Ethan Trang

I’ve always had an interest in psychology but had never really tried to actively learn more about it until coming across this book. First of all, the book has nothing to do with moonwalking or with Einstein (read until the end to understand what the title is about), but it focuses solely on memory: specifically about Joshua Foer, a journalist, who spent a year actively researching about the human mind and training for the USA Memory Championship. Each chapter follows chronologically through his timeline up until the championship. He consults trainers, meets true memory savants and experts, sat with people with memory disabilities, and shares the research he has accumulated about the history of memory techniques. The best part is him explaining how he used the methods he learned to perform incredible memory feats (memorizing a full deck of cards in 2 minutes or remembering a random sequence of 100 digits). We all fall victim to our memory: forgetting that item on the shopping list, forgetting your keys or phone. But Foer has proven that the mind is trainable. It’s a must read for those who want to learn about memory, how to train their memory, and how to efficiently acquire new skills in general. This book has shifted my entire conception of memory and psychology as a whole, and it has also motivated me to train my memory myself.

I was assigned to read this book as part of a statistics research project for mathematics class in grade 9. It’s a relatively short book, with clearly defined names for each of the chapter’s content. Each chapter delves into a different technique that statisticians may use to produce invalid information. For me, it cleared up the misconception that statistics are always credible and true. Every time I look at statistics now, I put myself in the shoes of the statistician: how did I get this data? Is the method used reasonable? Is the conclusion drawn from the data valid? (this is taught in the last chapter of the book). For instance, “this medicine cures 50% of your anxiety,” but how can anxiety be quantified to derive the “50%” value ? Some topics to name a few include the misuse of sampling, central tendency measures, deceitfully drawn graphs, and the effects of logic and real-life factors on statistics. The book had guided me very well through my mathematics project and set my work apart from those who didn’t. Darrell Huff delivers these techniques in an entertaining and understandable way with the frequent use of examples. and illustrations. The book has given me in-depth insight and knowledge about statistics and human nature that I know will be handy for me in the future.

This book was assigned for me to read during the summer before my high school junior year (perhaps being assigned to read books is the only way to get me to read). In school, I was repeatedly exposed and fed misconceptions about geography: “How will learning about rivers and mountains help in the ‘real’ world?”, “Why are we learning politics in ‘Geography’ class?” I had believed those previous notions about geography, but this book had changed all that. “Prisoners of Geography”, like suggested in its name, centralizes around a common idea: geography literally, politically, and technologically shapes our societies. Each chapter of the book talks about a nation or a group of nations including Russia, China, and the Middle East. Tim Marshall rewinds the clock and explains why these countries are the way they are today (of course, through the lens of geography), like the powerful and advanced USA or the poor and developing Africa. This book has allowed me to resolve the wrong ideas I had about countries. For example, why isn’t Russia as powerful as it should be given its landmass? Its climate has made much of its land inhabitable and location has limited its trading. One critique I have is that there is a lot of history embedded throughout the text (I don’t enjoy history). But if you’re into nature, politics, disputes, and the direction humanity is headed in the future, this book will give you a knowledgeable understanding about geography and our world as a whole.