I have two books I like to leaf through from time to time: Michurin’s “Conclusions from 60 years of work” (in Ukrainian; original text from 1935) and Lichtenshtein’s “Editing a book on science” (in Russian; from 1957). Also, a Russian translation of Kepler’s ‘On Six-cornered snowflake’ and other essays.
They aren’t very old, but they are dated. There’s a lot of ideology in Lichtenshtein—he quotes Lenin and Co about once a page, and I’m glad he does, because it both annoys me and works. They are comparatively narrow in scope; I likely won’t have to use them in practice. I haven’t ever read them from cover to cover. But I keep them, because...
They teach you to slow down. The new books tell you what to do and how to do it, yes. However, when you have bought labware, haunted your statistician into celibacy, grown your flies and are ready to sit down and count them—you have to slow down. There are small observations that never make it into articles, cryptic little notes in your journal like ‘slide 740 is too dark, but better contrasted than 741 - overheated?’ - the kind that makes up a large chunk of the ‘intangible knowledge’ in your field. Old books might have such asides (sometimes written in the margins by a reader before you), and emphasize the importance of not relying on memory.
They teach you that science is actually possible—in an inexpensive, tried, and criticable way. ‘Suppose all your knowledge about a certain domain was deleted, how could you re-invent it...’ is all good and well, but there’s no way you can just re-invent methabolic pathways from scratch within a currently available lifetime—and no way at all if your brain hasn’t been trained to notice things. I know a guy in our Ecology Department who is a great naturalist. One of them who will just as carefully weigh baby seals, measure stamens and collect rocks. That’s what you want in people whom you send to Mars (or to Antarctica, in his case) - not merely skill or dedication or high IQ, because it all isn’t worth shit if they bring you a damaged sample. He observes things… but for most people, he wouldn’t be the best instructor. He rambles, and if you aren’t in love with zoology, you won’t stay long enough for him to finish. (Also, he’s getting on in years and has a heart problem, and so doesn’t get out into the field often anyways.) Books are more bearable—and there’s more of them. (I think this point has been raised elsewhere on LW.)
They teach you about good illustration. Very often I see, in presentations, mags and even books, colourful photoes of plants—frequently, the flower; but as a botanist, I know I’ve also got to recognize the species out of bloom! I need to see the whole! Another problem I’ve run into when interested in someone’s experimental setup is too dark images in scanned articles (and useless angles of view, for example if the author had wished to show a rack of test tubes instead of one single fitting.) The old pictures are representative.
They teach you about different, perhaps no less efficient ways of presenting data, too. Not just the sad tombstones with error bars hung upon their tops. Lichtenstein’s section on tables is beautiful. He discusses the lengths to which a decent editor can and cannot go when preparing the manuscript for print. He showed me more about writing up the data than anybody in the grad school ever could.
They teach you to be picky. You can’t, on your lonesome, much improve the quality of contemporary research in any given area—you’re stuck not only with the ‘current ways of being wrong’ that the Lewis quote has addressed, but also with ‘current standards of being right enough’ - EY talked about it in the beisutsukai sequence. When I read Michurin, though, I have this chill between my shoulderblades, the feeling that he’d held himself to a much higher standard than I do, even if he happened to be wrong.
They teach you to look outside of your own field and to speak simply. Kepler engages the reader, lightheartedly and gently. Reading him actually made the world seem less cruel, more playful.
Einstein’s little book on special relativity is still one of the best on the subject.
/On Growth and Form/, written mainly between WW1 and WW2, is more thorough than any subsequent work on the interaction between environment, physics, and morphology. We have some additional key insights, but you still need to read OG+F if you’re interested in that subject.
This history seems to say that it was redone in 1905 because of changes in printing technology, and 1⁄3 was redone in 1973. I think there was continuous small turnover, too. [This] says that 113 engravings were added in 1887, which is adds up. But it might just give that number because it was a larger than normal change.
So the point is that few people read old non-fiction books for their original
purpose (i.e., ‘convey knowledge’), but only for secondary reasons—any
useful observations the originals made would have been observed in newer,
clearer works. In general, I agree with that.
But are there any exceptions?
Depending on what is called ‘old’… I found Einsteins introduction to
relativity one of the best layman’s introductions.
Much older, I would say that Plato’s/Aristotle’s writings on philosophy are
much clearer than the philosophy of the last centuries. They are misguided in
various ways, but at least that is clear—and I wouldn’t hesitate to
recommend someone to read those works to gain some insight in philosophy, not
just for their historical importance.
The oldest non-fiction book I’ve read (cover-to-cover) as it happens was a book of Seneca’s letters (first century). His Stoic philosophy might hold some interest to people here.
Veblen claimed he wrote the book as a perceptive personal essay criticizing contemporary culture, rather than as an economics textbook. Critics claim this was an excuse for his failure to cite sources. [citation needed]
I read The Origin of Species. I wasn’t trying to learn any specific thing, but I did learn from it, and it was interesting enough to finish the book. (Disclaimer: I find all kinds of history interesting, as well as biology.)
Anybody reads them to learn about biology or economics? Or just for entertainment?
The oldest non-fiction book I read for serious reasons was from 1899, and I’d much rather read something more recent if it existed.
