Saigo Takamori: The Man Behind the Myth

Customer Reviews:

Not what you're looking for........2005-01-02

As the first biography in English of Saigo Takamori and the first work to use original source material to examine his near-mythic status in Japanese history, this book does have value. However, it is not for the general reader. Though prodigious research was obviously behind this work, little accommodation is made to narrative thrust. The book appears to have been expanded from the author's masters thesis with passages which vary, often jarringly, in tone from the academic material. For those seeking a complete and more readable but still reputable history of the real man behind the character in "The Last Samurai" a better choice by far is the book by that name written by Mark Ravina.

Worth Reading.......2000-05-02

This is a worthwhile read, mainly because it is the only book in English on a fascinating subject: the life of Saigo Takamori. Much credit is to be given to Yates for exposing the true Saigo, which is quite different from the Saigo myth that has grown up in Japan over the last 130 years. Many pages are devoted to what Saigo's true motivations and skills were. My biggest disappointment was the lack of any detail about the military operations that Saigo conducted. The worst example of this is that the entire 7-month Seinan War is covered in about 2 pages.

Saigo is in the details.......2000-04-03

I had the great privelege and pleasure to have Charles Yates as my professor as an undergraduate. His keen insights and methodical decontruction, or "unpacking" of issues were seminal in my thinking about not only Japan, but the wider world. This book displays the same kind of attention to detail and thoroughgoing scholarship, combined with finely-honed skepticism, in dealing with one of the less understood figures in Meiji Japan. Through his ability to see through to the "why" in conventional scholarship, Chuck was able to write a convincing and human account of Saigo Takamori which successfully challenges the established ideas about the oligarch.

Book Description

"Eloquent testimony not only to the fragility of the human body but to its durability as well." The Washington Post Book World.
He was the handsome golden boy out of USC, the star running back for the New York Giants, and -- for the last twenty-two years -- the stalwart voice of ABC's "Monday Night Football." But for Frank Gifford, the road to success did not come easy -- whether on or off the field.
Now, for the first time, this intensely private man tells his inspirational story, providing an insider's look at the NFL replete with shocking and humorous anecdotes. A classic memoir of a true American gridiron hero.

Customer Reviews:

A football legend looks back.......2004-11-10

Frank Gifford is the first football player I personally remember. I can still picture him being interviewed on TV before a game, long before he was the one holding the microphone. But what interested me about his book was not only his account of his college and NFL careers or his broadcasting years but also his tribute to the high school and community college football programs in California, which have produced a number of outstanding players, and his look back on the celebrity social scene in New York City in the 1950's, the end of the Stork Club/Walter Winchell/Toot Shoor's era, where figures from the sports, journalism, political, entertainment and even literary worlds met and interacted. Another poignant moment was the meeting between Ronald Reagan and John Lennon in which the future President explained to the music legend the intricacies of football. Ironically, both would be shot; one would live, the other would not. And most of the country learned about John Lennon's murder while watching the December 8, 1980 Monday Night Football game.

Interesting for fans of pro football's golden age.......2003-06-13

Frank Gifford's autobiography is a fairly interesting book that isn't dry like so many sports biographies are. I found it to be a pretty good read and learned quite a bit I hadn't known before about The Giff.

Gifford covers his tough nomadic childhood, his rise to fame at USC, his years as a New York Giant playing in five NFL title games, his experience trying to break into the Hollywood scene, his eventual transition into broadcasting, and of course the Monday Night Football years. He also spends a lot of time at the end of the book gushing over Kathie Lee. Unfortunately this was written prior to his infamous indiscretions of the mid-1990s; it would be interesting to read his side of that story.... oh well.

Overall I'd say "The Whole Ten Yards" is an above average sports biography. If you were a fan of MNF's first quarter-decade or of the old Giants of the 1950s & early 1960s, you will probably enjoy this book.

Average customer rating:
The Whole Ten Yards
Frank; Waters, Harry, Jr. Gifford
Manufacturer: Ivy Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
ASIN: B000O3RRV8

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Whole Ten Yards
Frank (et al) Gifford
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000O6HTG8

Average customer rating:
The Whole Ten Yards
Gifford Frank
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000LB2AWE

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THE WHOLE TEN YARDS
GIFFORD FRANK & HARRY WATERS
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000PGMCB4

Book Description

From the Archies to Britney Spears, bubblegum music has excited every generation of music lovers. Featuring interviews with many of the genre's major creators, this ambitious anthology dismantles the worst myths about how bubblegum is produced and identifies the gum tendencies of artists as various as the Sex Pistols, Abba, the Monkees, and the Ramones. The book reveals the light and dark sides of the music, telling bitter tales of litigious backstabbing, pistol-wielding producers, and the perversities behind the jingles.

