Tales of an old horsetrader: The first hundred years (A Bur oak original)

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Tales of an old horsetrader: The first hundred years (A Bur oak original)
Leroy Judson Daniels
Manufacturer: University of Iowa Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Production & Operations | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0877451737

Book Description

BASE 66 is the true, nerve-wracking account of three young skydivers and their quest for membership in the most select extreme sports club on earth: The BASE club. In order to become a full-fledged member, Jevto Dedijer, Bernard Poirier, and Scott Elder had to parachute from the top of a building, an antenna tower, a bridge and a cliff, and survive to tell the story--a feat only some 800 adrenaline addicted people have succeeded in doing.

In BASE 66, Jevto Dedijer tells the tale of his hunger for the ultimate adrenaline rush. He and his companions shared several near death experiences while traveling across Europe with their parachutes and beer in Bernard's dented Renault 4.

They were pioneers in a sport so dangerous that several of their fellow BASE jumpers died in action.

"BASE 66 is a fascinating story about life and death, terror and joy, and intimate friendship. It is an account of extraordinary people taking a step beyond the edge."

Yuri Kuznetsov--BASE 416

"Everyone will enjoy reading Jevto's thrilling and humorous tale of his fascinating BASE odyssey and his discovery of a way of life that surpasses artificial boundaries and provides lifelong inspiration."

Jean Boenish--BASE 3

Customer Reviews:

Must Read 4 All BASE Jumpers.......2007-06-13

Jevto did a great job of sharing his excitement and fear at exploring a new and extreme sport.
Many years later, after I had made my first BASE jump, I found his feelings similiar to my own
experiences --- although the countries and objects were different.

I also really enjoyed the inclusion of the impact of his participation in this sport on his family.
So much so that I loaned my copy to my mom so she might better understand why I want to
make more BASE jumps.

The book is well written, moves quickly, has some great vintage BASE photos and would make
a great addition to any jumper's library.

Take It Light,
~Tom

What a great book.......2006-02-03

After reading this book, I have a greater appreciation for the pioneers of BASE jumping and the courage, fear and mental challenges they faced by being the first. This book captures the determination, frustration and excitement they experienced while blazing a trail in a completely new and thrilling sport. This is a "must read" for anyone that is intersted in participating in the wonderful sport of BASE.

Excellent Book.......2006-01-11

I ordered this book because I had an interest in BASE. All I can say is: "Well Done Jevto." This book gives you an up close view on BASE jumping. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in BASE, or anyone looking for a (true story) adventure book. Again.. Good job!!

Incredibly captivating! .......2005-11-29

Could not put this book down.

It is incredible in that it offers you a very personal behind-the-scenes of base jumping which is a rarity in itself - but what makes this book even better is that it is really well written!

A lot of times it would trip me out because all the emotion and adventure is so so so so incredibly intense - but it all really happened!

Cannot recommend it enough!

Great discovery........2005-07-14

I enjoyed a lot that wonderful story. It reminded me also about some of my past "crazy" experiences while rappelling, climbing and paragliding.
I recommend it also to everybody who does not understand why some people do that kind of sports. Jevto gives a previleged insight into his motivations and into his true reasons.
A must !

New book on building: moldings, architraves, base, brackets, stairs, newels, balusters, rails, cornice, mantels, window frames, sash, doors, columns, 45 ... etc., 66 plans of dwellings with size and

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New book on building: moldings, architraves, base, brackets, stairs, newels, balusters, rails, cornice, mantels, window frames, sash, doors, columns, 45 ... etc., 66 plans of dwellings with size and
Michigan Historical Reprint Series
Manufacturer: Scholarly Publishing Office, University of Michigan Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

United States | History | Historical Reproductions | Formats | Books
ASIN: 1425507972
Release Date: 2005-12-20

Product Description

This volume is produced from digital images created through the University of Michigan University Library's preservation reformatting program.

DUCKDATA a bibliographic data base for North American waterfowl (Anatidae) and their wetland habitats (SuDoc I 49.66:186)

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DUCKDATA a bibliographic data base for North American waterfowl (Anatidae) and their wetland habitats (SuDoc I 49.66:186)
Kenneth J. Reinecke
Manufacturer: U.S. Dept. of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B00010CCY6

Manual of acute toxicity: Interpretation and data base for 410 chemicals and 66 species of freshwater animals (Resource publication / United States Department ... of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service)

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Manual of acute toxicity: Interpretation and data base for 410 chemicals and 66 species of freshwater animals (Resource publication / United States Department ... of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service)
F. L Mayer
Manufacturer: U.S. Dept. of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

General | Real Estate | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Manual of Acute Toxicity: Interpretation and Data Base for 410 Chemicals and 66 Species of Freshwater Animals.

