Late Night Showdown

I’ve wanted to write about the late night television shows for a while. I’d better get to it before the lineup changes.

I’ll refer to the host instead of the show. For many of use, they’re nearly synonymous and the hosts clearly have a lot to do with the tone and flavor of the show.

7 (because there aren’t 10 on the list). Jimmy Kimmel
Kimmel is last on my list because I watch him least. I get poor reception of the nearest ABC affiliate. What I’ve seen suggests that he is good, but he doesn’t stand out from the crowd.

6. Carson Daly

I like the new format of Daly’s show. I think it suits him better than the traditional talk show format. I rarely stay up that late, so I rarely see his show. It’s like a little slice of MTV from the days before it was dominated by horrible reality shows.

5. Craig Ferguson
Ferguson is delightfully daft. He’s not for everyone and not always for me.

4. Jay Leno

Back in Leno’s Tonight Show days, I’d watch Letterman’s monologue and opening material. I might have switched over later if Leno had a more interesting guest.

When Leno started at 9:00 (central time), I was a little excited about seeing something new, a late night style show that came on before my bedtime. I was disappointed that Leno did the same old thing with seemingly less energy. Considering that NBC brings me some version of Law and Order or Dateline almost every night, I shouldn’t be surprised.

3. Jimmy Fallon
Fallon is the Minnie Pearl of late night. He is just so happy to be there. He is enthusiastic about everything and his excitement draws me in. He has loads of fun and is fun to watch.

2. David Letterman

Letterman is the king of late night. In my opinion, he has been the best for a long time.

Letterman is a famous curmudgeon, but he can be a sweet guy. He is often aloof, but often fatherly, warm of flirtatious. He makes a living through mirth, yet shows his anger. He makes a show of the off-putting elements of his character, but has a very loyal staff, which suggests he is very loyal to them.

Letterman is a man. He is not everyman. He is a unique man, full of flaws and contradiction that are his own, who through hard work and luck gained what he still sees as the privilege to make a very good living doing what he loves to do. What could be more appealing than that?

1. Conan O’Brien
Letterman is the king of late night, but O’Brien is its future. That is what I thought until recently he still can be if NBC gets its head on straight and invests in the future of its brand (and the personal brands it helped build) instead of grasping at a expedient solutions.

I think O’Brien will put on a good show wherever he lands, though he might initially suffer from a move to another show. Whatever network nabs O’Brien will be better off for it. In the long term, NBC will deservedly suffer for the loss.

The Solution by Lucinda Bassett

You may have heard of Lucinda Bassett and the Midwest Center for Stress and Anxiety. I remember hearing her on radio commercials talking about a book or audio program. You may have seen her infomercial or an appearance on a talk show, notably Oprah.

As you can guess form the name of her business, Bassett focuses on helping people overcome stress, anxiety, and fear. That is the purpose of her book, The Solution.

The first part of The Solution is a description of the problem. Of course, a certain amount of fear, stress, and anxiety are natural. They are our built-in emotional and physical responses to threats in our environment. They become problems when we experience them too often, when they capture us in constrained and unsatisfying lives. The worst part is that much of the fear, anxiety, and stress we experience is our own doing, responses to worries and imagined threats.

Worry turns our imagination into our worst enemy.  We seek out threats, conjure catastrophes, and foresee the worst. Bassett says we can turn this around. We can train ourselves to use our imaginations positively, to seek opportunities, to foresee desirable results. This notion is fundamental to most self-help, but Bassett frames it a little more interestingly. We can worry positively. A great worrier can be a great success.

These worries and the habitual behaviors they trigger, are rooted in a core story. This is another opportunity for reframing. A core story that once lead to defeat and discouragement can become motivation to strive for something better. Exercises in the book guide the reader in discovering his core story.

The second half of the book presents six strategies for dealing with stress and anxiety.

•  Detachment is about accepting and letting go of things you cannot change, being honest, and holding on to peace.
• Security is about improving your attitudes and beliefs about money and getting your financial house in order.
• Good health is important to coping with stress. Diet, exercise and sleep are the keys to good health.
• Compassion is a potent antidote to anxiety. Show yourself compassions by stopping the negative messages you repeat to yourself and intentionally practice positive self-talk.
• Reconnects with you dreams and decide what you want, the develop a plan to achieve your goals. Put the plan into action.
• A balanced life looks different for different people, but balance helps us all feel less anxious. Set your priorities, act on them, and live with purpose in the moment.

