Editorial Review

"A glorious book . . . A spirited defense of science . . . From the first page to the last, this book is a manifesto for clear thought."

 *Los Angeles Times

"POWERFUL . . . A stirring defense of informed rationality. . . Rich in surprising information and beautiful writing."

 *The Washington Post Book World

How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don't understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science? Pulitzer Prize-winning author and distinguished astronomer Carl Sagan argues that scientific thinking is critical not only to the pursuit of truth but to the very well-being of our democratic institutions.

Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs. And yet, disturbingly, in today's so-called information age, pseudoscience is burgeoning with stories of alien abduction, channeling past lives, and communal hallucinations commanding growing attention and respect. As Sagan demonstrates with lucid eloquence, the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong turn but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms.

"COMPELLING."

 *USA Today

"A clear vision of what good science means and why it makes a difference. . . . A testimonial to the power of science and a warning of the dangers of unrestrained credulity."

 *The Sciences

"PASSIONATE."

 *San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle

... Read more

Reviews

A Candle in the Dark, July 2, 2004
Demons, UFO's, the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot, fairies and the like are all investigated in this incredible non-fiction book by the late Carl Sagan. Pseudoscience, and those who perpetuate it, find their place in today's society among those who want to believe in the impossible. In fact, Sagan too admits that he would love to find life on other planets, among other things (he was, after all, an advocate of SETI, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence). However, science today has not been able to prove that such things exist. As the book states, "the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms."

This book challenges the reader to critically scrutinize information professed by supposed experts, and be more of a skeptic. Sagan states early on in the book that "some 95 percent of Americans are scientifically illiterate." By using the scientific method combined with a little bit of logic and common sense, one should find that it is much more difficult to be mentally taken advantage of by pseudoscience "experts." Intelligent inquiry and analysis of information presented, and those presenting it, proves to be an invaluable tool.

Nonetheless, stories regarding crop circles, area 51, and other such nonsense still abound. Sagan runs through various examples and places them under the hypothetical microscope. Once examined more closely, most of these theories and fallacious postulations crumble quite easily. What some people don't realize, and what Sagan points out, is that things just as mysterious and awe-inspiring can be found all around us, and they are indeed factual and are being investigated by those in science fields. We need not look elsewhere to find mysticism and intrigue. People are still trying to completely understand viruses and the molecular building blocks in gas in space, and if people were equally as drawn to understand real phenomena as they are fallacious theories, then more people would be working to unravel the true mysteries that are much more worthy of our efforts.

I truly feel that this is a book everyone should read. Not only does Sagan do an excellent job of attempting to popularize science, but he also tries to teach people how to think for themselves rather than to be force-fed information from less-than-trustworthy sources. The demons in this demon haunted world are both those who perpetuate such celebrated fallacies, as well as those who believe them without question. Sagan attempts to teach, in this book, how to distinguish "real science from the cheap imitation." Indeed, he does just that.

Sagan took the road less travelled......, April 1, 2000
One word: OUTSTANDING.

I read this book over two nights, couldn't put it down, and afterwards was eagerly searching for more of the same. Science at it's best-accurate, timely, well-argued, emotionally and mentally invigorating, spiritually uplifting; and filled with boundless enthusiasm and hope. Like the author, Carl Sagan himself.

This book describes the 'scientific journey'. Alternately curious, cautious, inquiring, uplifting, compassionate, humane, warning, discovering and fulfilling. Topics include UFOs, alien abductions, witches, religion-both good and bad, Roswell, frauds, scientific genuises, skeptical thinking, wishful thinking, deceptive thinking, balanced thinking, belief, superstition, astrology, ESP, myth, and the like; and the role and place of science and scientific inquiry in all of this. For those who think science "destroys" spirituality-does not scientific inquiry with its' abundant curiosity and courageous endeavour accurately describe a spiritual journey to find the truth? Sagan contends, with great clarity and enthusiasm, that it assuredly does. It's just that this scientific journey is not an easy one, neither for the individual, nor humanity, by any means. But when has the attempt to find "truth" and "light" in this complex world of ours, ever been easy? Sagan argues that science and the scientific method is a noble and enlightening endeavour, an unquenchable candle, lit by the human yearning for truth, and able to steer humanity towards truth and goodwill in a world of mists, shadowy truths, and darkness.

For those who wish to open their minds to science and what it has to say about much that goes in this beautiful, yet sometimes dark world of ours, this is the book for you.

This great book (Sagan's last) is a fitting testament to a great man of science. Sagan, who passed away recently, was one of the great communicators of science, and this book is considered by many to be his best.

Reading it was something I'll always cherish.

I wish I could give it Billions Upon Billions of stars!, September 26, 2005
I realize it doesn't make me a cool guy to gush over a scientist, but I can't help it. I love Carl Sagan! I love Carl Sagan's writings. He has that unique combination of both a brilliant mind and the ability to communicate complicated ideas in a simple, straightforward manner. He can write about complicated scientific topics in a way that conveys the beauty and wonder, but doesn't overwhelm or confuse. He can also write about more humanistic topics, such as abortion, politics, and facing his own death.

In Demon Haunted World, he writes about science, about what science is and what science isn't. Whenever you get in debates with religious types, or with those self-appointed geniuses, the philosophy majors, they will always hit you with the fact that science is just another belief system, just like any religion or philosophy. They will tell you science can't answer all the questions and is often wrong. Of course that is true, if you look at science strictly as a body of knowledge. But that is not what science really is. Science is a process. It is a way of approaching the world, a way of formulating and testing hypotheses. If it is just another belief system, then it is a belief system that grows by virtue of challenging its adherents to challenge and disprove the current state of knowledge. It's the only belief system where you have to be a skeptic to be a zealot.

Debunking myths is part of the fun of this book, but an even important aspect to it is investigating how the human mind works and why we are drawn to myths and magical explanations for things in the first place. After all, I get the thrill of pseudoscience, it's fun stuff to believe. But if presented correctly, the truth can be just as thrilling.

Demon Haunted World should be required reading for any first year college student. It is astonishing how many people get through four or five years of higher education without having developed the ability to think critically.

The lack of critical thinking in this country has real consequences. It is the reason that the anchormen on the national news can't convey a story about a scientific or medical topic in a meaningful way. It's the reason that you meet well-educated parents these days who are more concerned about side effects from vaccinations than about the lethal diseases being vaccinated against. It's the reason that parents believe treating their children's depression is more likely to lead to suicide than leaving it untreated. It's the reason the majority of voters in this country voted to elect a President who openly confesses to having a concrete interpretation of the world. Think about that for a second. We have come to the point where adults fail to recognize that seeing things in black and white, all good versus all evil, is a sign of stunted emotional and intellectual development, not a skill to be bragged about. We live in a time when the media tells us that being balanced means presenting peoples opinions from both sides of the political spectrum, as opposed to challenging the statements from an evidence-based, rational perspective.

I love Carl Sagan, I highly recommend this book, and I highly recommend all of his writings.

The final statement of a great man, December 29, 1999
In an age where we are surrounded by psychic hotlines and alien abduction stories, the vast majority of the population is consistently fooled into believing the most absurd of notions. As Sagan beautifully demonstrates, this is not because of our collective intelligence, but a part of human nature. _The Demon-Haunted World_ is easily one of the most important books of this century. High school students should read this book to graduate, at least a little exposure to sense will be advantageous to our growing society. Faces on Mars, aliens, faith healers, and various other practitioners of pseudoscience swirl around us in a pool of credulism and blind faith in the most absurd of Golden Calves. Sagan brings the razor of reason to the face of fallacy and superstition and cuts off delusion and myopic belief. There is perhaps no other person who could have exposed this seldom seen part of the human being. Carl Sagan, the man who loved science so much that he felt in his heart the desire to sing it to the rest of the world, deserves the highest recognition for his accomplishments. I can think of no better than to have _The Demon-Haunted World_ shown to the whole of the world.

Skeptic's Bible, November 16, 2001
Surely no semi-aware person in this unfortunate age of television dumbing down, condescending school textbooks, and widespread ignorance and gullibility fails to note the danger that is inherent in society due to a lack of rational thinking, healthy skepticism, and application of the scientific method among the common folk. This book is a plea to those people, and a "how-to" educate guide to those who do realize and want to do something about it. Perhaps the most interesting chapter in this well-rounded book is "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection" in which Sagan demonstrates a "Baloney Detection Kit" listing the checklist for determining whether or not a particular assertion (whether scientific or not) is Gospel. Conversely, he also wisely offers the companion kit, what NOT to do. Among the other interesting things in this book are convincingly argued debunkings of such annoying to rationalist topics as UFO abductions, astrology, faith healing, chanelling, and their indiscernable ilk. Sagan consistently brings up parallel cases from olden times, i.e. witchcraft mania and demo xenophobia, that show that such fears and paranoia have always been around in different forms. This goes a long way towards exposing them for being fraudelent. Sagan also expounds here his views on such subjects as religion (a very rational argument on their scientific insignifigance, while also pointing out its virtues: a balanced view that should open many eyes, without, perhaps, offending the faithful), public education (corollaried with an abundance of letters Sagan has received from readers on the subject, many of them eye-opening), and politics; many of which I agree with, all of which I can respect. This is a very enlightening and useful book, and an elegant manifesto for the useful application of the scientific method and skeptical and rational thinking in our modern world. It's a shame that Sagan is no longer around to parlay such truth to our all-too-ignorant public. Still, the incredible works that he left behind, including this indispensable book, can still enligten us and perhaps make our world that much better for whatever dose of rationality it can inject into our "demon-haunted", close-minded society: science as a "candle in the dark" indeed.

Life changing book, January 24, 2000
Many are turned off by science since they find it to be cold, desenchanting or even a bit nihilistic. With a clever sense of humor and easy-to read writting style, Sagan proves that science can be an awe-inspiring spiritual experience, when we are confronted with the immense complexity of nature and our universe. He reminds us how to be a good skeptic: one who is open minded to new information, but will only believe after receiving proof. (Which consists of much more than anecdotal evidence )As Sagan states "I believe that the extraordinary should be pursued. But extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." He urges everyone to think skeptically and to express our opinions while being respectfull of others' beliefs. Unfortunately those who would benefit from more skepticism are the ones less likely to pick up this book. It takes courage to abandon the comforts of an "all-loving" ever present god, immortality, and belief in psychic powers in exchange for the truth. However, Sagan shows us how science has greatly improved the quality of life throughout history, and how the systematic search for truth can be more rewarding than blinded-faith. We should be open minded("Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence") without being gullible. And we must remember how "wishfull thinking" does not make something true.

The Best Spent $14.95 In My Life, February 14, 2005
Ok. To keep this as short and simple as I can:
My buddy kept ranting and raving about this book almost in the same way that I am about to convey in this brief recommendation. For months he told me I should pick it up. He's been pedaling it to everyone he considereds close to him, or merely to those who have even a vague interest in science or comprehension of the world around them.
I'm 20 years old. A sophmore in college. In a reflection to how much I THINK I know, or knew rather, I have come to discover just how insignificant my "knowledge" is.

To be blunt: This book is as much an exceptionally incredible gift as it is a curse to self reflection, rational thought, and sketicism.
I've been tortured by the countless internal monologues, views, and arguments spawning from numerous points the author presents in this text. You can't help but think about how it pertains to YOU. What do you think? What do I think?
I think where I am now, or where I was more specifically, is nowhere near where I want to be.

I'm not even into science. I'm a history major. It doesn't matter.You cannot read this book from cover to cover, without getting caught up in Sagan's passion. It's not just about science. It's not just about philosophy. Or knowledge. Or history.

His opinion may vary from yours. In fact, it probably will. He may present views or arguments you choose not to acknowledge or agree with. Once again, it doesn't matter. It is precisely these elements that continually compell me to learn more about who I am and what I think of the world around me.

If I had to choose one book for any of my friends to read from start to finish, this would be the one. So I guess now it's my turn to start pedaling this book to others who might want to enlighten themselves.
And I guess this is my way of doing it.
You're already here. What more do you need to know?

Required Reading for School Boards, March 28, 2002
This was one of the late Carl Sagan's last books, and it is certainly one his most important. We live in a credulous society, a culture that seems to be incapable of critical thinking. That's an extremely dangerous situation. When a majority of U.S. citizens believe in astrology; when a voter can read a newspaper expose' on dial up fortune-telling scams and then dial a 900 number in order to decide what to do; well, it doesn't bode well for our country.

To some extent, Sagan oversold himself in the late 1980's and early 1990's. His eager sincerity was even parodied - "billyuns and billyuns - but he was an engaging science writer and popularizer. In this book he stepped a bit outside of that usual role, and made some critical and important points about our culture. No thoughtful citizen can read this book, look around and fail to be concerned.

I'd make this book required reading, not for students, but for school board members and teachers. If the average citizen is credulous to the point of embarrassment - and that's pretty clearly the case - the solution has to involve the educational system, and especially those in charge. We are not teaching our citizens and future citizens to think critically. In Sagan's phrase, "Extravagant claims require extravagant evidence." For better or worse, the life of the world is logic, and the ability to reason is as important as the ability to read and the ability to do arithmetic. And if you think it's not a problem, you need to read this book, or just attend the public comments portion of a school board meeting, or read the letters to the editor in your newspaper.

You should read this book. You should act on the message of this book. Not just because it is a thoughtful, entertaining treatment of an important issue. But because that issue hasn't gone away; and it seems to be getting worse.

Sagan Sounds a Warning, November 27, 2001
The underlying message of Carl Sagan's "The Demon Haunted World" is twofold. First, that we are becoming an increasingly scientifically illeterate society, and second, that our ignorance of science is a threat not only to the security of our future, but to the freedoms we all enjoy. Sagan spends much of the book debunking so-called psuedo-science (alien abductions, psycotherapy, astrology, etc). He also makes the point that America is doing a very poor job educating its young about the wonders of science. Sagan also castigates the media for not exercising more scepticism in scientific reporting, and, indeed, mostly ignoring hard science altogether.

The book itself is a bit disjointed, with several chapters deriving from expanded magazine articles. Additionally, Sagan pontificates about political issues, and reveals a leftist political bent. He also has a tendancy at times to overemphasize his point. Nevertheless, he has some important points to make, and as a society we would be better off if we paid close attention to many of the issues he raises.

A MUST READ, January 1, 2004
As a science student at university I bought this book expecting it to confirm and perhaps broaden my understanding of sceptical thinking, and how too many people do not employ it. Something that I have found frustrating on many an occasion. I was delighted to find that this book was gave me a terrific insight into why sceptical thinking and science should be employed in every possible way. And how failing to do so can result in the direst consequences.

Sagan devotes much of the first part of the book to the current fad of alien abduction. This is something that becomes a bit drawn out and boring and in my opinion the only flaw of this book. He does so comparing the many similarities to the role of demons in centuries past. He describes one example of how when scepticism is not used people will devise the most wild and unjust thinking which leads such ordeals as witch hunts.

He makes the case that in today's increasingly scientifically dependant western society, people, especially Americans, are abandoning scepticism. Few politicians understand science, and the applicability of it's philosophies. Furthermore the general public is becoming increasingly scientifically illiterate. If this trend continues we could easily slip into another `dark age' of witch hunts.

This book is one of those rare books that I would insist that everyone reads. Far too few people understand that to abandon scepticism, relying upon blind faith and assertions, is to close ones eyes, and abandon all hope of understanding the truth. Demon haunted world is truly a masterpiece. I found it completely engaging, and full of most valuable insights. Demon Haunted world will light the darkness for anyone that reads it. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Reviews

Excellent resource, July 17, 2008
Although there are many books on writing research or term papers, I have not found anything else which brings together material on planning, reasoning and writing the research paper as well as this book. Ignore any reviewers who make this book out to be a simplistic text. It is an excellent work on well reasoned writing that even most graduate students can benefit greatly from reading. As a professor of a graduate class on Research and Writing, I have recommended and required this book for several years. The book guides the reader from an idea of a topic, to defining a question, to formulating the conceptually signifcant research problem. It briefly covers finding, evaluating and using primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. Then a major portion of the book is devoted to understanding effective reasoning in the writing process. This is based quite a bit on professor Stephen Toulmin's practical approach to effective reasoning and argumentation. The Craft of Research diagrams and explains claims, reasons, evidence and warrants. It has detailed illustrations of warrants and when to use them, as well as how to challenge them. The book has other sections on organizing, drafting,and revising a paper. It also has a chapter on communicating information visually using tables, graphs and charts. Rather than focusing on the simple mechanics or obvious steps in writing a serious research paper, this book concentrates on the more difficult tasks of clearly defining the conceptual problem and addressing it with in depth, effective reasoning.

The best guide to research and writing on the market today, July 24, 2008
I read this book about a month before I submitted my dissertation (in U.S. history) and it convinced me to completely rewrite my introduction. That experience left me kicking myself for thinking I was too advanced for these sorts of guides and for not consulting this book earlier. The sections on formulating a topic (how to turn a general interest into a question/problem to be researched) and warrants (how to match claims to evidence) are especially helpful. Make no mistake about it, this book can help researchers at all levels, and I have had many students, both undergraduate and graduate, tell me how happy they were that they took my advice to read this book.

Disappointing, December 8, 2008
The third edition of this classic text pales when compared to the second edition. Many of the changes are cosmetic in nature and often blur what was clearly and succinctly stated in the second edition. For example, rearranging paragraphs within chapters often detract from what were logical sequences of ideas and information found in the second edition. Unfortunately, the authors, sans Booth, appear to abandon their own advice in order to create a new edition that will bolster sales. I hope the fourth edition, if there is a fourth edition, returns to the high standards one comes to expect from the University of Chicago and its press.

Good Antidote for "Just the Facts" Writing, September 20, 2008
We all respect scientists--even budding science students--for their commitment to accuracy and objectivity. Sometimes our strengths are also our weaknesses. Beginning scientists can naively believe that their writing only needs to report the facts, that anything further is bias, sophistry or even dishonesty. This book lays out the path to a better writing style. Readers will learn how to arrange and present their facts and evidence as coherent arguments. As a result, they will better serve their own readers.

The table of contents, outlined below, shows that the authors cover more than putting fingers to keyboard. Introductory chapters discuss the perspective and information needs of readers and how to connect with them. The authors address development of one's own authentic authorial "voice"--a topic often neglected in books about research writing. The next four chapters teach us how to conceptualize a research question, then find relevant and credible sources of information to answer it. The third edition contains a needed revision of the authors' earlier avoidant stance on the credibility of web-based information, containing good guidance for weeding flakey from factual online sources.

Chapter 7, "Making Good Arguments: An Overview," is the keystone chapter and a relatively quick read at eleven pages. It's where to focus when deciding whether to read the rest of the book. The authors define their working vocabulary of arguments, reasons, evidence, claims and warrants. In this and the following four chapters they show us how to use these concepts to present our points and how to acknowledge and respond to positions with which we disagree. They demonstrate how to do this with integrity as well as skill.

The final six chapters address the actual writing of a research report. Much of the advice on planning, drafting and revising is standard and consistent with other writing guides. Some, such as advice on graphical presentation of data, is an overview of information covered more thoroughly in other books (e.g., Tufte's Envisioning Information). But there is also a great deal of guidance on revising and fine-tuning arguments that is unique to these authors and their framework of written arguments. The closing chapter on style will help writers create clear and understandable structure while following their own authorial style. Recognizing they have presented only an introductory measure of what good writers need to know, the authors close with a comprehensive bibliography of readings, both online and in print.

This book, thoughtfully read and put into practice, is as good as a course in professional writing. Read it, underline in it, bend back the page corners, and keep it nearby when you write your next report.

--

Brief Table of Contents

I. Research, Researchers and Readers
- 1. Thinking in Print: The uses of Research, Public and Private
- 2. Connecting with Your Reader: (Re-)Creating Yourself
II. Asking Questions, Finding Answers
- 3. From Topics to Questions
- 4. From Questions to a Problem
- 5. From Problems to Sources
- 6. Engaging Sources
III. Making a Claim and Supporting It
- 7. Making Good Arguments: An Overview
- 8. Making Claims
- 9. Assembling Reasons and Evidence
- 10. Acknowledgements and Responses
- 11. Warrants
IV. Planning, Drafting and Revising
- 12. Planning
- 13. Drafting Your Report
- 14. Revising Your Organization and Argument
- 15. Communicating Evidence Visually
- 16. Introductions and Conclusions
- 17. Revising Style: Telling Your Story Clearly
V. Some Last Considerations

Wonderful, concise resource for students and researchers, August 21, 2008
Have you ever faced a blank computer screen and were at a complete loss of what you should write about for a 10-page research paper due the next week? Or maybe you knew what you wanted to write about but didn't know how to start? Or maybe you had all your sources, wrote out a draft and realized that no one cares if The Great Gatsby illustrates the three Aristotelian elements of a tragedy?

The Craft of Research helps students and researchers solve dilemmas like these and more. The authors dissect the anatomy of a research paper and create step-by-step stages that guide you all the way from choosing a topic to polishing your final product.

The major sections of this book address how to form a good research claim that your readers will care about; how to find and evaluate sources; how to support your claim with evidence, reasons and warrants; and how to prepare, draft and revise your paper. The authors use simple and clear language, and if that's not enough, they provide easy-to-understand visuals and diagrams to help make their point.

The authors also cover useful areas such as ethics (why you must always cite even when just discussing an idea of another writer's), the Internet (when it's acceptable to use web-based sources), and visuals (why 3-D graphs are a bad idea).

Sure, some of the advice they provide you may already know, but as the authors cover nearly everything to do with research papers (albeit in a generalized way), there's something for everyone. It's also nice to have a guide that will remind you of everything you learned in your freshman English classes. Clear, concise, and accessible, the Craft of Research is one of the best books on research.

Great book for the beginner researcher or undergrad who needs help with understanding research, especiallly the first 4 chapters, May 7, 2009
This book has been a wonderful help, easy to read and understand. I am working on my dissertation and need help with writing my comprehensive exams and my project proposal. I had so many questions and this book was recommended by someone on my committee. What a life saver for me!

A classic, October 29, 2008
I used the 2nd edition of this book and it got me through writing my honors thesis, and now that I'm in grad school I've found it useful, as have many of my colleagues. Sometimes it really helps to work your ideas out step by step - and this technique works whether you're using print or electronic resources. I find the authors' style to be candid and refreshing, and their approach can make any scholarly writing feel more doable. And while some people (like Freston) may find this book too elementary in its approach, I will say that in my experience as an editor of my department's working papers, I have found that many good papers could be made great if there was a bit more attention paid to the seemingly simple advice in this book like properly introducing data and clearly stating your focus. This book isn't just about becoming a better writer, it's also about becoming a better thinker.

For both scientific and humanities research, January 17, 2009
This is a well-written book primarily intended for researchers in the humanities. However, as someone who conducts research both in humanities and basic science, I found the book provided a useful perspective on scientific research. While the methods and method-specific questions are usually idiosyncratic to a field, the timeless question that the book poses: "What additional insight into [insert field here] does [insert novel work here] give me?" and the authors' meditations on how to approach it are well-worth the price of the book.

Great resource for graduate students, June 25, 2008
This book provides a wonderful introduction for graduate students embarking on their first research project. I use it every year in my classes. No matter what the field, students will find helpful advice on how to pick a research question and how to evaluate evidence. Invaluable!

Mandatory for academic research, optional for anything else, February 15, 2010


This book is literally a classic because it thoroughly covers the challenges involved in basic academic research. It is intended as a course between covers on academic researchers. It covers formulation of issues and questions, determining and finding stories, making your claims and how to write and support them. Overall, it will be of use to anyone who is new to academic research and writing.

It is not a guide to sources nor a treatise on using particular resources. Rather it is more along the line of teaching principles of effective research and academic writing.

It serves students well, but is lacking for those with real-world research needs, such as in business and law.

Overall, like so many academic style guides, a nice book to keep on the shelf if you are outside of academia, but not a necessary one.

Jerry
... Read more

Editorial Review

Neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran is internationally renowned for uncovering answers to the deep and quirky questions of human nature that few scientists have dared to address. His bold insights about the brain are matched only by the stunning simplicity of his experiments -- using such low-tech tools as cotton swabs, glasses of water and dime-store mirrors. In Phantoms in the Brain, Dr. Ramachandran recounts how his work with patients who have bizarre neurological disorders has shed new light on the deep architecture of the brain, and what these findings tell us about who we are, how we construct our body image, why we laugh or become depressed, why we may believe in God, how we make decisions, deceive ourselves and dream, perhaps even why we're so clever at philosophy, music and art. Some of his most notable cases:

• A woman paralyzed on the left side of her body who believes she is lifting a tray of drinks with both hands offers a unique opportunity to test Freud's theory of denial.
• A man who insists he is talking with God challenges us to ask: Could we be "wired" for religious experience?
• A woman who hallucinates cartoon characters illustrates how, in a sense, we are all hallucinating, all the time.

Reviews

An excellent, readible account of mind and brain study, July 23, 2002
Phantoms in the Brain is not only a marvelous narrative of the quirky facets of the brain and the mind, it is also a good illustration of the advances made in neurology over the past 30 years. Indeed if you take into account the extensive career of Freud, who was himself a neuro-anatomist prior to pursuing his medical profession, neurology and neuropsychology have well over a 150 years behind them.

In the book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, written in the 1970 and reprinted a number of times since, Oliver Sacks illustrates peculiar neurological deficits arising from various insults to the brain, from tumors to strokes and seizures. Although he can pinpoint the areas of brain compromise that cause the patient's problems and, like Freud, give the reader some theory as to what aspect of the "self" is effected, he does little beyond this. In Phantoms of the Brain, Ramachandran recounts numerous colorful stories, but develops a theory of what level of brain function is the cause of the observed deficits, then proceeds to test his theory with further study, making the "self" a topic of research. In the true spirit of scientific research he publishes his findings and elicits input from fellows in the field. Where there is a discrepancy, he and others conduct further research to illuminate the findings and integrate the data into the overall theory. While he freely admits that a true science of the mind is in its infancy, he also points at the major advances made since Freud's work.