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Manual of Acute Toxicity: Interpretation and Data Base for 410 Chemicals and 66 Species of Freshwater Animals.

Manufacturer: US Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000GKM0E8

1990 census of population and housing (SuDoc C 3.281:F 66/990/CD)

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1990 census of population and housing (SuDoc C 3.281:F 66/990/CD)
U.S Census Bureau
Manufacturer: U.S. Dept. of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Data User Services Division
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B000109KCS

Analysis of data bases for health services research on dementia (SuDoc Y 3.T 22/2:2 M 66/2/pt.2/data)

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Analysis of data bases for health services research on dementia (SuDoc Y 3.T 22/2:2 M 66/2/pt.2/data)
Korbin Liu
Manufacturer: Urban Institute [U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B000106WT2

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Amazing book !
an exciting book!
Have Chute - will travel!
Great Pictures I just wish the text was in english

Base 66
Jevto Dedijer
Manufacturer: Dare Dead Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Biographies | Sports | Subjects | Books

Air Sports & Recreation | Miscellaneous | Sports | Subjects | Books

Swedish | More Languages | Foreign Language Books | Specialty Stores | Books
ASIN: 0968799302

Book Description

B.A.S.E. 66 är den sanna berättelsen om tre unga vänner och deras inträdesprov i en exklusiv klubb av våghalsiga fallskärmshoppare. Med ett språk som dryper av adrenalin återskapar Jevto Dedijer det dramatiska året då han tillsammans med en fransk arkeolog och en amerikansk stridspilot hoppade fallskärm från radio antenner, klippor, broar och skyskrapor. Risken var stor men utmaningen större.

Customer Reviews:

Amazing book !.......2001-09-02

I was delighted to read this book. How can you be so fearless? Is there a recipe? I would suggest you have your book available in English now...

an exciting book!.......2001-08-31

First I have to tell you my background. I'm a skydiver with no background in base jumping. I know very little about the sport and even less about the start of base jumping, since there are no historybooks on this subject.
Jevto Dedijer's describes these first years of basejumping in his book, Base 66, in very exciting way. At that time they used equipment that by todays standards, no one would be caught jumping. Not from an airplane and absolutely not from a 100 meters high object. Jevto and his friends are pioneers in a sport that is as beautiful as it is deadly. BASE 66 takes off by describing how Jevto's skydiving career begins at the young age of 18. What makes him leap of his first BASE object and later makes him change his mind about BASE jumping.
I recommend this book to anyone who would like to know more about the first years in basejumping. It's an exciting book and well worth reading.
BSBD

Have Chute - will travel!.......2001-08-13

This white-knuckle ride read is a must read for anyone wanting to learn how to live life to the full - and live to tell the tale.

Jevto Dedijer writes about his own daring exploits in a way which made me gasp, feeling as if I myself stood on the brink of a cliff or a tower with nothing but a tiny chute to hang my life on. He puts you right into those chutestraps, creating huge sinking feeling in your belly and a small thought of envy - I wish I had had the guts to what he did.

Read it!

Great Pictures I just wish the text was in english.......2001-07-25

The pictures are great and from what I could translate so is the text. So if the publisher is reading this, how about an english translation. There is too little writen on BASE.

Comparison study on the performance of bituminous stabilized bases (M-66 and M-20) (Research report / Michigan Dept. of State Highways and Transportation, Research Laboratory Section)

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Comparison study on the performance of bituminous stabilized bases (M-66 and M-20) (Research report / Michigan Dept. of State Highways and Transportation, Research Laboratory Section)
Frederick Hsia
Manufacturer: Michigan Dept. of State Highways and Transportation
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Definitions and acoustical terms (U.S. Naval Submarine Base New London. Acoustical Research and Development Division. Technical report no. 226-66)

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Definitions and acoustical terms (U.S. Naval Submarine Base New London. Acoustical Research and Development Division. Technical report no. 226-66)
Robert York Chapman
Manufacturer: Acoustical Research and Development Division, U.S. Naval Submarine Base New London
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Naval | Military | History | Subjects | Books

General | Engineering | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0006BS3UC

Book Description

Caricatures of sixties television--called a "vast wasteland" by the FCC president in the early sixties--continue to dominate our perceptions of the era and cloud popular understanding of the relationship between pop culture and larger social forces. Opposed to these conceptions, The Revolution Wasn't Televised explores the ways in which prime-time television was centrally involved in the social conflicts of the 1960s. It was then that television became a ubiquitous element in American homes. The contributors in this volume argue that due to TV's constant presence in everyday life, it became the object of intense debates over childraising, education, racism, gender, technology, politics, violence, and Vietnam. These essays explore the minutia of TV in relation to the macro-structure of sixties politics and society, attempting to understand the struggles that took place over representation the nation's most popular communications media during the 1960s.

