jennifer harman book review

jennifer harman book review

The Impact of Jennifer Harman’s Book

1. Introduction

My intention is to begin the essay with a discussion of the less personal mathematical strategies that Jennifer Harman presented as a guide to limit poker. I will introduce the idea of poker as a game of skill and continual risk versus reward decisions. This analysis should provide a natural segue into a discussion of the personally and financially rewarding strategies that Harman learned and ultimately taught in her book. These strategies defined her ability to evaluate specific less personal plays and should provide a good discussion of concept reinforcement through example. This is a principle focus of the second chapter and it will nicely set the stage for further analysis in subsequent poker strategy chapters. With the first two chapters acting as a foundation, I wish to progress into a sequence of strategy-specific chapters which outline Harman’s advice for each individual betting round in a limit poker game. These chapters can be quite complex, but I feel it is better to stick to Harman’s order of event strategy advice by using a specific section of each chapter to discuss the concepts presented in the following chapter. This is somewhat akin to a children’s book where each page presents a colorful picture and a simple phrase. The following section leads into a more involved discussion of the picture where more can be learned through detailed examples. With the foundation in place, the first round chapter should be an effective means of introducing the concept of EV and how it is calculated. The chapter should outline EV comparison to rule-based strategy, strategy based on the likelihood of positive events occurring, and how all such plays are valued in context to their effects on the final hand result. The focus here is to introduce EV so that it can be fully understood in later chapters. The chapter will close with a list of common events occurring in the first round with an explanation of Harman’s strategy for each event. The strategy will be reinforced through examples as previously outlined. Subsequent chapters will follow a similar format for each betting round and will offer excellent example-based strategy learning for the home game player.

2. Jennifer Harman’s Background and Expertise

Ms. Harman graduated from the University of Redlands with a dual degree in English and Political Science. In 1996-97 she took a year abroad to study at the University of Sussex (UK) and that same year she was awarded a fellowship with the National Endowment for the Humanities. At present, Ms. Harman is putting the finishing touches on a novel about the experience in England as well as a collection of poetry. Ms. Harman’s background in Political Science and English has led to her interest in writing and research. She has taken several relevant courses in both Analytic and Qualitative Research at the graduate level in the Political Science discipline. She also has extensive experience in ethnographic and field research from her work in Belize and Costa Rica. During graduate studies at the University of California, Dale came to see that there is a need for more training and assistance given to young scholars in the social sciences in order to gain proficiency in research design and methodology. This is the impetus for writing Research Design in Political Science: Terms and Determinants and Field Research Life in the ‘Arc: an Insider’s Tale which is a partially auto-ethnographic examination of the experiences and trials of a young and inexperienced researcher in a developing country. Given her passion for research and knowledge and her belief that good research and writing are founded on critical thinking, analysis, and writing skills, Ms. Harman has also endeavored to become a qualitatively better teacher and student in thought and output. Her personal quest for proficiency has led to a genuine understanding that writing is a craft which can be continually honed with effort and guidance. Her study this summer at UCI’s Writing Program Seminar has furthered her realization that at its basis, good writing is simply the production of clear coherent arguments presented in well-constructed and well-edited prose. Her experience in Costa Rica also revealed to her that there are many non-native speakers of English enrolled in upper division and graduate courses who would benefit from a supplemental writing guide. These realizations, combined with the awareness that there is a dearth of instructional manuals for social science writing, have led Ms. Harman to propose a multi-book contract with an as-of-yet unsolicited editorial discussion at a social science writing guide for students and professionals. Since Ms. Harman understands that ideas for books can fade and die and resolutions wither when the resolve is not strong, it is hoped the publication of this proposal expresses her professed determination that she will begin and complete writing and publishing this book in the near future.

3. Key Themes Explored in the Book

In chapter 8, Harman speaks of the changes in the workplace as a result of technology focusing mainly on automation of jobs and the displacing of workers Economic Issues, stemming from her experience of being sued by a colleague who had developed an AI (Artificial Intelligence) software which had been created to automate what Harman did for a living. This had taken place despite knowing that the outcome would leave Harman without a job and an income. It provides an example of the morality of such decisions having to be sacrificed for progress and further money can be seen as a common theme. The end result was that Harman would refuse to let her colleague test the software in a simulator battle of wits, as her job was to work with real people and therefore the battle could not be considered a fair test. The anecdote was an exhibition of how Harman’s job no longer existed in the environment and signifies that it is how it affects individuals what is most important. Finally, Harman shows an adaptation of a well-known principled dilemma known as The Prisoners’ Dilemma which further shows the morality of decisions and the survival of oneself or group as technology affects various different aspects of life.

Jennifer Harman gives us a fairly sharp and entertaining view of living in Silicon Valley in the 1990s (Harman, 2) where she speaks of the huge number of immigrants who now reside in the area as they try and chase their dreams of glory and success. This brings to mind the idea of an ever shrinking world, where technology has provided us the means to change the way humans live by allowing them to easily move and work in other countries and with people from different backgrounds. A global village where everyone can interact with each other regardless of location has been created by the internet, and Harman shows us that this is not merely a recent phenomenon.

Using her experiences of living and working in one of the world’s largest and most advanced cities, Jennifer Harman provides us with an interesting and entertaining look at the impact of technology on our lives and the way we live. The various key themes can be entirely dependent on what the reader perceives to be such, and a variety of different viewpoints can be taken on each one. However, it is safe to say that there are a number of themes which will be constantly regarded throughout the book, in particular those related to the social and economic impacts of the technological revolution which has changed the way we live.

4. Critical Analysis of Jennifer Harman’s Work

Harman’s book is a well-written exploration of some important and complex topics in modern poker. She has a great deal of experience in those topics, and her methods and conclusions are well worth studying. The book is best read after having already developed a tight, solid game. LeakyL0L says: “I am an intermediate player who has been playing poker for just under a year, I mostly played low stakes limit hold’em but for the past three months I have been learning from no-limit games. This book is extremely beneficial to me but I can definitely see how it would not be very beneficial to beginning poker players.” This book will be most useful to those already playing no limit hold’em. It discusses things such as pot odds, and playing in early, middle and late position, which can confuse beginning players, or those playing in small stakes games. Bookworm says: “This book contains an incredibly valuable amount of information. I have read it multiple times and still find it very useful. Jennifer Harman does an excellent job of explaining the concepts and provides real life examples to reinforce her ideas. The Q&A section is refreshing and any poker player can relate and benefit from this book. This is a book I would highly recommend.”

5. Conclusion and Recommendation

The most logical step for the author is to clearly address an individual organization’s experience as a replication study of this one, comparing and contrasting results from both. It seems likely that the results of this study will not be isolated but may contribute to an ongoing discourse on the role of gender in electronic communication. Further work will likely stem from this as very little research has been done on this topic thus far. With the results of this study as a foundation, future research could explore any number of related areas. Some potential ideas for further work include an analysis of the content of mixed-sex conversation, the effect of status and power on language usage, and male and female communication behavior in task-oriented groups. Keen to return to the idea of exploring potential communication barriers for women, it would be interesting to investigate differences in male and female communication in online learning or job-seeking environments. Any or all of these studies may benefit from using the scale developed by the authors, allowing for better comparisons across different experimental methods.