One of the things I found most unique about the author's style is that he points out the pertinent contributions in the works of other, often earlier researchers, particularly Freud. It seems to have become fashionable to treat Freud and his work with great disrespect, ignoring that he was a man of his times and very progressive in his thinking for that time. Not all of his work is useless, particularly that in neuro-anatomy, and as is often the case in science, as more research is done today it may be found that some of his theoretical work is less faulty than has been thought. Ramachandran gleans the traces of gold from the mine of Freud's work and integrates them into his own.

The author's writing style is conversational and clear. He appears to be a natural teacher, making the work obtainable for any person with average reading skills. It might make a good book for showing high school students how problems in science are outlined and tested, especially in health care sciences. It's colorful stories of people and their problems should arrest the attention of the high school student, perhaps orienting them to a career in science. For those interested in mind and consciousness, the book is a good example of the research being done by biologists-as opposed to artificial intelligence professionals and philosophers like Roger Penrose and Daniel Dennett-and makes it obvious that there is still a long way to go in this fascinating field.

An Especially Good Intro to the Brain and its Quirks, August 15, 2002
I bought this book not long after my father was diagnosed with a glioblastoma multiforme. Like most people, I had no idea what a brain tumor really is and especially what a GBM IV is. To this day I wish I had never learned that term.

But this book was a great help to me as I tried to learn more about the brain's structure and how it works. This is an easy to read book with some very helpful illustrations. It demonstrates the brain's functions by showing its quirks. It is well written and easy (and surprisingly FUN) to read.

There is also a helpful bibliography and suggested reading list at the end of the book for those who wish to delve more deeply into the subject. But it is important to know that you don't need any background at all in the brain to enjoy this book.

I had no understanding of brain structure beyond what the doctors told me in describing the locations of my father's tumor. This book helped me understand the changes in my fathers abilities and behavior as the tumor destroyed different portions of his brain until it finally ended his life.

Honestly, this is a very good book and I think you will get a great deal from it.

I'm a Cognitive Neuroscientist and..., March 22, 2002
...I think Ramachandran is the most brilliant, creative Neuroscientist in the field. Sure, he is very popular, along with many other science writers. But if you aren't paying attention, you might not see that he is to our field what Mozart, Picasso, and Einstein were to theirs. And this book is both a masterpiece and a magnum opus. Here are some reasons to be so keen on Ramachandran:

Many, many neuroscientists pick "safe" topics and stick with variants upon a theme all their lives. The work is often valuable, but it is not exactly akin to a spectator sport. Ramachandran, in contrast, chooses "sexy" topics to study.

Most neuroscientists write primarily for their scientific peers. Ramachandran (with Blakesee) has written a book that is at once valuable to his peers and fascinating to everyone. And if you've ever seen Ramachandran speak (either to scientists or the general public), you know what I'm talking about, and you know that the book is not a fluke.

Ramachandran does not think like other neuroscientists. Most neuroscientists pick a topic or area of the brain, and then do systematic, parametric, sensible experiments to map and test the minute details of their theory. There's usually lots of data collection and data analysis. But Ramachandran has a knack for creating "breakthrough" experiments routinely. In these experiments, the answer to a sexy question comes instantly, dramatically, and powerfully. Such creative, intuitive genius is extremely rare. Trust me, we'd all like to do science this way.

I hope that we can appreciate that Ramachandran incorporates a wide variety of worldviews as he creates gem after gem. He is from the great culture that was and is southern India; he is a medical doctor and neurologist; he is a reknowned perceptual and cognitive neuroscientist who trained with master academics in England; and he is passionately insightful about art. I've heard people compare Ramachandran to mystics, healers and others. The cult status is of course a little ridiculous. But the enthusiasm is understandable. And the book is wonderful. I recommend it!

Ramachandran's "Phantoms", December 15, 2000
If you have read books by Oliver Sacks, M.D. (e.g., The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat), this book is in the same genre and is equally interesting and worthwhile. If you haven't--both Sacks and this author are neurologists who do the rest of us a considerable and fascinating favor by telling us about their patients. (Also, maybe you saw the movie, Awakenings, that starred Robin Williams as Sacks, and Robert DeNiro as one of his patients)

Both Sacks and Ramachandran arrange their patient stories under topical headings intended to elucidate the way the brain and body (especially the senses) work together, and also the nature of human personality and even consciousness itself. Ramachandran writes with great clarity, kindness and humor, and his origins in India and Hinduism provide a gently-presented, less-western point of view.

His book also contains some simple but amazing mind-body experiments you can do on yourself and with friends (really). In one, you will become convinced that the top of the desk in front of you is part of your body, since you will feel it when another person touches the desk. Those of you interested in religion will find the chapter "God and Limbic System" especially fascinating. And no, the purpose of his chapter is not to denigrate or analyze away religious experience, but to better understand it, and what it means to be human.

The best popular neurology book, March 13, 2000
I read this book at a clip of several hundred pages per day. It beats most fiction for excitement and provides the impetus to read more in neurology. Neurology is truly a science and this book asks the right questions about consciousness, perception, and mental "health." I have cleaned out the library shelves on neurology and only wish there were more books like this one. The section on body image is particularly interesting--could the technique described in this book be used to help treat eating disorders and the like? It also provides a fresh perspective on the much-discussed dual-brain theory. Enjoy.

stimulating, January 28, 2002
"What we call rational grounds for our beliefs are often extremely irrational attempts to justify our instincts. "
Thomas Huxley

VS Ramachandran shot to prominence with his explanation for the "phantom limb syndrome" (which occurs when people continue to vividly experience the amputated part of their body). VSR found that the experience of the phantom limb arises because the brain area which normally controls the (now amputated) limb gets invaded by neurons from neighbouring regions of the brain. Thus when the region formerly devoted to sensing the arm is invaded by neighbouring neurons which respond to face stimulation, the amputee feels his arm when he is stroked across the face. A striking example of such remapping was found in a man who experiences during sexual intercourse the orgasms in his phantom foot - since genitals are in the brain's body map right next to the foot, the nerve cells from the genital area take over the region formerly occupied by the "foot neurons" resulting in migration of the orgasm into the phantom foot. This makes one wonder about the basis of foot fetishes in normal people....

There are many intriguing chapters on blindsight, the concept of "self" and the issue of qualia, so beloved of neurophilosphers. Where the book is at its strongest, however, is when R. draws directly on his clinical experience. He tells scores of amazing stories of patients with symptoms and syndromes which affected their perception, conceptualization, self-awareness and self-knowledge. This book succesfully shows us that conscious mind is simply a thin facade for the (mostly unconscious "self") - that there is a huge gray space between seeing and knowing, of which we are completely unaware.

One especially intriguing issue is that of religious experience. It has been long known that people with temporal lobe epilepsy often "find God". Temporal lobes of the brain are the interface between perception and action and what strikes R. is the closeness between emotional centers of the brain (such as the amygdala), centers devoted to memory (the hippocampus) and sensory areas of the temporal cortex. An epileptic fit might "kindle" - reinforce - connections between these brain areas so that communication between them would be increased and people would experience all events (as well as themselves) as imbued with deep significance. Everything in the universe would be seen as conscious and be "carried by a universal tide to the shores of Nirvana". In contrast, a patient with Cotard's syndrome feels so emotionally remote from the world that he will actually make the absurd claim that he is dead or that he can smell his flesh rotting. What this book provides us with, therefore, is an intimate peek into how fragile our reality constructs are and how grateful we should be to these few pounds of gelatinous flesh for the constant reality checks (and un-checks) that they provide us with.

There are other fine popular books by prominent brain scientists(Damasio, Churchland, LeDoux and Crick come to mind). I think Ramachandran surpasses them all with his extraordinary experimental ingenuity and curiosity which drive him far away from the ivory tower of clinical science and all the way down to the greener pastures inhabited by psychoanalysis and religion.

Whatever she did, Sandra Blakeslee did an excellent job in making the book readable and enjoyable

Brilliant Stuff, December 29, 1998
Anyone looking for a new paradigm for consciousness should read this book, in particular anyone without any prior knowledge of neural science. The book is full of the latest discoveries about how the brain works, including several experiments you can perform by yourself or with friends. In particular, I found that the experiment which the author(s) have you perform on yourself with your blind spot particularly discombobulating, as you watch as your mind "fills in" missing information, and even "hallucinates" things that aren't there. You're left feeling that you can't even trust your own eyes! The final chapter is particularly important, and required reading for anyone interested in how neural science affects our understanding of consciousness and self.

My only complaint is that the book seems schizophrenic; it is scientific, but constantly needs to reassure us as if it were afraid that a purely scientific understanding of our lives is somehow inimical to our artistic selves. The book continually quotes Shakespeare. I'm not sure if that's because the book has two authors, that Ms. Blakeslee was brought in to soften up the science a bit. It often seems as if there's a phantom author.

Even so, it's enjoyable can't-put-it-down reading and contains several important points which should add significantly to your understanding of your brain works and consciousness itself.

Where'd those clubbed fingers go?, December 8, 2004
On page 7, talking about lung cancer and clubbing of the fingers, Ramachandran/Blakeslee say "Remarkably, this telltale sign disappears instantly on the operating table as the surgeon removes the cancer." I know this not to be true, but I was already very impressed with the book. This kept bothering me until by page 100 or so, I decided to check out the author a little. He appeared to have exemplary credentials. Then that very afternoon the new issue of Discover Magazine arrived and I found him mentioned twice, one of those times in a short feature.

In the preface, he says, "When writing a popular book, professional scientists always have to walk a tightrope between making the book intelligible to the general reader, on the one hand, and avoiding oversimplification, on the other, so that experts are not annoyed." Maybe the instantly cured clubbed fingers fit into this category. He also says, "Some of the cases I describe are really composites of several patients, including classics in the medical literature." Perhaps this explains it.

Possibly it was the journalist, Blakeslee, who decided to make the situation somewhat more interesting, but then one has to consider that other conclusions may be a little enhanced.

Be that as it may, this book presents remarkable data. It reads like a detective story and describes an empathetic doctor who has lots of rapport with his patients as he tries to help them deal with their unique problems. The book gives an excellent review of brain anatomy and function. The first 20 pages summarizes aspects of the scientific method so well, I was enthralled. As I kept reading, I found out that someone with a keen mind using curiosity, simple observations, and prop-like equipment could still uncover new scientific data.

Other reviewers have eloquently described the contents, and I urge you to read them. Despite my criticism, this book deserves a "5", and should add to anyone's knowledge about consciousness and how the mind works.

Closeness to Spirituality, March 18, 2000
Recent trends of neurology being close to spirituality as reflected in the works of Sir Charles Sherrington, Gray Walter and others finds a new perspective in this book. Ramachandran has hinted at this closeness at various places of his book and gives a clue that the day is not far when many spiritual problems of man can be found to have a deep relation with his neurological constitution.

Its refreshing to see a new light thrown on this subject. Ramachandran joins class with very few who endeavoured to join this quest. This book is a must for all who want to probe into the deeper truths of life.

Does God Dwell In The Limbic System, March 23, 2002
One way of studying the brain is to destroy parts of it in laboratory animals, and see how performance is affected. Obviously we cannot conduct similar experiments on humans. We can, however, learn a lot about human brain function by studying the behavior of people who have suffered brain damage through trauma or disease.

Dr. Ramachandran spends his time studying such patients. His book, Phantoms In The Brain, is filled with case studies from his experiences. A significant section of the book discusses the problems of patients with phantom limb syndrome. Why does the brain continue to think an amputated limb is still present? When a patient's brain reacts as if an amputated hand is in a continually clenched position, causing much pain, how can the brain be fooled into unclenching the hand? Why does shaving sometimes feel like your amputated arm is being stimulated?

Damage to various brain centers creates an amazing number of strange maladies. Damage to a visual area can cause "blindsight', where the patient cannot see an object, but can point out where it is. And, yes, what about the limbic system? Damage to certain areas in this system can cause various religious experiences. Then there's anosognosia. A stroke may leave one whole side of a patient paralyzed, yet the patient thinks that there is nothing wrong with him.

This book is the perfect adjunct to reading a basic book on brain function. That's not necessary, though, as it is totally accessible to the layman, and should keep the reader spellbound. Such works also impress upon me that the brain is the mind. Damage to that vital organ can change who we are. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Popular Lost Cities author David Childress opens the door to the amazingworld of ancient technology, from the computers of the ancient world to the"flying machines of the gods." Technology of the Gods explores thetechnology that was allegedly used in Atlantis and the theory that theGreat Pyramid of Egypt was originally a gigantic power station. Childressalso uncovers many other mysteries, including:*

the technology of ancient flight*

how the ancients used electricity*

megalithic building techniques*

the use of crystal lenses and the fire from the gods*

ancient evidence of high-tech weapons, including atomic weapons*

the role of modern inventors, such as Nikola Tesla, in bringing ancient technology into modernuse*

impossible artifacts, and more, much more.Childress has done it again! From beginning to end, Technology of the Godsis filled with facts, keen observations and tales that challenge modernassumptions in a humorous, intelligent and compelling way that isquintessential Childress. ... Read more

Reviews

Great Information; poor writing, August 22, 2000
I bought this book with great anticipation...was on the waiting list for months! When it finally became available I couldn't wait to read it. I flipped through it in even more anticipation at the fantastic pictures and illustrations once I got it.

I have to say I was thrilled and dissappointed all at once. The content of the book was absolutely fascinating. The author stirred up subjects that totally engulfed me; but as I'd read into each, I found him wandering off into some other rather uninteresting part of the subject and leaving me dieing to get back to the origional thought...which he often didn't. I got the feeling that he hurried the book and that it never really got edited... Thoughts ran off the page and never got finished; as if pages were missing from the printing.

I'd like to see this entire book re-thought and rewritten, because the CONTENT of the book is astounding to say the least. I'd recommend it to anyone who's digging into ancient history/origins because it has so much interesting material. But I would certainly warn them that it's not a well written or easy to follow book. I actually found myself getting bored with the author's wandering thoughts, especially when he teased with a fascinating subject, then wandered off to la la land.

Very Interesting, February 8, 2002
Even if you do not agree with everything in this book, this author does a great job of discussing technology that ancient people had. The text is highlighted by pictures that enhance many of this statements he makes. The author does a great job of taking information from a variety of sources to prove his points and clarify his writing.

My two complaints are that some of the pictures are so small that they are frustrating because you can't see much of the detail. Second, the assumption is made that you know about many of the places in this book and I don't. I had never heard of many of these places until reading this book. I would have appreciated a few maps to help clarify where some of these places are.

Great book. Very interesting. Enjoy.

Needs a few improvements, September 22, 2006
The topics are covered in a Ripley's Believe It Or Not Breathless Rush that leaves the reader wondering where it all will lead. Because there is no index, you will find it difficult to go back and find the inscrutible passages. Because there are virtually no margins (1/4 inch instead of a standard 1 inch) there is no place to write notes or even put stickums without affecting the text. The lines are closely leaded (too close together for comfortable reading) perhaps to save paper or cut costs, but regardless, a less-than-comfortable reading experience. Numerous anecdotes and examples are repeated, as if nobody bothered to edit the text, but rather just wrote it down from a transcribed tape or video. The lack of attention to these basics of book-reader's expectations makes you wonder about the validity of the contents. Good info, but bad format.

Science Fiction Stories, December 15, 2007
For those not researching much of what is written in Technology of the Gods, the stories would appear to be so fascinatingly convincing and wild and, for the most part, they are! However, if one were to REALLY do a little research and see how much of what Childress write is actually TRUE, they would find that much (and I would say, most) of it is just plain science fiction. Period. As I read Technology of the Gods, wanted badly to verify the accuracy of what Childress claimed, because as it turned out, the book made ever more outrageous claims as you get deeper and deeper into the book.

I wouldn't know where to start with a review, but a few facts stand out. For one, Childress quotes very extensively (and almost to the point of making his own analysis mute) several authors, such as Andrew Tomas, who have been known to write falsities themselves. Tomas is a good example. Most of what Tomas writes about cannot be tracked down mostly because he never left any sources for his outrageous claims. The "Vedic UFO's" from which Childress gets most of his ancient Indian Vimana ideas from (including illustrations of them) were inspired by a book, Vaimanika Shastra, that was claimed to have been "channeled" by the transcribed author, Pandit Subbaraya Shastry. Childress performs these same erroncies in which claims cannot be traced, verified, or researched. This is not science...this is pseudoscience. Or better yet: science fiction. This is a type of religion, in which you must simply believe what is said and leave it at that.

Another problem I found with Technology of the Gods is that there were half-truths (in which the whole explanation or alternative, and more realistic, answer seems to be ignored and not written about) or there were outright lies associated with many of Childress' claims. Quick examples:

-the Mitchell-Hedges crystal skull: was actually bought at an auction by Mitchell himself...not found at an archeological dig, as he claimed. But this explanation is never written about by Childress,

-the "metallic vessel" from Dorchester, MA was found near a mine in loose rubble, not, as Childress claims, "blown out of solid rock",

-the Coso Artifact, was found inside of a ball of hard clay, not, as Childress claims, a geode. Also, the object was found, under intense investigation, to be identical to a, then current, 1920's Champion spark plug, probably from mining equipment of the area. Of course none of this is ever mentioned or written about by Childress,

-the Iron Pillar of Delhi: not rusted due, possibly, to the high content of phosphorus film on its surface from the manufacture of it and also to its thickness. (None mentioned in Technology of the Gods),

and many more! In short, a book would need to be written that described the many inaccuracies and missleading information contained in Technology of the Gods. The book makes for some great science fiction, but not knowing anything about the subject matters written about and not researching any of the claims made by the author will lead one into believing a false religion.

Fascinating, challenging, controversial, informative., June 6, 2000
In Technology Of The Gods, David Childress documents the science and achievements of long-lost civilizations which are comparable to, and in some cases even exceeded, our own level of advancement. Contrary to scholastic traditions, humankind has not progressed in a steadily upward linear progression. The ancients had technologies that cannot be replicated by the science of today. Technology Of The Gods introduces us to antiquarian achievements such as the structures built by the megalithic cultures, the use of crystal lenses and the "fire from the gods" in both ancient religious ceremonies and warfare; ancient flight and the archaic documents describing the technology. Fascinating, challenging, controversial, informative, Childress' Technology Of The Gods is an informative survey and reference for students of history, science, and metaphysics.

This is a Great Book., February 10, 2005
This is a great book that is easy and fun to read. It takes your mind on a journey of adventure and forces the reader to think. My copy is filled with all kinds of penciled in notes, and it served me well. After I read this book I then went and followed up on other articles and issues that were raised in the book. It took me on an adventure that continues to this day. If you want to know about our past, and are tired of the stories of cavemen with greasy and dirty hands living in caves, then read this book. You will not regret it.

Pseudo science at its best, September 13, 2000
I enjoyed this book immensely, apart from typographical errors poor editing and poor science this is a classic. I think the best bit is "heavy protons in mercury." Does this mean that protons in other elements are lighter?...not...

A more scientific approach such as..this may be...or even, perhaps this could be..or, one interpretation... One doesn't expect too much use of passive voice past impersonal, but it would lend more credibility to some of the shallow arguments presented in this book if this had been done.

I for one certainly believe there is nothing new under the sun. Some of the artifacts presented in this book are extraordinary and require more thorough scientific study and presentation.

Mostly an incomplete rework of known information., February 24, 2005
Childress had a good title. The headings to his chapters sound great, but it's all sizzle and no steak.

Clark & Agnew's, "The Ark of Millions of Years," fills in all the blanks left by Childress' "Tech." From it I learned why the ancient wars were fought, and who the leaders were. I learned why the pyramids were built, who built them, and why the builders are no longer here.

But, the most important piece, and I mean this one will astound you, is their chapter "The Arrival of Noah." When you learn how the earth was put together and why the human race is here in the first place, it will change everything.

Mr. Childress. Work on a throrough second edition of this book. In the mean time, buy The Ark of Millions of Years. You'll never be the same.

Yellow Press Disservice to the Knowledge About Sophisticated Ancients, October 29, 2007
I clearly expected a more reliable, truly scientific book. Don't shoot the messenger, this is yellow press at its "best". You expect to read about "ancient computers" and find out meant is Stonehenge, only because astronomy can be predicted with it... The "best-selling" (as in sell the headline best) author - and yes, he's a journalist - hardly leaves anything out, which makes a fine sensation: flying carpets, Perseus' invisible making helmet, manbird Garuda's space travel to the Pole Star 58 lights years away, Icarus flying to close to the sun, King Solomon traveling in aircrafts, an ancient H-bomb knocking out the power plant in a pyramid (still standing).... you name it, and David Hatcher Childress will tell you, it's all true.

His proof is usually a bit lacking. Either in the tune of: "I once saw a levitating lama"; via free spaces in ancient cities around the world without further circumstantial hints have to be nothing else, but landing grounds for air and space ships; to the causal relationship string of thought that the A-bomb on Hiroshima caused some sand to turn crystally salty, the SIMILAR LOOKING salty area around the Dead Sea must have been caused by the ancient nuking of Sodom and Gomorrha, which turned organic material (Lot's wife) into the very same salt, too (but her family could escape the blast, I presume...). His credo by his very own (quoted) words: "The absence of proof is no proof of the proof's absence." Oh, I forgot: The usual unusual item to have been found by private citizens have been lost by now (Including the biggest megaliths ever known, which couldn't get transported by modern means!) or the owners refuse any examination... He's not shying away to present pictures supporting his theory, captioning them with the small print "POSSIBLE secret chambers beneath the Sphinx" (highlight by myself). Mentioning the pictures: Most of them are depicted twice or even four times without any apparent reason, which remains one of the biggest mysteries in this book.

In principle I know that "the ancients" had been MUCH more sophisticated than presented and/or believed by orthodox "science". This book simply is not the way to present that knowledge, for hardly any real knowledge gets included. The author himself terms it "speculation" once in a while. Some curious phenomena are merely mentioned in a sentence, a paragraph or a sub chapter of 2 or 3 pages. The only somewhat in depth analysis by comparison is a lengthy some 30 page quote from a another book, The Giza Power Plant : Technologies of Ancient Egypt, which at least offers a cohesive theory to work with. Some true discoveries, such as the very real antikythera mechanism device found in an ancient Greek ship wreck, are intermingled with fantasy. Also the ancient Egyptian source for the word "soap" is revealed, which is nice. However, most unsolved mysteries are hilariously distorted by wild fiction fevers. The thing with speculation is: Nearly always, it will lead to the realization later that it was a very funny imagination, even should the direction of thought have been somewhat based on reality. For that, in depth science has to get applied, usually over many years to come to worthy conclusions, usually not expected from the start. The author, however, doesn't engage in science. He merely compiles sensationalist stories, concocted for the Atlantis and UFO philes. He is actually doing a mighty disservice to progressive/alternative science.

Take the title page as an example. The Egyptians depicted are supposed to hold light bulbs. The cover image has been distorted, within the book it becomes clear that these light bulbs are human sized. Why that huge? The symbolic Djed-pillars they are resting on are supposed to be electric generators (yet holding the GLASS then, according to this interpretation on the back cover, i.e. no metal necessary for the electricity to flow). It is a bit bold to interpret ancient temple wall paintings and hyroglyphs of what they remind of in the modern world. It would be even bold to interpret the really depicted things literally. To me, this looks like serpents in a container or symbolic flower, but I wouldn't dare to aver this impression as such. The author doesn't provide ANY context of that image. His knowledge about Egypt seems to be very limited anyway, as he terms the GODDESS Isis/Aset a priestess. She and other facets of the goddess(es) are supposed to wear very real electric light or crystal lenses on their heads. Now we know the reason for the distortion into a real life priestess, killing all the symbolism. In that row of "priestesses" depicted one has a lioness' head. He doesn't refer to how he blinds THAT literally...

Usually the book is about phenomena AS OF YET unexplained (= in 2000 when the book was published originally). Occasionally, it DEFIES any existing scientific knowledge. For example he avers the Mediterranean would have been a dry valley with some lakes, inhabited by an ancient ancient civilization he calls Osirian. (Even though the reference to the mythical first ruler of pre-dynastic Egypt having turned into a god tells the diametrically opposed story of Egypt coming OUT of the water - the growing Nile Delta). I call the Mediterranean a lake myself, yet, tectonics teach that it used to be an OCEAN getting closed. Unorthodox views describe that process a bit variated, yet, it never has been a dry valley, even though the sea level (all over the world) was a bit lower at times.

The author also falls for historic legends (i.e. errors): One example would be the supposed burning of the library in Alexandria by Muslim conquerors. In reality, the re-built library had been re-burned the last time seven centuries before their arrival - by Christian fanatics. (The first time by Julius Caesar as punishment for not submitting quickly enough.) The poisoning of Alexander the Great is controversial at best. And Archimedes constructed a lot of (wooden) machines with which to destroy ships, yet no giant lenses were used to burn any fleet. None of the contemporary historians discribing his gadgets report such lenses, but many centuries later, this myth came to life. Hence it is funny reading this book averring (relatively) sophisticated technology involuntarily based on basically a fairy tale, exposing the very carelessness of the author's approach to scientific findings.

So why did I give any stars at all? Actually, I give 2.5 not 3. One star is obligatory. Half a star is for the principle of challenging orthodox believes, suggesting the ancients didn't know anything. An additional star is for providing information to be looked up independently with more trustworthy sources. For example I had never heard about the Iron Pillar of Delhi, which mysteriously has remained rost free and is some 97% pure iron, which is difficult or should be impossible to produce in these quantities. Two years after the publishing of the book, that mystery seems to have been solved: The ancient melting process of producing iron had been fundamentally different, leaving MUCH more phosphor in the product. That in turn caused a very thin, but very effective protective film to develop on the surface. So: Yes, we didn't know and the product is superior to modern corrosion stricken iron, yet the wild speculation in this book has proven to be just that. I am glad to have been introduced to the (lack of) knowledge about vitrified forts and Libyan Desert Glass (in Egypt), which obviously formed while exposing rock/sand to enormous heat. More theories exist than described in the book, which avers nuclear warfare, because no vulcanic or meteor crater has been found. Yet, as inconsistent as the book gets, existing craters elsewhere are supposed to be caused by nuclear bombs... By the way, the sinking of ships and planes in the Bermuda Triangle has been solved in the meanwhile as well. Gases breaking through the ocean floor temporarily cause such vessels not be supported any more by the transformed water and air. The referenced example of a squadron disappearing has been reconstructed by now as an error of judgement by the leading pilot flying in the wrong direction, though.