 
The strength of the book is Bassett’s own experience. She is someone who was once hindered by anxiety who has turned her imagination from and enemy to an ally. She reframed her core story from one of loneliness and lack to motivation to have a good life of family and abundance. Bassett also enlivens the book with stories of her clients, popular figures, and historical people.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Change Your Brain, Change Your Body by Daniel G. Amen

Secrets You Keep from Yourself by Dan Neuharth

Positive Imaging by Norman Vincent Peale

The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale

You Can if You Think You Can by Norman Vincent Peale

Bassett, Lucinda. The Solution: Conquer Your Fear, Control Your Future. New York: Sterling, 2011.

The Big Con by David W. Maurer

Maurer, David W.  The Big Con: The Story of the Confidence Man.  1940.  New York: MJF, 2009.

Even as it was coming off the press in 1940, The Big Con was describing history.  The confidence game described by David W. Maurer had evolved with the times, opportunities, and creativity of the con men, and it surely didn’t stop evolving 70 years ago.  Even so, it’s an interesting history.

Maurer was a linguist who studied the jargon of criminals.  The book includes a glossary of terms used by con artists in the early 20^th Century.  If you want to talk like a character in a hardboiled crime story, check it out.

This study led him to the culture and methods of confidence men.  Con men were the kings of grifters. The grift involved nonviolent crimes, in contrast to the heavy rackets.  The confidence game was the highest grift because the marks would give their money to the grifter.  It was a game of intelligence and acting (and deceit) that tripped up the greedy.  Con men had to be able to mix with legitimate society and seem to fit in with people who had regular jobs, legitimate business, and money.  The appearance of respectability was so important that con men avoided the company of other criminals and cultivated associations with straight citizens (maybe just a little bent).

The Big Con is not a textbook for running a con game.  It does give you a pretty good idea of how con men worked.  Maurer concentrates on the big cons: the wire, the rag, and the pay-off.  These games all convince the mark to get involved in a crooked scheme for sure-thing bets on horses or stocks.  They give him a taste of winning, and then send him off to get all the money he can get his hands on.  When the big money is in, the scheme falls apart and everybody needs to skip town to escape suspicion.  A hooked mark is convinced he was onto something and may come back to try again.  Even if he is suspicious, he has little recourse because turning in the con men means admitting involvement in something shady and possibly criminal.

Maurer summarizes several short cons, too.  Some of these may still be around.  I saw a version of the wipe depicted on and episode of CSI: New York.  Because it was a CSI: show, the con artist was murdered; obviously not part of the plan.

The big cons are not one man operations.  Maurer describes the con mob.  He also discusses the relationship between con artists and crooked officials and other criminals.  He is interested in culture as well as methods.

Maurer comes off as having some a fascination with the con men, even a kind of admiration.  I don’t think he admired what they did.  He seemed to respect the skill it took to pull a successful con, especially to do it over and over.   The con men come off as charming, probably because they were.  They had to be charming, they had to be able to read people, and they had to recognize people who had the right combination of money and greed to make a good mark.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Man Who Loved Books too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

Newton and the Counterfeiter by Thomas Levenson

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It’s Not About Me by Max Lucado

Lucado, Max.  It’s Not About Me.  Nashville: Integrity, 2004.

Do you want a life that is happy and fulfilling?  According to Max Lucado, in his book It’s Not About Me, that life is found when it is centered on God.

When Moses found favor with God and could have asked for anything, he asked to see God’s glory.  Lucado describes this glory as God’s preeminence and priority.  God made everything.  Our purpose, the purpose of all creation, is to show His glory.

How do we glorify God and experience this happy, fulfilling life?  It starts with two steps that go together.  We must stop being self-centered and start contemplating God.

Self-centeredness is common.  If you think you’ve never been self-centered, you’re deluding yourself.    Many of us think about ourselves, our problems, our hopes, our needs, our pains, our pride, or something about ourselves almost all the time.  It is very easy to do.

To change this, we turn our thoughts to God.  We contemplate Him, His glory, His goodness, His power, His holiness, His accomplishments, His character, His ongoing work in this world, His love, and more about Him.

Keeping the eternal God on our minds gives us perspective.  We experience troubles, but those who are His in Christ will experience unending perfection with Him, making even a lifetime of problems seem like a brief moment.  Our immutable God as good plan that will not be changed by the shifting sands of human cultures, governments, and economies.  God’s love is inexhaustible; He chooses to love, He eternally purifies His people in Christ, and He will not withdraw His love.

