experts are best able to coordinate when they focus on concrete details. Often times a physical object can be used to represent ideas in a concrete manner, even if the physical object is just a symbol.

Ideas are believed to be Credible if they mention a respected authority, mention someone who learned through hard experience, rely on the listener’s own experience, are on a human scale, and/or are testable by the listener.

Sticky ideas usually appeal to Emotion because people are wired to feel for people, not for abstractions. The key is finding the right emotion to harness. Emotions can be generated by an appeal to self interest, using associations, or appealing to identity, particularly the stories people believe themselves to be in.

Ideas told in a Story are easily visualized, have a plot, and let the listener simulate how to react to the idea.

This was an interesting book, but I’m going to have to run a wide variety of ideas against this test before I’m convinced of its usefulness.