I have to close. If you are interested in REAL, in-depth and as of today judged unorthodox science revealing ancient ancient technology, forget this book and read instead the 1966 Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings: Evidence of Advanced Civilization in the Ice Age and the 2004 Civilization One: The World Is Not as You Thought It Was. Then you WON'T have to wonder wether in 2,000 years someone interprets Star Trek and Harry Potter as the real state of technology of today...

A huge letdown., November 10, 2008
Quick summary:
Writing style/ability + editing ability + format: 1 star.
Information: 3-4 stars.

This book is incredibly difficult to read. Not because the author uses anything above a high school vocabulary, but because it reads like a first-draft manuscript that was never edited.

From page 79, last 2 sentences:
"This startling item, however, is one that should not remain in doubt. The detailed studies of metallurgists and the new carbon-14 dating method should be sufficient to give a definite answer on this point."

...turn page...

"in doubt. The detailed studies of metallurgists and the new carbon-14 dating method should be sufficient to give a definite answer on this point."

Any mildly-skilled editor should have caught that, and there are numerous other lack-of-editing issues as well.

While on the same area of the book (first 20% or so), it seems that the author didn't know what a pronoun is. So, every other (if not every) sentence has "metallurgist" or "metallurgy" in it.

Just opening up the book is sight to behold. The margins on the page seemed to have been completely removed. There is maybe 1/8th inch for the left-right margins. Not a big deal if everything else was perfect, but it was far from it.

Trying to work over to the actual writing portion...but wait! There's a little picture next to the text. And it has NO CAPTION, and NO mention in the text. In fact, it looks like the author got a DVD full of black-and-white clip art, and wanted to use ALL of it. While some of the graphics are actually important, a lot of it seems to be there just for looks. (And something else really weird - some of the images that seem important are SO important that they're in the book TWICE.)

OK, I just tried unsuccessfully to find a page without a nifty little graphic..but that reminded me of something else. There are entire sections of this book that are simply quotes from other guys. If I wanted to know the views of that OTHER guy, I would've bought his book. This author uses quotes so much, that he runs out of ways to introduce them...
"As for the pillars of salt, Keller says..."
"However, Keller himself admits..."
"Says Keller..."
"In short, Keller is saying"
"Says Keller..."
"In short..."

ALL of those were JUST from page 230. Other pages and sections are equally painful.

OK, to the actual info in the book. It's pretty good. A bit short on details in some sections, a bit high on assumptions in others, but some fairly good arguments are made. With additional research narrative, this could have been a lot better. As it is...not great, not horrible. Now the writing style...THAT was horrible.

Definitely would not recommend this book (maybe "Revision 2, with an Editor," but at as-is.) Try out Graham Hancock books if you haven't already - doesn't cover the exact same topics, but is a skilled writer that dabbles in some similar areas.

... Read more

Editorial Review

A highly infectious, deadly virus from the central African rain forest suddenly appears in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. There is no cure. In a few days 90 percent of its victims are dead. A secret military SWAT team of soldiers and scientists is mobilized to stop the outbreak of this exotic "hot" virus. The Hot Zone tells this dramatic story, giving a hair-raising account of the
appearance of rare and lethal viruses and their "crashes" into the human race. Shocking, frightening, and impossible to ignore, The Hot Zone proves that truth really is scarier than fiction.


From the Paperback edition. ... Read more

Reviews

A Tale of Horror, March 24, 2003
Richard Preston is not a horror novelist, but this will be one of the scariest stories you've ever read. The cause of all this terror is from little beasts that are only microns in size, filoviruses. "Hot Zone" discusses four of these viruses, Marburg, Ebola Sudan, Ebola Zaire, Ebola Reston. I first came across Preston in his New Yorker article, "Crisis in the Hot Zone" which is basically the cliff notes to this book. It piqued my interest and eventually led to me reading this book.

Everyone knows that they should be afraid of Ebola. The Zaire strand only kills 90% of those it infects, in just a matter of day, in the worst way imaginable. Filoviruses are hemorrhagic viruses, causing those unfortunate enough to be infected to crash and bleed out. Preston goes into grisly detail about how these viruses work, and the symptoms that occur in humans. He traces the history of these viruses from their discovery. These are just set up for his main topic, the discovery of Ebola in Washington D.C. A monkey house in Reston Virginia is full of dying monkeys that apparently are infected with Ebola. Preston tracks down the mystery behind this domestic infection.

This book does bring up an all-important point; we are only an airplane ride away from the outbreak of a pandemic. It is very possible that a highly contagious disease may break out and cover the earth in a matter of days leaving a large portion of the population dead, making the premise behind Stephen King's novel "The Stand" not so far fetched after all. These filoviruses are very interesting, and Preston reveals them in such a way that you want to know more about them. The only hint I have to offer is, to avoid Intern's Disease, don't read this when you have a cold.

A Nonfiction Thriller, March 10, 2003
In THE HOT ZONE, Richard Preston has woven epidemiological fact with the terrifying true story of how a strain of the Ebola virus came to the United States. He details various outbreaks of hemorrhagic fevers, traces them to their possible origins, and provides a basic education about viral evolution and forensics, all couched in narratives that will keep you turning page after page. After you have read his graphic descriptions of what happens to people who contract the deadlier strains of Ebola, you will understand fully just how dangerous the Reston, Virginia incident could have been.

With its crisp language and pacing, THE HOT ZONE reads like an expert thriller novel, making its reality that much more horrifying. Not for the faint-hearted, this book will likely alter the way you view viruses and epidemics.

I highly recommend this book for a general adult readership. (Teenagers under 16 may not be able to handle the highly disturbing descriptions Preston provides.) If you haven't read this book before, you should, especially now in this time of bioterrorism and global travel.

Some Hot Stuff, August 12, 2002
This was an interesting account of a biological incident at a monkey house near Washington DC, along with plenty of background information about the Marburg and Ebola viruses. I didn't mind the redundancy about which others have complained; the repetition of some of the information about viral functions prompted retention, along with stirring the imagination as to the effects of a killer virus.

After reading the book, I performed some web searches an found several sites advertising hiking excursions to Mt. Elgon's Kitum Cave in Africa, which is believed to be he home of the Ebola/Marburg strains, though it's presently unknown which animal is the natural host. Let me tell you, if you are sufficiently insane to visit Kitum Cave after reading The Hot Zone, then you are living proof of Darwin In Action.

I liked the author's analogy about fatal viruses, such as Ebola and HIV, acting at the Earth's own antibodies, protecting the environment from encroachment by humans in places where the Earth doesn't want humans to be fiddling with things. Invasions of the deep rain forests and encounters with fatal biological agents therein are warnings for humans to stay away.

Have everyone in your family read The Hot Zone, so that next time someone gets sick you will have all sorts of terminology to throw around the dinner table -- extreme amplification, crash-and-bleed-out and other delightful descriptions about the effects of disease on humans. Enjoy.

An intense reality check!, February 20, 2003
Have you ever pondered the many kinds of microscopic particles that live on this earth? I do even more now that I've read Richard Preston's true story, The Hot Zone. This book takes an extremely graphic dive into the facts within the first three pages. It all begins in Kitum cave deep in the heart of Kenya's wild jungles, where a deadly, unknown virus thrives. Scientific testing on monkeys then brings it to America, relating it to the fast killing Ebola virus, scaring the daylights out of our military. Their suspicions grow even more when they see the flesh eating symptoms of blood coming out of every orifice of the victims bodies. Many individuals get involved throughout this book, revealing their personalities and fears.
This exciting scientific thriller will keep you on edge for the whole read. With The Hot Zone being a true story, Richard Preston puts you in the level 4 biohazard zone easily, sharing the emotions of someone about to enter.
This book is definitely for you if you thrive on the life threatening facts of Ebola, Marburg, and other deadly viruses. With the first electron microscopy photographs ever taken of the virus alone, you won't be able to put it down!

Totally Disgusting and True., July 7, 2003
When I looked at the cover of this book it looked like it was science fiction. As I started reading it I was thinking, "Wait a minute this is all real. In this world where we all live there are microscopic monsters that can totally destroy the human race." I was just totally paranoid. Then when I read the vivid description of Ebola I was just terrified and for weeks I could't stop thinking about the poor people that died from this disease. I almost couldn't finish the book I was totally disturbed. When I did read it I found it to ve truly exceptional and I would recommend it to anyone who thinks that there life is horrible it will change your outlook on life and will make you think how lucky you are to be living in a place where you don't have to worry about dying from these infectious diseases.

Stunning story told in a superb style, May 16, 1998
While the story itself is fascinating, the opening of Preston's "The Hot Zone" is the best opening I've ever read, and I'm a writer myself, the author of four novels. His use of language hints at a writer with superior skills and with much to say. Some other reviewers fail to recognize that the book is not as much about the Ebola virus, but that the Planet Earth, tired of the prospect of five billion inhabitants, is trying to fight back and eliminate mankind. Aids, Ebola, they might be just the forerunners of an army of viruses with the goal of keeping the human population from exploding in ever-increasing numbers. Most of the books among today's bestsellers have nothing to say; but "The Hot Zone " is an exception. If nothing else, read the end, and memorize it if you can. I liked it so much that I've written it down and now I've included it here, I hope I won't get in trouble with the publisher for unauthorized duplication of copyrighted material.

The following is a direct quote from Richard Preston's "The Hot Zone"

"In a sense, the earth is mounting an immune response against the human species. It is beginning to react to the human parasite, the flooding infection of people, the dead spots of concrete all over the planet, the cancerous rot-outs in Europe, Japan, and the United States, thick with replicating primates, the colonies enlarging and spreading and threatening to shock the biosphere with mass extinction. Perhaps the biosphere does not "like" the idea of five billion humans. Or it could also be said that the extreme amplification of the human race, which has occurred only in the past hundred years or so, has suddenly produced a very large quantity of meat, which is sitting everywhere in the biosphere and may not be able to defend itself against a life form that might want to consume it. Nature has interesting ways of balancing itself. The rain forest has its own defenses. The earth's immune system, so to speak, has recognized the! presence of the human species and is starting to kick in. The earth is attempting to rid itself of an infection by the human parasite. Perhaps AIDS is the first step in a natural process of clearance." End of quote

An informative rollercoaster, February 10, 2000
I adored this book. Some reviews I've read have commented on the fact that the book is rich with description, sometimes more so than information and I do not find that a fault. I read books to entertain myself, if this book was simply a cut-and-dried medical text (and I've read my share of those) then I would've simply read it, processed it and discarded it. Because Mr. Preston gave us more than dry scientific information, this book became one of my all-time favorites. This book, to me, marries the art of masterful storytelling and conveying information. A must-read for anyone interested in the sciences or in a good thriller.

A Scary Reality, October 28, 2001
When monkies in a Washington DC area monkey house start dying of Ebola all hell breaks loose. Goverment officals must keep the cleanup out of the public's eyes. Preston gives the readers graffic discriptions of what Ebola can do. These descriptions are so scary the reader will wish the story were fiction, but it's not. This part of the book is terrific. Preston's writing is strong and keeps the reader on the edge of their seat.

The second part of this book is Preston's account of his journey to the Kitchum cave. The Kitchum cave is rumored to be the source of of diseases such as Ebola and AIDS. This part of the book is not as enjoyable as the first part. It is filled with details of cave walls, and many other details that make the essay a very slow read. It is also somewhat dated since the Kitchum cave although a one point was considered a hot zone it has shown no evidence of disease.

Overall this book is worth the read. The first part of the book is a great read that rivals fiction horror stories. The second part of the book although not as interesting is still worth a read since Preston did take a chance in visting a hot zone.

I Can't Believe This Is Non-Fiction!, April 26, 2001
This was such a great book. The entire time I was reading it I had to keep reminding myself that it was real, that this actually happened. I thought that Richard Preston, the author, did a wonderful job of researching this and did an awesome job with description. This gruesome tale was so realistic it made me want to been in a space suit at times. If you have never read this book its a must. I have never read a book like it before. If you want to see the movie that was based on this book, Outbreak, don't expect it to be the same as the book. The movie is very different, but I still enjoyed it. This horrifying encounter with the Ebola Virus in the book definitely gives a wake up call to readers. The scary part is that you can't see it, smell it, hear it, feel it, or taste it. But if you get it, you have a 90 to 100 percent chance of dying within 12 days. Imagine that! Talk about a horror story, well this isn't, this is real and I learned a lot from this. I learned that these lethal viruses are still with us today and that Mother Nature has a lot more control than we give her credit for.

Defines "The Creeps", August 5, 2000
After I read this book, I was afraid to touch anything or even breathe. It totally freaked me out. It was like an intense Robin Cook plot that was happening in real life... There was no escape for the tragic victims of the deadly Ebola virus. At the severe stages of the disease they began to puke their own insides as they were transformed to gunk. It really opened my eyes to the world of infectious diseases and made me more aware of lurking dangers. I read this book in the seventh grade and was engrossed. My friends begged to read it and it had a long waiting list. Even my English teacher proclaimed it amazing. And amazing it was...both as a reference book and as a medical thriller... ... Read more

Editorial Review

ox-y-mor-on-i-ca (OK-se-mor-ON-uh-ca) noun, plural: Any variety of tantalizing, self-contradictory statements or observations that on the surface appear false or illogical, but at a deeper level are true, often profoundly true. See also oxymoron, paradox.

You won't find the word "oxymoronica" in any dictionary (at least not yet) because Dr. Mardy Grothe introduces it to readers in this delightful collection of 1,400 of the most provocative quotations of all time. From ancient thinkers like Confucius, Aristotle, and Saint Augustine to great writers like Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, and G. B. Shaw to modern social observers like Woody Allen and Lily Tomlin, Oxymoronica celebrates the power and beauty of paradoxical thinking. All areas of human activity are explored, including love, sex and romance, politics, the arts, the literary life, and, of course, marriage and family life. The wise and witty observations in this book are as highly entertaining as they are intellectually nourishing and are sure to grab the attention of language lovers everywhere.

Reviews

The Wit and Wisdom of Incongruity, October 5, 2005

One of my best friends had an aunt (let's call her Ginny) who, like Yogi Berra, could bring a lively conversation to a screeching halt with one brief comment. Aunt Ginny really was unaware of this (shall we say) unique talent. She was not trying to be funny, clever, etc. On the contrary, she offered what she considered to be a serious comment and everyone knew what her intended meaning was. For example:

"Quicker than you can count Jack Robinson."
"Deader than a door knob."
"She was born on a silver platter."

My personal favorite:

"He's on a treadmill to Bolivia."

I am curious to know what Aunt Ginny would make of Grothe's book. (She died many years ago.) She would no doubt agree with many observations but perhaps not see the humor in any of them. Grothe has selected what he calls "oxymoronical" material from his vast collection of quotations. With regard to the term, his definition: "Oxymoronica, n.; A compilation of self-contradictory terms, phrases, or quotations; examples of oxymoronica appear illogical or nonsensical at first, but upon reflection, make a good deal of sense and are often profoundly true." As other reviewers have correctly noted, many of the quotations which Grothe has assembled are hilarious, others insightful, still others cynical. All of them qualify as "oxymoronica."

Among those forgotten or of which I was previously unaware, my personal favorites include:

"Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything."
John Kenneth Galbraith

"Hatreds are the cinders of affection."
Sir Walter Raleigh

"I must follow the people. Am I not their leader?"
Benjamin Disraeli

"What you get free costs too much."
Jean Anouilh

"Good fiction is that which is real."
Ralph Ellison

"Nothing is funnier than unhappiness."
Samuel Beckett (in Endgame)

Selections are organized within fourteen chapters, each of which has a generic subject such as "Sex, Love & Romance," "Ancient Oxymoronica," and "The Literary Life." I presume to suggest that Grothe's anthology be skimmed occasionally rather than read cover-to-cover. In the Foreword, Richard Lederer offers these comments which serve as an appropriate conclusion to my review: "Paradox is a particularly powerful device to ensnare truth because it concisely illuminates the contradictions that are at the very heart of our lives. It engages our hearts and minds because, beyond its figurative employment, paradox has always been at the center of of the human experience." Or, to paraphrase Yogi Berra, if people don't want to appreciate oxymoronica, nobody's going to stop them.

Those who share my high regard for this book are urged to check out The Portable Curmudgeon and The Return of the Portable Curmudgeon, both edited by Jon Winokur; also John M. Shanahan's The Most Brilliant Thoughts of All Time (In Two Lines or Less) and Condensed Knowledge: A Deliciously Irreverent Guide to Feeling Smart Again, edited by Will Pearson.

Quotations to Make You Go "Hmmm?", November 8, 2004


I am sure if someone had told me before I read this book that it was an easy-to-read, entertaining, and informative combination of a simple quote book, many cultural and historical references, and a scholarly and literary analysis of paradoxes and oxymorons, I would not have bought it. Well, I sure am glad nobody told me exactly what the book was about because I not only bought it and read it, I thought it was an outstanding book.

"Oxymoronica," a new term introduced by Dr. Mardy Grothe and the title of this book, was defined inside the front cover as "any variety of tantalizing, self-contradictory statements or observations that on the surface appear false or illogical, but at a deeper level are true, often profoundly true."

In keeping with that definition, the book contained over 1,400 oxymoronic and paradoxical quotations from ancient times to today, organized into fourteen categories, most of which you would expect to find in any standard book of quotations (i.e. advice; insults; politics; sex, love, and romance; marriage, home, and family life). Complementing the wit and wisdom of the quotations was Grothe's historical and cultural research and his ability to present and put into a logical, often humorous, context the quotations so that I could reflect on and appreciate their profound meanings. You can open the book at random or read it sequentially and get the same pleasant experience both ways.

I had many profoundly personal moments of reflection on people and events in my life throughout the pages of this book:

"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's own ignorance." Confucius

"You can't make anything idiot-proof because idiots are so ingenious." Ron Burns

"The child is father of the man." William Wordsworth

"When you add to the truth, you subtract from it." From the Talmud

"He had nothing to say and he said it." Ambrose Bierce, on a contemporary

"I learned an awful lot from him by doing the opposite." Howard Hawkes, on Cecil B. DeMille

"Most people when they come to you for advice come to have their own opinions strengthened, not corrected." Josh Billings

"Vision is the art of seeing things invisible." Jonathon Swift

"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." George Orwell, in "Animal Farm"

Absurdity is the spice of life, May 28, 2004
There's something about oxymorons that bring us up short even as we laugh over the sheer absurdity of it all. Even the name of this little book is an absurdity in itself: "Oxymoronica"?? Reading this volume helps us to stop and think about some of the gems and malapropisms that have enlivened the English language, both planned and unplanned. Here you'll find some of the more classic Berra-isms and the wit and wisdom of Shakespeare, Aristotle, and Confucius, just to name a few. The book is well organized into different areas of life such as politics, art, romance and sex (some of the more delicious examples of oxymoronica fall into this category), marriage and literature. The book makes you reminisce on some of the choicer oxymorons of your own experience; one of my favorites came from a lawyer friend of mine, who, hearing that an upcoming court hearing was being delayed because the judge-from-hell was ill, said "Gee, I hope it's nothing trivial." "Oxymoronica" is full of hilarious examples that match or top that one. Its wisdom should be absorbed slowly, savored bit by delicious bit. To use a classic oxymoron, it's a terribly funny book.

Depth Charges for the Mind, April 1, 2004
Word lovers find an immediate friend in Dr. Mardy Grothe, for in his latest book, Oxymoronica-Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom from History's Greatest Wordsmiths, he has labored long to prepare a banquet for their absolute delight. Psychologist and business consultant may be his profession - and a demanding profession it is - but Dr. Grothe always finds time for his chief passion, which is the love of language. In this book, he shares the fruits of many years of collecting quotations, concentrating on those of a peculiar type-the paradoxical and oxymoronic-comprehended in his newly coined term "oxymoronica."

This book is no quick read. When you discover a fine wine, do you gulp it down? Or do you prefer to savor it, to prolong the pleasure, knowing that even when at last you have finished, you can return for many more unhurried sessions. Such is the experience of reading this book. You may open it at random (if you are an unsystematic reader like me) and discover a treasure like this one from Groucho Marx: "The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made." Then you might laugh, but more often than not you start thinking and finding out there was something true about the thought, something that almost escaped your attention until the paradoxical twist brought it out.

What also impresses you is the broad range of the quotations, historically and culturally, from Confucius to George Carlin, arranged in fourteen different categories encompassing many if not most areas of your experience. What you find here is a tour de force, leading at least this reader to a conclusion - which itself is a paradox - that you will better understand yourself and your experience through paradox. I will not try to convince the skeptic (I was a skeptic myself), except to say that I am so glad that I experienced (so much more than "read") this book. Try it! Just maybe a few depth charges in your mind will clear your head!

A Tool For Wordsmiths: Mini-Review of "Oxymoronica" by Dr. Mardy Grothe, May 31, 2006
I have always found words to be marvelous tools, weapons or playthings - depending on who is wielding them and in what tone of voice. I marvelous at those who have the talent to express time-tested ideas in new and entertaining ways. So, I was delighted to find this little gem, written by Dr. Mardy Grothe: Oxymoronica - Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom from History's Greatest Wordsmiths." This HarperCollins book will be added to my bookshelf of hand reference works.

According to Dr. Grothe's own definition, "oxymoronica" are: "Any variety of tantalizing, self-contradictory statements or observations that on the surface appear false or illogical, but at a deeper level are true, often profoundly true."

The author has been collecting memorable quotations for many years, and out of the tens of thousands in his collection, he chose two hundred pages worth that best represent the art of verbal paradox.

I could share quotations from every page that are worth passing on, but to keep this mini-review from become too "maxi," I will share only a few quotations culled from my favorite authors.

From Dickens - the immortal opening passage to A Tale of Two Cities:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,
It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,
It was the epoch of believe, it was the epoch of incredulity,
It was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness,
It was the spring of hope, it was the spring of despair,
We had everything before us, we had nothing before us,
We were all going direct to Heaven,
We were all going direct the other way."
(Page 197)

From Dickens Bleak House:

"He is an honorable, obstinate, truthful, high-spirited, intensely prejudiced, perfectly reasonable man."
(Page 205)

From Dostoyevsky's Notes from the Underground:

"In despair there are the most intense enjoyments, especially when one is very acutely conscious of the hopelessness of one's position."

"Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering."
(Page 200)

From Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye:

"As in the case of many misanthropes, his disdain for people led him into a profession designed to serve them."
(Page 201)

From Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard:

"When a lot of remedies are suggested for a disease, that means it can't be cured."
(Page 204)

Joseph Heller, in Catch-22, is a veritable fount of oxymoronic wit and wisdom:

"Even amongst men lacking all distinction he inevitably stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who met him where always impressed by how unimpressive he was."

"The Texan turned out to be good-natured, generous and likeable. In three days, no one could stand him."

Heller - in Something Happened:

"When I grow up I want to be a little boy."
(Page 207)

From Aldous Huxley in Point Counter Point:

"Several excuses are always less convincing than one."
(Page 208)

Washington Irving in Bracebridge Hall:

"Whenever a man's friends begin to compliment him about looking young, he may be sure that they think he is growing old."
(Page 208)

Edgar Allan Poe in The Purloined Letter:

"The best place to hide anything is in plain view."
(Page 211)

George Bernard Shaw in Man and Superman:

"The most unbearable pain is produced by prolonging the keenest pleasure."

Another Shavian gem, from Heartbreak House:

"The surest way to ruin a man who doesn't know how to handle money is to give him some."
(Page 212)

Finally, Alexander Solzhenitsyn in The First Circle:

"You only have power over people as long as you don't take everything away form them. But when you've robbed a man of everything he's no longer in your power - he's free again."
(Page 212)

This is a book you can read in one sitting, and then will return to again and again for inspiration and delight.

In keeping with the spirit of the book, let me conclude: "This little volume is a quick snack that will feed you for a lifetime!"

Enjoy!

Al

I laughed so hard I was brought to tears, March 7, 2004
When we hear the word "oxymoron", we typically think of the simple and classic contradictory word-pairs like "military intelligence", "boneless ribs", and "jumbo shrimp". But as Dr. Mardy Grothe teaches and demonstrates to us, there is much more to the oxymoron than meets the eye.

An oxymoron, he explains, is paradox ("a truth standing on its head to attract attention") compacted into a single sentence or phrase. Dr. Grothe offers us a remarkably rich collection of self-contradictory statements which on the surface appear to be false or nonsensical, but which upon reflection appear to be true -- often, as he points out, "profoundly true".

"Oxymoronica" is a book that should not be read quickly, any more than a box of Belgian chocolates should be devoured in a single sitting. Each of the many hundreds of paradoxical gems bears multiple layers of meaning: I found myself inevitably smiling, shaking my head, or whispering a delighted "ahah" to myself as I allowed each one to sink in.

Well-documented and organized (there's even a section on Oxymoronic Insults), "Oxymoronica" is a rich collection, but it does not pretend to be exhaustive. In fact, the author has built a website and encouraged a community of collectors and wordsmiths to participate in a dymamic and growing collection in celebration of this form of word play.

Dr. Grothe's collection is, in a word, "extraordinary". Which is, come to think of it, itself a one-word oxymoron.

A Treasure-Trove of Double-Faceted Gems, August 27, 2004
Dr. Mardy Grothe, author of _Never Let a Fool Kiss You or a Kiss Fool You_, has written another gem -- _Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom from History's Greatest Wordsmiths_. The subtitle is perfectly apt: Wit and wisdom form the crux of an oxymoron, and Grothe's examples -- drawn from around the world -- span millennia.

As Grothe says in his introduction, "Many examples of oxymoronica appear illogical or self-contradictory on the surface. But at a deeper level, they usually make a great deal of sense and are often profoundly true."

A linguaphile extraordinaire, Grothe has been collecting quotations for nearly four decades. From his eight to ten thousand examples of oxymoronica, he has culled nearly 1500 for inclusion in the present volume. He has arranged them into fourteen chapters, each with a theme, such as romance, family, politics, the arts, and literature. One chapter is devoted to "ancient oxymoronica," another to "inadvertent oxymoronica." Grothe provides commentary through about the first half of each chapter, citing oxymora (the purists' plural) that illustrate his points. The last half of each chapter presents additional oxymora without commentary. Grothe advises readers not to read these too quickly but to take time to savor each one as if it were gourmet chocolate.

