The last of Christopher Alexander’s books that I read. It left me in a somewhat melancholy mood. In this book, Alexander gives a few examples (mostly from classical cultures and his own works) of buildings and neighborhoods that have life in them. I catch a glimpse of the “vision of a living world”, but also realize for the first time how fragmented and unwholesome the modern buildings are. Just as […]
Read moreLatest Post
“Notes on the Synthesis of Form” by Christopher Alexander
A Real Design Problem “We are searching for some kind of harmony between two intangibles: a form which we have not yet designed, and a context which we cannot properly describe.” The harmony / good fit between form and context can be regarded as the total absence of potential misfits, which can be represented by a finite set of binary variables all taking the value 0. A Homeostatic Form-Making Process […]
Read more“Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain” by Oliver Sacks
A comprehensive overview of the various aspects of musicality and the relationship between music and the mind, especially emotion and memory. Although I didn’t gain any further insights into the neural correlates of musicality (than what I’ve already learned from his other book “The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat”), I enjoyed stories of people whose lives are intimately bound with and affected by music. Links Oliver Sacks […]
Read more“Joys and Sorrows: Reflections” by Pablo Casals
Casals and Bach’s Cello Suites About a week ago I got interested in Bach’s cello suites. I started with Rostropovich’s EMI 1995 recording. The sound was beautiful, but the music was bland, entirely not what I expected from Bach as interpreted by Glenn Gould on piano and Jascha Heifetz on violin. Then I listened to Yo Yo Ma, Pablo Casals, and Pierre Fournier. That’s when I discovered Casals for myself. […]
Read more“The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat” by Oliver Sacks
Understanding Mental Illness “Nothing is to be feared, but to be understood.” This is perhaps true especially in the cases of mental disorders. There are few things more devastating than losing one’s mind or the control of one’s body. If we can understand the cause of the disorder, however, we may be able to find a cure, or at least come to term with it. This books details some of […]
Read more“The Nature of Order: The Phenomenon of Life” by Christopher Alexander
Living Centers Centers arise in space and each center has life to a certain degree. It is not inherent in the center by itself, but is a function of the whole configuration in which the center occurs. The life of one center is increased or decreased according to the position and intensity of other nearby centers. The centers are the fundamental elements of the wholeness. Fundamental Properties of Life The […]
Read more“In Search of Memory” by Eric Kandel
A Good Mystery Novel Kandel tells the story of how fascination with memory has led him to a life-long search for the biological underpinning of memory and consciousness. It’s part autobiography and part textbook, but reads like a good mystery novel. I could hardly put it down until I finished it. His writing is very fluid and concise, and he inserts figures at just the right junctures to illustrate and […]
Read more