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somewhere in the middle --

absolutely impenetrable

The best cultural criticism on Elvis ever. End of story

Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession
Greil Marcus
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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Mystery Train: Images of America in Rock 'n' Roll: Fourth Edition

In Search of Elvis: Music, Race, Art, Religion

Elvis Religion: The Cult of the King

Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley

Elvis: Still Taking Care of Business

ASIN: 0674194225

Book Description

In life, Elvis Presley went from childhood poverty to stardom, from world fame to dissipation and early death. As Greil Marcus shows in this remarkable book, Presley's journey after death takes him even further, pushing him beyond his own frontiers to merge with the American public consciousness--and the American subconscious. As he listens in on the public conversation that recreates Elvis after death, Marcus tracks the path of Presley's resurrection. He grafts together scattered fragments of the eclectic dialogue--snatches of movies and music, books and newspapers, photographs, posters, cartoons--and amazes us with not only what America has been saying as it raises its late king, but also what this strange obsession with a dead Elvis can tell us about America itself.

Customer Reviews:

somewhere in the middle --.......2005-10-24

I found this book engaging enough. It is not an Elvis biography, more a commentary on pop culture and perception. Marcus is a solid writer and his points are well-founded, especially the chapter in which he deconstructs Goldman's scathing bio 'Elvis'. As another reviewer has suggested, you will need to know some about Elvis' story before you get your head around everything in this book. Having said that, it's not as grave as that reviewer made it out to be. I don't consider myself an Elvis follower by any stretch and I didn't feel out of place understanding what Marcus was conveying. A solid, quick read that even the most casual of Elvis fans will enjoy.

absolutely impenetrable.......2002-06-09

I have a Ph.D., and most of the time I had no idea what Marcus was talking about. Not because of the academic jargon -- there is little or none. Because he kept dropping in names of obscure punk rock groups or fan mags or ezines and expecting me to know all about them, he kept starting discussions in the middle, and most infuriating, he assumed that readers positively worshipped Elvis, so if he alluded to what happened in Tupelo in 1957, or Elvis' relationship with his cousins, we would nod and say "oh, sure." Casual readers, beware -- in order to understand this book, you need to have read at least a dozen biographies of Elvis, watch all of his movies a dozen times, and have every word of every song he ever wrote memorized. I conclude that it's not a cultural obsession at all, to anyone but the author.

The best cultural criticism on Elvis ever. End of story.......1999-10-28

Greil Marcus's collection of randow essays and pieces is still more cohesive, fascinating, intelligent and amazing that most books written on Elvis Presley. Quite simply, Marcus is one of the best writers operating today. When writing about EP, most cultural critics don't have the musical background, and most biographers (save Peter Guralnick & Dave Marsh) don't have the philosophical insight. Marcus does and he isn't afraid to flex his intellectual muscle and still be funny and accessible. If you could only own 2 books on Elvis Presley, it would be this and Peter Guralnick's "Last Train To Memphis."

Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession. (book reviews): An article from: Columbia Journalism Review

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Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession. (book reviews): An article from: Columbia Journalism Review
Jon Katz
Manufacturer: Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B00091X07U
Release Date: 2005-07-28

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Columbia Journalism Review, published by Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism on May 1, 1992. The length of the article is 608 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession. (book reviews)
Author: Jon Katz
Publication: Columbia Journalism Review (Refereed)
Date: May 1, 1992
Publisher: Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism
Volume: v32 Issue: n1 Page: p67(2)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Book Description

"The following description is for the second edition of About Face. The 3rd Edtion, About Face 3 (ISBN 0470084111), is now available."

First published seven years ago-just before the World Wide Web exploded into dominance in the software world-About Face rapidly became a bestseller. While the ideas and principles in the original book remain as relevant as ever, the examples in About Face 2.0 are updated to reflect the evolution of the Web.

Interaction Design professionals are constantly seeking to ensure that software and software-enabled products are developed with the end-user's goals in mind, that is, to make them more powerful and enjoyable for people who use them. About Face 2.0 ensures that these objectives are met with the utmost ease and efficiency.

Alan Cooper (Palo Alto, CA) has spent a decade making high-tech products easier to use and less expensive to build-a practice known as "Interaction Design." Cooper is now the leader in this growing field. Mr. Cooper is also the author of two bestselling books that are widely considered indispensable texts. About Face: The Essentials of User Interface Design, intro-duced the first comprehensive set of practical design principles. The Inmates Are Running the Asylum explains how talented people and companies continually create aggravating high-tech products that fail to meet customer expectations.

