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  • Book cover of Money

    The co-host of the popular NPR podcast Planet Money provides a well-researched, entertaining, somewhat irreverent look at how money is a made-up thing that has evolved over time to suit humanity's changing needs. Money only works because we all agree to believe in it. In Money, Jacob Goldstein shows how money is a useful fiction that has shaped societies for thousands of years, from the rise of coins in ancient Greece to the first stock market in Amsterdam to the emergence of shadow banking in the 21st century. At the heart of the story are the fringe thinkers and world leaders who reimagined money. Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor, created paper money backed by nothing, centuries before it appeared in the west. John Law, a professional gambler and convicted murderer, brought modern money to France (and destroyed the country's economy). The cypherpunks, a group of radical libertarian computer programmers, paved the way for bitcoin. One thing they all realized: what counts as money (and what doesn't) is the result of choices we make, and those choices have a profound effect on who gets more stuff and who gets less, who gets to take risks when times are good, and who gets screwed when things go bad. Lively, accessible, and full of interesting details (like the 43-pound copper coins that 17th-century Swedes carried strapped to their backs), Money is the story of the choices that gave us money as we know it today.

  • Book cover of Sensation and Perception

    . Bruce Goldstein's SENSATION AND PERCEPTION, the best-seller which has helped over 150,000 students understand the ties between how we sense the world and how the body interprets these senses, is now in a brilliant full-color Seventh Edition. A key strength of this text has always been the ability to show the student what they are learning through examples and visuals. Now, the book takes this visual learning one step further by using color throughout as a learning tool. As the sole author of the text, Goldstein's singular voice combines with his extensive classroom experience and most innovative research to create a visual text unparalleled in the field. The text walks the student through an intriguing journey of the senses with a mixture of clarity and thoroughness. The accompanying, "Virtual Lab" media exercises (available both on CD-ROM, within the Perception PsychologyNowTM student tutorial platform, and in the online WebTutorTM Advantage product) offer a wide array of animations and examples designed to stimulate understanding of difficult concepts. Every chapter has been updated for currency and readability, and a new chapter six on Visual Attention rounds off this timely revision.

  • Book cover of Polarized Light

    Polarized light is a pervasive influence in our world—and scientists and engineers in a variety of fields require the tools to understand, measure, and apply it to their advantage. Offering an in-depth examination of the subject and a description of its applications, Polarized Light, Third Edition serves as a comprehensive self-study tool complete with an extensive mathematical analysis of the Mueller matrix and coverage of Maxwell’s equations. Links Historical Developments to Current Applications and Future Innovations This book starts with a general description of light and continues with a complete exploration of polarized light, including how it is produced and its practical applications. The author incorporates basic topics, such as polarization by refraction and reflection, polarization elements, anisotropic materials, polarization formalisms (Mueller–Stokes and Jones) and associated mathematics, and polarimetry, or the science of polarization measurement. New to the Third Edition: A new introductory chapter Chapters on: polarized light in nature, and form birefringence A review of the history of polarized light, and a chapter on the interference laws of Fresnel and Arago—both completely re-written A new appendix on conventions used in polarized light New graphics, and black-and-white photos and color plates Divided into four parts, this book covers the fundamental concepts and theoretical framework of polarized light. Next, it thoroughly explores the science of polarimetry, followed by discussion of polarized light applications. The author concludes by discussing how our polarized light framework is applied to physics concepts, such as accelerating charges and quantum systems. Building on the solid foundation of the first two editions, this book reorganizes and updates existing material on fundamentals, theory, polarimetry, and applications. It adds new chapters, graphics, and color photos, as well as a new appendix on conventions used in polarized light. As a result, the author has re-established this book’s lofty status in the pantheon of literature on this important field.

  • Book cover of Pearl Harbor

    The New York Times–bestselling authors of Miracle at Midway delve into the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor during WWII in “a superb work of history” (Albuquerque Journal Magazine). In the predawn hours of December 7, 1941, a Japanese carrier group sailed toward Hawaii. A few minutes before 8:00 a.m., they received the order to rain death on the American base at Pearl Harbor, sinking dozens of ships, destroying hundreds of airplanes, and taking the lives of over two thousand servicemen. The carnage lasted only two hours, but more than seventy years later, terrible questions remain unanswered. How did the Japanese slip past the American radar? Why were the Hawaiian defense forces so woefully underprepared? What, if anything, did American intelligence know before the first Japanese pilot shouted “Tora! Tora! Tora!”? In this incomparable volume, Pearl Harbor experts Gordon W. Prange, Donald M. Goldstein, and Katherine V. Dillon tackle dozens of thorny issues in an attempt to determine who was at fault for one of the most shocking military disasters in history.