Customer Reviews:

Letter to the Editors.......2005-07-15

The following is a copy of a letter I wrote to the editors of "Music Is the Naked Truth" - it says all I can say about the book:

I'd been looking forward to reading your book
"Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth" for several years
and finally got hold of copy and read it last month.

I felt like I needed to contact (you) the editors,
if only to express my major disappointment.

Your book is advertised as a dark history of bubblegum music
and I was looking forward to some sort of logical outline and
readable history of bubblegum (a type of music I don't know much about)

However, immediately upon reading the introduction and first few
tentative essays, I could see it was going to be rough going.

While planning the book, I'm sure you all thought it would be cute for
your contributors to use as many kooky and coy references
to gum, candy, sugar, sweets, etc as possible.

While delving into your book, initially the candy
references were annoying...then they became plain
excruciating... and then painful. The painful candy references
on almost every page made reading the book an almost impossible chore.
But I'd paid good money for it, so I struggled through all the "gooey,
chewy, yummy" references

Another glaring annoyance in "Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth"
is the fact that there are NO color photographs inside...and what photos you
do place in the book are all 2 X 2 inches and in gray-ish black and white

Oh, wait...I forgot...there IS a large forlorn photo of a Monkees lunch box...
...but why are all the other photos the size of large Puerto Rican postage stamps?

A book about bubblegum music without color photos is
beyond ridiculous. Something along the lines of a thick,
colorful, well-written glossy would have been preferable
and you may have sold a few more books.

I'm sure by now your book as become the "textbook"
on bubblegum music...however, it's clearly not.
And I'm sorry I paid money for it...and I would
feel guilty loaning it to friends or even donating
it to my local library.

Thanks for reading and better luck next time

Give me more, more, more of that bubblegum music.......2003-11-09

This is a collection of essays about (yes) bubblegum music. Most of them are very interesting. If you like to interested in the lighter side of rock and roll, this book should interest you.

POP!.......2003-03-07

I'm a big fan of bubblegum music (it's not often someone will openly admit that), and I thought this book was going to be interesting. It was, to an extent. All of my favorite bands were listed (1910 Fruitgum Company, Ohio Express, and my personal faves, The Monkees), and a lot of the cartoon rock bands were talked about, too (mostly from Hanna-Barbera Studios, such as The Impossibles, Josie and the Pussycats, and the Banana Splits, just to name a few). Another one of the book's best moments was the "100 Greatest Moments of Bubblegum" list in the beginning (or something like that)

However, there were some drawbacks to this book. When they were talking about the producers and record labels, the essays got kind of long, and sort of boring. I got bored with this section very quickly. Another downside to the book was when the authors were talking about the Backstreet Boys, 'NSync, Britney Spears and the like (which in my opinion are NOT bubblegum) and then comparing them to The Monkees (which is totally bogus, becuase the Monkees DID play their own music after the first 2 albums, and 'NSync and the rest have yet to actually pick up a guitar, but I digress).

Other than the drawbacks listed, I think you'll get a bang out of this book. It's the perfect thing for those who grew up with the Partridge Family and the Monkees, or those of you who are new fans, and want to know more about the subject of bubblegum music.

SPLAT!.......2002-01-22

The naked truth, indeed!

Editors Kim Cooper and David Smay have outdone themselves in producing the definitive work on the wildly popular yet strangely esoteric world of bubblegum rock, compiling dozens of essays written by some of the finest scribes of the underground press.

Case in point: "Looking for the Beagles" by Steve Mandich, the author of the fantastically comprehensive biography "Evel Incarnate: The Life and Legend of Evel Knievel." Here Mandich sheds a similarly swell light on the all-but forgotten rockin' doggie duo the Beagles, who starred in their own short-lived late-'60s Saturday-morning cartoon series and released one gleeful pop album.

Other contributors include the comic world's Peter Bagge ("Hate") with a hilariously enthusiastic overview of his young daughter's contemporary bubblegum CDs, Jake Austen ("Roctober") deconstructs KISS, and, in the interest of fairness, Dennis Eichhorn ("Real Stuff") bursts the bubble with "I Hate Bubblegum!"

Buy for its long-lasting flavor.

Splat!