Robert Reimann has spent the past 15 years pushing the boundaries of digital products as a designer, writer, lecturer, and consultant. He has led dozens of interaction design projects in domains including e-commerce, portals, desktop productivity, authoring environments, medical and scientific instrumentation, wireless, and handheld devices for startups and Fortune 500 clients alike. Joining Cooper in 1996, Reimann led the development and refinement of many goal-directed design methods described in About Face 2.0. He has lectured on these methods at major universities and to international industry audiences. He is a member of the advisory board of the UC Berkeley Institute of Design.

Customer Reviews:

Alan Cooper is a genius.......2007-04-07

This book not only defines a "layman user" but also answers the question of how your application can educate a layman user step by step.

Designing of application.......2006-11-10

How to design a application from a designers perspective. Cannot say I agree with everything, but the writers are probably right.

Needs more examples!.......2006-05-16

I think this guy has a book about how the inmates are running the asylum...well this book suffers from what happens when the subject matter experts (SME) are allowed to write books. BORING!!! SME's always seem to forget to include compelling examples. Yes there are little screen shots, but IMO in order for a book to be compelling that has to do with design...it needs to show LOTS of examples of good design. The bulk of the book should be about breaking down those designs. I need to hear why a specific design is effective. Take a hint from Steve Krugs book "Don't Make me Think". That book is extremely effective without inundating the reader with jargon. Lots of examples with meaningful visual breakdowns. Afterall...isnt UI design a VISUAL communication form?

Not for experienced developers.......2006-03-05

I have 7 years experience and I wasn't able to get any value out of this book. Based on some of the reviews on this site I thought that the book would be worth buying but unless you are in school or right out of school then your $35 is better spent elsewhere.

I suggest that you put your $35 towards "The Usability Engineering Lifecycle" by Deborah J. Mayhew. Don't let the $64.95 price tag scare you away. This book is worth $100.

Good on concepts, weaker on examples.......2006-02-21

This follow up to About Face is a good overview of the critical concepts to improve software usability. Cooper and Reiman know their stuff. Reading this certainly provides you with the grounding you need to make good decisions. At a tactical level, the book could certainly do more to help with real-world examples.
For that, you may want to take a look instead at Jenifer Tidwell's Designing Interfaces : Patterns for Effective Interaction Design. Where About Face is strong on theory, Designing Interfaces is all about practical ideas, demonstrated through graphical examples.
If UI is an important part of your world, buy them both.

Average customer rating:

Very deep and very heartfelt

Theological flaws

Gripping True Stories of Faithful Devotion

Christ Costs

Keep the faith

Costly Call, The: Modern-Day Stories of Muslims Who Found Jesus
Emir Fethi Caner , and H. Edward Pruitt
Manufacturer: Kregel Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Religious | Leaders & Notable People | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Christianity | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
Discipleship | Christian Living | Christianity | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
General | Islam | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
General | Fiction | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

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Christian Jihad: Two Former Muslims Look at the Crusades and Killing in the Name of Christ

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ASIN: 0825435552

Book Description

These are the tales of the untold heroes of the Christian faith, those rejected, tortured, and killed because of the One they chose to follow.

Customer Reviews:

Very deep and very heartfelt.......2007-08-15

This book is about 18 testimonies of muslims around the world that found Jesus as their Lord and Savior. This book was so intriguing I read it in less than 3 nights, I could barely put it down. It was very deep, not a light read at all, consequently I had to read it at night because I would get teary eyed or be so overwhelmed with the faith displayed in these pages it would blow me away.

The book really encouraged me to live out my faith in Jesus even more stronger, because most of the people in this book faced death and/or family disownment and all for the Love of Jesus Christ. This encouraged me so much. I read it almost a month ago and still cannot stop thinking about how much of a sacrifice these ex-muslims made because of Jesus sacrifice for us. They figured, Jesus has done so much for me, by dying on the cross, and raising in 3 days, I might as well be willing to die for Jesus, since he was there to die for me.

Very good book, in fact I just ordered the second costly call book because I was so impressed with this book. Truly, I tell you, I cannot say enough good things about this book. It is a tool that will enable the believer to strengthen their faith in Christ and get a glimpse of what muslims go through if they begin a relationship with Jesus. It's a costly call, but the eternal rewards are well worth the cost we face here on earth.

Theological flaws.......2007-07-23

On the positive side, this book shows the work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of these courageous individuals. From all reports that I have seen, the author is giving us an accurate picture of the persecution and rejection suffered by Muslims who profess Christianity.

On the other hand, the book has some very serious theological flaws. The first major flaw: That all Muslins and non-Christians are going to hell. The second: That the Creator God (the God worshiped by Christians and Jews) and Allah are not the same God.

To quote from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 841: "The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day."

Jesus Christ gives us our understanding of the last judgement (Matthew 25:31-46): In the end, all the nations will be gathered before Christ and the angels. The people will be divided into two groups: On his right, Christ will place those who fed the hungry, received the stranger, took care of the sick, etc. To these he will say, "Come and possess the kingdom which has been prepared for you since the creation of the world." On his left will stand those who refused, and they will be sent to eternal punishment.