Here are a few of my favorites from _Oxymoronica_:

There is no exception to the rule that every rule has an exception. --James Thurber

Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it. --Montaigne

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. --G. K. Chesterton

I'm the Hiroshima of love. --Sylvester Stallone

_Oxymoronica_ is a linguaphile's paradise. It will delight you again and again with its double-faceted gems. It is a celebration not only of people's wit and wisdom but also of the paradoxical nature of our world.

Tantalizingly True!, January 13, 2005
Dr. Grothe's "Oxymoronica" left me chuckling and amused on more than one occasion. Although this book is -- as another reviewer indicated -- a mere collection of quotes, the presentation and commentary provided by Dr. Grothe makes it so much more than a simple book of not-so-simple quotes. If you buy this book, be prepared to mark it up because you'll find yourself repeatedly reminding yourself, "I've got to remember that quote". A stellar read that should be enjoyed, savored, and referred to frequently!!

Entertaining, Useful and and a Pleasure to Read!, March 27, 2004
I loved this book! If you are interested in the clever and inadvertently clever use of language, you will enjoy Oxymoronica. The chapters are organized into general categories and I especially enjoyed the ones on Politics and Family Life. I think the book would be an excellent resource for attorneys, pastors, teachers and anyone interested in public speaking.

Please, don't write between the lines, December 16, 2007
This book contains many fine entries by people other than the author, "Dr." Mardy Grothe. Many of them are not `opposite' or `contradictory' enough to fit in, and are less interesting than the ones that do belong.

The problem with the book is the many comments by the author, which at their best are not necessary. His day job evidently involves some sort of counseling. Perhaps this line of work leads him to expect that people require explanations. For whatever reason, he provides his readers, or rather the readers of his selections, with plenty of explanations. He tells us what it is about contradictory statements that makes them contradictory, or whatever else we might need to understand these otherwise entertaining quotations. He even tells us why some of them are funny. Like most people who `explain' what it is about a joke that makes it funny, he's not very funny, and neither is the joke when he is finished with it. No doubt you have heard the term, "firm grasp on the obvious."

Do I dare provide a quote from this mischief? Well, ok. From the Introduction:

Oxymoronica?" [sic] you might be thinking, "What's that?" While you surely know what an oxymoron is, oxymoronica is probably a new word to you. You won't find it in any dictionary (at least not yet) because I came up with it only a few years ago. In coining oxymoronica, I was inspired by words you may know . . . I use the word oxymoronica to describe quotations that contain incompatible or incongruous elements. Many examples of oxymoronica appear illogical or self-contradictory on the surface. But at a deeper level, they usually make a great deal of sense and are often profoundly true.

By leaving out the marginally appropriate quotations and ALL of "Doctor" Grothe's comments, this book could be reduced to half its size, and be considerably improved. ... Read more

Editorial Review

In this landmark book, Robert O. Becker, M.D., a pioneer in the field of bioelectric science, presents a fascinating look at the role electricity plays in healing, challenging the traditional mechanistic model of the body. Colorful and controversial, this is a tale of engrossing research, scientific and medical politics, and breakthrough discoveries that offer new possibilities for fighting disease and harnessing the body's healing powers. ... Read more

Reviews

The Whole Truth And Nothing But The Truth, November 28, 2003
Here is a dedicated surgeon who spent three decades doing the step-by-step research necessary to determine what causes limb regeneration. During those years he and his colleagues had to run interferance against the most hideously uninformed, petty, self-serving agencies and beaurocracies, which are often made up of other scientists. Dr. Becker was studying something very important, and his conclusions flew in the face of the conventional views of science at that time, and also of today. He was way ahead of his time.

One of the most important parts of the book was the information on how we are bombarded every day by electromagnetic radiation which has proven to be harmful, but which is DENIED harmful because of economic interests. Studies showing it is harmful are delayed or buried. As a result of this radiation across America, people suffer from all sorts of ailments that doctors are unable to diagnose.

This man is one of the true pioneers of energy medicine. At the time he was doing his research, he had no idea that the electrical signals he was detecting in the bodies of both animals and humans, were part of the body's energy system, one of which is the Meridian system (along which acupoints are located). Against professional backbiting and the loss of all funds for further research, he persevered with his honor intact. This work was important because he was questioning why, if newts and salamanders can re-grow a limb, why can't we? If we continue to have a few scientists who buck the beaurocracy, and go public with their findings, and are able to withstand the ferocious attacks of peers and intrenched institutions, then we will have scientific progress. If not, we will continue to have most of our research projects done by mediocre follow-the-leader researchers on increasingly obscure projects which are far removed from the wholistic view of the human body that needs to be taken. I say "Bravo" to this man.

A Killer Cronology of Medicine, Healing and Regeneration, January 20, 2004
If you have not read Robert O. Becker yet you must, if you have any interest in health processes or the healing process. He was a very thorough medical researcher with a keen interest in regeneration and lays the basis of his work on a rich history of medical evolution from 2,000 BC forward. While he touches only lightly on silver, he was the first to certify that electro generated silver ions not only kill most pathogens but are also the only metallic ions to cause dedifferentiation of cells and thus rapid local regeneration. His primary application was as bimetallic (battery) implants to speed bone and other tissue healing but he opened the world to the electrical nature of cellular life processes.

Another interest I have always had was TENS or zapper units but after reading his works find 99% of applications are very risky due to mans constant desire to "make it stronger" - he found as little as a few billionths of an ampere and less then 1 volt triggered healing or regeneration and more was not only counterproductive but usually dangerous.

He gets bitter in the end, having been forced to close his lab, essentially banned from research by his peers because he moved forward too far too fast plus eventually got involved in attacking the electropollution man has introduced into our environment in the last 60 years. Our universe and thus evolutionary development are based on a low level electromagnetic environment with the dominant 10 hertz frequency of both our brains and gravity waves but man has increased the electropollution by 1,000 times,with the advent of 50/60 Hz electric lines blanketing the earth and pervase pulsed microwaves to the point we are effecting the Van Allen belt and thus weather, if not the general decline of many of mans bio-functions!

His followup book Cross Currents is slightly repetative but adds a great deal more, especially to his electropollution comcerns.

The rebirth of electrobiology, June 14, 2004
This is not an extremely technical book. You would have some trouble trying to reproduce the good doctor's experiments with nothing but this. But it is very influential, and very interesting. A collection of the Biological works of Robert Becker would not only get 5 stars from me, but would be the greatest scientific work of the 20th century, with the POSSIBLE exception of Einstein's "Collected Works on Relativity". Yes, Becker is that good.

My first exposure to Becker was a relatively unimpressive interview on 60 minutes when I was a boy. In college I watched this man's work almost singlehandedly bring back electrobiology, which (so said the books printed in the 80's) was dead. There is still much to do in this field. It's rare for an MD (no, he is not a PhD) to be able to figure these things out without having someone else tell it to him. That's a compliment, by the way. Hell, MD's keep saying the Atkins diet won't work, when bodybuilders and wrestlers have been using the same principles very successfully for decades. They just aren't progressive thinkers for the most part, but this guy has more to say (that you need to hear) than any PhD around today.

His early article in the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery(an early inspiration for my thesis) is cited here, as are several of his later articles, so it gives you leads to follow. If you are a scientist or are studying to be one, I recomend this as something very important to read between semesters. If you are a laymen that is either interested in science or just worried about the potential hazards of electromagnetic pollution, I recomend it as a starting point.

Excellent start of the field..., March 25, 2003
This book finally leads medicine (and biology) from the early 1800's into the 21st century. That is, these areas have been stuck in a mechanistic, chemical-based view of how the body works since they elected to ignore Maxwell's work - work that has lead to all of the electrical gadgets and technology we all love so dearly.

For some reason those in who study life have elected to ignore Maxwell's work and concentrate on chemical reactions. As was pointed out back in the 1920's (and earlier even) this approach precludes life so it is no wonder that medicine has not advanced very far.

Becker lays the groundwork for understanding ancient traditions such as Qigong (the Taoists certainly understood the concept of the energetic body) in addition to exposing the widespread pollution we are now exposed to. One wonders when people will wake up and realize that the electromagnetic pollution is no doubt doing at least as much as the chemical pollution in causing changes to the planet's biosphere.

Excellent book in addition to the newer "Cross Currents".

Must Read For Any MD/Researcher/Engineer Worth Their Salt, June 9, 2004
"The Body Electric" (1) and "Cross Currents" (2)These books are the basis for electro-medicine good/harmful effects. They (the first one especially) provide cogent explanations on the cancer
mechanisms; bone/tissue/organ regeneration and electromagnetic effects. One can deduce how wrong and primitive mainstream thinking is in these matters.

I think these books should be required reading by any MD/researcher/engineer worth her/his salt.

Incidentally Dr. Becker, far ahead of his time, is the king of stem cell research, however, he was hounded by the mainstream as his research would have put much of the wrong headed & self serving research funding in jeopardy and he hardly ever gets credit for his ground breaking work.

Regenerative Science, January 1, 2006
Electric current, nerves, and dedifferentiated cells form blastama that will different into tissue, bones, and organs. Becker discovered negative charged electric current after limb injury. He observed tissue repair for CNS, Brain, Bone, and heart in Salamander specimens. The heart of regenerative technology is the ability too create artifical dedifferentiation. Current causes the puromycin blockage to be lifted. The cells differentiate into new tissue and bone structures in the damaged area. The electric forces unlock the repressed genes. Mammals followed a similar pattern, Blastemas form around electrodes flowing with low current and redifferentiation proceed into tissue regeneration. Becker used Rats too test out the idea. The rat had regrown a shft of bone extending from the severed humerous, new muscle, and new nerve. At least ten different kinds of cells had differentiated out from the blastema. The regeneration was not complete but offered promising potential for complete regeneration in the future.

By mid-1978 Becker had successfully treated fourteen osteomyelitis patients with positive silver mesh wire. Five of them had healed nonunions. The silver mesh wire had stimulated bone-forming cells, cured stubborn infections from all kinds of bacteria, and stimulated healing in skin and other soft tissues.

Cartiage damage from arthritis. Becker reasoned that since cartiage was made from one kind of cells they could get it to regenerate. A orthopedic surgeon removed the cartilage layer from one side fo the femar at the knee of a white rabbit. They then implanted silver-platinum couplings into the bone and extending to the region where the cartilage was removed. All rabbit great improved repair. However, two of the rabbits completely healed with hyaline cartilage just like the original material.

The Lazus heart involved the surgical removal of the scar tissue, placing an electrod at the damage site, injecting embroyonic stem cells and sealing the region with a tissue patch. Beck seemed hopeful that one day the procedure would be used to heal massive heart damage.

Spinal cord injury involved debridement of the cord ends, injecting cutured embryonal ependymal cells, and a ectrode to DC generator, close the wound an allow regenerating between the cord ends.

The book is profound in research and hypotheses., February 10, 1999
This is a book that will enlighten a lay person that has limited knowledge in the sciences and interest the educated. It focuses on: Regeneration, Politics in Medicine, and Electromagnetic pollution. It slows down a bit when the author chooses to voice his opinions on politics in the medical field, but quickly picks up in the end when he explores the effects of electro-magnetic fields on the human body. I recommend this book because, in short, I found it very interesting.

An exploration into the mysteries of life., November 3, 1998
Robert O. Becker, the 20th century pioneer of research in bioelectric phenomena, does a masterful job of leading the reader into the invisible yet profound world of electromagnetism and its effect on all living organisms. At times awe-inspiring, at others frightening, Becker ends his book with more questions posed than answered, both in the realm of medical implications of tissue regeneration and in the realm of electropollution and its possible ramifications for our industrialized society. An excellent book for the intellectually curious.

Fantastic book, truly enlightning..., March 12, 2001
"The Body Electric" is a ground-breaking dissertation on human health as it relates to small electrical fields. Being a scientist, I was suspicious of the book's initial hypothesis, but I was later convinced by the overwhelming clinical data provided in the book. Very well written, easy to read, and extremely valuable. I highly recommend this book.

Amazingly good book!!, April 7, 2001
I first read this book nearly 10 years ago and it started me down a path of exploration that hasn't ended yet. Read it, and then look at its bibliography, and read a few of those books. I first picked it up because it was quoted in another book I love. I have no technical training in this area but I understood it and loved it. Very mind expanding!!! ... Read more

Editorial Review

The Large Hadron Collider is the biggest, and by far the most powerful, machine ever built. A project of CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, its audacious purpose is to re-create, in a 16.5-mile-long circular tunnel under the French-Swiss countryside, the immensely hot and dense conditions that existed some 13.7 billion years ago within the first trillionth of a second after the fiery birth of our universe. The collider is now crashing protons at record energy levels never created by scientists before, and it will reach even higher levels by 2013. Its superconducting magnets guide two beams of protons in opposite directions around the track. After accelerating the beams to 99.9999991 percent of the speed of light, it collides the protons head-on, annihilating them in a flash of energy sufficient—in accordance with Einstein’s elegant statement of mass-energy equivalence, E=mc2—to coalesce into a shower of particles and phenomena that have not existed since the first moments of creation. Within the LHC’s detectors, scientists hope to see empirical confirmation of key theories in physics and cosmology.

In telling the story of what is perhaps the most anticipated experiment in the history of science, Amir D. Aczel takes us inside the control rooms at CERN at key moments when an international team of top researchers begins to discover whether this multibillion-euro investment will fulfill its spectacular promise. Through the eyes and words of the men and women who conceived and built CERN and the LHC—and with the same clarity and depth of knowledge he demonstrated in the bestselling Fermat’s Last Theorem—Aczel enriches all of us with a firm grounding in the scientific concepts we will need to appreciate the discoveries that will almost certainly spring forth when the full power of this great machine is finally unleashed.

Will the Higgs boson make its breathlessly awaited appearance, confirming at last the Standard Model of particles and their interactions that is among the great theoretical achievements of twentieth-century physics? Will the hidden dimensions posited by string theory be revealed? Will we at last identify the nature of the dark matter that makes up more than 90 percent of the cosmos? With Present at the Creation, written by one of today’s finest popular interpreters of basic science, we can all follow the progress of an experiment that promises to greatly satisfy the curiosity of anyone who ever concurred with Einstein when he said, “I want to know God’s thoughts—the rest is details.” ... Read more

Reviews

Particle Physics for the Curious, October 25, 2010
The completion of repairs to CERN's new supercollider has resulted in a wealth of general science offerings devoted to the attempt to explain humanity's most expensive and complicated machine. It is quite clear that a number of publishers are hoping to ride an anticipated wave of publicity to great profit--if and when the Higgs boson is discovered. Having previously tackled several of the related books, I am pleased to say that this volume is one of Dr. Aczel's best efforts; it provides an excellent road map to the intricacies of the standard model--which I now understand a bit better than before--and provides both a more informative and more entertaining read than its competition. To be sure, this is no replacement for a text nor should anyone think of it in that light; rather, it is a story about discovery.

To even begin to intelligently discuss the science that makes the supercollider relevant requires massive amounts of backstory. The reader must be introduced to fantastically complex theoretical musings and, I think some editor somewhere has dictated that no equations may be used, although a few of them crept into the appendix. Here is where Dr. Aczel's effort is superior. His recital of the basic underlying scientific principles has all the hallmarks of a capable lecturer--other authors in this area focus almost entirely on their unique and valuable contributions to the science in such a way that makes an understanding of the whole picture somewhat difficult, but this more general work is better able to convey the sense of wonder and shared discovery that motivates scientists to keep digging deeper into nature's inner workings.

Now, I grant that perhaps having read several similar books my understanding was primed to better receive this volume; however, I believe that independently of the other offerings, this work does a better job of telling a story and teaching the science. It can always be done better and, frankly, much of it just makes my head spin. Yet because this book can take such an esoteric topic and leave you interested in learning more, the author is to be commended.

Highly Recommended

Aczel's PRESENT AT THE CREATION celebrates life, October 13, 2010
It is obvious in talking with bestselling author Amir Aczel on my radio show that he has a real passion for life, and it would be impossible to read his newest book PRESENT AT THE CREATION and not realize that he has just as much passion about math and the world around us. The book takes us into unprecedented access of the mechanism that explores the world that lies beyond what we see with the naked eye, and help us to realize really how small and insignificant we are.

If you are a lover of science and curious about the lives of those who are giving us the knowledge of the world we take for granted, then PRESENT AT THE CREATION is a book you definitely want to take your time and enjoy. ... Read more

Editorial Review

"What happens when we die? Does the light just go out and that's that—the million-year nap? Or will some part of my personality, my me-ness persist? . . . What will I do all day? Is there a place to plug in my laptop?" In an attempt to find out, Mary Roach brings her tireless curiosity to bear on an array of soul-searchers: scientists, schemers, engineers, mediums, all trying to prove (or disprove) that life goes on after we die. ... Read more

Reviews

Enjoyable although not quite as sharp as "STIFF", February 11, 2006
People frequently confuse a breezy style, humor and ability to entertain with being superficial. While Mary Roach's latest book isn't quite as compelling as "Stiff" it's an enjoyable journey one step beyond. When Roach is serious (which pops up between very funny quips)she asks some important questions about the afterlife, our perception of it, ghosts and reincarnation. Perhaps it's the subtitle that disappoints people but having read "Stiff" I knew what to expect. If you come to this book ignoring the subtitle (this skeptical humorist tackles the afterlife and science although more about that later with a sense of humor but doesn't quantify the afterlife with science herself).

Roach asks some penetrating questions with humor. For example, she discusses an author that discusses reincarnation, birthmarks and how a pregnant woman can see the corpse of someone. The soul of the slain man turns up in her child. Also, she discusses a pretty creative idea--emotional imprinting from an event that can leave birthmarks on the skin of the unborn creating a duplicate of a birthmark from the person whose soul has flown into the unborn child. She goes on a journey to investigate a family that claims their child has memories from a previous life and while going as an unbiased observer using humor and logic to deflate some of these unusual claims.

Yet she's always hopeful. She relates the story of a computer that is used for near death experiences. She discusses Professor Bruce Greyson's experiment in near death experiences using a computer with images that can only be seen if you were hovering below the ceiling. Patients that have had defibrillators put in have their hearts stopped to see if their defibrillators are working (they should restart the patient's heart). Many people claim to have seen the attempt to revive them floating above their body. If that's the case they should be able to see the computer screen and tell Greyson what images are on it. She also takes a look at cases involving ghosts and other related areas.

Roach focuses on the scientific approaches taken by various people to try and verify the afterlife's existence. This isn't a "science vs. faith" argument. Instead, this is an attempt to see if the scientific approach works or not in these various experiments. Roach asks some practical and hard questions about these various experiments, theories and researchers. The subject is more elusive here than in "Stiff" for obvious reasons. This isn't a book about faith. Roach is trying to find some solid basis for faith in the afterlife and that is going to continue to be challenging.

Roach discusses in her afterword that she starts all of her books in complete ignorence of the subject. Does that provide her with a sense of the impartial attitude that journalists need to write material like this? I'm not sure but it does allow errors, holes and mistakes to occur. It also means that she really doesn't have a whole lot to prove. Regardless of whether "Spook" is as balanced and informed as it should be Roach asks some provocative questions and tries to find answers. You may not be enlightened but you will be entertained and the questions that Roach asks are always interesting. While the answers don't always hold up to scrutiny Roach's journey to discovery is always entertaining.

Big Subject, Nice Attempt, Not Worth It, January 11, 2006
I can see where Ms. Roach probably found herself a bit cornered while exploring the subject of life after death. First, she doesn't want to turn this book into a sprawling tome that explores the meaning of human existence. She also doesn't want to go down the long road of exploring every spiritual quest ever taken on by humanity. Then there are considerations regarding strongly held religious feelings; you don't want to step on the wrong toes. So, I think Ms. Roach took the right approach to the book in exploring a few areas of possible interest, looking at them as objectively as possible and seeing if anything raises an eyebrow.

So, the shortcomings of "Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife" may not be so much the fault of the author. If you've ever watched a Bigfoot documentary, you know that you're going to be disappointed if you expect some hunter to emerge from the woods with an eight foot tall ape-man on a leash. Also, you know that the blurry footage is a guy in a gorilla suit, no matter how much you'd like to believe otherwise. These documentaries always jazz up the footage with a little editing and some scary music. That's because simply showing how unrealistic it is to believe in Bigfoot after all this time doesn't make for entertaining viewing. They're taking advantage of us because we want to be taken advantage of, just a little.

Mary Roach respects us more than that and gives us what she can. Unfortunately, it doesn't make for very entertaining reading. The one thing that was really missing for me was that feeling of "Aha!". I understood that Ms. Roach couldn't take on everything regarding the subject but I wished it had been a little wider in scope. I would've liked a little more philosophical exploration and perhaps a bit of sociological and psychological examination regarding our views on death. I'm not suggesting Roach should have done an Elizabeth Kubler Ross examination on the process of dying or re-written "Being and Nothingness", but something to chew on in those areas wouldn't have been bad.

I think there might have been a little more to touch on regarding the subject other than debunking soul weighers and psychic mediums. For instance, the culturally independent archetypes that we all share, or the discoveries in physics, mathematics, biology and philosophy that entice us to believe that there may be a God or at least a design. Then again, this book isn't called "Science tackles God", its called "Science tackles the Afterlife", but the discussion of one seems to so inevitably tie into the other, which once again leads to the complications I mentioned above.

I can't let the author completely off the hook, though. "Spook" pales in comparison to Carl Sagan's "The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark", a book that deals with similar subject matter, and more, in a more thought provoking manner. I also have a new rule regarding review snippets claiming a book to be "Hillarious!"; they are never "Hillarious!". I think "Hillarious!" is book-critic speak for "the author makes occasional off-the-cuff comments." Then again, Roach didn't need to re-write "The Demon Haunted World" and I don't get the impression that she would claim herself to be "hillarious!" Perhaps my greatest criticism of Roach's approach is that she sacrifices some of the exploration previously mentioned for long, detailed accountings of her research. I think she could have convinced the reader that she thoroughly explored the subject without giving us so much detail. She may have mistaken our enthusiasm for her own when it came to the minutiae of her subject. The few inset diagrams and photos never seem to get to the heart of what we want drawn out. Maybe she could have even stepped on a toe or two. Also, I don't know that science tackles the afterlife so much in "Spook" as does a healthy skepiticism. This is another trap; you really can't "prove" a negative.

"Tackling the afterlife" may look like a wellspring to a writer looking for a subject, but it turns into a blind alley. I can't say that its entirely the author's fault, and I wouldn't dismiss other work from Mary Roach, but "Spook" never really finds its footing. I don't think that anyone expects to find the truth of our human destiny in this book, but they won't find much else, either. Inviting as this book may seem, both skeptics and those looking for something more than life has to offer will be disappointed.

Tasty froth on some weak beer, January 3, 2006
If you're tuned in to her boisterous, quirky sense of humor, you'll find Mary Roach's book will take you on a sprightly voyage around the earthly borders of the afterlife. Don't expect any serious examination of whether there is or can be any real evidence of something beyond those borders, and you'll enjoy the excursion.

Building on the success of _Stiff_, her well-received survey on the world of corpses, our author advanced to the obvious next stage. She set out to write a book about secular investigations into the hereafter, beginning from a state of utter ignorance and friendly skepticism. She lets us look over her shoulder as she pokes around rather randomly into reincarnation research in India, the vaginal and gastric origins of ectoplasm, the accuracy of industrial scales used to weigh the soul, near death experiences, tape recordings of the long-dead in Donner Pass, and testimony from a ghost once allowed into evidence by a North Carolina court. She has a great deal of fun, much of it gossipy, some of it delightedly gross. The list of eminent men and women who have tried to cage and measure spirits is long. (I had no idea that Alexander Graham Bell's Mr. Watson was a devotee of spirit voices plucked from the ether.)

Ms Roach is game for pretty much anything, enrolling for example in a school for mediums. Skepticism wins almost every round, though never too decisively, which might spoil the party. The most interesting research is into possible correlations between hauntings and (1) infrasound or (2) EMF, each of which can induce a sense of uncanniness in a certain percentage of the population.

In sum, you will learn nothing substantial from the book, but it's not intended to resolve any serious questions. It's an entertaining, anecdote packed ramble through some of the fringe science community's haunted attics, under the aegis of a tour guide whose chatty, brassy style will turn off some tourists and enchant many others.

Not as good as Stiff, October 17, 2005
For me, this book was okay. The source of my disatisfaction is what caused one reviewer here to give the book 5 stars. The writing was beautiful, but never said much. I almost wonder if Roach was afraid to go any deeper than a superficial analysis, like she was holding back or holding out.

The information introduced is googleable and, in that sense, the book really doesn't add to the topic. It's a basic primer, that leaves you wanting more.

I also would have liked pictures. At one point, I fanned through the book hoping there would be pictures to go with the prose. There weren't and I really feel this book would've benefited from some visual aids.

The book is okay. The writing is beautiful, Roach has a gift for prose, but in this case, not for the subject.

Another One Hit Out of the Park, October 19, 2005
Whatever the topic or format, Ms. Roach brings to her work a wonderfully wry sense of irony. This book is no exception; it will keep you laughing and leave you wondering how we humans survive our own bizarre preoccupations and ambitions. Ms. Roach also has a unique gift of compassion and empathy, seasoned with rigorous skepticism, and is apparently completely without pretense. She gets quickly to the heart of any matter without ever losing heart or rubbing the noses of fools in their own folly.

This book is similar in format to her first book, Stiff; it is comprised of a series of chapters in which Ms. Roach looks over someone's shoulder as that person goes about business. In Stiff, we learned of the many ways cadavers are used; in Spook, we learn of attempts to validate the existence and nature of the soul, or some entity that endures beyond a single body's mortal life. While the subjects in Stiff were mostly to be admired for pursuing valuable science no matter how revolting, the subjects in this book are often far afield anything most readers would call science or, in some cases, reality. To appreciate the work of the denizens of Spook, one must value the subjects for their hearts and aspirations instead of appreciating their scientific contributions.

