Michael Dirda is the book critic of the Washington Post. Tha author of several books about, well, books, and authors and writing and things, Dirda has a smooth prose style, which distracts you from the very considerable difference between his level of erudtion and yours. But, I digress. The reason I’m bringing this up here and now is that I found something by him in praise of Martin Gardner. His story is pretty much the same as mine, and we both got hooked on the same Mg book: Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, but he makes the case for getting hold of, and reading, some of the numerous works this man has penned, and does it much better than I can. If you don’t believe me, and why should you, believe Michael Dirda:
Dirda

The crafty creator of mathematical puzzles, Martin Gardner, will celebrate his 95th birthday tomorrow. For many years, he ran a column in Scientific American magazine on recreational mathematics, but he retired from that post some years ago. Retiring and quitting are different things, and Gardner most definitely did not quit. He’s the author or editor of over 70 books, and publishers know that he is “box office” in that almost anything with his name on it will enjoy healthy sales. His undergraduate training was in philosophy, and he never considered himself a very good mathematician, but he wrestled with the ideas behind the puzzles he selected for publication in his SA column and in the numerous collections which appeared under his editorship. So, once he had the ideas clearly stated in his own mind, he could write about them for other people with insight and force.
Gardner was a fierce defender of science against nutsos, pseudos and fadists of all kinds. He had his facts in order and could punch, hard. I read Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science almost in one sitting. But he also has a whimsical side, as shown by his Annotated Alice in Wonderland, The Annotated Wizard of Oz and others. But, his mathematical puzzle collections form the bulk of his oeuvre, and are the basis of his reputation as an effective popularizer of difficult concepts. So, let’s hoist a cold one for Mr. G on his 95th. He’s still works, every day on his old style typewriter and still publishes. He’s an American original.

Martin Gardner

In the beginning was the Kindle, and then, there were Kindle follow-ons. Amazon jump started the dormant e-book market with the launch of this product family, and for a while was king of the mountain. As we’ve reported in these lines, a number of other outfits think they can do the e-book thing better, since they think the Kindle is dorky piece of gear. These guys are headed for chapter 11, since it’s not about the gear. Amazon charged ahead because they had the reader, the inventory, an aggressive discount policy on digital versions of the books they sell, which are easy to get, wirelessly. Barnes and Noble sells a lot of books too, and they went after Amazon big time. Next week, B&N will launch their version of an ebook reader, and some leaked photos of the gadget, along with some specifications and description, have popped up in different places. We are going with the story on WIRED’s news site. B&N will allow users to share books, while Amazon does not, giving the new guys an extra advantage.
Reader
PS: I should have mentioned that the new item is called the “Nook”, for “N Book” maybe?

Sergey Brin is one of Google’s co-founders. In a New York Times Op/Ed piece, he defended the Google book settlement, what I have been referring to in these lines as The Deal. Naturally, he thinks the Deal is just great and everybody should think so too, even those scowling meanies at the Department of Justice, who keep bringing up these little, purely theoretical objections about monopoly and anti-trust and all. The parties are going back to the negotiating table in response to a large passel of criticisms and objections, hundreds of them, to see what they can do. It seems that nobody wants a trial, everybody wants an agreement, but just not this agreement. I’m not a Google-basher, but I do become more sceptical about an outfit as it grows, so while Brin’s OP was a very good piece of special pleading, I prefer to link to a story on The Resource Shelf which gives users both the Op/ed and some useful comments of the “yes, but” sort.

Brin and Comments

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is now 30 years old. According to the Hippy maxim, you’re not supposed to trust anybody older than that. But, I guess that changes, as do most things. A group of doughty fans braved the lousy British weather to celebrate, and to greet the man entrusted with composing a sequel to Donald Adams’ cult classic. Eoin Colfer, author of Artemis Fowl and other books, has written a follow-up, in the same loopy vein, called And Another Thing. Naturally, he’s hoping for success and so are all the Adamsites who have been unable to mainline craziness since the author of the original Guide went to the great Improbability Machine in the sky. And as NASA guided the probe that hit the moon to see if the resulting lifted debris might contain evidence of water, they played the whale’s solliloquy from the movie. The poor whale is conjured up at impossible odds by the Improbability Gizmo, and as he rejoices in his whaleness, he ponders Identity, Cause, Finallity, all the while dropping toward the surface of planet Whatzit. Splat! Well, that’s where we all wind up.
Whale
Another

Our building was without AC or even ventilation for several days. The explanation given was that storm damage from hurricane IKE had compromised the primary and backup equipment. About half the chill water capacity was lost, and what was left was routed to the hospitals. So from Wednesday through this morning, most of the other campus buildings were extremely uncomfortable, and a lot of people simply couldn’t get to their workstations because these are located in areas that require artificial venting. Temporary, portable (in the sense they can be moved, on flatbed trailers towed by big trucks or other prime movers) cooling units have been set up and we are gradually getting the interior temperature and humidity back to a reasonable point. We thank our readers for understanding.