I second the "Man’s Search for Meaning" recommendation. That book is great for putting one's struggles into perspective, and emphasizing the importance of a "why."
This book gets recommended a lot probably because it relates to the Holocaust, but it's worth pointing out that "Man’s Search for Meaning" describes itself as "a story". It's not a philosophical book. If you want, you can learn about the development of human thought over time. There is an entire history of philosophy.
"Siddhartha" or "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" might also relate to the meaning of life but they are also not philosophy books. They might be great books but you might be looking for something completely different.
If you get the full edition, there’s a complete discourse on Frankl’s method (designed for the layperson). That said, I found the actual story of his experience far more compelling and much easier to relate to… at least in a way of making any problems I might have seem meaningless by comparison.
Interestingly I found the logotherapy part of the book much more useful and compelling. Using the holocaust as an example of putting it into practice is so extreme it's unrelatable. The daily life type case studies in the second part of the book were much easier for me to learn from. Saying that, hearing a first hand account of the holocaust was powerful in its own way.
The book is a personal reflection, but it’s also a distillation of “logotherapy,” which is both a philosophy and a therapeutic technique. If the book resonates with you, then looking into a more formal application of logotherapy would be a logical next step.
Insofar as the algorithms in the machine are adjusted to overcome past inaccuracies (whether they are adjusted by the machine itself or by the machine programmers) we are merely witnessing a new tool for use when developing scientific theories.
Whether or not we understand everything that the ML systems are doing, we can still observe if events corroborate their predictions, and will be forced to debug or reprogram them if they are not learning well.
Also, I am guessing that many if not most of these ML systems do not start learning from zero, but have some pre-ML naming, sorting, and classification scheme baked into their algorithms. If that is the case, increasing the accuracy of the scheme - refining the concepts of the theory - should only increase the accuracy of the systems' predictions.
Any edition of "Mathematical Ideas"[0] might be a good place to start. While it may seem too basic for some, I feel that it covers a lot of concepts and material that are very useful when programming - problem solving, set theory, logic, number theory, basic algebra, etcetera - and does so in a way that is gradually cumulative and not so daunting.
Maybe this book will help you to realize you don't really suck at math, you just had some terrible teachers or whatever. It's also a great introduction to many different mathematical subfields so you can see which ones are most interesting/useful to you for future study.
Two of my favorite bands have great and expansive websites. Because the bands are insanely prolific (Guided By Voices with their studio releases and Phish with their live recordings) I don't think I'll ever be able to visit every single page on either site.
Beyond the technical aspect, the thing that has helped me the most to not be as anxious before interviews is preparation. Read the job description a few times, and even if you don't have experience with all of the requirements listed (I mean who does) at least familiarize yourself with the technologies so you can talk about them a bit. Check out the company's website so you know what/how they do and why.
Also, this list[0] of common interview questions is a great help. If you have already figured out and practiced your answers to most of these then the interviewer will have less of a chance to catch you off guard with them.
Lastly, write and practice an "elevator pitch"[1] that way "tell me about yourself" or questions like it won't catch you off guard either.
Best of luck getting the job you want! Job hunting and interviewing is very difficult for anyone who is new to it, regardless of their technical skills. I definitely agree with blingojames that interviewing is kind of a subject all its own.
For me writing is thought exploration and a way to share knowledge, and while I have published some books and am working on others, some of my thoughts do not warrant being included in a book but are still interesting enough to want to share them. That's where the blog comes in, for content that is not quite book-worthy but definitely share-worthy.
Also, I suppose that an indirect benefit of having a blog as an author (whether you monetize it or not) is that it allows potential readers to experience some of your writings, thoughts, and writing style for free.
> Most everyone agrees that the cosmological principle is worth scrutinizing.
Well, any scientific principle worth anything is worth scrutinizing, since surviving scrutiny and numerous attempts at falsification is the only way such principles can be corroborated.
Indeed. Presumably extreme weather events were in existence before humans were here to experience them, and they will continue to exist so long as the Earth's surface is heated unevenly by the Sun. But which events would have happened anyway, and which are the result of some new element(s) accounted for by the theory in question?
In fact - if we are unable to distinguish the former from the latter - is the theory in question refutable by any conceivable event?
There was such a bad hurricane season during the Revolutionary War that the French navy sailed back home in tatters, refusing to port there again in that time of year.
If you argue a modern tornado proves global warming, then extreme hurricanes in the 1700s (by extension) disproves it.
Wow. This is a full-blown book, not merely a post or a paper. A thorough mathematical survey of network science (probability, graph theory, path analysis, etc.). Downloaded my copy. Although I wouldn't mind paying some money for the printed tome.
This definitely seems like a bad move, and not very customer-centric. It reminds me of when they disabled the download of any mobile browser alternatives in the 2nd-Generation Kindle Fire in order to push their Silk browser (which itself was terrible nearly to the point of being unusable). This is not to say that Amazon Instant Video is not a great service. It's pretty awesome IMO. But forcing people who want alternatives to seek them out elsewhere will just inconvenience them and drive them away from amazon.com.
