I know this is a rather tangential issue, but a friend of mine who works for the public library mentioned that authors get some amount of ‘monetary compensation’ every time one of their books is taken out/lended from a library.

I’ve never heard that before… I can tell you when I get book sales/royalty info from my publishers, there’s no line for “library compensation” or anything like that

Not to worry atomjack, your local public library most likely has everything you need in that specialty.

I know this is a rather tangential issue, but a friend of mine who works for the public library mentioned that authors get some amount of ‘monetary compensation’ every time one of their books is taken out/lended from a library.

So, I guess if you really don’t want to even ‘drop a dime’ on such works, you might want to search for some _torrents_ online

I ain’t droppin’ a dime on anything an evolution denier publishes.

Not to worry atomjack, your local public library most likely has everything you need in that specialty. Some of it will be with religion, some of it will be with science, some of it apparently in writing instruction (haven’t figured that one out yet), and I think I’ve found it in other sections, so definitely make use of the computer catalog.

Hemant, surely you aren’t taking the blame for some of your students failing one of your classes (“failing my students”), are you? You teach in the real world, right, no god stuff in the classroom?

Some kids just want to fail, like they think it sends some sort of message other than “I’m a geode!” (geodes are basically hollow rocks). Getting an “F” in a class, where I come from, is harder than getting an “A”.

Have been enjoying your blog quite a bit.

Just logged onto this post, however, and I noticed there was an ad above it for Dianetics. I’m assuming this is some kind of auto-Google ad, and I wanted to let you know ASAP. Dianetics is a bit of a sticky business.

Keep up the great work!

For specific topics, “The beak of the finch” by Jonathan Weiner and “The Neandertal Enigma” by James Shreeve are also good reads.

For slightly meatier books, but still aimed at the layman, I can recommend Dawkins’ “The Ancestor’s Tale” and Sean Carroll’s “Endless Forms Most Beautiful”.

An excellent read! It’s really not a general introduction though, it concentrates on Shubin’s own work a) teaching human anatomy b) discovering early fish/amphibian fossils. I think the personal touch is what makes it so great.

For something about fossils, there’s
Evolution: what the fossils say and why it matters by Donal Prothero.

Hemant,

How would you rank The Ancestor’s Tale compared to The Blind Watchmaker?

The Ancestor’s Tale >>> The Blind Watchmaker

How would you rank The Ancestor’s Tale compared to The Blind Watchmaker?