Medieval Essays, Christopher Dawson
Principally concerned with the creation and growth of Europe's Christian culture.
Principally concerned with the creation and growth of Europe's Christian culture.
Which book are you reading now? Volume XI
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SS-18 ICBM
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About to finish Blockbuster Drugs by Jie Jack Li. It covers the history of those drugs that make more than a billion US$ in sales worldwide, from the late 1970s ulcer treatment Tagamet to the late 2000s pain medication and anticonvulsive Lyrica. The stories of the researchers and their innovations are crisply outlined in accessible but still academic language.
Onto the criticisms. Author is obviously a chemist, considering how he constantly goes on about how the contributions of chemists are just as important as the biologists (and yet later on concedes that biologics, as opposed to small-molecule drugs, are the next wave of blockbusters). Face it man, the biological research is more important than the chemical fabrication of the drugs. You can make all the small molecules you want, but if their pharmacokinetics suck and/or they have terrible side effects, you may as well have done nothing at all.
The book has the subtitle The Rise and Decline of the Pharmaceutical Industry. The latter is only covered briefly in the afterword. Disappointing.
Book has not changed my stance on the need to have greater government involvement in pharmaceutical R&D, perhaps even development.
Book seems to treat direct consumer marketing as a good thing. No, just no.
Onto the criticisms. Author is obviously a chemist, considering how he constantly goes on about how the contributions of chemists are just as important as the biologists (and yet later on concedes that biologics, as opposed to small-molecule drugs, are the next wave of blockbusters). Face it man, the biological research is more important than the chemical fabrication of the drugs. You can make all the small molecules you want, but if their pharmacokinetics suck and/or they have terrible side effects, you may as well have done nothing at all.
The book has the subtitle The Rise and Decline of the Pharmaceutical Industry. The latter is only covered briefly in the afterword. Disappointing.
Book has not changed my stance on the need to have greater government involvement in pharmaceutical R&D, perhaps even development.
Book seems to treat direct consumer marketing as a good thing. No, just no.
I've decided to dedicate April to English literature, English history, English culture, etc, in honor of St. George's Day on the 23rd, and am starting off with The Vicar of Wakefield.
Should start with (or at least include) The Canterbury Tales, surely?
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
Ah St George. Patron Saint of Catalonia. Here we have these nice tradition where people buy roses (only roses) and books to each other. Every library and some newsagents put stands on main streets and these are at their most crowded in the whole year with people looking at and for books, waltzing and pushing each other, pressing their way in, out, through the word-thirsty masses. Queueing to get a signature, attend a panel, buy a bundle of printed pages.
It truly is a wonderful day.
It truly is a wonderful day.
I would like to recommend the dialogue Theaetetos, by Plato. It is around 120 pages. It has a number of references to quite poetic expressions as well (such as ancient proverbs), along with some info (as a second-source, obviously) on philosophers like Protagoras, Heraklitos and other Ionians, as well as some geometric spirals and the usual socratic tone- I mean literally the first thing Socrates tells Theaetetos when he meets him is that he wants to look at his face carefully so that he may see his own face without using a mirror (cause his geometry teacher, Theodoros of Cyrene, had told Socrates that Theaetetos is ugly and generally looks like Socrates...).
Why not Piers Plowman? I just read an essay on that. I'm not working chronologically, but that is an idea if I can find a readable version of it, preferably with commentary to throw light on more obscure references. I'd like to take on JRR Tolkien's translation of Beowulf, but there's only four weeks in April.
I am considering letting this theme go forward until June, when I will start reading American Revolution material obsessively...It's nice to know in the modern age that people still celebrate St. George, slayer of dragons.
It sounds considerably less bacchanalian than what St. Patrick's day celebrations have become.
Why not Piers Plowman? I just read an essay on that. I'm not working chronologically, but that is an idea if I can find a readable version of it, preferably with commentary to throw light on more obscure references. I'd like to take on JRR Tolkien's translation of Beowulf, but there's only four weeks in April.