This gathering of all peoples from all centuries will include many individuals who lived before the time of Christ, many who have never heard the Christian Gospel, and many who have never heard the Gospel presented in an acceptable way. Through no fault of their own, these people do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church. As Catholic Christians, we believe that this group includes many who have responded to God's love and his call in their lives.

Gripping True Stories of Faithful Devotion.......2007-02-04

This book, along with Costly Call Book 2, is a heart-wrenching view into the lives of modern-day saints for the Christain faith. These two books have opened my eyes and turned my heart toward believers in difficult situations, boldly and whole-heartedly defending Christ and His redemptive work to all of humanity. Whether you are a Christian or not, these stories will grip your heart, keep your attention, and will hopefully move you into action to fight for justice in our hurting world.

Christ Costs.......2007-01-19

This is a realy good book,written by a very dedicated writer and shows life as it is when we have to come up against opposing forces.Nadia REhmani writer of Sharper Than A Two Edged Sword aslo found on Amazon

Keep the faith.......2006-05-31

Twenty, short, easy to follow stories of Muslims around the world, whom once converted to Christianity became subjects of persecution. Fundamentalist Islam dominates many countries. A minority hold on to their faith only to find a costly call. The author tends to pick people with similarities in their stories. Hence I partly question the authenticity of the writings. I don't know if this is coincidence or on purpose. Otherwise I am happy to have read it.

Book Description

In the fall of 1739, as many as one hundred enslaved African and African Americans living within twenty miles of Charleston joined forces to strike down their white owners and march en masse toward Spanish Florida and freedom. More than sixty whites and thirty slaves died in the violence that followed. Among the most important slave revolts in colonial America, the Stono Rebellion also ranks as South Carolinaâ€™s largest slave insurrection and one of the bloodiest uprisings in American history. Significant for the fear it cast among lowcountry slaveholders and for the repressive slave laws enacted in its wake, Stono continues to attract scholarly attention as a historical event worthy of study and reinterpretation. Edited by Mark M. Smith, Stono: Documenting and Interpreting a Southern Slave Revolt introduces readers to the documents needed to understand both the revolt and the ongoing discussion among scholars about the legacy of the insurrection.

Smith has assembled a compendium of materials necessary for an informed examination of the revolt. Primary documentsâ€"including some works previously unpublished and largely unknown even to specialistsâ€"offer accounts of the violence, discussions of Stonoâ€™s impact on white sensibilities, and public records relating incidents of the uprising. To these primary sources Smith adds three divergent interpretations that expand on Peter H. Woodâ€™s pioneering study Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion. Excerpts from works by John K. Thornton, Edward A. Pearson, and Smith himself reveal how historians have used some of the same documents to construct radically different interpretations of the revoltâ€™s causes, meaning, and effects.

Customer Reviews:

Splendid Historiographical Account of the 1739 Stono Uprising.......2006-05-01

Mark M. Smith has given us a splendid account of the 1739 Slave Revolt in the Charleston, South Carolina area. Rather than simply giving us his interpretation of this important, yet not widely studied event, Smith gives us the opportunity to look at some of the key documents relating to the uprising and then provides the reader with four separate essays to show different interpretations of the documents.

The essays Smith presents are written by well recognized historians, including one by Smith himself, and vary in analysis - we see such concepts forwarded as the idea that the rebelling slaves were mainly ex-military, that these male slaves revolted because they were pushed into agricultural work that they saw as "women's work", and that the slaves revolved on September 9, 1739 because of the religious significance of the date.

All told, this book will make an exceptionally useful case study of this revolt, and the presentation of the material makes it a most valuable addition to the field of historiography and training of future historians in how documents may be interpreted differently to come up with the "real" picture of what happened in the past.

Finally an accurate account!.......2006-02-11

The author has taken his time to present all sides of this important event in South Carolina history. By taking a dispassionate look at the contemporary accounts as well as later oral histories he allows one to make up his or her own mind as the the true events. I found no evidence of any political slant.
Not a novel for light reading, but easy to read. Makes a case as a good text, not only in the realm of black history, but in how one event can be looked at from numerous eyes. Gives one a perspective on how the history we come to accept can be changed and minipulated depending on ones desires and point of view.
Highly recommend this in any student of South Carolina or black histories library.

You are There!.......2006-01-27

This little book is a must read for anyone interested in colonial American, Southern, or African American history. Mark Smith has assembled an incredible collection of original documents [some never before published] that describe the largest slave revolt in 18th century Amercia. There are also several essays by modern historians discussing the significance of the Stono Rebellian and its aftermath. And, believe it or not, they are just as interesting as the primary documents. Smith's, in particular, is very thought-provoking.