  • Book cover of Console and Classify

    Since its publication in 1989, Console and Classify has become a classic work in the history of science and in French intellectual history. Now with a new afterword, this much-cited and much-discussed book gives readers the chance to revisit the rise of psychiatry in nineteenth-century France, the shape it took and why, and its importance both then and in contemporary society. "Goldstein has raised our understanding of the politics of psychiatric professionalization on to a new plane."—Roy Porter, Times Higher Education Supplement "[A]n historiographical tour de force, quite simply the most insightful work on the subject in English or any other language. . . . [A] work of distinctive originality. . . . It is written with lucidity and elegance, even a certain confident scholarly panache, that make it a pleasure to read."—Toby Gelfand, Social History "Exhaustively researched, elegantly written, and persuasively argued, Console and Classify is an excellent example of the . . . sociologically informed intellectual history, stimulated by Kuhn and Foucault."—Robert Alun Jones, American Journal of Sociology

  • Book cover of A History of Modern Tibet, 1913-1951

    The "Tibetan Question," the nature of Tibet's political status vis-à-vis China, has been the subject of often bitterly competing views while the facts of the issue have not been fully accessible to interested observers. While one faction has argued that Tibet was, in the main, historically independent until it was conquered by the Chinese Communists in 1951 and incorporated into the new Chinese state, the other faction views Tibet as a traditional part of China that split away at the instigation of the British after the fall of the Manchu Dynasty and was later dutifully reunited with "New China" in 1951. In contrast, this comprehensive study of modern Tibetan history presents a detailed, non-partisan account of the demise of the Lamaist state. Drawing on a wealth of British, American, and Indian diplomatic records; first-hand-historical accounts written by Tibetan participants; and extensive interviews with former Tibetan officials, monastic leaders, soldiers, and traders, Goldstein meticulously examines what happened and why. He balances the traditional focus on international relations with an innovative emphasis on the intricate web of internal affairs and events that produced the fall of Tibet. Scholars and students of Asian history will find this work an invaluable resource and interested readers will appreciate the clear explanation of highly polemicized, and often confusing, historical events. The "Tibetan Question," the nature of Tibet's political status vis-à-vis China, has been the subject of often bitterly competing views while the facts of the issue have not been fully accessible to interested observers. While one faction has argued that T

  • Book cover of One Dharma

    One of America’s foremost Buddhist teachers shares a “wise and mature vision of Buddhism [that is] destined to be a classic”—preface by the Dalai Lama (Jack Kornfield). Buddhism has evolved in various ways across time and geography. Now, as a genuine Western Buddhism takes root on American soil, Buddhist teacher Joseph Goldstein explores its unique traditions as well as its essential adherence to the universal principles of mindfulness, loving-kindness, and nonattachment. In One Dharma, Goldstein distills a lifetime of practice and teaching, including his years at the renowned Insight Meditation Society, to present a groundbreaking, contemporary vision of Buddhism.

  • Book cover of War and Gender

    Gender roles are nowhere more prominent than in war. Yet contentious debates, and the scattering of scholarship across academic disciplines, have obscured understanding of how gender affects war and vice versa. In this authoritative and lively review of our state of knowledge, Joshua Goldstein assesses the possible explanations for the near-total exclusion of women from combat forces, through history and across cultures. Topics covered include the history of women who did fight and fought well, the complex role of testosterone in men's social behaviours, and the construction of masculinity and femininity in the shadow of war. Goldstein concludes that killing in war does not come naturally for either gender, and that gender norms often shape men, women, and children to the needs of the war system. lllustrated with photographs, drawings, and graphics, and drawing from scholarship spanning six academic disciplines, this book provides a unique study of a fascinating issue.

  • Book cover of Incompleteness: The Proof and Paradox of Kurt Gödel (Great Discoveries)

    "A gem…An unforgettable account of one of the great moments in the history of human thought." —Steven Pinker Probing the life and work of Kurt Gödel, Incompleteness indelibly portrays the tortured genius whose vision rocked the stability of mathematical reasoning—and brought him to the edge of madness.

  • Book cover of Miracle at Midway

    New York Times bestseller: The true story of the WWII naval battle portrayed in the Roland Emmerich film is “something special among war histories” (Chicago Sun-Times). Six months after Pearl Harbor, the seemingly invincible Imperial Japanese Navy prepared a decisive blow against the United States. After sweeping through Asia and the South Pacific, Japan’s military targeted the tiny atoll of Midway, an ideal launching pad for the invasion of Hawaii and beyond. But the US Navy would be waiting for them. Thanks to cutting-edge code-breaking technology, tactical daring, and a significant stroke of luck, the Americans under Adm. Chester W. Nimitz dealt Japan’s navy its first major defeat in the war. Three years of hard fighting remained, but it was at Midway that the tide turned. This “stirring, even suspenseful narrative” is the first book to tell the story of the epic battle from both the American and Japanese sides (Newsday). Miracle at Midway reveals how America won its first and greatest victory of the Pacific war—and how easily it could have been a loss.