In Stiff, each chapter brought us to a new and different question of scientific process and ethics. In every new setting, a remarkable wealth of collateral information, fascinating asides, and thoughtful consideration illuminated the purpose and value of some individual's unique and arcane pursuit. Spook is similarly packed with information, all of it delightful and surprising. Due to the nature of the topic, the author's research took her to a far broader set of disciplines than just science and ethics. This is truly a work of cultural history and psychology as well as a study of how people use and abuse scientific methods.

Whether your background and affinities lean towards or away from science, this book will entertain and inform you. It is a delightful consideration of, and example of, the human capacity to explore, connect, hope, dream and laugh.

Anything But Impartial, June 4, 2006
I had expected this book to present an unbiased review of scientific efforts to establish proof of the existence of the soul. However, this book is highly biased in its presentation. Possible non-supernatural explanations get a great deal of latitude, whereas she finds excuses to dismiss any evidence that suggests that the soul does exist.

As an example of a non-supernatural explanation, Roach reports on the research of Vic Tandy, who hypothesizes that reports of ghosts are due to people's reactions to very low-frequency sound waves - infrasound. The one haunted site that Roach reports the results from, a cellar under the Coventry Tourist Information Center, does not have any infrasonic readings. There are only infrasound readings in the hallway outside the cellar. Now, if this were the reverse situation (proof of the existence of the soul), Roach would call the experiment a failure and move on. Not here. Instead, she reports Tandy's explanation that people aren't inclined to report ghosts in a well-lit hallway and that they prefer the idea of ghosts being in 14th century cellars. That is just hand-waving, not a scientific explanation either for or against the hypothesis. She also goes on at length comparing how only small numbers of people sense either the ghost or the infrasound (this does not establish a causal equivalence, though that seems to be her implication).

On the other hand, when it came to mediums, Roach was very restrictive in what she would consider sufficiently "correct". In a reading with Allison Dubois (the real life medium that the television show Medium is based on), Roach attempts to connect with her deceased mother. Near the end of the session, Dubois says, "I'm showing a metal hourglass, that you turn over. Does your brother have one?" Indeed, Roach's brother collects hourglasses. However, although Roach admits being impressed by the accuracy of the statement, Roach has all sorts of issues with Dubois' references to the letter 'K' (Roach's middle name is Catherine with a 'C') and her mother's reference to "the man that still has the ring on his finger for her." Her dad never wore a wedding ring. It never seems to occur to Roach that some things might be symbolic rather than literal. And even with the hourglass (which is very specific and certainly cannot be faulted as being a general statement that could be attributed to virtually anyone), Roach complains that it seems an odd image for her mother to send to her. Why not send her birth date or address?

Another annoying example was the way Roach dismissed a study on out-of-body projection that had had positive results (144 hits and 83 misses - much better than random chance). The researcher (Osis) and the man doing the projection (Tanous) had both died since the study came out, so she couldn't interview them. Roach summarizes the whole thing by saying, "So we are left to conclude that either Tanous was some sort of bizarre on-call living ghost, or Osis was a deluded or sloppy researcher." Maybe Roach was just trying to be humorous (as she does with flip comments throughout the book - and many of them ARE really funny), but in this case it just struck me as a mean put-down for either possible interpretation.

I think that the humorous aspect of the book played a huge role in the examples that Roach chose to include. After all, talking about attempts to weigh the soul allowed her to include all manner of bizarre anecdotal material, which provided rich sources for flip remarks. The same with the chapters on ectoplasm and going to a school on mediumship. Perhaps because this was the first book I'd read by Mary Roach, I had certain expectations for a serious exploration of the material that were not met. I read the book through to the end (though at times I debated just chucking it) because most of the cases were interesting on some level. So, if you want a whimsical, humorous, pseudo-scientific discussion of research efforts into the afterlife, you may enjoy reading this book.

Grow up, Mary, April 22, 2008
Let me begin by saying that Mary Roach is an excellent researcher and a deft writer. That's the good news. The bad news is that she is immature and there is way too much Mary in this book. Reading this book is like spending an afternoon with a precocious 12 year old boy. At first she is somewhat amusing, but quickly becomes ill-mannered, whiny, and rude. By the end of the afternoon, you are quite eager to return the boorish, annoying little brat to her parents. She has a mean streak, and when I say mean I'm talking Ann Coulter-mean. She makes fun of people's names, looks, dress, and how they talk. (As a researcher, this shows terribly bad form--you do not insult those who have been kind enough to help you write the book). She also an unsettling and frequent habit of including something gross every chance she gets. I lost count of the number of times she digressed into some tangent involving bodily functions. Then she has the nerve to write something like, "It's always underpants with these guys." No, Mary, it's always underpants with YOU. The title of the book is meant to mislead, by the way (I'm sure Mary snickered when the publisher informed her about the chosen subtitle as she knew it would pull in the "suckers.") The title should actually be "A Skeptic's Cynical Guide to Wackos who Believe in the Afterlife." Mary should not be allowed out of her room until she becomes a grown-up.

Thoroughly Entertaining, November 15, 2005
My husband and I heard the interview with Mary Roach on NPR independently of each other. It was the first time either one of us felt compelled to buy a book immediately. We were going by a book store that night so popped in and purchased it (after much searching with staff help). Spook was not disappointing! Roach's witty but irreverent style of writing is most entertaining. She tackles, from a very unscientific position, science's search for the soul, ghosts, spiritual mediums, reincarnation, out-of-body experiences and the like. I laughed the whole time I was reading it and not until the last line do we find out if she is a believer or skeptic. I am going to recommend this to my book club even. I've already recommended it to a number of friends.

After finishing Spook, I went out and bought her book, Stiff. I enjoyed learning about what happens to cadavers but I don't think my book club would be as keen on it. It maybe a touch gory for some.

I certainly look forward to Roach's next book. My hope is that she writes about consciousness next!

Please see a comedy instructor immediately, December 27, 2007
Spook is not a book about the afterlife. It's about Mary Roach's Zany Adventures With The Afterlife!, and to enjoy it, you better enjoy Mary Roach. Otherwise, this book will annoy the hell out of you.

Spook was a disappointing read. First off, let me say that I am not a believer, so please do not count me among the handful of one star reviews below from people clearly irritated that Roach did not take their beliefs seriously.

In the book, Roach covers a spread of supernatural topics, from ectoplasm and auras to near death experiences and seances. One thing you get out of the book is that a number of ridiculous modern paranormal beliefs harken back to shoddy science of the early 1900s spiritual movement that refused to die.

However, the book was disappointing for several reasons. The first is that Mary Roach professes to know very little about the subject and, modest or not, it's pretty clear after reading it that she does in fact know very little; and that further more, she did very little more than surface investigations for this book. I imagine part of the problem is the subject matter - this stuff ISN'T very deep to begin with, and certainly has little to no scientific basis to draw from.

But, for example, at one point, Roach goes to a weekend course in communicating with the dead. She is, predictably, surrounded by kooks and nutballs all of whom think they can communicate with the dead. And then the course ends, she's learned - predictably - nothing, and that's about it from that section of the paranormal world. To the reader, the weekend was clearly a wasted trip that would result in nothing more than comic anecdotes. On top of it are a number of stories and facts clearly garnered from Google searches, which really takes away from her abilities as a researcher.

Another problem: Roach really, really needs to take a course in comedy. The subject matter she's dealing with is so zany, so ridiculous, it is simply hilarious at times by just writing down what happened. Instead, Roach sticks in very, very obvious and forced jokes that really do nothing but detract for the humor at play. It's annoying at times, like a third rate Dave Barry. It would be like writing about people who bathe in Jello, then making a joke about how dumb they are for bathing in Jello. You don't have to - the reality is far funnier than any joke could be.

Overall, it's a scattered, fluffy read that serves more for a series of comic (yet not so comical) essays on crazy, zany paranormal stuff starring Mary Roach. Read it if you want a very light primer, but beware the horrible, horrible jokes to come.

Science writer researches the afterlife, July 30, 2006
Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife. Mary Roach

Spook provides a light-hearted look at the current status of research into the existence and survivability of the soul. Mary Roach calls it "a book for people who would like very much to believe in a soul and in an afterlife for it to hang around in, but who have trouble accepting these things on faith." At the end of the book, she admits that she began this project "from a state of near absolute ignorance." This is one of the book's most endearing features, since the reader gets a glimpse of how Ms. Roach goes about researching a topic.

The book does not end up with a definitive answer. If science had proof for or against the afterlife, it would have been big news. So this is an exploration of the current state of the research. The author claims that she does not approach the topic as a debunking skeptic, but she does throw in a lot of humorous asides in an attempt to amuse as well as explore.

Chapter One, "You Again," is about reincarnation. Ms. Roach goes to India for a week to visit Kirti S. Rawat, director of the International Center for Survival. Her purpose is to accompany him as he examines a claimed case of reincarnation. She meets the child, his family, and the family of the deceased man that the child claims to be. She also runs into cultural differences in a society where many people believe in reincarnation and don't need scientific proof.

The second chapter is a historic discussion on past research by people who believed there was a soul. Questions such as whether the soul came from the sperm or the ovum, or whether it entered the fetus at some point in its development are reviewed. Also looked at are those who searched for the exact bodily organ that contained soul.

"How to Weigh a Soul" is the third chapter. It explores the research done to see if the soul has weight. If so, can a drop in weight at death be proof of the existence of the soul leaving? The famous experiment by Duncan Macdougall that determined the soul weighs 21 grams is reviewed as well as other more recent attempts. The fourth chapter goes on to look at the attempts to photograph or capture an image of the soul as it leaves the body.

The next couple of chapters delve into the claims of mediums who say they can establish communication with departed spirits. Chapter 5 is a history of the attempts by mediums to produce ectoplasm, a physical manifestation of spirit energy. Chapter 6 then goes on to look at current research with gifted mediums at the VERITAS Research Program of the University of Arizona conducted by Gary Schwartz. This is followed by the author taking a Fundamentals of Mediumship course at Arthur Findlay College in England.

Chapter 8 "Can You Hear Me Now?" looks into attempts to use technology to establish communication with dead souls. EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) on tape recorders and radio static is the current trend, but Ms. Roach also looks into the history of this field.

Chapter 9 begins a section where Ms. Roach looks to see if physical phenomena, rather than spirits, may cause the feelings of contact with the beyond. First she visits Dr. Michael Persinger at the Consciousness Research Lab at Laurentian University in Sudbury Ontario. He is studying the ability of complex electromagnetic fields to produce hallucinations that might resemble contact with the dead. Chapter 10 looks into whether low frequency sound waves (10 - 20 hertz) could do the same thing. Ms. Roach visits Vic Tandy who teaches at Coventry University whose research is in this area.

Chapter 11 is my personal favorite. It deals with a 1925 North Carolina ghost who appeared to his son to tell him where to find the most recent version of his will. The case went to court and the new will was accepted by the family. Both the old and new wills were on file in the courthouse, and Ms. Roach brings in the president of the American Society of Questioned Document Examiners. Although the family decided to accept the new will, it turns out to be a poor quality forgery. Yet the story of family intrigue is so interesting that the chapter left me wanting someone to write more about this case.

The last chapter looks into what Mary Roach feels is the most promising of the current research to prove the existence of the soul. Based on the reports of people who have had Near Death Experiences (NDEs) who claim they felt themselves rising out of their bodies and looking down on the room they are in, this research places an object that can only be seen from the ceiling in rooms where people might possibly experience an NDE. Interviews are then conducted to see if they experienced an NDE and saw the object. This research is being conducted by Bruce Greyson at the University of Virginia.

The books ends with a 13 page bibliography that goes chapter by chapter through the resources Mary Roach used for the book. Some may criticize her for attempting to write such a book without being an expert in the field. I find that her newness to the topic gives her a fresh unbiased perspective. However, I feel that she attempts to cover her inexperience with humor that sometimes detracts from the work. If you can endure the jokes, the information provided is well presented. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Since Peter H. Rossi, Mark W. Lipsey, and Howard E. Freeman first published Evaluation: A Systematic Approach, more than 90,000 readers have considered it the premier text on how to design, implement, and appraise social programs through evaluation. In this, the completely revised Seventh Edition, authors Rossi and Lipsey include the latest techniques and approaches to evaluation as well as guidelines to tailor evaluations to fit programs and social contexts.

This bestselling text covers the full range of evaluation topics, including

* Framing evaluation questions

* Uncovering program theory

* Studying implementation

* Designing impact assessments

* Assessing program costs and benefits

* Understanding the politics of evaluating

With decades of hands-on experience conducting evaluations, the authors provide scores of examples to help students understand how evaluators deal with various critical issues. They include a glossary of key terms and concepts, making this the most comprehensive and authoritative evaluation text available.

 Thoroughly revised, the Seventh Edition now includes

 * Substantially more attention to outcome measurement

* Lengthy discussions of program theory, including a section about detecting program effects and interpreting their practical significance

* An augmented and updated discussion of major evaluation designs

* A detailed exposition of meta-analysis as an approach to the synthesis of evaluation studies

* Alternative approaches to evaluation

* Examples of successful evaluations

* Discussions of the political and social contexts of evaluation

Reviews

A primo primer, August 18, 2006
This book works well as an introductory textbook to the field of Evaluation -- including a brief history of its origins, essential components of evaluation, theory, and designs.

If you are looking for a class in Evaluation 101, or a refresher course on the principles of evaluation, this is a good textbook for you.

I am in the process of reading the 6th edition cover to cover (something I never do), and have hopped on line to order the latest edition so that I can upgrade.

Extremely helpful text!, June 4, 2005
It is always hard to keep personal bias out of the picture when evaluating an employee or coworker. This book understands that concept and goes beyond other books to demonstrate exactly how to do just that!

Good for the basics, March 9, 2009
While this is a good resource book to sit on the shelf, it is not an interesting, insightful, or enjoyable read. It is one of the most boring textbooks I have ever had to read. My professor was right: I will use this when I am a practitioner, but as a student, it is tough to get through. There are MANY, MANY spelling mistakes. Whoever edited this book should be ashamed. I can't wait until I am done this class so i never have to read through the book again. STUDENT TIP: Don't bother reading each chapter in its entirety; only read the summaries at the end of each chapter.

Systematic Approach, January 3, 2007
I found this book to be moderately helpful, although I found the format to be somewhat cubersome and confusing. In order to successfully write an evaluation proposal I had to use this book in tandem with other resources. There are plenty of foundations that offer step-by-step guidelines for conducting an evaluation, for free. This book is not worth its cost.

Evaluation, July 30, 2009
This book was informative, but I found it difficult to read. There was a lot of information I felt was repeated or dragged out unnecessarily.

A large and bloated sleep-inducing book, December 7, 2004
The prose in this book is so convoluted and each point takes so long to develop that you'll be soon asleep.

What's worse, the book is neither a solid academic overview of the field nor is it a useful handbook for the practitioner.

Rossi and his co-authors make many attempts to give us the grand theoretical frameworks but they quickly get lost in qualifying themselves into a tepid soup in which nothing is ever black or white, hot or cold, true or false.

Although there are some capsule summaries and references to real programmes, these callouts are helpful only to break the tedium. They are not presented in sufficient detail that normal people could ever learn from them. There is never any clear instruction about how one should begin an evaluation or how one should proceed.

Possibly this book is useful for an intermediate-to-advanced evaluation practitioner who is interested in comparing his broad generalizations with Rossi's.

Boring, February 7, 2008
After about five pages of elementary school level material and repetitive, wordy, boring text that said almost nothing of substance I skipped the first three chapters (because skimming them revealed more of the same). I think some of the later chapters might be more useful but I'm up to chapter 6 and so far have underlined about three pieces of text that might be worth referring back to. The rest is filler.

Delightful sense of humor, February 5, 2009
Rossi has a sense of humor that he shares in his book. I laughed outloud. For a dry toast title, it was not too hard to read. By the way, if you are in a hurry, read chapter 13 first.

Evaluation, February 23, 2008
It is an excellent text both as a University course requirement and for social elevation. The authors provide such a wide array of cases in the texts that are social and policy issues in the United States that are also issues in Canada and other parts of the world. The notion of greater good of the society is so valuable as to raise the social consience. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Qualitative Research Design: An Interactive Approach, Second Edition provides researchers and students with a user-friendly, step-by-step guide to planning qualitative research. A bestseller in its First Edition, this invaluable book presents an innovative approach to the components of design and how they interact with each other. The text presents a clear strategy for creating coherent and workable relationships among these design components and highlights key design issues. Based on a course the author taught for seven years at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, the work is written in an informal, jargon-free style and incorporates many examples and hands-on exercises.
... Read more

Reviews

Maxwell provides roadmap, January 27, 2001
Having acquired a veritable library of qualitative methods books and journal articles, I still felt like I was floundering. This book gave me not only a new and more valuable way of thinking about what I was doing, but a step-by-step action guide, practical, practicable, and with a depth (both explicated and in specific references) that makes me much more confident about eventual orals. Short and extremely sweet!

Buy this book!, January 10, 2001
I and several of my compatriots found this text to be a practical island in an overwhelming and contradictory sea of theory. It's short, eminently readable, and especially useful for those struggling to write a qualitative dissertation proposal. Maxwell's liberating revision of the usual ponderous "lit review" to the actually applicable "research context" is in itself worth the purchase price.

has no equal., April 26, 2007
This brief, thorough, and engaging introduction to qualitative research design has no equal. Maxwell avoids the superficial and confused paradigm discussions that so many qualitative authors engage in. He takes a pragmatic and rigorous approach that builds on the potential strengths of qualitative research while promoting well-accepted principles of scientific validity and integrity.

The chapter on validity is especially noteworthy, recognizing that "Validity is a goal not a product; it is never something that can be proven or taken for granted" and that "Validity is also relative: It has to be assessed in relationship to the purposes and circumstances of the research, rather than being a context-independent property of methods or conclusions. Finally validity threats are made implausible by evidence not methods; methods are only a way of getting evidence that can help you rule out these threats." Amen.

Great for your dissertation proposal!, October 9, 2007
This was by far the most useful resource that I found for my dissertation proposal. Maxwell's writing is clear, smart, and informative. The sample proposal in the back of the book was extremely useful as well.

Easy to Read, March 17, 2006
This is the best book I have found that describes, in simple easy to read language, how to design qualitative research. I enjoyed reading it. The exercises included throughout the book facilitated my learning. I highly recommend it!

Very good book, November 24, 2010
This is an awesome book. I love how everything is easy to understand. I love the way the author laid out the details and explained concepts. The examples are very helpful & so are the diagrams. Also, the fact that the book is small makes it approachable even though some of the material may be challenging. I would recommend this book to both students learning qualitative design for the first time and professors who want a good book for their students.

Great little book, September 16, 2010
What's amazing to me about this book is how well it fits all the essential about qualitative research into a relatively few amount of pages.
It's clear and fairly simple, but respects the complexities involved. A great place to start for work on a research paper or dissertation.
Pound for pound, I can't think of a better book on the topic.

Qualitative Reseach Design: An Interactive Approach, May 21, 2010
Joseph Maxwell is always engaging regardless of the topic. Very insightful and helpful as I work toward the completion of my degree.

Qualitative Research Design : An Interactive Approach (Applied Social Research Methods), February 18, 2006
The book was delivered on time and the quality of the book is great. ... Read more

Editorial Review

"[A] distillation of a decade of exploration, magnificently illustrated and eloquently written. Some will treasure World Ocean Census as a valuable reference, others as a place to find white-knuckle adventures."

-- From the foreword by Sylvia Earle

The Census of Marine Life was launched in 2000 with the goal of producing the first-ever ocean census by 2010. Two thousand scientists from 82 nations agreed to the mandate to answer three important questions:

• What once lived in the global ocean?
• What is living there now?
• What will live there in the future?

With the census nearing completion, scientists around the world will inherit critical data that will be studied for decades to come. This data will be a basis for answering such simple questions as "What will become of sharks, whales, reefs and salmon?"

This book deals with the adventures and experiences of the Census of Marine Life and the process of gathering the data, revealing the stories behind the science. The authors detail the most fascinating findings and exciting discoveries -- the thrills encountered and the difficulties overcome -- all illustrated with fabulous images captured during the project's explorations.

The text readily engages the reader, and the photographs are as beautiful as they are accurate. The information is comprehensive, compelling and current, and it represents an enormous group effort by some of the world's leading scientists.

The organization of the book follows the three-part census mandate. Individual sections focus on a range of topics, from the logistics of the census to the space-age technology used to project the uncertain future of the world's oceans. The book is fully illustrated and provides informative captions and sidebars of data.

World Ocean Census is a unique record of a monumental global undertaking, worthy of a wide audience with a variety of interests.

Reviews

Science as adventure, October 27, 2009
I first heard about the Census on Marine Life in the news this past summer. So I was interested to come across this book. Apparently this is the "official" book (at least for non-scientists) about the census. It's quite something, when you think about it, the idea of counting every species in the ocean.

This is a gorgeous book. What I like is that not only is it packed with beautiful pictures of the fish and marine creatures they found it's also full of pictures and stories of the expeditions. It describes the difficulties of this kind of research and the scrapes the scientists got into, almost drowning, broken equipment, Kodiaks filled with equipment floating in Antarctic waters, deep sea dives into places with absolutely no light, tagging seals that don't want to be tagged.

There's no question the ocean is Earth's unexplored frontier. It's obvious that we know very little about what is down there. There's probably a cure for cancer but we've just not found it yet.

This is part adventure, part science and you don't have to be a scientist to enjoy it. There's virtually no intimidating terminology. I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in the oceans, the environment, or marine life.

A thrilling and awe-inspiring resource., December 26, 2009
This beautiful book which reflects the ongoing work of the World Ocean Census is a must-have for any family or individual with appreciation for and curiosity about the wonders of our natural world. The photographs are stunning and the writing is accessible and fascinating. I don't think it would be possible to read this book without coming away with a renewed desire to explore the world and to take a more active part in conserving our remarkable natural resources.

Superb introduction to the ocean realm, June 17, 2010
World Ocean Census may be sort of a clumsy title for a book, but this volume on the findings of the ongoing Census of Marine Life is just wonderful. Clearly and skillfully written, the text conveys both the science and the wonder of undersea exploration. Sections on everything from ancient fisheries to how new species are named flesh out the basic narrative.
Then we get to the photos. I simply run out of superlatives in trying to describe the photographs in this book. It's not too strong to say the book reminded me, in this age of video and CGI, how evocative still photographs could be. New and weird species, photographed with astonishing clarity, pop out from almost every page. It's hard to imagine how this book could have been better. It's also hard to imagine a better book for introducing people to the facination, diversity, and fragility of the ocean world.

avid book reader/collector, December 11, 2009
Growing up near the ocean and enjoying everything it has to offer, I found this book an excellent read about the seemingly unlimited expanse and diversity of life in the oceans of the world. It is a fascinating look into all of the regions of earth's oceans, their environments and the vast array of living species that exist.

The book is both entertaining and informative from a layman's viewpoint with hundreds of beautiful photographs that enhance and enliven the authors' narratives on the particular subject matter discussed. I was drawn in by the pictures so much that I wanted to read on and learn more about just what I was looking at in the photograghs.

I really liked the glossary of terms at the end of the book,also, which defined and explained in concise sentences exactly what the word meant in the context of the subject matter.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning about marine life and about the history ,scope and future of the world's oceans and the limitless variety of marine life they contain.

Wonderful Book, September 22, 2010
This is a wonderful book -- interesting, beautiful, and well written. If you care about the condition of our planet, and are curious about the incredible creatures that inhabit our oceans, you'll love this book! ... Read more

Editorial Review

STEPHEN W. HAWKING is widely believed to be one of the world’s greatest minds: a brilliant theoretical physicist whose work helped to reconfigure models of the universe and to redefine what’s in it. Imagine sitting in a room listening to Hawking discuss these achievements and place them in historical context. It would be like hearing Christopher Columbus tell of his journeys to the New World. This book approaches that. In The Theory of Everything, Hawking presents a series of seven lectures in which he lays out, perhaps more clearly and concisely than ever, the history of the universe as we know it. These essays capture not only the brilliance of Hawking’s mind but his characteristic wit as well. A great popularizer of science as well as a brilliant scientist, Hawking believes that advances in theoretical science should be "understandable in broad principle by everyone, not just a few scientists." In this book, he offers, for all who would take it, a voyage of discovery about the cosmos and our place ... Read more

Reviews

So how *does* this relate to A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME?, November 21, 2004
"...minus several million for good thinking..."
- Zaphod Beeblebrox, THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY

The above quote (and the score I've assigned to this book) aren't in reference to the text or the author, but to the publishers. Why anyone with the brains of a sea urchin would cross Professor Hawking as they seem to have done is beyond me.

Briefly, save your money and buy THE ILLUSTRATED BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME instead of THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, even if you're a compulsive Hawking completist. Alert readers should notice that Hawking doesn't hold the copyright for THEORY OF EVERYTHING, and attempted to block its publication. It was originally titled THE CAMBRIDGE LECTURES: LIFE WORKS, and appears to have been drawn from some recordings of lectures given by the professor years ago. (See the professor's web site for details.)

The "vanilla" (i.e., not the ILLUSTRATED) THEORY OF EVERYTHING consists of an introduction, seven lectures, and an index, without *any* illustrations or diagrams. Out of curiosity, I compared a library copy of it with THE ILLUSTRATED BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME.

Unless otherwise noted, each of the 7 lectures corresponds to a chapter of the same name in BRIEF HISTORY, in some segments only with slightly different paragraphing and punctuation (and occasionally the kind of spelling errors that creep in when one transcribes audio narration to text, if I may speculate as to the cause).

I don't understand why anyone would prefer the less polished text of THEORY OF EVERYTHING to THE ILLUSTRATED BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME, which not only has updates for new areas of research, but has been revised and rearranged to explain things more gently to the layperson.

"Ideas About the Universe" is essentially an extract from "Our Picture of the Universe", the first chapter of BRIEF HISTORY, with about one sentence's worth of drift per paragraph.

BRIEF HISTORY's version of "The Expanding Universe" has a more gradual introduction to the methods of measuring distances to nearby stars, and explains technical terms that may be unfamiliar to the non-scientist, such as luminosity.

