Einstein
author of "Benjamin Franklin," comes the first full biography of Albert Einstein since all his papers have become available--a fully realized portrait of a premier icon of his era.
Stats for nerds
24recommend
56mentions
52people
2008–2025years
43% recommend52% neutral5% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Aaron Greenspan created the early version of what Facebook became, and has loudly criticized the zero-sum tactics used by Zuckerberg, Gates, and other billionaires: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-legend-of-mark-zucker_b_7...
Some interesting books in this category: * Masters of Doom. It’s about John Carmack and the team that built Id Software * Einstein. By Walter Isaacson, author of the Jobs biography. Einstein’s 4 papers are one of the most unexpected, ground breaking discoveries in history * Houdini!!! Tells the story of the escape artist and magician, and exposer of psychics. * The Double Helix * Stress Test. By Tim Geithner who pulled the world out of the financial crisis * Man’s Search for Meaning. Surviving and finding meaning in a concentration camp
- list of (most of) the books mentioned in this thread so far. I tried reading every comment but used chatGPT instead.
1. The Big Rich - Texas oil boom.
2. Barbarians at the Gate - Private equity origins.
3. Masters of Doom - John Carmack and Id Software.
4. Einstein by Walter Isaacson - Einstein's discoveries.
5. Houdini!!! - The escape artist and magician.
6. The Double Helix - DNA discovery.
7. Stress Test by Tim Geithner - Financial crisis.
8. Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl - Concentration camp survival.
9. The Chariots of Apollo - NASA's space program.
10. Across the Airless Wilds by Earl Swift - Development of the moon buggy.
11. Apollo: The Race to the Moon by Charles Murray and Catherine Bly Cox - Apollo missions.
12. The Secret Life of Groceries by Benjamin Lorr - Food supply chains.
13. The Prize by Daniel Yergin - Oil industry evolution.
14. Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson - Ambitious wreck divers.
15. The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes - Manhattan Project.
16. American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin - Robert Oppenheimer.
17. Conquistador by Buddy Levy - Hernán Cortés and the Aztecs.
18. Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner - Water infrastructure in the American West.
19. The Wright Brothers by David McCullough - The invention of flight.
20. Walt Disney by Neal Gabler - Vision and innovation in entertainment.
21. Tuxedo Park by Jennet Conant - Invention of radar.
22. Insisting on the Impossible - Edwin Land and instant photography.
23. The Logic of Failure - Understanding and avoiding failure.
24. The Big Short by Michael Lewis - 2008 financial crisis.
25. The Box by Marc Levinson - Shipping container revolution.
26. Latitude by Nicholas Crane - Cartography innovations.
27. When the Heavens Went on Sale by Ashlee Vance - Space startups.
28. The Founders by Jimmy Soni - PayPal's early days.
29. The Perfectionists by Simon Winchester - Precision engineering.
30. The Little Engine That Could - Children's classic.
31. Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell - Success mechanics.
32. Shoe Dog by Phil Knight - Founding of Nike.
33. Black Hole Blues by Janna Levin - Building LIGO.
34. Freedom’s Forge - WWII industry mobilization.
35. Empires of Light by Jill Jonnes - Electrification by Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse.
36. The Path Between the Seas by David McCullough - Panama Canal construction.
37. Annapurna by Maurice Herzog - Climbing a Himalayan peak.
38. Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder - Data General engineers.
39. Showstopper by G. Pascal Zachary - Development of Windows NT.
40. Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand - WWII survival.
41. The Measure of All Things by Ken Alder - Defining the meter.
42. The Cuckoo’s Egg by Clifford Stoll - Tracking a hacker.
43. The Man Who Knew Infinity by Robert Kanigel - Srinivasa Ramanujan.
44. The Power Broker by Robert Caro - Robert Moses and New York infrastructure.
45. How Big Things Get Done - Large-scale project execution.
46. Dealers of Lightning by Michael A. Hiltzik - Xerox PARC.
47. Built by Roma Agrawal - Civil engineering insights.
48. The Will to Keep Winning by Daigo Umehara - Competitive gaming.
49. Absolute Zero and the Conquest of Cold - Low-temperature physics.
50. Carrying the Fire by Michael Collins - Apollo 11.
- You should read their biographies, both by Walter Isaacson, I don't know how you can read those books and not see that they are more than just marketers.
Isaacson also wrote the definitive biographies for Einstein and Benjamin Franklin, among many other historical figures.
Also "Masters of Doom" describes Carmack's career and idk about the word genius, but he is undeniably one of those engineers who's just 10x better than the average engineer.
- Thanks, this is serendipitous and fascinating timing for me. Literally just a few hours ago I finished Walter Isaacson's excellent biography on Einstein and was enthralled by the story of Einstein's brain. Remarkable the coincidences of life sometimes!
- Isaacson's biography on Einstein helped me understand the fundamentals of relativity and gave me the language + a brief enough understanding to figure out more. I highly recommend. It's also just a great read all around. He has a chapter called 'Einstein's God' and it cleared up some misconceptions I had about what Einstein believed about the supernatural and religion.
- I am in the middle of listening to Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson and would highly recommend this biography to anyone interested in more.
