Are there any good books for /lit/ types who fucking suck at /sci/ stuff?
I'm looking to learn math (especially geometry) and science, of course, but also for literature or nonfiction that will make me appreciate their beauty more.
So far I am thinking of reading
>Logan - The Poetry of Physics and the Physics of Poetry
>Newsom - Mathematical Discourses: The Heart of Mathematical Science
for the latter goal.
For the actual learning part, I was thinking of reading college-level introduction books from the early 20th century, which assume basic arithmetic / maybe algebra but otherwise give you the ground-up treatment in math and science. These older books seem a lot more holistic than modern glossy textbooks. The latter are more pared-down and specialised for modern needs, but I kind of want a slower, more human approach. Especially with more focus on the history of math/science, how these ideas developed, relating them to philosophy, etc.
Anyone else trying to self-teach in a similar way?
I'm assuming you are talking about elementary levels since you don't specify what "math" or "science" you want to learn, and since that's the case just fucking learn it online. Or if you want to get a book then just get a normal textbook.
"Literature that makes me appreciate their beauty more" is for lazy potheads who just want to be told what math might be like and not actually learn it.
>>7858551
This sounds pretty fascinating from what my babby brain can make of it. I'm actually interested in learning STEM majorly so I can into stuff like this. Thanks man.
>>7858552
Yeah, elementary because I'm retard tier. I never went to school so my math knowledge is a patchwork. I taught myself algebra and vaguely up to precalc with aforementioned glossy textbooks, once upon a time, but have mostly forgotten everything, and I'm innately bad at math.
I can learn online or use the textbook method, but I'd rather not. I don't want some For Dummies version that makes everything popsci accessible, I just don't want textbooks that assume I'm an engineer with no time to stop and smell the roses.
>>7858564
Are you an African child?
>>7858576
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtjUELl2qxY
>>7858564
m8, I'm saying that if you buy Carl Sagan books or whatever then you aren't going to learn shit.
If you just want to read about math and science (in a pop way) that's fine but it isn't going to teach you anything.
If you actually want to learn then that involves going through didactic materials and doing problems by hand.
Why do you want to learn math anyways? If you aren't using it a lot then there's no point because you'll just forget it anyways, as you already admit.
If you just want to have a basic math literacy then you should just find a youtube playlist.
>>7858580
https://youtu.be/uQqs-Cno5Bc
>>7858598
I specifically want to avoid Sagan-lite stuff. I'm talking about shit like reading Principia Mathematica, Euclid, and famous/magisterial histories of mathematical knowledge, not How To Learn Math While Tweeting by Neil de Grasse Tyson or whatever.
>>7858613
You read that stuff for historical value. You aren't actually going to learn Calculus just from the Principia Mathematica unless you already had an extremely solid mathematical background and you also were a genius.
If you actually want to learn calculus then get a cheap edition of Calculus by James Stewart, which is the text pretty much every college uses and will keep you busy for a couple years at least.
If you really want to get to the good stuff, you are gonna have to go through all the basics.
By basics I mean:
- Elementary Algebra (HS level)
- Basics of Mathematical Proof
- Calculus
- Linear Algebra
Then move on to the mid level stuff:
- Analysis on R
- Analysis on R^n
- Analysis on C
- Number Theory
- Algebra (Groups, Rings, Fields)
- General Topology
- Differential Geometry of Curves and Surfaces
Then some slightly higher level shit:
- Analysis on Manifolds / Differential Topology
- Commutative Algebra
- "Modern" Real Analysis
- Functional Analysis
- Algebraic Topology
Even higher level shit:
- Riemannian Geometry
- Analysis on Complex Manifolds / Complex Geometry
- PDE Theory
- Algebraic Geometry
Now you can really start seeing how deeply everything truly is connected through mathematics.
>>7858537
richard feynman
>>7858564
Khan academy to learn basics, then teach your self calculus, chech the sci wiki. After you've learned some decent maths you might want to read a book on math or what ever
>>7860155
>books for /lit/ types who fucking suck at /sci/ stuff
Check your privilege.
