About BMB

At Bare Minimum Books, we follow Einstein’s advice:

Make things as simple as possible, but no simpler.

Each book can be read in a single sitting. Each page contains a single idea.

When you get to the end of a book, something about the world will make sense, where it didn’t before. You will have been both edified, and entertained.

About Ian Underwood

Ian Underwood has degrees in mathematics and learning sciences. He has been a planetary scientist and artificial intelligence researcher for NASA, the director of the renowned Ask Dr. Math service, co-founder of Bardo Farm and Shaolin Rifleworks, and a popular speaker at liberty-related events. 

In his Bare Minimum Books (BareMinimumBooks.com), he’s careful about words, asks good questions, answers from first principles, and strips away needless complexity to expose underlying simplicity — all to help his readers see old things in new ways. He lives in Croydon, New Hampshire.

About the Celtic Knots

Celtic knots provide a generative theme, so people can spot my books from a dozen paces.  I have a vaguely Celtic background, so Celtic knots seemed appropriate.  Sometimes they can be suggestive — for example, the knot for Barefoot Learning looks kind of like a pair of sandals, and the knot for XIV looks sort of like it’s ready to eat something.  But mainly, Celtic knots seem complicated on the surface, but have an underlying simplicity that you can see once you know to look for it — much like the subjects that I write about.

Selected Podcast Appearances

Free State Live (video, April 25, 2022, 1 hour) with Justin O'Donnell, Jeremy Kauffman, Carla Gericke

Free Talk Live (audio, August 20, 2022, 30 minutes) with Ian Freeman, digest form.

 

NBC Boston Docuseries on the Free State Project (video, February 20, 2023, 13 minutes)

  • Episode 5 starts with Ian shooting on our home range and musing about the proper relationship between a citizen and a government, and in particular why we use tax dollars to pay for school.

  • Podcast: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of New Hampshire, Episode 5 (Croydon, Part 1).

 

GrokTalk (audio, January 25, 2014; popular with NH conservatives and libertarians, 30 minutes) with Steve MacDonald

  • This was Ian’s first-ever podcast appearance.

  • Ian entered public life when he gave testimony on a gun-rights bill. His testimony took an angle on things that no one had ever thought of, and people were amazed by it. He was on the show many times after that.

  • Ian is introduced at 02:15. He's on the last segment, which starts at 01:30:33.

  • Podcast: GrokTalk 2014 Jan 25

Girard At Large (video, February 24, 2019, 1 hour) with Jon DiPietro