THEORY OF EVERYTHING really shows its age in "Black Holes" when compared to BRIEF HISTORY, as Hawking has not been idle in that area over the years. The illustrated edition of BRIEF HISTORY has had a fair bit of interesting material added to "Black Holes", especially regarding cosmic censorship and naked singularities (Hawking having made a few *more* bets on the subject with Preskill and Thorne, although he paid off the Cygnus X-1 wager).

"Black Holes Ain't So Black" lacks major blocks of clarification/explanation added by Hawking to the version in BRIEF HISTORY.

BRIEF HISTORY's version of "The Origin and Fate of the Universe" goes into more detail: about the kinds of particles that are predicted to have come out of the big bang, and what sort of results we'd expect to see today if the predictions hold, and the scientists who first put forward these theories. BRIEF HISTORY also contains a much longer version of the "open questions" section, leading more gradually up to the discussion of Guth's development of the inflationary model.

"The Direction of Time" corresponds to BRIEF HISTORY's "The Arrow of Time" (which is worth picking up just for the picture of the keeper of the U.S. cesium clock). BRIEF HISTORY goes into more detailed examples to explain what Hawking means by the psychological arrow of time, with the simplest kind of "computer": an abacus.

"The Theory of Everything" mainly corresponds to BRIEF HISTORY's more modestly titled "The Unification of Physics", which is much more up to date (string theories are still covered, but a lot more work has been done in that area over the years). The tail end of the lecture corresponds to the ending of BRIEF HISTORY's "Conclusion".

--

In summary, this is interesting stuff, but THE ILLUSTRATED BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME does it better.

Good introduction, but somewhat oversimplified., June 27, 2002
Stephen Hawking's The Theory of Everything is a short book that can act as an introduction to the subjects of cosmology raised by modern science, but the book is only that; I preferred his Brief History of Time to this work because it was longer, more detailed, and covered more ground. If you are looking for a very basic introduction to the current thinking of astrophysicists, this is a good book; if you really want to wrestle with the subject at length, you should buy a Brief History of Time, or one of Paul Davies works, such as About Time. If you are looking for a good lecture series on physics, Richard Feynman's Six Easy Pieces and its sequel, Six Not So Easy Pieces is really the finest of this genre.

That being said, the book does a good job in outlining the basic subject matter, discussing the development of the Big Bang theory, and the implications of both the general theory of relativity and quantum physics on the formation of the universe. Hawking is at his best when discussing singularities -- the points of the universe, such as black holes, where the laws of physics break down.

Excellent book, exceeded only by A Brief Hostory of Time, July 1, 2002
Hawking clearly fleshes out his important findings in this book, but it's essentially an abridged version of his earlier A Brief History of Time, and the recent The Universe In A Nutshell. His latest incarnation of singularity physics and grand unifying theory speculation offers no new research from the last three or so years, and virtually everything can be found in either A Brief History of Time or in Universe in a Nutshell. If you're trying to meet a paper deadline, buy this book. Otherwise, read his more detailed and illustrated works for better comprehension

Engaging introduction to the man and his work, March 23, 2003
This is a collection of seven related lectures by Hawking originally published in 1996 under the title, The Cambridge Lectures: Life Works. He does not cover as much ground here as in did in A Brief History of Time, but what he does cover he does so in a charming and engaging style. There are some few statements here that could be interpreted as less than modest--although not by me--and a mistaken prediction or two, which may be a reason that Hawking is not pleased with this book's publication. He might also object to the title, since neither a "Theory of Everything" nor a conclusive answer to the origin and fate of the universe are presented.

However, Hawking does address these questions, and his expression is interesting to read and has the agreeable characteristic of being laconic. There are no equations in the book, no mathematics as such, and everything is explained in language that would be intelligible to a high school student. There are the usual droll Hawking jokes about God and His intentions, facetious, epigram-like understatements (I have done a lot of work on black holes, and it would all be wasted if it turned out that black holes do not exist. p. 66) and witty asides about the convergence of politics on physics, as when he mentions a particle accelerator the size of the Solar System that "would not be funded under current economic conditions."

A good chunk of the book is devoted to black holes (about which Hawking is or was the world's foremost authority) and whether they have "hair" and "sweat" or not. Hawking avers on page 92 that if a primordial black hole is discovered "emitting a lot of gamma and X rays," he will get the Nobel Prize. This is an ironic lament since, as he explains later on, it is most likely that even if these very difficult to observe and very ancient black holes do exist, they are mostly evaporated by now, and so it is probable there will be no Nobel for Hawking.

He also discusses a "no boundary condition" (p.119) of the big bang universe which seems to begin and end in a singularity in real-time while in imaginary time there are no singularities, just beginning and ending poles, like the north and south poles of the finite, unbounded surface of the earth. (p. 139) I especially like this idea since it does away with the infinite singularity and the theological implications that some draw from such a beginning of the universe. As Hawking asks rhetorically, in a "completely self-contained" universe with no boundary or edge--a universe "neither created nor destroyed"--what place would there be for a creator? (p. 126)

He also addresses string theory, and I was pleased to read that he is no more enamored of all those little curled up dimensions than I am. He says the theory has several other problems that need to be worked out, not the least of which is that we still don't know whether all the infinities will cancel out. (p. 159)

Hawking closes with his ideas about the prospect for a Theory of Everything. He gives three possibilities: (1) There is a "complete unified theory which we will someday discover..." (2) There's no ultimate theory, "just an infinite sequence of theories that describe the universe more and more accurately." (3) There's no theory, period: "Events...occur in a random and arbitrary manner." He seems to like (1) believing "that there is a good chance...[for] a complete unified theory by the end of the century..." Apparently--since he is speaking from circa 1996--he means the twentieth century. In that case he's wrong since we haven't yet gotten such a theory.

For the record, I like (2). I think that our present "laws" are approximations that we will continue to improve on. I believe we develop the ability through science to better and better order our environment and to increase our knowledge. I don't believe we are actually discovering "ultimate truth."

Hawking asks here as he has elsewhere, "Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?" Why is there anything at all? He believes that if we do discover a complete theory, we will then be able to answer this question, and then we would "know the mind of God."

Treading water, June 30, 2002
This book, like the theory of relativity, is something I can grasp for a brief period of time and then it slips away. The first chapters gave a fascinating history and mini-review of where we've been but as he progressed I could not get my mind around some of the concepts he was discussing and some of the basic terms he used weren't explained. Such is the fate when trying to appeal to a broader range of people. For me, Carl Sagan's works were much easier to understand. Hawking does an admirable job but if you do not have a science background, or are bent in that direction, this may not be the best book for you. For us poor huddled masses what Hawking needs to do is get a good ghost writer with a minimal science background and have the writer come up with analogies to what Hawking is discussing. I know I could have used some additional explaining when he started talking about the extra 20+ dimensions, singularities and the string theory. Around the string theory I stopped treading water and drowned. All in all though, I would like to see more of trying to explain science to us unwashed and sadly miss Sagan. Hawking is to be commended and I hopes he continues the attempts. I will attempt to read his future works in that direction.

lacks substance, July 21, 2002
This book provides a historical perspective of the events leading up to the quest for finding a unified theory. It is a very light read that can be finished in a couple of hours. In some points, Steven Hawking dwelves a little deeper, especially in his own work on blackholes. However, if the reader is looking for more substance, especially into today's challenges, then I recommend the following book, "The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory" by Brian Greene.

A Fascinating Journey, June 23, 2002
This is a book that takes the most incomprehensible material, theories, and operations of our universe, and breaks them down to the simplest form. Using "balloon" analogies and simple descriptions, Hawking is able to simplify the theories of space, time, and, well, 'Everything' else. I loved this book! Whether you're a fan of science fact, or science fiction, this is a book that will expand your understanding and appreciation of our wonderful universe.

Read the "author"'s opinion on this book !, September 3, 2003
Pr. Hawking gives this opinion on this book ! The policy here is not to give URLs, so just search for Pr. Hawking homepage on the web and you will know... I quote : "We would urge you not to purchase this book in the belief that Professor Hawking was involved in its creation."

I suggest that you instead buy "A Brief History of Time" which is a terribly great book !

My comment on New Millenium Pr (publisher) is that it looks like they have little scruples... Who would try to make money on a disabled person ?

Professor Hawking did NOT authorize this Book, March 2, 2006
On his website, Professor Stephen Hawking claims he did NOT authorize the publication of this book under his name.

In a nut shell, June 9, 2007
The toughts of the supposed beginings of the universe are thought provoking. The book was easy to read, in fact this book took me no time at all, but has left me with a life time of knowledge. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Kathy Charmaz is one of the world's leading theorists and exponents of grounded theory. In this important and essential new textbook, she introduces the reader to the craft of using grounded theory in social research, and provides a clear, step-by-step guide for those new to the field. Using worked examples throughout, this book also maps out an alternative vision of grounded theory put forward by its founding thinkers, Glaser and Strauss. To Charmaz, grounded theory must move on from its positivist origins and must incorporate many of the methods and questions posed by constructivists over the past twenty years to become a more nuanced and reflexive practice. ... Read more

Reviews

A great new book on grounded theory, July 24, 2006
As a qualitative researcher using grounded theory methods in the late stages of my dissertation process the last thing I thought I needed was yet another qualitative/grounded theory textbook. Because of the recommendation of a friend and because I am a bit of research methods nut I bought "Constructing Grounded Theory" - and I am glad that I did. I actually read the whole book.

Charmaz provides the researcher with a vivid picture of grounded theory. Throughout the book she provides easy-to-read explanations and examples for each step of the grounded theory journey. Best of all, she treats you like a thinking scholar. You are not forced into a method because of dogmatic language, instead you are tantalized to think for yourself and develop solutions to your own research problems.

This is an important book to read if you are a grounded theory researcher.

A Real Contribution to Grounded Theory, October 5, 2006
As someone who writes about grounded theory and supervises PhD students using grounded theory, I have absolutely no hesitation in recommending this book to them and anyone else using grounded theory. It is infinitely superior to the Strauss and Corbin book which in my opinion is too restrictive and makes it difficult for graduate students to apply grounded theory. Charmaz also very cleverly avoids the schism that rose between Glaser and Strauss on the application of the method by giving the student several alternative steps. A scholarly book which is also very accessible. As someone using grounded theory, I am relieved that Kathy Charmaz wrote this book - she really does do a good job in reformulating it for 21st century researchers.

A 'how to guide' and much more!, May 17, 2007
As the title suggests, Kathy Charmaz's 'Constructing Grounded Theory' is a practical and thoughtful guide to the intricacies of undertaking qualitative research. Each chapter focuses on a specific aspect with numerous 'hints' and examples from her own work. Charmaz is an excellent teacher, unafraid to challenge the work of Glaser & Strauss with humility and commonsense. Highly recommeded to all aspiring qualitative researchers.

Excellent core reading for Qualitative Researchers, March 11, 2007
Charmaz has used her vast experience in qualitative analysis to produce an excellent resource for qualitative researchers. Whether novice or experienced in qualitative research, Charmaz' book "starts at the start" for newer researchers; assists the reflective process of the qualitative methods; and leads the researcher to a firm research outcome thoroughly grounded by informant experience. Charmaz provides substantial examples from her own research to illustrate methods and techniques which encourage the researcher to remain on track, grounded by informant experience and to persevere with reflective and inquisitive thinking. Her book also offers suggestions for creative writing of the project report. I will be prescribing this as a basic text/reference for future qualitative research students.

Wow!, April 4, 2007
This is by far the best and most detailed introduction to Qualitative Analysis I have seen. Charmaz is thorough, clear, to the point, and the book is well-written so that even beginner analysts could follow her points. Excellent find.

MUST HAVE, December 11, 2007
This book is a must have for anyone doing grounded theory research or dissertations. Kathy Charmaz helps the fans of qualitative methodology into the 21st century with this wonderfully written guide through grounded theory. The book promises to be of value to students or experts in the field, then delivers as promised!

Can't wait for her next book for my collection!!!

A Genuinely Practical Guide to Grounded Theory, November 8, 2008
This is a particularly well-written guide book for doing Grounded Theory. Grounded theory is one of the qualitative research methodlogies in which there are deep philosophical divides (i.e., Strauss, Corbin, Glasser). Charmaz manages to strike a middle ground between prescriptive, post-posivist approaches and some of the highly interpretative approaches emerging in qualitative research.

I would strongly recommend this as a "how to" book for those desiring to employ the disciplined and rigourous approach to grounded theory, without giving up on the creative process.

My only negative on this book is the quality of the binding. For $40+, I am disappointed that the pages are starting to fall out. However, that is probably because I am using it a lot:)

Excellent service - prompt response, June 29, 2009
Excellent service. Book was in great condition and arrived in time for writing my dissertation proposal. Thanks! ... Read more

Editorial Review

Written by one of the preeminent researchers in the field, this book provides a comprehensive exposition of modern analysis of causation. It shows how causality has grown from a nebulous concept into a mathematical theory with significant applications in the fields of statistics, artificial intelligence, economics, philosophy, cognitive science, and the health and social sciences.Judea Pearl presents and unifies the probabilistic, manipulative, counterfactual, and structural approaches to causation and devises simple mathematical tools for studying the relationships between causal connections and statistical associations. The book will open the way for including causal analysis in the standard curricula of statistics, artificial intelligence, business, epidemiology, social sciences, and economics. Students in these fields will find natural models, simple inferential procedures, and precise mathematical definitions of causal concepts that traditional texts have evaded or made unduly complicated.The first edition of Causality has led to a paradigmatic change in the way that causality is treated in statistics, philosophy, computer science, social science, and economics. Cited in more than 3,000 scientific publications, it continues to liberate scientists from the traditional molds of statistical thinking. In this revised edition, Judea Pearl elucidates thorny issues, answers readers' questions, and offers a panoramic view of recent advances in this field of research.Causality will be of interests to students and professionals in a wide variety of fields. Anyone who wishes to elucidate meaningful relationships from data, predict effects of actions and policies, assess explanations of reported events, or form theories of causal understanding and causal speech will find this book stimulating and invaluable. ... Read more

Reviews

Causality, December 5, 2009
This is a very suggestive analysis on a quite forgotten by now subject: the study of causality in the social sciences. The author traces very much the original idea of Havelmmo on the nature of econometrics, and brings up to date in the study of several strands of social phenomena that have to do with the nature of causation in human behaviour. He makes use of the notions of bayesian statistics, probability theory, graph theory, correlation analysis and the otherwise called non recursive hierarchical models in social studies. Recommended to those persons who still believe one of the purposes of social studies is to identify and measure causal chains and mechanisms and not simply to focus on correlations and forecasting techniques without due regard to the notion of what causes what and how does it seem to operate in reality.

some interesting questions, February 11, 2010
In the introductory material, the book claims the graphical method presented in this book 'solves' the problem of causality. However, the book does not read as if the problem has been solved. Instead, it reads like an extended discussion/argument with philosophers, scientists, and statisticians. The book raises a great many interesting questions (some it raises only implicitly), so for this reason I give it 5 stars without hesitation. I do recommend, though, that the third edition of this book substantially reorganize the material; for example, the excellent epilogue should be brought forward as introductory material (and expanded). ... Read more

Editorial Review

Reviews

An extraordinary account - even decades later, January 29, 2001
IN THE SHADOW OF MAN, first published in 1971, remains one of the most extraordinary observations of chimpanzee behavior in the wild. Goodall begins with the story of how she arrived in Africa and her first days there, but wisely switches the attention from herself to the endangered chimpanzees she studies. She not only recognizes individuals but learns their distinctive personalities, describing in compelling detail the smallest of moments that illuminate who these great animals are. Unlike most scientists of the time, Goodall documents emotions and complex political behavior, the social hierarchy and parenting abilities, the aggression and the bonds formed between chimps that can only be described as friendships. In eloquent prose, Goodall tells the stories of these chimps - most notably that of Flo and her family - and will forever change the way you view chimpanzees.

The book contains several black and white photographs of the chimps, a real treat after getting to "know" these chimps in writing.

If you have any interest at all in primates or in animals generally, this is a must-have book.

Super-de-duper!, November 15, 2004
Like another reviewer, I'm an anthropology student and I had to read this book for a class I'm taking. Never has a book, meant for education, made me both laugh and cry out loud. It was simply wonderful. You will learn a lot about chimpanzees, and I promiss you will never watch them in the zoo, in the same way, again. Even if you are not looking to learn about chimpanzee developement and behavior, the book is excellent on a purely entertainment level. Even though this book is was a required reading, I was so impressed that I'm going out to buy her other books... just out of interest.

Observation is the key to all the doors of knowledge, July 30, 2001
The pleasure that Ms. Goodall had placed and received in sharing her life with chimpanzees is conveyed effortlessly in this book and touches you quite easily. I started reading this book not being to sure about what I was doing, since to know about the habits of these primates is not exactly among my list of favorite topics. So I just started browsing and before I knew it, sixty or eighty pages had gone by as well as my possibilities of getting up early in the morning.

The author will guide your through the complex social structures in which chimpanzees live to the very detailed and amazing details of their everyday life. For example that they would eat gladly a human baby if given the chance. But more important she makes you care for their lives not as a consequence of a higher scientific purpose, but simply because the more that we relate to nature the more we are embraced in its blessings.

Great Reading, September 15, 2003
I read this book a long time ago and have looked into it many times since. It's an entertaining read that teaches us not just about chimpanzees but also about human nature and behavior. If you pay attention to this book, you'll be a better person for it!

This is behavioral science done correctly, April 30, 2002
Jane Goodall is a unique undividual whose work should be studied by those who think that the animal rights people don't have a clue. Her efforts at gaining the trust of chimpanzee's in their natural habitat have spauned a host of up-and-comers who will continue to carry her work to the next level.

Goodall distinguished herself by sitting in the bush on a daily basis until the local chimpanzee tribal members came close enough to make physical contact with her. That an English woman scientist would journey to Tanzania to engage in this type of research is unusual and certainly puts her at "the top of her class".

She follows the lives and behavior patterns of her subjects until her research sounds like a Michener novel with its generational emphasis and timelines of family heritage. Within this effort she follows each subsequent offspring through each of their successive cycles from birth and death.

What is fascinating is how she describes personality differences, the kind that come from hard-coded genetic diffences, the same as we find in human individuals. The mating behavior sounds like something out of "Cosmopolitan". The squabbles and fighting behavior could be that of any large Homo Sapien family. While Chimp's aren't on the same intellectual level as humans they certainly come closer than any other species. Jane Goodall deserves every accolade she gets for bringing us a lens through which to observe another geneological line of a species that has developed from our common ancestors.

Her work suggests that we should rethink our medical research toward more humane treatment of these animals whose behavior is too similar to ours to ignore. This is an excellent book.

A Great Book!, November 12, 2002
Reading this book has changed my life. I better know now who I am and why I am. The chimpanzee in the wild is a remarkable mirror.

Fascinating account of ground-breaking work, July 28, 1999
Few people remember that Jane Goodall was the first person to document without a doubt that chimpanzees use tools and display many complex behaviors that betray significant cognitive abilities. This book details her amazing work and may inspire girls to enter scientific careers.

In the Shadow of Man is wonderful, June 27, 2000
If you have some time this summer, let Jane Goodall motivate you with her enlightening stories of chimpanzees. The book will make readers aware of the fascinating similarities between man and chimp. Dr. Goodall portrays her stay in Africa vividly, and is truly inspirational. "In the Shadow of Man" is a wonderful book!

An amazing woman!, July 18, 2002
Jane Goodall is such an ambassador for chimpanzees and all other life on this planet. Her hard work, insights, and drive are to be admired! This book is her beginning and a must read for everyone. She is a truly amazing woman!

Great For ALL!!!, June 11, 1999
This book is truly insightful, as is all books by Dr Goodall. But what is truly great about this book is the insight into human society and how it may have been formed.

This book needs to be read by mothers-to-be because it will truly give you insight as to what may truly be the right and wrong ways to raise a child. The chimpanzees that Dr Goodall studies reveal mothering practices that can be seen in human society. However, the truly great thing about this is that it also shows how the baby chimpanzees grew up and which ones where more likely to survive and what their personalities are like as adults.

This book is also great for those who are of scientific mind and want to know more about behavior and its evolution.

Overall this book is a must read for EVERYONE!! ... Read more

Editorial Review

This long-awaited work from one of the world's mostrespected scientists presents a series of dramatic discoveries neverbefore made public. Starting from a collection of simple computerexperiments---illustrated in the book by striking computergraphics---Wolfram shows how their unexpected results force a wholenew way of looking at the operation of our universe.

Wolfram uses his approach to tackle a remarkable array of fundamentalproblems in science: from the origin of the Second Law ofthermodynamics, to the development of complexity in biology, thecomputational limitations of mathematics, the possibility of a trulyfundamental theory of physics, and the interplay between free will anddeterminism.

Written with exceptional clarity, and illustrated by more than athousand original pictures, this seminal book allows scientists andnon-scientists alike to participate in what promises to be a majorintellectual revolution. ... Read more

Reviews

The Emperor's New Kind of Clothes, February 28, 2003
This review took almost one year. Unlike many previous referees (rank them by Amazon.com's "most helpful" feature) I read all 1197 pages including notes. Just to make sure I won't miss the odd novel insight hidden among a million trivial platitudes.

On page 27 Wolfram explains "probably the single most surprising discovery I have ever made:" a simple program can produce output that seems irregular and complex.

This has been known for six decades. Every computer science (CS) student knows the dovetailer, a very simple 2 line program that systematically lists and executes all possible programs for a universal computersuch as a Turing machine (TM). It computes all computable patterns, including all those in Wolfram's book, embodies the well-known limits of computability, and is basis of uncountable CS exercises.

Wolfram does know (page 1119) Minsky's very simple universal TMs from the 1960s. Using extensive simulations, he finds a slightly simpler one. New science? Small addition to old science. On page 675 we find a particularly simple cellular automaton (CA) and Matthew Cook's universality proof(?). This might be the most interesting chapter. It reflects that today's PCs are more powerful systematic searchers for simple rules than those of 40 years ago. No new paradigm though.

Was Wolfram at least first to view programs as potential explanations of everything? Nope. That was Zuse. Wolfram mentions him in exactly one line (page 1026): "Konrad Zuse suggested that [the universe] could be a continuous CA." This is totally misleading. Zuse's 1967 paper suggested the universe is DISCRETELY computable, possibly on a DISCRETE CA just like Wolfram's. Wolfram's causal networks (CA's with variable toplogy, chapter 9) will run on any universal CA a la Ulam & von Neumann & Conway & Zuse. Page 715 explains Wolfram's "key unifying idea" of the "principle of computational equivalence:" all processes can be viewed as computations. Well, that's exactly what Zuse wrote 3 decades ago.

Chapter 9 (2nd law of thermodynamics) elaborates (without reference)on Zuse's old insight that entropy cannot really increase in deterministically computed systems, although it often SEEMS to increase. Wolfram extends Zuse's work by a tiny margin, using today's more powerful computers to perform experiments as suggested in Zuse's 1969 book. I find it embarassing how Wolfram tries to suggest it was him who shifted a paradigm, not the legendary Zuse.

Some reviews cite Wolfram's previous reputation as a physicist and software entrepreneur, giving him the benefit of the doubt instead of immediately dismissing him as just another plagiator. Zuse's reputation is in a different league though: He built world's very first general purpose computers (1935-1941), while Wolfram is just one of many creators of useful software (Mathematica). Remarkably, in his history of computing (page 1107) Wolfram appears to try to diminuish Zuse's contributions by only mentioning Aiken's later 1944 machine.

On page 465 ff (and 505 ff on multiway systems) Wolfram asks whether there is a simple program that computes the universe. Here he sounds like Schmidhuber in his 1997 paper "A Computer Scientist's View of Life, the Universe, and Everything." Schmidhuber applied the above-mentioned simple dovetailer to all computable universes. His widely known writings come out on top when you google for "computable universes" etc, so Wolfram must have known them too, for he read an "immense number of articles books and web sites" (page xii) and executed "more than a hundred thousand mouse miles" (page xiv). He endorses Schmidhuber's "no-CA-but-TM approach" (page 486, no reference) but not his suggestion of using Levin's asymptotically optimal program searcher (1973) to find our universe's code.

On page 469 we are told that the simplest program for the data is the most probable one. No mention of the very science based on this ancient principle: Solomonoff's inductive inference theory (1960-1978); recent optimality results by Merhav & Feder & Hutter. Following Schmidhuber's "algorithmic theories of everything" (2000), short world-explaining programs are necessarily more likely, provided the world is sampled from a limit-computable prior distribution. Compare Li & Vitanyi's excellent 1997 textbook on Kolmogorov complexity.

On page 628 ff we find a lot of words on human thinking and short programs. As if this was novel! Wolfram seems totally unaware of Hutter's optimal universal rational agents (2001) based on simple programs a la Solomonoff & Kolmogorov & Levin & Chaitin. Wolfram suggests his simple programs will contribute to fine arts (page 11), neither mentioning existing, widely used, very short, fractal-based programs for computing realistic images of mountains and plants, nor the only existing art form explicitly based on simple programs: Schmidhuber's low-complexity art.

Wolfram talks a lot about reversible CAs but little about Edward Fredkin & Tom Toffoli who pioneered this field. He ignores Wheeler's "it from bit," Tegmark & Greenspan & Petrov & Marchal's papers, Moravec & Kurzweil's somewhat related books, and Greg Egan's fun SF on CA-based universes (Permutation City, 1995).

When the book came out some non-expert journalists hyped it without knowing its contents. Then cognoscenti had a look at it and recognized it as a rehash of old ideas, plus pretty pictures. And the reviews got worse and worse. As far as I can judge, positive reviews were written only by people without basic CS education and little knowledge of CS history. Some biologists and even a few physicists initially were impressed because to them it really seemed new. Maybe Wolfram's switch from physics to CS explains why he believes his thoughts are radical, not just reinventions of the wheel.

But he does know Goedel and Zuse and Turing. He must see that his own work is minor in comparison. Why does he desparately try to convince us otherwise? When I read Wolfram's first praise of the originality of his own ideas I just had to laugh. The tenth time was annoying. The hundredth time was boring. And that was my final feeling when I laid down this extremely repetitive book:exhaustion and boredom. In hindsight I know I could have saved my time. But at least I can warn others.