Amazing essay collection.......2001-08-17

This was a rarity in non-fiction for me: I couldn't put it down! So many of the essays were so wonderful, I just had to keep reading to see how strong the next one was. There are a few that I can tell were included more for completeness than quality compared to some, but overall this book is highly educational and entertaining at the same time. Worth it for anyone with an interest in pop culture. Also would make a good gift for that too-snobby-for-the-room culture vulture in your life that needs to be reminded that even The Ramones got into kitsch.

Customer Reviews:

Must read.......2007-08-29

For all parties involved in Software Development this is a must read. It is an easy read with excellent real life stories highlighting the key themes and principles.

The most influential book I've read in my profession.......2007-07-23

I'm a programmer by trade and have been for the past 15 years. I've led many large and small projects. Over the years you learn what works and what doesn't. I never did figured out why that was until I read Lean Software Development book. Not only did it explain why some projects make it and some don't it also gave me tips on how to change the equation for my future projects. It gave me the data and the reasoning to help me understand and also help me explain it to others in simple terms with good reasoning to back it up. The book is one of the most influential books I've read in my profession. I encouraged all of my team and bosses to buy it and read it. Thank you Mary and Tom for writing the book.

Great Principles based on Bad Assumptions.......2007-05-08

I am a senior software systems engineer working for an aerospace company. I recently read the Poppendicks' book and have mixed feelings about it. Overall they present some great lean development principles and tools that appear to be useful in boosting productivity in my software engineering organization. On the other hand, their understanding of CMM/CMMI is so off-base that it is hard for me to take them seriously as authors.

They misrepresented CMM several times in the book, so they either do not understand what CMM is and how it works, or they are intentionally misrepresenting it to "scare" people into using their lean software tools. The reality is that agile software development principles and tools fit perfectly into the CMM/CMMI models and the Poppendicks would have a much stronger book if they realized that. Rather than bashing CMM to make their tools seem more useful, they might do better if they realized that CMM/CMMI and lean software development can work perfectly together.

My advice to people interested in buying the book is to only read the book if you can take what the Poppendicks say with a grain of salt. Read about the lean principles/tools and think of how you could apply them in your software development environment. In the spirit of implementing the primary principle of lean development (i.e. eliminate waste), I would ignore the anecdotes they include in the book. They appear to be intentionally sensational while offering little value.

concise and thorough mapping of lean production learning onto Agile software development practices.......2007-04-09

Reading this book is like taking simultaneous intensive courses in both lean production manufacturing systems and agile software development. The Poppendiecks provide 22 (yes, they're numbered) tools for planning and running development projects, each of which is derived from their experience with physical product development and manufacturing. These tools are each presented at an overview level, with real world examples interspersed throughout. However, the authors use an academic footnoting style that makes it easy to identify other books that could be used to find deeper knowledge on any one subject.

I found that the greatest value the book provides is in putting Agile concepts into a framework that has proven real world success. Traditional project management is so entrenched that abandoning Gant and Pert charts for burnddown graphs and backlogs can feel both risky and unproven. Seeing that the underlying concepts of Agile are not only present in other industries, but are in fact the drivers of competitive advantage gives me a huge confidence boost as I try to apply them.

Of the tools provided, I found some to have especially thought provoking aspects. Among these was:

Tool 1- Seeing Waste: Since anything that does not deliver value to the customer is waste, and customers do not use a majority of available features, implementing fewer features is almost always a good goal.

Tool 6 - Set Based Development: Structure teams so that members inform each other about the entire set of possible solutions to a problem rather than a back and forth response to specific proposals. The intersection of sets of possibility will more quickly identify workable solutions.

Tool 8 - The Last Possible Moment: Delay decisions as long as they can responsibly be delayed in order to more fully explore alternatives, and to allow the correct design to take shape through feedback from customers. The implication is that systems must be architected skillfully so that they can accommodate a variety of different directions in the future.

Tool 10 - Pull Systems: Make sure the team knows what needs to be accomplished, and help them set up mechanisms for signaling when they need work from others, but demand that they schedule themselves.

Tool 21 - Measurements: Don't measure the performance of individual components; this can lead to local optimization at the expense of the product as a whole. Instead, measure one level above where each person or team is working. Individuals are measured on the success of the team. Feature teams are measured on the success of the product, and so on.

The bibliography at the end also deserves a special mention, as it is thorough and obviously contains books covering most of the concepts discussed in the main text. A good education in this field could probably begin by simply reading through the books listed there from first to last.

Overall an excellent an informative book with many practical insights.