Book Description

All humans see the world in two fundamentally different ways: even babies have a rich understanding of both the physical and social worlds. They expect objects to obey principles of physics, and they're startled when things disappear or defy gravity. Yet they can also read emotions and respond with anger, sympathy, and joy.

In Descartes' Baby, Bloom draws on a wealth of scientific discoveries to show how these two ways of knowing give rise to such uniquely human traits as humor, disgust, religion, art, and morality. How our dualist perspective, developed throughout our lives, profoundly influences our thoughts, feelings, and actions is the subject of this richly rewarding book.

Customer Reviews:

Child psychologists.......2006-09-30

Day-old baby boys respond to entertaining mobiles of objects, while girls fasten on faces or even images of faces. Apart from the gender distinction, this early clue of infant awareness indicates infants enter the world with a running start on coping with life. They may not be able to articulate their methods in dealing with the world, but certain fundamentals are laid down and built upon. The most basic orientation of all is "self" and "everything else". For Bloom, this is a new form of "dualism".

Dualism is a philosophy attributed to 17th Century French philosopher Rene Descartes of "cogito ergo sum" fame. Cognitive scientists have rejected dualism in recent years, and Bloom's resurrection of the term may surprise some readers. The author explains at the outset that his version has deep evolutionary roots. These roots are seen in the way infants and children interact with the world. Living things, especially "Mum" and other family members, are quickly perceived as different from "objects". This awareness develops at various paces for different forms of interaction, but the result is that children are cognisant of human intent - the "soul" - fairly quickly and nearly effortlessly. They must be able to assess what other people will do and at some point develop understanding of the reasons for particular behaviours. This ability, a form of "mindreading", guides the child's response and personal behaviour. The "root" origins of this dualism, though favoured by Bloom, aren't really explained by this book. They're not even speculated on to any extent.

Bloom is at pains to reach a wide audience for a variety of reasons. The primary readership appears to be more new parents and less his academic colleagues. He works in his own family, particularly his sons. The two boys have the advantages of being both different in age and in temperament. He's not beyond a small shock when it suits, as when he claims one son had transgressed every "sin" but "lust" by the age of four. He examines the characters of "Star Trek", especially the "logical" Mr Spock and the emotionless android "Data", to compare with emotional humans. Other film and TV series characters are offered as examples of many aspects of our feelings and behaviours. The expression of emotions, which bloom examines at some length, become indicators of the human possession of a "soul".

It is Bloom's dealing with the "soul" that erodes this book's value. Part of that broad audience, [parents all ?], will be various types of "the faithful". These folks are keen to arrive, soul intact, in some afterlife. They wish it even more for their children [except when the latter misbehave]. To deny this possibility would see the book languish on store shelves. Bloom dances about the question of the afterlife by declaring that the "physical soul" [whatever that is] cannot survive death. The door remains wide open for other forms of "soul" - simply fill in your favoured definition. The point of this dodging is that Bloom doesn't want to define "soul", while wishing to retain its use as shorthand for the vast panoply of mental experiences humans have in life. So, what happens to those experiences after death, the author leaves to reader prejudice and interpretation. It's a difficult term to deal with in any circumstance. Bloom fails to either clarify or simplify the task.

Although Bloom has examined a wealth of research and non-academic works to assemble a coherent package, the book remains a shining example of "pop" psychology - especially child psychology. While there is a great deal of good information in this book, there are serious gaps that aren't even clearly indicated. He understands clinical research and its value, but once more a scholar pandering to a limited audience relies on research performed solely on a single society. Yet, he blithely stresses the "universality" of behavioural characteristics. Children's attitudes about gods and the afterlife may be universal, but we can't know until we've queried more kids - especially those in different cultures. Even in cultures as near as Europe, there are distinct differences in the way children view some of the topics Bloom addresses. It's a pity he didn't read about them. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]

From baby steps to leaping to conclusions.......2006-05-07

In Descartes' Baby, Paul Bloom engagingly writes about research that shows babies are more sophisticated than we usually give them credit for. At a very early age, babies are aware of the constancy of objects, that appearances may be deceptive, and that other people may hold false beliefs. The problem is what Bloom makes of this.

Bloom thinks those experiments prove babies are Cartesian dualists because they distinguish objects from belief-holding humans. But dualism isn't simply the belief that there's a difference between people and objects. We were making that distinction before Descartes. Cartesian dualism conceives of the mental and the physical as so distinct and different that it doesn't seem the two could ever even interact. And that's not a distinction babies make. If "dualism" means that we distinguish conscious critters from inanimate things, then, yes, we're all dualists. But what have we learned except a new definition of "dualist"?