This perspective on God should affect our behavior.  We should reflect His glory.  We should talk about Him.  We should express gratitude to Him, first for saving us and then for everything else He does in our lives.  We should live purely and take care of our bodies.  We should face problems with equanimity, remembering that problems are temporary and God may be glorified in surprising ways.  Even when we succeed, we should remember God, recognize His blessings, and imitate His generosity.

And we should never get things backwards.  We can never add anything to what God has done for us in Christ.  We can never deserve it.  We do good because God makes us able, because we are grateful, and because we love Him who loved us first.  It starts with God and He deserves the praise.

*

Yet we get something out of it anyway.  It’s all about God, but God loves us and wants us to be joyful and deeply satisfied.  Following God is the path to fulfillment.  When we delight ourselves in God and lift Him up, He readily delights in us and lifts us up.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Into the Depths of God by Calvin Miller

Walking with God by John Eldredge

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Timeless Healing by Herbert Benson with Marg Stark

Herbert Benson, M.D., is known for discovering the relaxation response. This is a natural, restorative state of the body that can be elicited with practices similar to meditation. Though the relaxation response is discussed in this book, it is not the focus.

Timeless Healing is about the power of the mind, especially the power of belief, to cause or accelerate healing. Benson specifically refers to the well-documented placebo effect, which he refers to as “remembered wellness.” Remembered wellness is a phenomena distinct from the relaxation response, though both can be useful.

Benson summarizes the results of several studies related to remembered wellness. Patient beliefs, caregiver beliefs, and positive patient-caregiver relationships have significant, large effects on healing and the effectiveness of medical treatment. The body affects the brain and the brain powerfully effects the body; they are intimately linked and there is no body-mind dichotomy.

This connection between body and mind was recognized in historic medicine. Because the processes of the body were not understood, ancient physicians relied heavily on remembered wellness. As scientific knowledge increased, medical practitioners became reluctant to acknowledge the effect of remembered wellness, instead preferring the newfound power of science.

That very science had to account for remembered wellness. The placebo effect in powerful.  Traditionally, placebos were thought to be about 30 percent effective; studies conducted by Benson and his associates showed them to be 70 to 90 percent effective. Instead of dismissing the placebo effect as an oddity, Benson advocates recognizing and using remembered wellness in medical practice, patient care, and especially self-care.

Another element of belief that affects health is faith. We seem to be wired to believe in God (or something greater or an ultimate power).  Benson sites studies that show that regardless of the particulars, religious beliefs and observances contribute to healing. He refers to the combination of remembered wellness, the relaxation response and belief as the “Faith Factor.”

Mind-body medicine has gained popularity in the 17 years since Timeless Healing was published, but the overall medical system has not changed a lot, in spite of the constant talk about and changes to medical policy. There is still relevance to Benson’s chapter on incorporating remembered wellness into the medical system, and the billions that could be saved by helping people heal themselves of the mostly stress-related symptoms that drive them to physicians. The book also has a chapter on how an individual can incorporate remembered wellness into his self-care and his relationship with his physician and medical care.

Some strategies for self-care using remembered wellness include

-challenging negative automatic thoughts,

-using visualization and affirmations (especially combined with eliciting the relaxation response),

-focusing on helping others,

-letting go of worries (and stopping obsessing over health and all the medical news),

-recognizing the healing power within yourself while wisely recognizing the need for medical care,

-finding trustworthy guides and advisors

-trusting your instincts and recognize the value of your emotions as well as analytical facts, and

-letting your faith, religion, or belief in God be part of your healing.

There is also a note of warning in the book. The placebo effect can also produce negative results, or a “nocebo” effect. Our beliefs can cause illness and negate the effectiveness of medication. Negative beliefs, stress and worry are bad for your health.

Herbert Benson also wrote The Relaxation Response.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Change Your Brain Change Your Body by Daniel G. Amen

Rapt by Winifred Gallagher

Benson, Herbert, with Marg Stark. Timeless Healing: The Power of Biology and Belief. New York: Scribner, 1996.

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The Magic Power of Self-Image Psychology

Surgeon Maxwell Maltz proposed that we are powerfully motivated to—actually must—produce in reality our self-image. If one wants to improve his life, he must improve his self-image. Maltz elaborates this theory, along with advice on improving self-image, in The Magic Power of Self-Image Psychology.

In an early chapter, Maltz introduces a though experiment. He encourages you to imagine yourself in a theater. You’ll find that you are also the primary actor in the show. In addition you are the writer and director. This is your self-image and you are in control—if you want to be.