One of the best management books ever written.......2007-03-12

Very no-nonsense review of best development practices with NO RELIGIOUS FERVOR. Unlike most other books, the authors cover all the best practices and all argument actually make sense.

Average customer rating:

Reardon captures the real MFK

Not Always Pretty

Oh well and Ho Hum

A Very Good Biography of a most important culinary writer

An unusual person excellently described

Poet of the Appetites: The Lives and Loves of M.F.K. Fisher
Joan Reardon
Manufacturer: North Point Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Authors | Arts & Literature | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
Women | Specific Groups | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
General | Gastronomy | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
General | U.S. Regional | Regional & International | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

Long Ago In France: The Years In Dijon (Destinations)

Two Towns in Provence

The Art of Eating

M.F.K. Fisher and Me: A Memoir of Food and Friendship

The Gastronomical Me

ASIN: 0865475628
Release Date: 2004-10-14

Book Description

In more than thirty books, M.F.K. Fisher forever changed the way Americans understood not only the art of eating but the art of living. Whether considering the oyster or describing how to cook a wolf, she addressed the universal needs "for protection, food, love." Readers were instantly drawn into her circle of husbands and lovers, artists and artisans; they felt they knew Fisher herself, whether they encountered her as a child with a fried-egg sandwich in her pocket, a young bride awakening to the glories of French food, or a seductress proffering the first peas of the season.

Oldest child, wife, mother, mistress, self-made career woman, trail-blazing writer--Fisher served up each role with panache. But like many master stylists, she was also a master mythologizer. Her portraits and scenarios were often unrecognizable to those on whom they were based, and her own emotions and experiences remained cloaked in ambiguity.

To retell her story as it really happened is an important enterprise, and Joan Reardon has made the most of her access to Fisher, her family and friends, and her private papers. This multifaceted portrayal of the woman John Updike christened the "poet of the appetites" is no less memorable than the personae Fisher crafted for herself.

Customer Reviews:

Reardon captures the real MFK.......2006-06-18

Having read 10 of Fisher's books I was beginning to not like her all that much and then along comes Reardon's biography and I like MFK even less. Fisher was a talented writer but truly a narrcicist who sponged off her parents and hung out with others, mostly well to do and who were "artists and writers"; people who, for the most part, never really worked. What I found hardest to take was the fact that she never told her oldest daughter who her father was - even in MFK's dying days she refused Anna's request to tell her who this man was. I am afraid I will never read my remaining Fisher books - Too bad, I want to like her but it will be hard to forget the facts laid out by Reardon.

Not Always Pretty.......2005-09-20

I enjoyed Joan Reardon's intimate biography of the food writer MFK Fisher quite a lot but the pleasures of reading it deepened into dispiriting reflections on how intrusive biography can be. Taking its title from an inane description of Fisher;s writing by John Updike, POET OF THE APPETITE peers almost literally into the abyss, the destruction and mixed feelings left behind by a talented, "play-acting" lady's sweep through life. Reardon details the events of Fisher's three marriages almost as though she'd been there, and she brings to life some long affairs as well. Before reading this book, I don't remember knowing that Fisher had often had to fight off members of her own sex, and occasionally she succumbed, bragging about it later. In contrast to the three dimensionality imparted to Fisher's male lovers, it is perhaps unfortunate that Reardon seems unwilling to portray the estimable Marietta Voorhees as anything other than a quarrelsome, needy, aged and ugly pest, whose function in Fisher's life was to whine and to fret about her mother.

Meanwhile a comparable affair with a man, her late in life hook up with Esuqire editor and Hemingway buddy Arbold Gingrich, a married man no less, is presented as kind of cute in that old-lovers Cocoon way.

Most distasteful is Reardon's prompt, efficient way of laying out the whole sad story of Anna Parrish, Fisher's younger daughter. After reading the facts of her life in this book, how could poor Anna ever raise her head high again? Reardon eviscerates her as a hedonistic hippie who let her toddler walk across a six lane highway unattended, while she was having a manic episode on a commune. I guess part of the point is that Fisher's karma finally caught up with her.

And what about the food industry, which drove Fisher to restless spasms of having to produce a new book every year even when she was dying, or trying to? Those late books are looking more and more grotesque, like the late De Koonings produced by "the Master" in the stages of Alzheimers Disease. And yet, as Reardon shows, Fisher was complicit in their production. Anything for a buck or so it seems. I liked reading the book, its cool analysis, its thorough research, its sturdy construction, best of all for showing us, in more detail than entirely necessary, how a legend fights its way into being, and folks, it isn't always pretty.