Baby dualism isn't even necessary dual. I can believe that you are different from a log because you are aware of and care about your world without thinking that you are made of two types of substance. I don't think Bloom has shown much more than that babies are aware that logs don't think and feel but people do.

This "insight" doesn't give Bloom much of a lever for understanding the Big Issues he deals with: Art, philosophy, religion, ethics... For example, he wonders how we can be moved by "anxious objects," i.e., art such as Warhol's Brillo boxes or conceptual art such as a dead horse hung from the ceiling. Most of the chapter goes through the predictable explanations of why we respond to art. At the end he acknowledges that he hasn't yet explained the appeal of "anxious" art. The big explanation: "...We enjoy displays of skill, of virtuosity, both physical and intellectual." But that's true of non-anxious art, and not true of all anxious art. Without acknowledging this, he moves on to say that we enjoy anxious art because we can see the human intention in it. But, again, that's true of all art, not just anxious art. His investigation does not come close to answering the question he raises. (Artworks are a good example of the impossibility of separating the physical and the intentional...evidence against dualism.)

Likewise, his explanation of why children tend to believe in Creationism (AKA Intelligent Design) - it is "a natural by-product of a mind evolved to think in terms of goals and intentions" - doesn't help. Animism also seems to be a "natural by-product." So what? How does this socio-biological explanation help? Likewise for his explanation of altruism, his discussion of essentialism - which waters the concept down the way the book waters down "dualism" - his consideration of the origin of religious beliefs, etc.

The book is exceptionally well written and engaging. The baby research is fascinating. But I think it fails as an attempt to make something big out of that research.

Babies and the Intentional Stance.......2006-04-17

About 20 years ago, philosopher Daniel Dennett started talking about what he calls the "intentional stance." The intentional stance is the ability, prevelant in humans and animals to a lesser extent, to look at other beings as intentional agents with goals and desires. Dennett explained how th intentional stance could easily be viewed as an evolutionary adaptation - allowing those who can adapt it to predict others behaviors, understand language as a thing communicating inner states, etc.

In this book, Bloom is basically taking the same idea, showing the science that backs it up, and applying it to psychology. Babies, Bloom writes, seem born with the ability to see others as agents, differentiate between animate and inanimate objects, and feel empathy ("step into others' shoes").

Towards this end, Bloom cites innumerable studies done with babies, infants, and young children. Most of the studies on babies and infants measures whether the baby looks longer at certain images than others to see which are more interesting and (it is hoped) unusual. Fior instance, in order to see whether babies can 'grasp' the idea of objects' solidity, babies were shwon a picture, first, of a mug being pulled where the handle AND the base move in the same direction at the same speed and, second, a mug being pulled where the handle and the base travel in the same direction at different speeds. The babies tended to look longer at the second image, leading to the conclusion that they see the second as more 'curious' and unusual.

As other reviewers menktion, these experiments can be dicey and can lend themselves to a few different interpretations. Be that as it may, studies of children are more straightforward, as they consist of children being asked questions and to perform tasks. Needless to say, all the experiments with children support strongly the idea that children are quite good at the intentional stance. What seems to clinch it is the studies involving children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD). ASD children, when tested, fail in every case whereby experimenters ask that the intentional stance be applied to other beings. From attempts to find out whether ASD kids feel empathy with those in pain to cases of whether ASD kids see God anthropomorphically, Bloom shows that ASD simply destroys the ability to 'read minds,' an activity non-ASD kids seem to do naturally.

I am taking one star off because some chapters seem so loosely related to the authors thesis that they seem to impair the book's effectiveness. The chapter on the evolutionary origins of disgust, for instance, is interesting but hardly applicable to exploration of kids ability to see other minds as other minds.

To finish, the chapter on how children see God is particularly interesting, in light of many recent attempts to explain religion naturalistically. (See my review of Dennett's "Breaking the Spell") In their young years, children seem to see God as a figure with human qualities (both phyically and spiritually). Even studies done with adults show that adults tend to apply human traits to god even when they "know" that God is omniscient and far from human. Bloom's take? Religion is (a) an attempt to explain the duality between the physical world and the mental world; and (b) an extentsion of our natural ability to apply the intentional stance by creation of a god figure to whose mind we can attribute human traits writ large.

interesting book all around. Bloom is a good writer and provides a good balance between clarity and profundity. Anyone who enjoys books exploring how biology affects the mind will enjoy this one as well.

Non-existence of the soul.......2004-12-22

The name of this rather fascinating book is somewhat misleading: there is not too much in this book about child's psychology and a lot about psychology in general. Mr. Bloom, who is evidently a professional psychologist himself, created a very readable fusion of psychology, evolutionary biology and great multitude of historical and scientific facts.