Maltz returns to this concept of watching a film or play throughout the book. You can recall previous successes and bring that sense of confidence and accomplishment into the present moment to help you act with boldness. You can imagine yourself taking on challenges and overcoming them before it happens. You can use your imagination to anticipate problems. People often do this to stir up their fear and talk themselves into withdrawing, but you can also do it to invent solutions and find answers to objections so that you can proceed with reasonable confidence.

After introducing the idea of self-image, Maltz uses the remaining chapters to discuss building a healthy self-image to help you be happier and more successful in various situations or aspects of life. This covers a lot of ground, which is not easily summarized. Some of the advice seemed useful and interesting to me.

For instance, he discusses goals. Goals should be your own (not someone else’s). They should be realistic. Visualize your success (in that theater in your mind).

It’s important to be yourself. Don’t be afraid of being different. Don’t be afraid of seemingly perfect people. Accept yourself as a human being with strength and weaknesses; don’t beat yourself up. Express yourself in positive ways.

It’s natural to experience fear. Be open about it; fears seem less bad when they are brought out into the light. Solve problems as well as you can—imperfect solutions can still make things better. Once you’ve done what you can, think about something else.

Throughout the book, Maltz reiterates the basic theme. Your unconscious mind is working to produce what you want. Give it good and clear instructions by having a good, positive, realistic self-image. Your imagination, Maltz refers to it as your “success mechanism,” will guide you.

Maxwell Maltz also wrote Creative Living for Today.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg

Succeed by Heidi Grant Halvorson

This Year I Will... by M. J. Ryan

Maltz, Maxwell. The Magic Power of Self-Image Psychology. 1964. New York: Pocket Books, 1970.

STEM Books

I’ve reviewed 39 STEM-related books (and counting).  STEM is an acronym for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.  As you may have seen in the news, there is a push to improve STEM education, interest students in STEM fields, and grow the number of workers in these fields.  The idea is that these will be the skills needed by workers of the future.  If you’re a STEM educator or a student considering a career in STEM fields, you might like to take a look at some of these books.

I’ll confess that I’m not an educator, but I think most of these books will be accessible to high school and college students, and a few to middle school students.  The list is also a reflection of my career and interests in engineering, public health, policy, and history.  Even with these biases, I think it is a good list for someone looking for STEM-related books.

How to Build an Android: The True Story of Philip K. Dick’s Robotic Resurrection by David F. Dufty

I was fascinated by robots as a kid.  I enjoyed reading Isaac Asimov’s robot stories.  I longed for the Omnibot 2000 in the Sears Wishbook.

Robots have come a long way.  In How to Build an Android, David F. Dufty describes the short strange life of a very complex robot made to look and talk like science fiction author Philip K. Dick.  The robot had a very sophisticated and lifelike head and complex artificial intelligence.  As with most complex things, it was the work of many people who had to solve a lot of problems.

If you’re interested in robotics, this is an interesting nontechnical book.  In addition, you’ll get introduced to some freaky sci-fi.  You may even get as (somewhat) legitimate reason to use the word “Dickhead” (capitalized, it refers to a fan of PKD, so don’t go using it on anyone).

The Big Roads: The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways by Earl Swift

The Interstate highway system in the United States is one of the most enormous structures built.  Some of the prospective STEM students who read this may actually be younger than the Intestate system, though in some sense it is never complete because it needs constant repair and maintenance.  The Interstates were completed in the 1990s, but the Federal-Aid Highways go back to 1916.

Earl Swift wrote an accessible history of the Interstates in The Big Roads.  If you interested in automobiles or transportation, it’s a good read.

Dreams of Iron and Steel by Deborah Cadbury

Deborah Cadbury describes seven wonders of engineering in Dreams of Iron and Steel.  It covers almost a century of history, but many of the events are concentrated in the Victorian Era.  That was a time of great technological innovation.

Though the book is history, many of the structures still stand.  Railways, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Suez and Panama Canals, and Hoover Dam stand testament to an age of big engineering.

The Physics of Superheroes by James Kakalios

Though the memory of Professor Wragg’s sneer prompts me to not make this confession, part of my interest in science and technology came from comic books.  Iron Man was cool.  Spider-Man’s web shooters were very cool.  Superhero comics are full of fantasy, admittedly, but the strange, unrealistic science and technology they depict have inspired many to study STEM in reality.

Physicist John Kakalios uses examples from comic books to explore real physics in The Physics of Supeheroes.  Sometimes comics get there science right.  Even when they get it wrong, it can be instructive.  If you know what people are talking about when they refer to the “New 52,” you may find this book to be a great introduction to physics.