Oh well and Ho Hum.......2005-08-13

If you have read the published journals and collected letters, this book is largely redundant. Ms Reardon has meticulously documented how she has supplemented these with interviews and excerpts from the Fisher papers at the Schlesinger Library at Radcliffe. Despite the significant effort and research, I'm not sure that this book has added significant content or understanding. I believe that we are all human beings with our own frailties and foibles and I think that Ms Reardon has tried to fairly capture that aspect of Ms Fisher's life. However I think Ms Fisher's voice in the published journals and letters does this as well.

A Very Good Biography of a most important culinary writer.......2005-07-08

`Poet of the Appetites, The Lives and Loves of M.F.K. Fisher' by Joan Reardon is, obviously, a biography of America's greatest culinary essayist. It is important to distinguish Ms. Fisher's subject from her great contemporaries, Julia Child and James Beard, who wrote about food and cooking. The point of the title of this book is that Ms. Fisher wrote about eating and the enjoyment of eating.

Ms. Reardon is eminently qualified to do the biography of Ms. Fisher, as she was a friend and associate of Ms. Fisher for several years and a commentator on her works in earlier writings. Her main problem was that the eminent writing stylist, Ms. Fisher wrote so many memoirs on various parts of her own life that it may have been hard to compete with her subject.

In Ms. Reardon's favor is the fact that Ms. Fisher had a tendency to `play fast and loose with her renditions of events' (quote from Ms. Reardon's introduction). This means that while Ms. Fisher's description of, for example, her early 1930s life with her first husband in Dijon in `Long Ago in France: The Years in Dijon' may be more interesting to read than Ms. Reardon's account of the same period, Joan Reardon is more likely to be giving us the unvarnished story.

Part of my problem in reading this biography may have been the fact that I knew relatively little of Ms. Fisher's life. Unlike my reading the biographies of Julia Child and James Beard, I had no sense of anticipation to discover how, for example, Julia Child acquired her passion for French cooking.

My exposure up to this point had been a brief essay by James Villas on an encounter with Ms. Fisher late in her career. And, many of her most famous pieces were published by the early 1950's, when the biggest events in her life were her private problems with husband number two and her daughters. When I reached this point in her life, the reading becomes much more labored.

Ms. Reardon's narrative is, I am convinced, extremely accurate, albeit not very engaging. It is obvious from financial difficulties why Ms. Fisher wished to disengage from her second husband Donald Friede, but I simply get no strong sense of why she fell out of love with her first husband, Al Fisher, aside from her interest in Dillwyn Parrish.

As I write this, I get the sense that maybe I wanted too much, but I will go with my visceral reaction and say that Ms. Reardon's straight talk may not get behind the events quite as well as I may hope.

The problem may also be in the fact that where Child and Beard had such public, active lives, Fisher's life was quite private.

The very best thing about this book is that it gives you a new perspective on Fisher's own writings and add to their value. The book may or may not encourage you to read Fisher's works, in spite of John Thorne's enthusiastic recommendation on the back cover.

My final take on this book is the fact that I have read other culinary biographies with more interest than I got from this book, but I still consider this an excellent biography of a very important American writer.

An unusual person excellently described.......2005-06-10

Just like the author of this biography, I had read MFK Fisher's books and wondered who she was. Who were the men in her life? How did she learn to write the way she did? This book has all the answers and then some.

If you are interested in food history, cooking, family life or travel, this book will please you. MFK Fisher was a fascinating, exasperating person who had a fabulously interesting life with sojourns in France, mysterious love affairs and a zillion excellent meals.

The author does a wonderful job of never, ever boring the reader. I kept asking myself: How could she plug ahead through so much research, so many years, never rushing, never overdoing the details, getting it all just right? But she did it somehow and for that I admire her.

Book Description

What is the status of belief in God? Must a rational case be made or can such belief be properly basic? Is it possible to reconcile the concept of a good God with evil and suffering? In light of great differences among religions, can only one religion be true? The most comprehensive work of its kind, Reason and Religious Belief, now in its third edition, explores these and other perennial questions in the philosophy of religion. Drawing from the best in both classical and contemporary discussions, the authors examine religious experience, faith and reason, theistic arguments, the problem of evil, Reformed epistemology, miracles, and religious language. They also treat subjects not often included in competing texts, such as process theism, religious pluralism, religion and science, and the relationship between religion and morality. The third edition retains the engaging style and thorough coverage of previous editions and also takes into account the latest contributions in the field by such thinkers as Plantinga, Alston, Martin, Murphy, Dembski, M. Adams, and Swinburne. Integrating a variety of perspectives, it adds a chapter on the openness of God debate, several sections on feminist concerns, and frequent comparisons of how Eastern religions compare with Western theism. A sophisticated yet accessible introduction, Reason and Religious Belief, 3/e is ideally suited for use with the authors' companion anthology, Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings, 2/e (OUP, 2000).