If a million scientists worked on a million experiments ..., May 20, 2002
If a million scientists worked on a million experiments for three hundred years, would they learn as much about the universe as Stephen Wolfram does by sitting at his computer for twenty years?

Apparently not, according to Stephen Wolfram.

I'm annoyed with Wolfram for forcing me to poke fun at him like this. I've been waiting for this book a long time, and I genuinely wanted to give it a thumbs up. Unfortunately, Wolfram has made that impossible.

I gave the book three stars, but in fact I consider it almost un-ratable. What do you do with a 1200-page tome that contains a wealth of substantive and fascinating results, but which is insists, at every turn, to draw over-blown and under-supported conclusions from them? I split the difference and gave it a middling rating, but that does not convey the deep ambivalence I feel toward this work.

Given Wolfram's reputation, I expected a certain amount of hubris, and even looked forward to it. Most scientists work hard to suppress the egotism that drives them, but Wolfram's ego is out there in the open. While this can be refreshing, what I found here left me dumbfounded. For Wolfram, all of scientific history is either prelude or footnote to his own work on 1-D cellular automata. On pages 12-16 he breezily sites other work in chaos theory, non-linear dynamics and complexity theory. At the end of the book, there are hundreds of pages of footnotes describing previous history as essentially one damn thing after another - a testament to all the people that didn't see the promised land, as he has.

Wolfram attempts to usurp all credit for the "computational perspective." Assertions such as "the discoveries in this book showing that simple rules can lead to complex behavior" are repeated to the point of exhaustion. But his attempt to shock us falls flat: if that idea was ever radical, it surely would not be considered so today. The other fields that Wolfram casually dismisses have provided strong indications of the power of this principle, as well as the idea that many diverse systems are computationally equivalent. An entire generation of physicists has grown up quite accustom to these notions.

Wolfram did make very substantial and important contributions to the study of complex systems in the early eighties. But he was not the only one, and those studies have not induced a wholesale revision of science. Despite what he would have us believe, the general concepts he espouses are not that radical. It would probably be more accurate to call them expressions of the modern scientific zeitgeist.

Meanwhile, some of Wolfram's specific claims are indeed very novel, but only because they are breathtakingly arrogant. Consider his comments on two famous scientific principles: The second law of thermodynamics, and evolution by means of natural selection. Both these principles date from the mid-nineteenth century. Both have incited considerable controversy, and both have withstood mountains of empirical observations from diverse sources. Wolfram, however, calls both of them into question. Why? Because he has done 1-D cellular automations simulations on his computer that he feels make them suspicious. How does Wolfram expect to be taken seriously when he makes such assertions almost non-chalantly?

Wolfram lacks any hint of balance in assessing the true place of his results. He admits to having been a recluse for years, and it shows. The desire to free oneself of the mainstream community, to allow oneself to be more creative, is understandable and healthy. But one concomitantly loses the critical faculty that derives from being part of a dynamic community. Though Wolfram will likely never see it, what he lost by pulling away from the world has substantially outweighed what he gained. Consequently, his loss has become ours. We did not get the much shorter, but wiser, book that lurks somewhere inside this one.

A new kind of review, October 14, 2002
Why you are reading this review

I can only imagine how fortunate you must feel to be reading my review. This review is the product of my lifetime of experience in meeting important people and thinking deep thoughts. This is a new kind of review, and will no doubt influence the way you
think about the world around you and the way you think of yourself.

Bigger than infinity

Although my review deserves thousands of pages to articulate, I am limiting many of my deeper thoughts to only single characters. I encourage readers of my review to dedicate the many years required to fully absorb the significance of what I am writing here. Fortunately, we live in exactly the time when my review can be widely disseminated by "internet" technology and stored on "digital media", allowing current and future scholars to delve more deeply into my original and insightful use of commas, numbers, and letters.

My place in history

My review allows, for the first time, a complete and total understanding not only of this but *every single*
book ever written. I call this "the principle of book equivalence." Future generations will decide the relative merits of this review compared with, for example, the works of Shakespeare. This effort will open new realms of scholarship.

I am the author of all things

It is staggering to contemplate that all the great works of literature can be derived from the letters I use in writing this review. I am pleased to have shared them with you, and hereby grant you the liberty to use up to twenty (20) of them consecutively without attribution. Any use of additional characters in print must acknowledge this review as source material since it contains, implicitly or explicitly, all future written documents.

What it is, and why it disappoints, October 14, 2002
This is a book of ruminations about cellular automata. It is chiefly concerned with the way that the state of a system evolves when deterministic rules are applied to it. The simplest system is a single point in either state 0 or state 1. The transition rule could be that the state "0" changes to state "1", and state "1" changes to state "0". That rule can be expressed as follows.

{1->0, 0->1}

If the system's initial state is 1, then the transition rule (repeatedly applied) yields the following alternating pattern of states.

1
0
1
0
.
.

For hundreds of pages the author discusses the behavior of 1-dimensional automata built from 3-cell transition rules. The 2^3=8 different states of a 3-cell cluster can be written in binary notation from 000 up to 111. The cell in the middle can transition to either of two binary states, yielding a total of 2^8=256 rules. Most rules lead to periodically repeating behaviors, with short periods like the alternating pattern shown above.

An exception is rule 30 (30 in binary is 00011110; these bits the right-hand-side values for the 8 transitions).

rule 30:
{ 111->0, 110->0, 101->0, 100->1, 011->1, 010->1, 001->1, 000->0 }

When applied to an initial state of a single 1 surrounded by 0's, rule 30 generates the following pattern (developing downward from the top row). The array can be displayed as a bitmap of black and white pixels, producing a visualization of the evolving state of the horizontal rows.

..00000000100000000..
..00000001110000000..
..00000011001000000..
..00000110111100000..
..00001100100010000..
..00011011110111000..
..00110010000100100..
..01101111001111110..

What excites many people about such rules (and about replacement grammars in general) is that applying the rule to an input string produces new strings whose characteristics are hard to predict. Plus, the patterns in the resulting visualization look pretty cool and are suggestive of all sorts of things found in nature. It's very easy to write computer code that will generate the patterns based on input rules, so anybody can play the game.

Lots of people have implemented cellular automata and been fascinated that the behavior is so sensitive to the choice of input string and transition rules. Watching the patterns unfold is a bit like playing the slot machines. So many possibilities. So fun to watch. Addictive to play. Great to show your friends. A meme that keeps on meming. Search the Web for "one-dimensional cellular automata" and "applet" and you will find examples that you can run in your browser.

What bothers many readers about the book is that it is like an undergraduate honors project gone haywire. Page after page of printouts of these things. Thousands of them. And with endless streams of the impressions they made on the author. "My Daily Journal of Cellular Automata" would have been a fair title. Wolfram's inflated sense of their importance, and his own, is evident in the copyright statement:

Discoveries and ideas introduced in this book, whether presented at length or not, and the legal rights and goodwill associated with them, represent valuable property of Stephen Wolfram ..

Thus he lays claim to every cellular automaton and any application thereof. Pretty annoying, coming from someone arriving late to the automaton party.

He concludes of the book proper (pp. 844-845, just before his 350 additional pages of "notes") that

.. building on what I have discovered in this book .. there is nothing fundamentally special about us. .. For my discoveries imply that whether the underlying system is a human brain, a turbulent fluid, or a cellular automaton, the behavior it exhibits will correspond to a computation of equivalent sophistication. .. [W]hat my discoveries and the Principle of Computational Equivalence now show is that .. cellular automata can achieve exactly the same level of computational sophistication as anything else.

Wolfram discovery/epiphany appears to be that all algorithms can be computed by a simple model. An example of such a model, called the "Turing machine", is taught every semester to computer science students worldwide.

It excites many people that the physical world is inherently computable, allowing computational simulations to have predictive value. It is bizarre to read Wolfram represent that he is the author of this insight.

A New Kind of Ego, May 30, 2002
Wolfram does a great deservice for science in his new book. Not for scientists themselves, who can easily find out that more than half the overblown statements in the book are well known old science ideas. But a deservice for the non-scientific reader, who may actually be infused by the mantra that science is just purely speculation, without actually experimentation or show-and-tell.

I can speculate as much as I want about any single model. In fact, if a model is Turing Complete, as a CA is well-known to be, any speculation can always be verified by my model! But science is about proving with experiments one's theories. Or at least showing some interesting predictions that can be made based on chosing the proposed model. But neither of them are present in the book. In fact, in the beginning of the book itself Wolfram warns the reader that scientists are non-believers and will try to destroy his idea.

So he is now in a comfortable place. He has a Turing machine, and can therefore adjust the model to explaining anything. He claims due to the nature of the model he can predict little (interesting, isn't that the decidability problem?), and that
all scientists will atack him because what he believes is true.
This is circular reasoning.

Fractals have shown us that simplicity generates complexity. Even caos models that can be run on hand calculators show that. Or a double pendulum. It is a very well-known result (shown in the 50s/60s) that the game of life is Turing complete (ie. can compute any function given an appropriate program). CA are also Turing complete, so where is the news? I can compute anything. Writing a CA that generates prime numbers amounts to finding the right "program"...

What is disappointing is that most claims are not based on any theory or verification. Let us say that he cannot really run lab experiments to check his ideas. Or even that is too early to predict any new pheonomenon based on his ideas. Well, the least he could do is to use the powerful tools of Complexity Theory (especially Kolmogorov complexity) to measure the complexity of the patterns generated by a CA. Or to at least have some results veryfying the behavior of his set of axioms ... Ok, provide with
some useful examples on how to apply CA to important problems in bioscience, engineering, etc ... Not toy computing (!).

But what he cannot do is to use ideas from other people without giving them proper credit (ok, he puts a tiny side note) or just assume that arrogance, young academic brilliance, or money can justify science. When he claims that all the major revolutions happened like this, I would suggest him to take a look at the first writings of Newton, Gauss, Einstein, Von Neumman, etc ... His predecessors had ideas that revolutionized science, but they always provided results for the scrutiny of other scientists as well. Moreover, their models and ideas could be translated to verifiable statements or allowed new and interesting predictions.

Science is about communication as much as it is about ideas. If one cannot convince other people rationally of the validity of the ideas, and also verify such ideas through experiments (the true hallmark of a scientific theory is checking predictions against experiments) then he is not scientific. He is just creating a cult. Not even a religion, because that assumes that God is not oneself. And Wolfram is convinced he is some kind of
superhero. Well, I finally understand the title of the book. A new kind of science is about follow-the-leader and do not question, have faith, because my ego is the answer you have been waiting (not even 42)...

nothing new, May 30, 2002
I don't see how this book is revolutionary. He says that models based on simple programs operating on discrete elements can do a much better job of capturing the real behavior of the universe than mathematical equations. But surely everyone knows that right? That's why we have finite element analysis, computational fluid dynamics, etc. The math is still the foundation, and is useful for describing simple cases exactly, but to model the universe effectively in all its complexity you often need a computer.

In Chapter 8, he shows a simple cellular automaton that models crystal growth. He says that his model is superior to standard models that are based on traditional mathematical equations because it does a much better job of capturing the intricate structure of real crystals. I find it hard to believe that he is the first person to come up with the idea of modelling crystal growth using a computer, and even if he is, I don't see that as particularly groundbreaking. His cellular automata do an OK job of modelling one particular type of snowflake growth, for example, but that's because he has tuned the rules to get
the expected result. His automaton does not cover other types of snowflakes though, and they do not give much insight into how and why real snowflakes grow.

Also in that chapter he presents a (crude, IMHO) fluid dynamics simulation using cellular automata and shows how turbulent flow occurs in his simulation. No surprise there, since people have been running fluid dynamics simulations for some time now to study turbulent flow. In the notes he seems to indicate that his simulation is superior to existing fluid dynamics simulations because existing simulations are discretized, ignoring the fact that his simulation is discrete as well.

Then he shows how seemingly complex patterns in biology, like the structure of leaves and trees, can be reproduced using simple rules. To anyone who has read a book on fractals this will not be new information. The interesting question is, why do those simple rules work so well for describing nature? What is it about leaves that make them grow in that pattern? He didn't spend much time on that.

Later he comes up with a cellular automaton with reversible rules that does not obey the second law of thermodynamics. He uses this to show that not all systems in nature (notably biological ones) obey the second law. Well that's fine with me, as long as all thermodynamic systems obey it.

It's a strange book but still an interesting one, as a review of a lot of info about science and fractals and cellular automata and how they interrelate, complete with lots of pretty pictures, but I don't really see how it's groundbreaking. He makes some radical assertions (like saying that the universe may be a big cellular automaton) but I don't find them particularly compelling. I believe that the universe is some large mechanism with fairly simple rules that result in complex behavior (and I thought everyone agreed on this point; that's the goal of physics, to find the fundamental equations and them use them to model reality, right?) but I think mathematics are a much better way of expressing the rules, and existing computational models are a much better way of applying them.

Mind candy, June 15, 2002
A New Kind Of Science may come to be viewed as the Godel, Escher, Bach of our generation. It's full of challenging big ideas that touch on nearly every field of science and beyond. It's a brilliant and delightful read and makes wonderful mind candy.

The only problem is I don't believe any of it. Wolfram bases the entire opus on the complicated behavior of a few simple cellular automata (CAs). Curiously, he never discusses any of the cool things that originally got a lot of people so excited about CAs -- topics like adaptation on the edge of chaos, and genetic algorithm evolution of specific functions. Instead, the entire book is just about how it's sometimes possible to observe complex and unpredictable patterns. And he tries over and over to convince the reader of just how important that observation is for understanding the universe.

As a supposed harbinger of a major paradigm revolution, we can contrast it with Einstein's one-time dramatic new theory of the universe. While a lot of people didn't understand it, the theories of relativity gave quite a few very specific predictions that could be -- and were successfully -- tested by observation and experiment. I've now read through the entirety of A New Kind Of Science and I can't find any specific predictions that would show his worldview explains reality any better than conventional ideas.

The only prediction he gives us relating to his theories is that every field of science will ultimately be transformed by them, and he goes on to list many of those fields. As I have a doctorate in molecular evolution, I was particularly interested in his dismissal of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection -- one of the most firmly established theories in science. Wolfram claims that Darwinian evolution is not sufficient to produce complex adaptations. I'm loathe to criticize an intellectual of Wolfram's stature, but his understanding of evolutionary theory, at least insofar as is presented in this book, is not very sophisticated. At any rate, anyone wanting an authoritative explication of the power of natural selection to generate complex adaptations may refer to Richard Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker. I wish Wolfram offered some sort of testable alternative, or evidence of any kind beyond an endless display of pictures of the output of his simple programs. While the output may match the complexity observed in nature, Wolfram never makes the case that they match the adaptivity or intelligence observed in nature.

Many of these pictures are indeed very pretty. But by the fourth or fifth hundred page his obsession with these automata becomes a bit tedious. And the outworldly conclusions he draws from observing their behavior will leave you bumfuzzled. For example: because his automata are discrete in space and in time he proposes (with no further justification) that the entire universe must be made up of discrete cells of space and time. Sounds great, but where's the evidence, and where are the testable hypotheses? He goes on to propose, again with no evidence other than the observed behavior of a select few of his automata, that the mysterious rules of the universe update only one discrete time cell at any given instant. Wolfram offers countless other extrapolations to the mechanisms of nature and structure of the universe, all similarly astounding and similarly unsupported.

As I read through this opus, and especially as I neared the end, I kept asking myself -- How is it possible for someone so brilliant to have spent so many years developing something so uncompelling? I came up with three possible explanations:

1) Wolfram has gone off the deep end. Just like Dr. Richard Daystrom of Star Trek's "The Ultimate Computer", the undisputed genius who goes mad trying to exceed his former glory. Perhaps Wolfram has been staring at his pretty pictures for so long his synapses can no longer make any other kind of connection.

2) Wolfram is perpetrating an elaborate hoax on the world, much like Dr. Alan Sokal's famous "Transgressing the Boundaries" paper, a parody of the academic humanities that the editors of Social Text were fooled into publishing. But Wolfram's physics flimflam is writ on an infinitely larger scale. Just to prove he's so much smarter than every one else, and just as a practical joke, he's trying to derail the entire scientific enterprise.

And finally,

3) I have become so entrenched in the practice and paradigms of traditional science that I am unable to grasp or appreciate the profundity of what's been laid before me in the simplest of terms.

Number three is always possible. And in fact it would be wonderful to bear witness to what he's calling the greatest discovery in the history of science, even if it does fly over my head at Mach 2. Wolfram is one of the smartest and most accomplished residents of the universe, and even though one of the basic tenets of the (traditional) scientific method is that the validity of a claim is judged independently of the stature and reputation of the one who proposes it, it's difficult not to give someone like Wolfram the benefit of the doubt -- no matter how much of a stretch.

All the same, I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys being intellectually stimulated and likes to think about big ideas. Even if he's wrong, I'm sure glad I read it.

Not new, not science, or not Wolfram, May 31, 2002
Of course I didn't read *everything* in this enormous
book, but 100% of the sample passages read so far
can be described by the title of the review. For example,
the idea that the universe may be run by a simple cellular
automaton is not new (I heard it from Edward Fredkin 15 years
ago), and the Principle of Computational Equivalence is
not science, since it is stated so vaguely it can never
be disproved. The one *very nice* new scientific result
found in the book so far, that the rule 110 is computationally
universal, is not due to Wolfram, but to his young
employee Matthew Cook, who does receive some acknowledgment
in the small print in the back of the book, but who was prevented
to publish his work by Wolfram's lawyers for years, while
the Master was finishing his Book.

As a review of ideas close to Wolfram's heart, this
could be an interesting book to read, but it suffers
terribly from repetitious self-congratulations and
high-flying but vague pronounciations. A good editor
should have made the book about 300 pages long, then
I would have probably recommended it. A scientist
who works in isolation needs a high degree of self-criticism
to succeed, and this is exactly what Wolfram sorely lacks.

Gorgeous, maddening, stimulating. And wrong., July 13, 2002
I can't believe I read the whole thing.

I'm a sucker for cellular automata, so the week ANKOS came out, I snapped it up, on the theory that even if Wolfram's revolution turned out to be a fizzle, I'd learn a lot of new twists on CA.

True enough. There's a pretty neat 400 page book here on CAs (and other discrete algorithmic systems in the same spirit - call them SASs, simple algorithmic systems, for short.) The remaining 796 pages are maddening (tedious, vainglorious, repetitious, handwaving) and fascinating by turns. It's peppered with intriguing projects, results, insights and conjectures. But Wolfram is so determined not to scare off the laymen with any display of rigorous definition or deduction that it's usually impossible to tell when he is just pontificating and when he actually knows how to cash out a given statement.

For example, after making 1-dimensional CAs the centerpiece for eight chapters, Wolfram begins to tackle physics, and acknowledges that CAs aren't the right tool for the job, because space and time (worse, a time which contradicts special relativity by requiring absolute simultaneity) are already built in. In a tour de force, he shows how there's a broad class of SASs involving self-generating networks, out of which something very much like space and time and causality, and special relativity, get constructed as a natural byproduct. This is terrific stuff. But then he can't really suggest where to go for the next step, other than brute search through the zillions of such SASs in hopes of hitting on one that generates real world physics.

There are at least two gaping holes in Wolfram's presentation, which he shrugs off far too lightly.

First: He acknowledges that it is extremely hard, given a set of constraints, to find an SAS that satisfies them, even when the constraints are simple. His moral: don't bother thinking about constraints. But out in the real world, it so happens that the realm of physics (both quantum mechanics and general relativity) does satisfy a complex and demanding set of constraints known as the principle of least action. Wolfram gives no reason for believing that an SAS satisfying such a complex constraint set will appear anytime in the first few billion, or the first few googol, of SASs studied. On the contrary, the rarity of 1-dimensional CAs satisfying the simple constraints he does examine strongly suggests the search for the New Kind of Physics will prove to be a wild goose chase.

Second: Thermodynamics, mathematical logic, and computer science have produced several sophisticated definitions for "complexity." Wolfram discusses them briefly - too briefly for the lay reader to get even a weak grasp on what they mean - and dismisses them in favor of his own "type 4" complexity, which is never more rigorously defined than "complex enough to produce pictures that look kind of like these." In chapter 11, he identifies this version of complexity with "universality", the ability of the system, if fed the proper initial conditions, to emulate a universal Turing machine. Astonishingly, he then asserts that all systems exhibiting "universality" - including such things as weather patterns and the vortices in a fast-draining tub - are essentially equivalent. He assumes that "ability to calculate x, given the right program" is the same as "ability to calculate x as fast as any other system, given the right program" - which is demonstrably false. And he assumes that "ability to calculate x, given the right program" is equivalent to "is as likely to calculate x in practice as any other system," which ignores the difference between human beings (who not infrequently calculate a long string of primes, because that's the sort of inputs they feed into their own system) and his rule 110 (which will never in a quadrillion years calculate a long string of primes unless a system more "complex" than itself deliberately sets it up with the right initial conditions.)

Because it fails so monumentally to deliver on its promises, I can't give the book more than 2 and a half stars. As a sourcebook for cool ideas on ways to build models and otherwise play with computers, though, it rates a 4. People will be drawing ideas from this book for a long time to come - or at least from the more reader-friendly books it will inspire. But science as a whole will not be noticably altered.

The "new" science is 35 years old, December 20, 2002
Of course it was not Wolfram but Konrad Zuse himself, inventor of the
first working programmable computer (1935-1941), who was the first to
suggest that the physical universe is being computed on a giant computer,
presumably a cellular automaton (CA). His first article on this topic
dates back to 1967 (in Elektronische Datenverarbeitung, pages 336-344,
vol 8). And Zuse's full-fledged book on CA-based universes came out
2 years later: Rechnender Raum, Schriften zur Datenverarbeitung,
Band 1, Friedrich Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig 1969.

Wolfram's book briefly mentions Zuse in the notes, but unfortunately
does not discuss his work in any satisfactory way. I guess an honest
title for his book would be something like: "More on Zuse's thesis."
An honest abstract would be something like: "In the 1960s Zuse proposed
that the universe and everything is the result of a dicrete computational
process running on a cellular automaton. Here I try to extend Zuse's
thesis as follows: 1).. 2).. 3).."

So far I have not found anything but minor extensions of Zuse's "new"
1967 science, and none of the expert reviewers (search for "Wolfram
reviews" on the web) has found anything real new either - since the
early 2002 marketing blitz the reviews have shown a tendency of becoming
both more competent and less favorable. The popular press interviews
focus on the "universe as a computer" idea - but neither there nor in
the book's main text Wolfram does anything to correct the wrong
impression it's all his idea, not Zuse's. But hey, the scientific
truth finding process will be stronger than any misleading
marketing efforts.

Nice pictures though. I give it two stars. ... Read more

Editorial Review

This book helps students learn to analyze and interpret research data using SPSS by demonstrating how to compute a variety of statistics covered in intermediate statistics courses. This edition features SPSS 15.0, but it can also be used with SPSS 16 & 17 or earlier versions.

Each chapter introduces several related statistics in a user-friendly manner and provides instructions on how to run them and interpret the outputs. The book reviews research designs and how to assess the assumptions, accuracy, and reliability of data. The authors demonstrate how to: choose an appropriate statistic based on the research design and level of measurement; use SPSS to help answer research questions; and interpret and write about SPSS outputs. The examples use real data contained on the book's CD.

The 3rd edition features:

• Instructor's Resource materials (available on request) with answers to interpretation questions, extra SPSS problems and course support for instructors
• Four extra SPSS problems in each chapter for additional practice
• A new chapter on multilevel linear modeling with SPSS
• Post-hoc tests in addition to contrasts in the Factorial ANOVA and ANCOVA chapter
• Coverage of odd ratios and effect sizes for logistic and discriminant analyses
• How to compute and interpret post-hoc power demonstrated for each statistic
• An expanded Appendix, Getting Started and Other Useful SPSS Commands, including how to work with the output; import and export files; select cases; and split and merge files.

SPSS for Intermediate Statistics, 3rd Edition provides:

• The key SPSS windows needed to perform the analyses
• Display of the outputs readers can expect to produce with call-out boxes to highlight what to focus on
• Interpretation sections and questions to help students better understand the output and write about the results
• Charts and tables to help select an appropriate statistic and interpret statistical significance and effect sizes
• Lab assignments organized around the way students proceed in every step of a research project
• Appendices on getting started with SPSS, a brief review of basic statistics, and answers to the odd-numbered interpretation questions
• Twenty data sets on the book's CD along with a quick reference guide and how to make tables and figures.

This inexpensive paperback is intended as a supplemental text for advanced undergraduate or graduate courses on intermediate/advanced statistics and/or research methods taught in departments of psychology, education, human development, and other applied and health sciences, and/or for researchers in these areas looking to have a handy reference for SPSS.

 Instructor's Resource materials are free upon adoption. View www.researchmethodsarena.com.

Reviews

One of the MOST useful guides to SPPS and statistical procedures, December 22, 2005
This book has been a life-saver. Its clear and concise about most of the main techniques you might need for analyzing your data. Its written as a practical guide to help you understand which statistical procedure to use. I'm a PhD student in Epidemiology and this is the book that really helped clear my concepts about the various statistical techniques and most importantly how and when to use them. All the classes I took in advanced mathematical statistics were full of jargon and theoretical stuff. This book is what helped me really understand the various techniques. Consider it a like a Dummies Guide to Practical Statistics..... I hope the author writes another book called SPSS for Advanced Statistics.

SPSS for intermediate statistics, February 11, 2008
I found this book to be very helpful in understanding the output from the SPSS statistical software. I would recommend it to anyone using this software. This book was listed as a recommended book for a class I am taking in intermediate statistics. Normally I do not buy those books listed for my classes as "recommended". This book has been so helpful in understanding the data output from the statistical software, I would definitely recommend anyone using this software to purchase this book. I especially like the tips for writing that is given in each section. these tips make your write-up of the data look and sound very professional as well as making it easy to understand the write-ups in the professional journals.

From a Graduate Student, March 14, 2008
This book helped me understand ANOVAs and helped me pass my qualifying exams for my doctoral program.