I meant because it begins quite famously with the month of April - although if you're reading Beowulf, Seamus Heaney's verse translation is excellent.
Here's what I have been reading:
Game Change - Election porn in an off year, nothing more, nothing less.
I Was Wrong - Andrew Sullivan on his changing opinions on the Iraq War via his blogs. A good read for me.
Freedom From Fear - Enjoyed it, trying to work through all of the Oxford Histories of the US. Looking at Glorious Revolution or Grand Expectations next.
Before the Storm - The start of Perlstein's history of the modern American conservative movement. I loved it, starting Nixonland next.
On Being A Scientist - This is basically a pamphlet from ACS, I think. I wish some of my less scrupulous labmates would have read this book.
Merchants of Doubt - About how particular industries including big tobacco, the fossil fuel industries, etc. work the media angle to create uncertainty on stuff that is otherwise the consensus of the scientific world.
Game Change - Election porn in an off year, nothing more, nothing less.
I Was Wrong - Andrew Sullivan on his changing opinions on the Iraq War via his blogs. A good read for me.
Freedom From Fear - Enjoyed it, trying to work through all of the Oxford Histories of the US. Looking at Glorious Revolution or Grand Expectations next.
Before the Storm - The start of Perlstein's history of the modern American conservative movement. I loved it, starting Nixonland next.
On Being A Scientist - This is basically a pamphlet from ACS, I think. I wish some of my less scrupulous labmates would have read this book.
Merchants of Doubt - About how particular industries including big tobacco, the fossil fuel industries, etc. work the media angle to create uncertainty on stuff that is otherwise the consensus of the scientific world.
madviking
north american scum
<nvm>
Miroslav I
Warlord
"Loosing Nelson" by Barry Answorth
Borachio
Way past lunacy
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- Jan 31, 2012
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Never Let Me Go
Katzuo Ishiguro
He writes extremely well, imo. It's effortless to read his prose.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Never_Let_Me_Go_(novel)
Katzuo Ishiguro
He writes extremely well, imo. It's effortless to read his prose.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Never_Let_Me_Go_(novel)
Zkribbler
Deity
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
July's People (not the month, but the short form of Julius), by Nadine Gordimer.
It is an interesting book. It was banned in South Africa for its depiction of a violent end to Apartheid and the mostly dialectic realisstion of a progressive white family how deeply within the colonial mindset they thought they had overcame did they live and act. Nevertheless, the writing style makes things needlessly confusing and nebulous. Good book overall, if somewhat hard to get into. 7/10
It is an interesting book. It was banned in South Africa for its depiction of a violent end to Apartheid and the mostly dialectic realisstion of a progressive white family how deeply within the colonial mindset they thought they had overcame did they live and act. Nevertheless, the writing style makes things needlessly confusing and nebulous. Good book overall, if somewhat hard to get into. 7/10
thecrazyscot
Spiffy
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The Emperor of All Maladies
by Siddhartha Mukherjee
Almost 30% of the way through - fascinating.
by Siddhartha Mukherjee
Almost 30% of the way through - fascinating.
Reread the whole Parmenides dialogue yesterday. Ie 80 pages (but had to be checking the ancient text next to it, so more than that).
At least the presentation today went very well again. Surely every now and then some massive sentence resulted in blank stares by the people there, but my 'excellent' humor returned things to normal, eg when claiming that Embedocles of Akragas fell to the opening of the volcano of mount Aetna cause he likely could not deal anymore with Parmenidian philosophy.
(pay day coming soon...).
At least the presentation today went very well again. Surely every now and then some massive sentence resulted in blank stares by the people there, but my 'excellent' humor returned things to normal, eg when claiming that Embedocles of Akragas fell to the opening of the volcano of mount Aetna cause he likely could not deal anymore with Parmenidian philosophy.
(pay day coming soon...).
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