Customer Reviews:

Reason & Religious Belief.......2003-07-14

Most books on theology for the layman are actually either apologetics or mostly inspirational in content. This book presents much broder and more basic material on such subjects as does God exist, the problems of evil, process theology, and foundationalism, all described in language that the layman can easily understand. The subjects are treated in a balanced manner with reasons for and against certain beliefs. I would recommend this to any layman who is interested in digging down to the bedrock of how, mostly Christian, beliefs are viewed from a rational, and occasionally spiritual perspective.

Excellent.......2001-06-17

The philosophy of religion is a fascinating subject which is getting more attention in recent years. There are any number of introductory works on the subject, but this is one of the best I've seen. It is particularly comprehensive and deals with a number of subjects beyond the traditional topics found in such books, including science and religion, religious pluralism, and life after death. It also introduces the reader to leading thinkers in every area, but avoids excessively technical language. A person who is studying philosophy for the first time or who has a basic knowledge of philosophy but wants to study the philosophy of religion would benefit from reading this book.

The authors are Christians and the writing tends to sympathize with the theistic approach. If you get this book, make sure you get the authors' collection of readings, Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings.

A good introduction to Religion/Reason discussions.......2001-01-06

This book is a an easy introduction to the issues about religion and reason. It is about discussions on faith and reason, existence of God from different approaches, miracles and its compatibility with science, ethics and religion. In short all religious concepts and beliefs in relation to reason is discussed and different view points are explained. For each case the streght and weakness of the arguments are highlighted. Language used is not deep philosopical and therefore it is easy to read and understand. There is no conculusive arguments but rather the issues are identified and different responses is studied as general knowledge. It is a good text book for starters. Each chapter ends with list of questions for study with extensive suggested readings list.

An extensive and Neotheist introduction.......1997-10-20

This books covers a very broad range of issues. It is not written in a technical but in an accessible way, making it a good introduction to the subject. For each topic it exemplifies some chosen aspects, but this leads to misrepresentations (e. g. of the Kalam argument).. It is written from a Neotheist and evolutionist perspective. To counterbalance its Neotheist emphasis, I would recommend reading "Creating God in the Image of Man" by Norman L Geisler.

REASON AND RELIGIOUS BELIEF An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion

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REASON AND RELIGIOUS BELIEF An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion
Michael & William Hasker & Bruce Reichenbach & David Basinger Peterson
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OK66Q8

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Reason and Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion
William Hasker, Bruce Reichenbach, David Basinger Michael Peterson
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OKVIV6

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Net Talk , Society of the Mind (iRobot) , Nestor , presynaptic memory models, postsynaptic memory models

Edifices: deliberate, fantasmagorical, neural

"Fascinating" -- Nature ... "Rich and Lucid" -- James Gleick

In the Palaces of Memory: How We Build the Worlds Inside Our Heads
George Johnson
Manufacturer: Vintage
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Memory Improvement | Self-Help | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
Neuropsychology | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
Intelligence | By Topic | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
General | Science | Subjects | Books
Physiology | Basic Science | Medicine | Subjects | Books
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The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci

The Art of Memory

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ASIN: 0679737596
Release Date: 1992-03-03

Book Description

Even as you read these words, a tiny portion of your brain is physically changing. New connections are being sprouted -- a circuit that will create a stab of recognition if you encounter the words again. That is one of the theories of memory presented in this intriguing and splendidly readable book, which distills three researchers' inquiries into the processes that enable us to recognize a face that has aged ten years or remember a melody for decades. Ranging from experiments performed on the "wetware" of the brain to attempts to re-create human cognition in computers, In the Palaces of Memory is science writing at its most exciting.