>>7858980
This. Paul's online math notes and khan have gotten tons of tards through college math; no reason they won't help you
I honestly think it is a lot easier to be a stemlord that teaches themselves the humanities than vice versa. I'm in the process of that right now, Op, I've never seen someone get into very high level math with as basic of a background as you. It will take a LONG time and I'm not sure if it will ever be worth it, but if you want to I would focus much much more on online courses than books.
The kind of books you're looking for -- more readable and narrative than textbooks but more rigorous than popsci trash -- literally do not exist. There is no market there. What you should do is find khan academy, mit open courseware, that kind of stuff, and follow along with classes. Reading the principia will not teach you calculus.
I hate the place for various reasons, but
>>7858537
Start with the Greeks. Euclid's Elements. Work your way up from there.
>>7858537
go to khanacademy if you're serious
you won't learn stem by reading, only by practicing
you need a career-related reason to do this. if you don't have one you'll give up and it's better for all involved in that case for you to stick to pop-sci airport books
>>7860595
This is pants-on-head retarded. That just isn't how you learn about modern math and science. Starting that abstract before you have a grasp of even precalculus will get op nowhere.
As other anons have said, online courses are the only way to go. Popsci books can't and won't teach you how math actually works, just a watered-down overview of the results. Textbooks are essential, but not to read, just to find practice problems. When in stem, learn as the stemlords learn.
Thanks to all who made recommendations (practical and otherwise).
I think I should have been less vague or more concise in the OP. But whatever.
>>7860439
Thanks bro.
>The kind of books you're looking for -- more readable and narrative than textbooks but more rigorous than popsci trash -- literally do not exist. There is no market there.
This in particular I think I should have explained better. I only meant using older textbooks and teaching methods. I work in a STEM library, so I made the OP literally five minutes after shelving 600,000 math/science college textbooks, and I run into a lot of neat old ones. I like leafing through them and seeing that there's more of a personal touch, it's a LOT more writing and explanation, a lot more historical context sometimes. I have just been writing down ones that interested me and seemed approachable.
I shouldn't have mentioned Euclid/Principia.
>>7858736
I get what you're trying to communicate but this is the douchiest possible way to say it.
>>7860155
>Just w h a t
Teaching yourself calc 1-3 outside a classroom without an instructor solely from a text will easily take a year or two.
>>7858537
OP, decide what you actually want. Either resign yourself to fluff books for laypeople, or do math. There isn't much in between. Math isn't going to increase your appreciation of the beauty of literature or the universe or some shit, and unless you take up a career that uses it, you'll never use most of it.
Take courses at university or teach yourself. Either way go to khanacademy, start at the beginning, and do it all. Math isn't hard, it's just work. You're not inherently bad at it unless you're literally retarded. What probably happened is that you had some combination of not doing the work and bad instruction at a crucial stage. So go back to the beginning, and do it all.
>>7860642
>Teaching yourself calc 1-3 outside a classroom without an instructor solely from a text will easily take a year or two.
If you can't manage Stewart's book in 1-3 months then you just might not be cut out for doing maths.
>>7860621
It's a dip you meme
>>7860647
>precalc to multivariable in 1 month
I don't know if you're trying to meme or just that one stupid autist who convinced himself he knew all the material because of his high iq then failed all the tests
>>7860897
I said one TO THREE months, not necessarily one. Plus I was excluding precalculus because you're assumed to know it when you start Calculus.
But again,
>spending "a year or two" on Stewart's walk-in-the-park of a text
My sidesssss
>>7860911
So you didn't read the thread at all. Op said he has a very tenuous grasp of basic algebra. He is not going to breeze through Stewart's in a month. Literally nobody has gone from precalc to a good understanding of multivariable in a month. Don't be the idiot that pretends he has, either.
>>7860634
I would consider not starting with the old textbooks because (atleast from my experience) they often have a harder to follow introduction into the topic then many modern textbooks.
If you really want to start learning maths maybe you should start with a recent book as introduction and get an older one later.
Also do the problems in the books they will tell you what you have understood and what not.
>>7860137
Ma maaaan
>>7860911
You're a moron.
1. Use Khan Academy
2. Find a website of some university
3. Find out what books they use for physics, math or whatever the fuck you want to know.
4. Give up and consider suicide
It's hard to be a STEMfag. Khan academy will bbeenough if you want to get the general feeling of how it's done.