1089 and All That: A Journey into Mathematics by David Acheson

Here is another confession: I’m not especially interested in math.  I endured a lot of math classes to study engineering.  Reading David Acheson’s 1089 and All That did not require such endurance.  For one reason, it is a short book.  For another, Acheson doesn’t expect his readers to be mathematicians; it is enough to follow the outline of the math he discusses.

I recommend this book because so many people have a fear of math.  1089 can be followed by many high school students and older folks with math phobias.  Just take a deep breath, relax, and follow along as well as you can.  You’ll see that math can be interesting, useful, and even beautiful in a way.

The Brooklyn Bridge: They Said it Couldn’t be Built by Judith St. George

Judith St. George’s The Brooklyn Bridge is a short history of and iconic bridge.  Written for the bridge’s 100^th anniversary, it is also the story of the engineers who sacrificed life and health to see it completed: John Roebling and his son Washington.  John Roebling was a German immigrant who built many suspension bridges and owed a wire-making business.  He gave his son and extraordinary education in bridge engineering for the time, and before beginning work on the Brooklyn Bridge he served as an officer in the Union Army during the Civil War.

Why should a cutting-edge STEM student read about a bridge that is almost 130 years old?  It’s because we still use and rely on very successful, centuries old technologies.  Improving and rebuilding our infrastructure will be an important part of our economy.  As recently as 2010, New York City and the federal government committed $500 million to repair and repaint the Brooklyn Bridge.

The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems by Henry Petroski

STEM lumps together science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.  Is there a difference between science and engineering?  Is it important?

Henry Petroski, a professor of civil engineering and history and author of The Essential Engineer, believes there is an important difference.  At heart, science is about increasing knowledge.  Engineering is about invention.  Of course, new knowledge makes new invention possible.  Just as often, though, engineering runs ahead of science.  Sometimes science didn’t advance until someone invented the instruments to conduct new observations and experiments.  The invention of the microscope made possible the science of microbiology.  Steam engines were built and greatly improved before we had a modern scientific understanding of thermodynamics.  In fact, thermodynamics was to a large extent born out of desire to understand steam engines. In this sense, it is an engineering science (study of manmade things) as much as a natural science (study of natural things) or branch of physics.

Petroski’s focus in the book is the importance of engineering to policymaking, where it is often overshadowed by science.  Policy, science, and engineering play off of each other a lot.  Most of my career as an engineer has been related to government, policy, and regulatory compliance.

The Ghost Map: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic—and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World by Steven Johnson

The Ghost Map by science writer Steven Johnson is the story of the birth of epidemiology.  Epidemiology is a medical science that uses statistics to help us understand how diseases operate in a population.  Using various statistical and geographic tools, long before we had computers and GIS, physician John Snow demonstrated that cholera, once a recurring plague that wiped out hundreds of thousands of people in some outbreaks, was a waterborne disease.  This understanding, initially met with much skepticism, allowed officials to intervene to prevent the spread of the disease.  For those who say of their math classes, “I’ll never us this,” here is a case where math (and science and policy) were used to make a great difference.

Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Stephen Ambrose

It is not much publicized today that the Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804 to 1806 had a partly scientific mission.  Captains Lewis and Clark were charges with bringing back samples of the flora, fauna, and culture of the western territories.  It was also hoped that they would find a water passage to the Pacific Ocean.  In Undaunted Courage, Stephen Ambrose writes about the scientific mission as well as the policy, diplomacy, and commercial hopes the expedition carried.

Of course, what attracts most people to the Lewis and Clark expedition is that it was a great adventure.  There is a place in STEM fields for thoughtful adventurers and explorers. 

Buried Alive: The Terrifying History of Our Most Primal Fear by Jan Bondeson

A list like this deserves something strange, creepy, and more fun than you care to admit.  Right now, thousands of very young future STEM workers are catching bugs and snakes, breaking their toys to see what is inside, or staring into space with a weird expression of vacancy and concentration.

Jan Bondeson’s Buried Alive is not a morbid book.  It is sometimes humorous, especially in consideration of topic.  From a STEM point of view, Bondeson shows how knowledge accumulates over time.  The fears and activities of our forefathers may seem strange to us, but they sometimes made sense in light of what they knew.  Buried Alive doesn’t simply play off our fascination with the grotesque and death, though the book might not have been written if we lacked that fascination, I think it reminds us to approach our ancestors with a touch of grace and humility.  Maybe our progeny will show us the same courtesy.

If you’re looking for something for a younger student, check out this post→ from Joanne Loves Science or these recommendations→ from STEM Friday.  By the way, I also write about engineering, infrastructure and the environment at Infrastructure Watch.

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