Customer Reviews:

Net Talk , Society of the Mind (iRobot) , Nestor , presynaptic memory models, postsynaptic memory models.......2007-06-15

Hopfield student, Terry Sejnowski created an invention that could learn to read. The network had a input layer that read the letters, a middle layer which generated the phonemes, and an output layer. Each neural was connect to eighteen thousand synapses. The weights on the synapses were adjusted according to the back-progragation error routine. NetTalk went through the babbling stage, after a half day pronounced a thousand words, and by the end of the week, it pronounced twenty thousand words. "Unlike an A.I. programmer, Sejnowski didn't start with symbols as the primitive units, the letters and phonemes that would be manipulated according to rules." Rules like long e, in she and he were generalized by the strength of units in the middle layer.

Minsky: 1. The biggest problem with neural networks is scaling: "There is no reason to thing that a small network capable of learning a fairly easy task could be scaled up to solve the kinds of harder problems that brains do." 2. Many of the new NN take tens of thousands of trails to learn a simple skill, like recognizing a small number of objects. 3. If NN scale exponentially, so that multiplying the size of the body of material to be learned by a factor of n, meant raising the processing time to the nth power. Learning something difficult might take longer than the universe would exist. 4. Perceptron was not written to kill NN. The field had already died. Minsky and Papert were explaining why. Minsky listen to NetTalk and said he couldn't understand many of the words it said. 5. Minsky embraced both the NN and Symbolic agent programming model of the brain, "society of the mind". The agents interact in a complex cooperative hierarchial system where agents communicated with other agents simulating intelligent behavior. High level agents control low level agents. Conditional, if-then-do rules active agents to return a positive or negative result. The world of sensation was defined as: sensation -> reception -> recognition -> cognition. The brain received an input from one of the five senses. The sensory input activates various processes from connected agents. A polyneme signals different agencies (color, shape, or texture agencies) too turn on process in their agencies Agents interaction can be diagrammed into deterministic asynchronous finites states and used by robots. "How do you make a management structure in which some of them are good at learning how to manage how other learn?" That is what the brain is. The brain has 300 kinds of neural networks, and some specialize for the controlling the input and outputs of others. Other NN specialize in retaining memories. 6. Perceptrons is about how you'd use a lot of different types of neural nets to make something smart.

Nestor Inc, is a leader in commercial NN technology. Nestor, Inc. is a leading provider of advanced intelligent traffic management solutions. Nestor is creating intelligent scan radars and laser based system that system can track cars, on multiple lanes, simulatenously track and measuring speeds of each car passing by. The scans are accomplished a 100 times per second.

The Biology of memory: 1. During epileptic seizures neurons fire wildly secreting a flood of glutamate. The NMDA receptors respond by letting calcium, into the cells. "Could it be that calcium activates proteases in so great a number that they begin to eat up brain cells? 2. Gary Lynch observed that NMDA receptors responded to the glutamate by opening their calcium channels. Calcium would rush into the neuron and trigger the calpain mechanism, a protease. Calpin is a destructive enzyme involved in the degeneration of muscle and nerve tissue. The APV blockage experiments of NMDA did not stop all types of rat learning. NMDA receptors are used in only certain types of learning. 3. NMDA receptor had the distinction of being both electrical and chemical. If the neuron was already in a state of arousal, the NMDA were free to react with a second rush of glutamate receptors.

Edifices: deliberate, fantasmagorical, neural.......2000-01-26

"Whenever you read a book or have a conversation, the experience causes physical changes in your brain. In a matter of seconds, new circuits are formed, memories that can change forever the way you think about the world. [...] I'll never forgive David Lynch for his movie Erasorhead." The first two pages of In the Palaces of Memory introduce remembrance as an act not only of acquisition but of self-exposure. Memories make it possible for us to function; they may also lodge themselves in us "like a shard of glass healed inside a wound," never to be expelled. Some memories are desired and some become a part of the structure of our minds against our will.

Memory's palaces, though, may be as much the edifices the theorists construct as they are the ones inside our heads. This slim volume is not only an analysis of the way memory works but also an exposé of the way memory morphs depending on who's studying it. The underlying question, as in so much of Johnson's work, is really "how a theory matches up with some kind of real world," and what the world (in this case the brain) looks like from the point of view of the brain-children, scientific or philosophical, that purport to explain it. In this book the "unruly, creative art of theory-building" occupies center stage with memory.

What is remarkable about Johnson's writing is the uninhibited intimacy he seems to have with his subjects and with us, his readers, so that we can feel ourselves to be as close to the Thing, whatever it is, as he is. Johnson has granted me the delightful illusion of being nose to nose with a neuron, with Gell-Mann, with Planck's constant -- almost as though the experience were unmediated by an author. The man's a master story teller. But what comes across is also -- and here's the clincher -- a profound sense of amusement. If I'm not mistaken George Johnson is given to quiet chuckles in the dark over theoreticians and theorems. He infuses his translations of science in the making with a persistent, ironic-affectionate grin.