>>7858537
Chaos by Gleick is good, especially if you have an okay understanding of philosophy.
It's a fundamentally useful book for understanding non-determinative systems: systems that are determined on the most recent outcome (like how people tend to do what people around them do, creating a feedback loop) as opposed to deterministic situations (like how a car will travel over a specific distance if you give it a specific speed and a specific velocity)
I recommend
Mathematics: From the Birth of Numbers by Jan Gullberg
This book is probably more along the lines you may be looking for OP, it works through the history of mathematics and mathematical thought. The topics range from elementary arithmetic and by the end you should be able to do elementary calculus.
I personally haven't read the book but it's pretty well regarded, you could use standard textbooks and khan academy if you need it as you go along too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSo4sxQGqT4
>>7858537
I'm doing a similar thing right now, OP. Only I might I have a little more of a background in maths.
Check out the Dover Mathematics series. All different topics, all levels. Plus they run from about $4 - 15. Pic especially is a great intro.
>>7858740
This. He makes things easy to understand and has that personal touch you're looking for
>>7863875
He's overrated
Poorfag here
Is it OK to just pirate all the textbooks? I really don't wanna wait 2 weeks from Amazon for a $60 intro to precalc by Dr. Goldstein
>>7863910
You can get old editions of textbooks for like less than $5 on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/Precalculus-4th-Robert-F-Blitzer/dp/0321559843/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1459255217&sr=8-13&keywords=pre-calculus
It's not surprising how many of you recommend Khan Academy given how awful it is as a pedagogical tool for learning how to think like a mathematician. Video lectures do not compare with textbooks. Period. If you're < 20 and you've been raised by Youtube, drop that habit right now and learn to work with pen and paper. Forget about the calculator until you've attained a relatively decent grasp of higher mathematics via the pen and paper approach. If you're serious about mathematics you should have notebooks full of definitions, problems, sketched ideas, etc. That you should be ashamed if you do not know the algorithm behind long division or subtraction goes without saying.
Now, although Khan Academy is okay for learning algorithmic plugging-in and manipulation of arithmetic and algebraic syntax, it doesn't tell you the important practice of naming mathematical objects (which boils down to *talking mathematically* and talking *about* mathematics *in English*), knowing what these names stand for (a gateway to abstract reasoning), and communicating mathematics clearly (/sci/ is a good illustration of how not do it: replies to threads are by and large idiosyncratic and beyond comprehension). Reading books initiate, promote, and encourage this practice way better than videos do. This is an indispensable habit if you want to succeed in higher mathematics that goes beyond Calculus.
That said, get a precalculus text by the recommendation of >>7860155, master that, and move on to the 'basics' as laid out by >>7858736.
>>7863936
>being an elitist about math education
>>7863936
Yeah, Khan academy and the like is really useful if you're already in a class and using it to supplement the traditional materials because you were sleeping in class or something. It's terrible by itself. Practicing with pen and paper until you understand why things work the way they do has been the way people learn math since people have wanted to learn math because it works.
>>7863936
Math grad here. I don't agree with everything in this post, but I do like privileging books and drafting notions, then tidying them for later.
I was pretty good at this by senior year. Some homeworks were turned in using latex (I was just starting to use it and therefore went slow), but usually I'd work out remaining problems on scratch paper, and once I had the ideas right I'd transfer the relevant material by hand to blank, un-lined printer paper and submit that. By this point the trains of thought were complex enough that I would blend text and formula in hand-writing - just as a textbook or mathematical article is obliged to do. Organizing thoughts in this way is a tier or two up from just "grinding problems using only formulas", which is how things normally proceed up until around the time of calculus. The break in the USA at least, is in going from HS to a college, where although you are still not particularly expected to do anything new or interesting (original research, bigger projects), although it's certainly very good if you can, you /are/ at minimum trained and expected to start communicating like a real (educated) adult. That means that from the math major's perspective, just cranking problem sets eventually doesn't quite fly anymore, or shouldn't toward the end.
>>7863936
Khan academy was very helpful alongside a textbook when I learned calc ii the lectures explained things well but the questions and worked examples were very good desu. I wouldn't use them beyond calc ii as they don't seem to have questions beyond it.