I have two books I like to leaf through from time to time: Michurin’s “Conclusions from 60 years of work” (in Ukrainian; original text from 1935) and Lichtenshtein’s “Editing a book on science” (in Russian; from 1957). Also, a Russian translation of Kepler’s ‘On Six-cornered snowflake’ and other essays.
They aren’t very old, but they are dated. There’s a lot of ideology in Lichtenshtein—he quotes Lenin and Co about once a page, and I’m glad he does, because it both annoys me and works. They are comparatively narrow in scope; I likely won’t have to use them in practice. I haven’t ever read them from cover to cover. But I keep them, because...
They teach you to slow down. The new books tell you what to do and how to do it, yes. However, when you have bought labware, haunted your statistician into celibacy, grown your flies and are ready to sit down and count them—you have to slow down. There are small observations that never make it into articles, cryptic little notes in your journal like ‘slide 740 is too dark, but better contrasted than 741 - overheated?’ - the kind that makes up a large chunk of the ‘intangible knowledge’ in your field. Old books might have such asides (sometimes written in the margins by a reader before you), and emphasize the importance of not relying on memory.
They teach you that science is actually possible—in an inexpensive, tried, and criticable way. ‘Suppose all your knowledge about a certain domain was deleted, how could you re-invent it...’ is all good and well, but there’s no way you can just re-invent methabolic pathways from scratch within a currently available lifetime—and no way at all if your brain hasn’t been trained to notice things. I know a guy in our Ecology Department who is a great naturalist. One of them who will just as carefully weigh baby seals, measure stamens and collect rocks. That’s what you want in people whom you send to Mars (or to Antarctica, in his case) - not merely skill or dedication or high IQ, because it all isn’t worth shit if they bring you a damaged sample. He observes things… but for most people, he wouldn’t be the best instructor. He rambles, and if you aren’t in love with zoology, you won’t stay long enough for him to finish. (Also, he’s getting on in years and has a heart problem, and so doesn’t get out into the field often anyways.) Books are more bearable—and there’s more of them. (I think this point has been raised elsewhere on LW.)
They teach you about good illustration. Very often I see, in presentations, mags and even books, colourful photoes of plants—frequently, the flower; but as a botanist, I know I’ve also got to recognize the species out of bloom! I need to see the whole! Another problem I’ve run into when interested in someone’s experimental setup is too dark images in scanned articles (and useless angles of view, for example if the author had wished to show a rack of test tubes instead of one single fitting.) The old pictures are representative.
They teach you about different, perhaps no less efficient ways of presenting data, too. Not just the sad tombstones with error bars hung upon their tops. Lichtenstein’s section on tables is beautiful. He discusses the lengths to which a decent editor can and cannot go when preparing the manuscript for print. He showed me more about writing up the data than anybody in the grad school ever could.
They teach you to be picky. You can’t, on your lonesome, much improve the quality of contemporary research in any given area—you’re stuck not only with the ‘current ways of being wrong’ that the Lewis quote has addressed, but also with ‘current standards of being right enough’ - EY talked about it in the beisutsukai sequence. When I read Michurin, though, I have this chill between my shoulderblades, the feeling that he’d held himself to a much higher standard than I do, even if he happened to be wrong.
They teach you to look outside of your own field and to speak simply. Kepler engages the reader, lightheartedly and gently. Reading him actually made the world seem less cruel, more playful.
Einstein’s little book on special relativity is still one of the best on the subject.
/On Growth and Form/, written mainly between WW1 and WW2, is more thorough than any subsequent work on the interaction between environment, physics, and morphology. We have some additional key insights, but you still need to read OG+F if you’re interested in that subject.
Med students still use Gray’s Anatomy.
Gray’s Anatomy has been revised 40 times, sort of proving my point.
I think it still uses the original art. Haven’t checked, though.
This history seems to say that it was redone in 1905 because of changes in printing technology, and 1⁄3 was redone in 1973. I think there was continuous small turnover, too. [This] says that 113 engravings were added in 1887, which is adds up. But it might just give that number because it was a larger than normal change.
So the point is that few people read old non-fiction books for their original purpose (i.e., ‘convey knowledge’), but only for secondary reasons—any useful observations the originals made would have been observed in newer, clearer works. In general, I agree with that.
But are there any exceptions?
Depending on what is called ‘old’… I found Einsteins introduction to relativity one of the best layman’s introductions.
Much older, I would say that Plato’s/Aristotle’s writings on philosophy are much clearer than the philosophy of the last centuries. They are misguided in various ways, but at least that is clear—and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend someone to read those works to gain some insight in philosophy, not just for their historical importance.
The oldest non-fiction book I’ve read (cover-to-cover) as it happens was a book of Seneca’s letters (first century). His Stoic philosophy might hold some interest to people here.
Ah, Wikipedia humour:
Veblen claimed he wrote the book as a perceptive personal essay criticizing contemporary culture, rather than as an economics textbook. Critics claim this was an excuse for his failure to cite sources. [citation needed]
I read The Origin of Species. I wasn’t trying to learn any specific thing, but I did learn from it, and it was interesting enough to finish the book. (Disclaimer: I find all kinds of history interesting, as well as biology.)