How can we resist.

"Fascinating" -- Nature ... "Rich and Lucid" -- James Gleick.......1995-12-13

"One of the last great mysteries is the one we carry inside our heads: how we remember, what we remember, why we remember. "In the Palaces of Memory" is a rich and lucid guide to this entangled and enchanting domain." -- James Gleick

"Johnson has written a fascinating book, which perhaps throws as much light on how science is done and on the scientists who do it as any book since "The Double Helix" -- Stuart Sutherland, Nature

"Johnson has achieved a rare blend of scientific and literary sophistication. Faithful to its complexities and controversies, the book is a fully dimensional portrait, a hologram of the field." -- Richard Mark Friedhoff, USA Today

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In The Palaces Of Memory - How We Build The Worlds Inside Our Heads
George Johnson
Manufacturer: Grafton Books
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Binding: Paperback
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In The Palaces of Memory. How We Build The Worlds Inside Our Heads.
George Johnson
Manufacturer: Alfred A. Knopf
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In the Palaces of Memory: How We Build the Worlds Inside Our Heads
George Johnson
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great summary of pollution politics in the 1980's in Ontario.......1998-06-17

'St. Clair Blob' rekindled in new book

review written BY CALE COWAN Courier Press staff

------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is Environment Week. What better time to revisit the 10-year-old controversy that came floating down the St. Clair River? The issue of the infamous 'St. Clair Blob' that focused the country's environmental ire on the region came to a head in 1985 when Dow Chemical spilled 40,000 litres of dry-cleaning solvent into the river. The resulting 'blob' demonstrated just how poorly the St. Clair had been treated.

It's a decade later and things are better but not as good as they could be, according to some of the players who were around in the day. Adding to the nostalgia of the event is a book published earlier this spring by PhD Laurie E. Adkin that has a chapter dealing with the 'blob', along with the industry, government and media reaction. Some of the conclusions drawn in Chapter 11 of 'Politics of Sustainable Development -- Citizens, Unions and the Corporations' are less than flattering. An excerpt: "The story of the blob uncovered not only the extent of long-term chemical dumping in the river but also the degree of collusion between officials of the (Ministry of Environment) and the chemical industry."

Publicly revealed in 1984, Adkin said the blob was actually known to MOE officials since 1976. Adkin, who did extensive research in the area during the fallout of the discovery, also recounts how citizen groups and unions dealt with the environmental impact and how they dealt with industry in their desire to clean up the river and preserve jobs. Adkin writes: "Dow had undertaken a campaign to woo over to its point of view the citizen 'thought leaders' in communities downstream of the Chemical Valley. Shortly after the blob incident had broken in the media and had resulted in the shutdown of the water purification plants in downstream communities like Wallaceburg, Dow scientists and managers we! nt to Wallaceburg to reassure citizens that everything was under control. "They found that their audience was not prepared, this time, to accept either their assurances or their authority." Kris Lee, a member of the Wallaceburg Clean Water Committee at the time, has read Adkin's book and feels it's an accurate depiction of what happened here.

"It's a credit to Wallaceburg," she said of the book and the recollection of how citizens here stood up to protect a natural resource. Lee said interest in the problem has faded since spills have become less of a media event but also concedes that "Sarnia has really cleaned up" since the problems they had in the 1980s. Part of that has been due in no small part to a downsizing in the petro-chemical industry, but is also partly due to self-policing in the industry and a greater appreciation for protecting the environment, said Lee, who is a teacher at Wallaceburg District Secondary School.

There are still concerns today, however, like ICI Canada, which recently got permission from the environment ministry to discharge treated waste water into the St. Clair. And with cuts in all government agencies, Lee says it's just as important today for residents to remain diligent in keeping an eye on what's happening. "We can't stop them from discharging ... but we can make sure they monitor it and speak with ICI and find out what's going on. "People say that today there are not as many spills but you have to remember that every day tons of contaminants are allowed into that river. People seem to forget." Things are better now, Lee says, but there are signs that indicate a watch dog approach is necessary. With Wallaceburg's former town council taking an "arm's length" approach to the ICI issue and accepting a $1.5 million compensation package, more than ever it seems that environmental concerns are in the realm of the individual.

"We have to have people more aware of what's going on," Lee ! said.

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