Onward!

We are at the very beginning of time for the human race. It is not unreasonable that we grapple with problems. There are tens of thousands of years in the future. Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can, improve the solutions and pass them on. It is our responsibility to leave the men of the future a free hand. In the impetuous youth of humanity, we can make grave errors that can stunt our growth for a long time. This we will do if we say we have the answers now, so young and ignorant; if we suppress all discussion, all criticism, saying, ‘This is it, boys, man is saved!’ and thus doom man for a long time to the chains of authority, confined to the limits of our present imagination. It has been done so many times before.

~ Richard Feynman from, http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/03/06/richard-feynman-responsibility-of-scientists/

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Feynman wrote several great, short books that are not hard science. This, and “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”, are great places to start.

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BookMooch: free, used-book swapping

http://www.bookmooch.com/

BookMooch.com is a huge (as in: 100,000’s of books), free, book swapping site. Why buy a new book when you can save one from the landfill?

It’s free to join and create your account. You start out by posting up some books which you are willing to give away. If someone would like one of your books, they request to “mooch” it from you. If you accept the mooch, you simply ship it to them paying the postage. In return you get a bookmooch “point”.

If you see a book you want, you can request to mooch it. (If the owner accepts, they ship it to you and they pay the postage.) Each mooch costs you one point. You earn points when someone mooches a book from you; you get 1 point for within-the-U.S. mooches, and 3 points if you’re willing to ship internationally. You also get 1/10 of a point for each book you list in your moochable inventory.

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