When reading I could not stop recollecting myself as a child and juxtaposing the facts from the book with episodes from my childhood. For example, Mr. Bloom describes kids' imagining of God. As per one of the studies, they think that God is a human like creature with a voice and a face. Many kids in my kindergarten shared their vision of God in similar terms, but I remember a debate (if you can call it that) between other kids and me when we were arguing if God was a man or a woman. For some reason, the majority of kids were absolutely convinced that God was a man even though they could not explain why. The vision of God was changing with age - when I was a student, my professor of a set theory told me that God was infinity in its most abstract version. He was absolutely serious about that.

The book is practically infested with a great deal of facts and citations, which eloquently illustrate author's points. I have to admit that the author reminds me of Borges in this regard, whom he also mentions when describing some aspects of how human memory functions. Some of such illustrations are quite unusual. For example, when discussing the art and its role in human life, Mr. Bloom mentions a weird habit of Aristotle Onassis to have his barstools upholstered with the scrota of killer whales. Many might find it unusual at least and disgusting at most but it does perfectly illustrate how different human beings are in demonstration of status and power. The same is applicable to the description of Goya's painting SATURN DEVOURING HIS SON. After I read about Mr. Bloom's experience when he was admiring this painting in Madrid, I found reproduction of this artwork in the Internet and become very puzzled of how can it be anyhow enjoyable.

The last chapter of the book left me disappointed. Not because of the text itself, which was a very good reading throughout the whole book, but because of Mr. Bloom's verdict regarding factual non-existence of the soul. It is really hard to deal with such an approach, especially when formulated by a competent scientist like Mr. Bloom. I wonder how Mr. Bloom himself is dealing with this shocking discrepancy. He might be explaining it in his following book. Hopefully.

Dualism is for Babies.......2004-10-25

We have handled with equanimity the concept that the Earth is not the center of the universe, though some good fellows who championed that idea when it was new suffered mightily for doing so. Most of us, even the redoubtable Catholic Church, have accepted that evolution explains animal diversity and even the emergence of humans, although there are some who for religious (not scientific) reasons are kicking and screaming in refusal. Science cannot itself take on the existence of gods, for that is not a scientific question, nor is the existence of an afterlife. But souls; now there is something that science, and especially modern neuroscience, might go to work on. In _Descartes' Baby: How the Science of Child Development Explains What Makes Us Human_ (Basic Books), Paul Bloom takes an even more basic approach, hardly mentioning such technological wonders as the scanners that show brains at work. He examines a wealth of clever experiments on babies and children to answer about babies the question posed more often about disreputable politicians: "What do they know, and when do they know it?" The answers provide an entertaining and informative evaluation of what we might be able to tell about souls.

René Descartes promoted "dualism": the body exists, and it is a machine of meat which, when it is alive, is coupled with an immaterial soul. This, according to Bloom, is a natural view; evolution itself has made us into dualists. We are wired to perceive material objects and mental manifestations as separate entities, and so naturally we think of the two as separate realms. But that we evolved that way is not an argument that it is the right way to think of things. From the very beginning, experiments show, babies treat the world as dual. Bloom goes on to explain experiments that show that children have inborn knowledge of fairness that is at the heart of our ability to get along with others. "... Our moral feelings are no less adaptations than our taste for sweet foods and our perception of solid objects." We are from an early age able to empathize with the pain of others, which leads to compassion and to helping them; it's all commendable behavior, and no less so because we come into the world hard-wired to perform it.

We perform it because it pays to perform it, and it simply gives us a reproductive advantage. Empathetic people (and those with altruism and other laudable traits described here) are most successful at working in societies, and we are social animals. What's more, they will be more effective in understanding and raising children, and so the behavior will be passed on. Bloom is clearly a materialist, not a dualist, but wisely avoids any attempt to prove the issue. What he has done instead is not to examine if dualism is justified, but merely why belief in it is so prevalent. The belief that objects are not really solid is just as fundamentally unnatural as the belief that mind is an emergent physical property of the brain. This could be heavy stuff, and philosophers have argued heavily for centuries one way or the other. But Bloom has a diverse array of interests, and includes discussion of such subjects as slapstick humor, autism, modern art, and disgust. Those familiar with Noam Chomsky's claim that we have special "language organs" in our brains that make us linguistic creatures will find that idea mentioned here, but vastly expanded to show our "physics organ" and "social organ". Throughout Bloom has illustrated his arguments with summaries of his own or others' experiments on babies. Those who would expect a materialist also to be a pessimist will be disappointed; he declares himself to be a "morally optimistic materialist," and gives examples of moral improvement (like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) that would have made little sense to our forebears. Not bad for a bunch of natural-born dualists.

Dualists from birth.(Psychology)(Book Review) : An article from: American Scientist

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Dualists from birth.(Psychology)(Book Review) : An article from: American Scientist

Manufacturer: Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society
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