Helpful Stats Book, October 30, 2010
This is a great stats book. It walks the reader step-by-step through the process of writing results by highlighting the output portions that are relevant in a write-up. I've used both the beginner book and now this intermediate book and have found both of them helpful in my PhD studies.

Essential for students learning statistical programs and prodecures simultaneously, May 22, 2009
As a person learning both how to use statistical programs (e.g.: SPSS) and how and when to apply different statistical procedures, this book has been a lifesaver for me. Clearly written, with very helpful step-by-step instructions for running procedures using SPSS's drop down menu, the syntax this creates, and interpretations of output. The authors provide enough theoretical statistical background but not so much that you can't see the forest for the trees. If only all of my time trying to learn statistical procedures had been as well-spent as my time using this guide!

Easy to understand, April 8, 2009
This book is a step by step instructions how to interpretate your data and give examples of writing. ... Read more

Editorial Review

Santiago Ramon y Cajal was a mythic figure in science. Hailed as the father of modern anatomy and neurobiology, he was largely responsible for the modern conception of the brain. His groundbreaking works were New Ideas on the Structure of the Nervous System and Histology of the Nervous System in Man and Vertebrates. In addition to leaving a legacy of unparalleled scientific research, Cajal sought to educate the novice scientist about how science was done and how he thought it should be done. This recently rediscovered classic, first published in 1897, is an anecdotal guide for the perplexed new investigator as well as a refreshing resource for the old pro.Cajal was a pragmatist, aware of the pitfalls of being too idealistic--and he had a sense of humor, particularly evident in his diagnoses of various stereotypes of eccentric scientists. The book covers everything from valuable personality traits for an investigator to social factors conducive to scientific work. ... Read more

Reviews

"Los tonicos de la voluntad" or how to create a science, February 12, 2000
Santiago Ramon y Cajal's achievement, the neuronal doctrine -undoubtedly the foundation of all relevant knowledge about the nervous systems, including the human brain-, was not the product of teamwork, technology or fashion. It was the achievement of his educated insight and uncomparable dedication. Scholars in the field of psychology teach us that advice can be interpreted as an attempt to justify the thoughts and actions of its originator. It seems inevitable that this work should reflect Cajal's disillusions with the institutionalization of mediocrity and with the arbitrariness of academic hierarchy. Surely, today, readers in numerous parts of the world will find these commonplace. Yet, Cajal's voice sounds as loud and clear as ever as a guiding light in the obscure path of human accomplishment. It will prevent any cultured reason from originating the kind of monsters that arise from its dreams. The book will -quoting Lucian- "...ornament your soul with what concerns you most: temperance, justice, piety, kindliness, reasonableness, understanding, steadfastness, love of all that is beautiful, ardour towards all that is sublime; for these are the truly flawless jewels of the soul... for though you yourself depart from life, you will never cease associating with men of education and conversing with men of eminence".

I have returned to these pages constantly since I was in medical school.

Recommended to lay people or scientists alike of an inquisitive nature who disregard authority, distrust officiality, wish to create, and consider themselves perpetual students of men and nature. A vey useful resource, too, when things go wrong in the lab.

A fantastic insight into the actual practice of neurobiology, September 18, 1999
Too often our science is cleaned and polished to the point that it appears logical and quite easy. This remarkable monograph gives a much clearer view of the strenuous, adventurous, and often confusing nature of actually being a pioneer. It explores the social and political nature of scientific advance in a remarkably honest way, and each chapter rings true to the ears of a practicing neurobiologist today. It has quickly become favorite reading and the subject of discussion at our university, and is a must read for anyone interested in the actual craft of doing biology.

True inspiration, December 6, 2003
A good book captures the time in which it was written, and preserves that time for the future. A great book describes all times. Most of this book is great, current and pertinent a century after its first edition.

I was glad to see a scientist describe science as a personal, passionate, maybe even religious act. He describes the progress of a life in science, from young researcher, to professional, teacher, and finally retiree. At every step, he describes the emotional, social, and even spiritual value of that stage of life. Best, he speaks from an acknowledged place within the world of science.

Only a few parts of this book seem dated. Many specifics of a biologist's education have changed, though some - like the Zeiss brand name - have not. Marie Curie notwithstanding, he assumed that men would generally make or direct the real contributions. Women mattered mostly as support for the husband, though he did note that educated and professional women might be the most understanding company.

What he says about scientists is equally true about serious artists - the dedication, intellectual honesty, and rewards are much the same. His examples are nearly all drawn from the sciences, though. That may prevent artists from seeing themselves in his descriptions and prescriptions.

This book is true inspiration. I can't wait to pass it along.

Still applies today, April 14, 1999
In this brief, well composed work, Cajal- a most notable scientist in his own right, outlines his thoughts on what it takes to succeed in science. In fact he covers most of the intangable information that I seem to remember learning in graduate school. Not a bad deal, a few nights reading as opposed to 7 years of indentured servitude.

More seriously, Cajal has a clear idea of what it means to be a scientist and what it takes to be a successful practitioner. He even provides some leavity in the form of diagnosees of scientists' personalities.

All in all a good book, what he said back in the early 1900's is as true today as it was then. I plan on giving copies of it to my grad-school bound students.

not kind of advice that my advisor will give me, December 31, 2005
I am a graduate student (not in biology-ralated field) looking for general advice from this book. To my surprise much of Cajal's advice is still applicable not just today but in different disciplines. However, this is not a run-of-the-mill advice book for graduate students, and definitely not kind of advice my advisor will give me. Cajal is very passionate about doing science, and he doesn't hesitate to point out (sometimes very harshly) what he thinks the wrong ways of doing science.

It's expected that part of books are dated (remember it's first releasesd in 1897), but should not deter interested readers from reading it. Sometimes Cajal made comments upon which any readers today will frown, like "A woman [...] is in different to all work related to change and progress". But don't call Cajal a sexist, and don't interpret his work in the value system of the 21st century. Cajal is so enthusiastic about science that few other things matter to him. Anyone can easily feel and understand his commitment to science after reading few pages of the book.

Critically valuable for those overlooked by peer review, January 2, 2006
Modern scientific publishers unduly constrain modern observers. Much like the growing gulf between rich and poor, the gulf between the peer reviewed and the independent investigator is widening. Peers can usually accept incremental improvements on what is already accepted, and their role is to maintain those views. However, their own reputations may be at stake if a true paradigm shift is found that weakens the foundation on which their decades of work has been founded. So peers frequently block progress at great expense to the scientific community.

Some bridge this gulf by making their own money and then breaking the rules, like Jeff Hawkins or Mike Lazaridis. Such men can write books or start their own schools, using money to prevent the dismissal that they might otherwise suffer.

But others, with less money, must travel a perilous path with the potential of instant and permanent dismissal when they make wrong guesses, en-route to a breakthrough. For these observers, there is no clear path to "legitimacy", regardless of any talent they may have.

Cajal is a remarkable guide to those who labor alone. His "Advice" is precisely what is needed to avoid most of the mistakes that lead to dismissal. He is both respectful towards predecessors and insistent that the work of all predecessors is to be passed.

Although this book is often criticized for "quaintness" or being "Cajal-centric", I believe that it is more important now than when it was written, and, like Shakespeare, rewards those who can tolerate the differences of language and circumstances that must be accepted to understand it. It is nowhere near as distant as Shakespeare in this regard.

I thank the Swanson and Swanson team for their excellent light and explained editing of this book, and of Cajal's two volume "Histology", leaving Cajal's meaning as untouched by modern theory as possible.

A Nobel laureate reveals the secrets..., May 13, 2000
There are really no secrets...Ramon y Cajal warns us against several diseases of the will which affect research. He does that with great candour and much charm. I felt myself included in the category of "bibliophiles and polyglots", who collect more books and learn more languages than they could possibly use. Not that I changed: I just added guilt to my innocent vices! It adds to the charm that this book was written in the beginning of the 20th century when, well, wisdom was different. I wonder how the great scientist would react to the success of Marie Curie, Rita Levi-Montalcini, Lise Meitner, Countess Ada Lovelace (whom he could have met) and many other great women of science.

Excellent Book, poor translation job, July 4, 2001
Santiago Ramon y Cajal was a genius of his time, this books is an excellent description of himself and his research methods, but it is unbelievable that the translators decide NOT TO INCLUDE SOME CHAPTERS of the original! Anyone who can read Spanish should avoid this translation and go for the original

Raises Self Esteem in scientists, April 9, 2000
Ramon y Cajal was a wonderful scientist. As this book shows he was also a magnificent teacher as well. The advice he gives about how to pursue research are as true today as they were in his days. Every graduate student should read it and take his advice...except about what he has to say about women in chapter 6.

Edification for the researcher, April 20, 1999
What a fantastic book...this advice is so germane to those involved in any kind of research. While the work is ostensibly focused on the "young" investigator, I imagine that this advice could well be heeded by those older, and some more stagnant, researchers. ... Read more

Editorial Review

“[A] rollicking, eye-opening, hilarious account of the underbelly of international AIDS research.”—Carlin Romano, Philadelphia InquirerAs an epidemiologist researching AIDS, Elizabeth Pisani has been involved with international efforts to halt the disease for fourteen years. With swashbuckling wit, fierce honesty, and more than a little political incorrectness, she dishes on herself and her colleagues as they try to prod reluctant governments to fund HIV prevention for the people who need it most: drug injectors, gay men, sex workers, and johns. With verve and clarity, Pisani shows the general reader how her profession really works; how easy it is to draw wrong conclusions from “objective” data; and, shockingly, how much money is spent so very badly. 12 illustrations ... Read more

Reviews

Raking through the muck of the AIDS industry, May 30, 2008
If Michael Moore were to dress up in women's clothing and prowl through the red-light districts of Jakarta, we might get a book similar to "The Wisdom of Whores." But this author not only has Moore's street smarts and a lively writing style, she also has a PhD in infectious disease epidemiology. Elizabeth Pisani knows whereof she speaks, because she has spent years on the streets and in the dingy bars where AIDS futures are traded.

"Whores" is one of a rare species of book such as Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" or Jessica Mitford's "The American Way of Death" that has the power to reform an industry. In this case, the author exposes the AIDS prevention industry that sprang up when First World governments started to shovel money into the vital struggle against the HIV retrovirus. Or at least, that's where they should have shoveled it. If you think that the U.S. Government's emphasis on chastity over latex is a great way to spend your tax dollars, you definitely need to read this book.

I was particularly interested in learning why the AIDS epidemic in Asia has not taken off with the same alacrity as it did in South and East Africa.

Elizabeth Pisani may resemble one of Dante Gabriel Rossetti's ethereal Pre-Raphaelite models, but she talks about sex, drugs, and AIDS in the language of her subjects: the sex workers of Indonesia, China, East Timor, and Africa (foreskin soup, anyone?). She describes how governments are wasting billions of AIDS dollars on "schoolgirls and housewives and Boy Scouts" when they should be concentrating on preventive measures for the people who are actually at risk for this deadly disease: "junkies and gay guys and the people who buy and sell sex."

If you are someone who believes that "junkies and gay guys and the people who buy and sell sex" are getting what they deserve, this author has a message for you, too: remember who is infecting the housewives, Boy Scouts, and even the unborn children. The HIV-positive carrier could be your boyfriend, your sister, or your grandchild. Is there anyone in this 21st century without a friend or relative who is infected with this deadly retrovirus?

Some people may object to the frank language of `Whores.' Others may object to its message that condoms will do more to limit the spread of AIDS than misguided attempts at abolishing the sex trade. Most of us will have our eyes opened on what really needs to be done with our tax dollars in order to mitigate the worldwide AIDS crisis.

Review copy supplied by author

A Must-Read, June 10, 2008
Elizabeth Pisani's The Wisdom of Whores - Bureaucrats, Brothels and the Business of AIDS is a great book (along with a great website). Elizabeth Pisani is an epidemiologist with years of experience working on HIV/AIDS (or sex and drugs, as she puts, which sounds a lot, well, sexier) at a variety of agencies, including UNAIDS. The book is the story of her frustrations at the way the international community, national governments, NGOS and AIDS activists have dealt with the epidemics, as well as her hopes in some of the progress made.

I got interested in the book when I read an interview Pisani gave to the Guardian. The interview kinda billed the book as a controversial work where Pisani would be the mean lady who said people got AIDS because of their stupid behavior and not enough was being done because of political correctness. So, I was ready to get really pissed off with the book. That has not been the case at all.

Elizabeth Pisani is a scientist and that perspective is pervasive in the book. That's a good thing. I much prefer sober, "just the facts" perspective to touchy-feely stuff. Actually, one of the main frustrations that Pisani deals with in the book is the fact that AIDS had to be made about innocent wives and children for the international community to gear into action, as opposed to the real populations at risk in most parts of the world (except Africa, and she shows that even in Africa, the innocent wives and children trope does not work, as the data show): drug injectors and people who buy and sell sex.

To me, precisely because the book is data-driven, it was not controversial. My reaction was more, "well, if that's what the data show, so be it." But also, I think, the book was billed as controversial because Pisani calls things what they are: penises, receptive or insertive anal sex, etc. and she does spend a lot of time describing her study in red light districts of Jakarta and other (mostly Asian) place. She discusses the brothels, the warias (transgendered male prostitutes) and rent boys, the drug injectors. She does spend a lot of time describing that world that a lot of people would rather never hear of: the stigmatized, the marginalized, those we can safely ignore and those that don't get politicians votes come election time. Doing nice things for whores and junkies carries no political rewards. Doing things for innocent wives and children does. So, that's what has been done with HIV/AIDS and this has been a tragic mistake.

But these descriptions are unvaluable and fascinating because we never read about them. If you read about HIV/AIDS, you will read a lot about Africa (which does make sense since the high rates of infection in the general population are to be found in Eastern and Southern Africa). The problem is that the African patterns of infection have been assume to apply everywhere, especially Asia, where that is just not the case. So, the solutions and programs suggested are inadapted.

The programs needed in Eastern and Southern Africa are not those that are needed in Asia. In these parts of Africa, AIDS does affect the larger population but that's just not the case in Asia where most of the solutions described by Pisani involve programs to distribute condoms, lubricants and clean needles. It is also one of Pisani's other frustrations: we know how HIV is transmitted (biologically, that is), we know the types of behavior most likely to facilitate this transmission, so, we know what kind of prevention is needed. And yet, there is too much focus placed on treatment, rather than preventing people from getting infected in the first place.

Another thing that definitely comes through as Pisani tells the story of her peregrinations through Jakarta, trying to collect good data to design good public health policy, is that, whether she likes it or not, she comes across as someone who really does care about all the junkies, whores and warias she meets along the way. Her scorn is reserved for other people: UN bureaucrats who do not want to call things what they are because of who might get offended, religious conservatives who lie and work their hardest to prevent good prevention or good policy. But don't think the liberal crowd, the NGOs or activists are off the hook either.

Pisani has no patience for distraction, a major one being that AIDS is a gender / development / poverty issue. Pisani shows that this liberal idea, favored by a lot of NGOs and UN agencies and other donors is a distraction. First, it's a distraction because first, you may have the causality wrong (AIDS causes development / gender issues rather than the other way around), second, as shown in the book, even in Africa, that's not always the case, and third, because, again, that gets in the way of common sense prevention which should be the main focus, along with treatment for the already infected population. But again, focusing on women and children makes the AIDS issue more palatable to donors than those filthy whores, junkies and fags, so, Pisani and her colleagues at the AIDS Mafia, as she calls them, played that game too. After all, once you have the money, you can still get stuff done.

And, of course, I particularly enjoyed the chapter blasting the Bush administration and its faith-based initiatives and PEPFAR (President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief). Although she does credit the Bush administration for putting money on the table, Pisani makes mince meat of the Bush and his religious nuts crowd for their hypocrisy and nonsensical attitude. She deals swiftly with Virginity Pledges and the creepy Virginity Balls and the whole family values crowd.

Finally, Pisani has also no patience for the workings of the international community and civil society, the demands that donors put on local activists, the circuits of money distribution which end up sometimes producing ridiculous policies: like having an AIDS program in East Timor when there is no AIDS problems in East Timor (although there are other problems that would need funding but don't get it).

Again, let me state: when was the last time you read an epidemiology book that was a great read, straight to the point, data-based, sometimes fun, but always informative.

Superb! An excellent book for the layman and scholar, June 2, 2008
Dr. Pisani is a rarity in that she is a scientist who can write! She is a former journalist turned epidemiologist (aka "epi")working in AIDs research amd prevention. Her book will interest not just those readers concerned with AIDs, but anyone who wants to understand the effect politicians and bureaucrats and competing NGOs(Non-government orgaizaions) have on public health. Often only scientists and academics can grasp the process and explanation of scientific research. Dr. Pisani explains it so clearly that the general reader will understand as well. However, she hasn't "dumbed down' the scientific research process and data analysis. Through out this excellent book she shows a deep respect for the intelligence of her reader. No matter what opinion someone has regarding AIDs and its victims, this book will help improve understanding of the disease, its transmissions, the risks of being infected, and how its spread could be stopped. The title may be shocking, but sometimes it take a shock to get many of us to pay attention. Buy this book! Once you start reading you will not put it down until you reach the final page!

Great science meets great journalism, June 23, 2008
For sheer accuracy of synopsis, maybe "The Wisdom of Whores"'s subtitle ought to be "Practical Epidemiology, What We Know About Solving the AIDS Crisis, and How the Politics of International Aid Complicate Matters." Though Pisani probably wants to sell a copy or two.

This is one of the few books I've read that actually lives up to its jacket blurbs. One author describes it as not only a work of science, but also a page-turner. And indeed it is. Pisani holds a Ph.D. in epidemiology, and you can tell from reading The Wisdom of Whores that she has the chops to do serious data analysis. It's data analysis in the service of a practical end, namely figuring out the most efficient ways to stop AIDS. Pisani has been on the ground interviewing prostitutes and junkies for a couple decades now, so she's learned a bit about how the disease actually spreads.

Part of the answer is just common sense: HIV spreads when an infected person's blood comes in contact with an uninfected person's blood. When heroin users share needles, the risk of HIV's spreading rises. Unprotected sex is riskier than protected sex. Unlubricated sex is riskier than lubricated sex, because the risk of causing tears is higher. Uncircumcised men are at higher risk than circumcised men. Prostitutes and their johns are at higher risk than non-prostitutes, because they have more partners.

This much should be common sense; the fact that this common sense often doesn't translate into policy is where the "bureaucrats" in the subtitle come in. The Bush administration and many other nations have changed the conversation: we don't talk about the actual mechanics of sex and drug use, in part because prostitutes and drug users are considered wicked, and it helps no politicians to aid the wicked. From a public-health perspective, most of our effort ought to be focused on the populations that are most at risk: addicts, gay people, and prostitutes. But that doesn't sell. What sells is to talk about "neutral" topics: pretend that consumers of prostitution come home to their innocent wives and unwittingly give them the disease, which then spreads to their kids. When you frame the issue as "AIDS hits everyone," surely you can get votes. Likewise with international aid: if you tell your voters that "poverty and gender disparities" cause AIDS, you can sidestep the icky topics of sex and heroin injection.

Once the money flows, there's a great risk of corruption and waste. Fortunately, Pisani tells us, there are a lot of people on the receiving end of that money who are really trying to do right by the world's taxpayers. And there are organizations like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that seem to disburse funds more efficiently and measure programs' effectiveness better than a lot of governments do. And the governments are learning from their mistakes, in no small part because the epidemiologists on the ground are pushing back on them. Pisani never takes the step that a lot of libertarian fanatics do, namely jumping from the observation that foreign aid can be wasteful to the conclusion that all foreign aid should end. That's because Pisani isn't a libertarian fanatic. She's a hardworking, nose-in-the-details scientist who, like a good disciple of Herb Simon, tries to assume as little as she can before she starts gathering data.

Indeed, the big takeaway from The Wisdom of Whores is that reality is complicated, and that the only way to actually help solve the AIDS epidemic is to dig into the details and be honest about how the disease actually spreads. Don't let ideology, for instance, blind you to the virtues of free condom distribution. Don't let ideology stop needle-exchange programs. At the same time, don't let ideology convince you that needle-exchange programs always work: look at the data first. This book is what happens when a truly scientific worldview merges with the passion of an activist.

Angry and emotional, but sloppy research, August 22, 2010
Elizabeth Pisani cuts a colourful figure in the media and in writing. Before she trained in epdemiology she was a journalist and her eye for people and incidents is part of the make-up of this book too. Unfortunately, it's less coherent than some of the enthusiastic reviews would make you think. Her underdog approach and commitment bring out some home truths, especially relating to corruption and infighting in the medical and international aid communities, but her choice of targets is sometimes misguided.

In working with the epidemic and then writing about it, Pisani seems to have grown heavily conditioned by what groups she wants to be *for* and who she wants to raze down, respectively. She clearly bonded with sex workers and drug addicts in SE Asia - no fault with that, but it sways her analysis of the epidemic because she wants to avoid describing them in terms of victimhood outside of the disease: that's a likely reason for her slagging at the idea that poverty drives entry into sex work/trafficking and careless sexual encounters (when one has to garner a large number of cheap bed-downs every week, one can't always insist on condoms and you certainly don't tell the customers about the risks). On the other hand, she more or less identifies the US gay movement - which she viscerally doesn't like - with the "aids mafia" and insinuates that US homosexuals a)were to blame themselves for the rapid spread of the disease in their clubs and beds and b)had a heavy vested interest in pushing the notion that actually, anyone can be exposed to Aids and it should not be classed as a gays-and-hookers disease. Pisani, by emphasising the view that people pick up aids by semi-voluntary "dumb behaviour" and by claiming there are virtually no straight HIV positives outside of Africa (and saying patients with serious aids in the West can live rather normal lives anyway 'cause they're getting retardant drugs) effectively casts it as a junkie, escorts and gay plague. This of course distorts the character of the disease, and has very limited relevance for the present or the future: in 2009, Washington D.C. had a level fo HIV infection approaching some of the worse parts of sourthern Africa, and that's not all gays and rentboys. As another reviewer pointed out, Pisani seems to have been burned out at some point - the final chapters of her book convey this - and her heavily polarized view of the ways the epidemic has been spreading is probably due to antipathies that built up during her years in the field in SE Asia.

Ms Pisani's use of statistics is spotty sometimes and tailored to fit the desired conclusions. Reading her pages, or even more reading her blog, one gets the impression that Aids would be, at present, close to being contained in the western world, and that it would be a relatively mild condition which could be phased out of the system if only the sick people were more careful and clean-living and if the efforts at fighting it in Asia and Africa were better organized and framed - and avoided targeting the sex trade. The author doesn't seem to recognize that AIDS is still, invariably, a lifelong condition and that even if a vaccine were found, it would be a long time, before it had anything near the swift global reach that penicillin or smallpox vaccination have had in neutralizing once deadly diseases. Of course the fact that Aids is lifelong (and that it can have an exceptionally long incubation time, which makes it harder to contain) is well known to her, but it is completely left aside in the way she sizes up the challenges of the epidemic. Although her stories from the years she spent in South-east Asia are engaging and sometimes funny, they miss out on important aspects of how the diesase spread and underestimate how hard it seems to have been to predict where it would go next.

A polemic and ultimately a bit of a mess, March 26, 2010
It's difficult to offer a contrary view in the face of so much enthusiasm, but I feel like it's important to add something different to the discussion of this book. I should mention that Pisani and I are rough contemporaries with overlapping time in Asia. I don't think we've ever met, although Pisani and I have known and even worked with some of the same people and they generally come across in a way that is recognizable to me. I came to the book via reviews on [...] and elsewhere. The book starts off in a promising way, mixing the personal and the professional and avoiding the dreaded "too much information." As the book continues, it becomes more polemical and despite an effort at structure, it begins to lapse into stream of consciousness, with important issues quickly raised, but with little follow-up and complex issues treated with oversimplification, as in the cases of sex work and poverty. The scholarship is spotty in places (e.g., recent history of sexual mores in Thailand, which had been changing for women even before the HIV epidemic). The scholarship also falls apart in small ways. For example, Pisani places her former employer's HQ in Washington, DC when, in fact, the DC area presence has been shrinking and the HQ always has been in North Carolina. I'd been hoping to get more wisdom of whores, but ultimately, it's too much of Pisani and her own melting down.

The book is puzzling in places. Pisani complains about numbers and the difficulties of measuring HIV cases and risky behavior, but never really enlightens the reader about why this is important and how people treat soft data. Given her training in demography and epidemiology, she should have been able to do this better than someone who has learned epidemiology on the ground like me. Pisani does things like raise the issue of non-injection drug use as a driver of HIV epidemics and then never comes back to it. The discussion of sex work rightly questions the motives and the evidence for some efforts directed at trafficking, but ultimately goes overboard in minimizing things like debt bondage and the growth of trafficking in some parts of SE Asia. There are similar problems with her treatment of economics. In many of the poorest parts of the world, there is relatively little HIV, but poverty often plays a role, as a driver into sex work and the drug trade and in terms of HIV's impact on working age populations (particularly in Africa). The tendency to over generalize and to play the role of iconoclast mars much of the book, particularly in the later chapters

Compared with literate researchers like Chris Beyrer or the rare journalist knowledgeable about HIV like Jon Cohen or Randy Shilts, Pisani comes off poorly. As a polemicist, her use of evidence is too easily challenged by someone working in the field. In addition, she fails to communicate the difficulties in predicting where the epidemic will go, how much it will expand, and where it might be contained. The magnitude of the Thai epidemic of the 1990s surprised many people, as did the more recent epidemic among gay men in Thailand. The epidemic has been contained in unlikely places that have unstable or poor infrastructures, while continuing to devastate in places with relatively functional public health systems. Pisani spent her time in residence in Indonesia, a country with many ingredients for a concentrated epidemic of significant size and yet, it's unclear from the book or from other evidence, why Indonesia has not experienced the rapid expansion seen in Vietnam or the kind of general population epidemic that occurred in Thailand during the early 1990s. While Pisani provides some discussion of why HIV Africa is different from Asia, she never really explains why it varies so much on both continents and her description of Africans having more sex actually flies in the face of a lot of data. Explaining the situation in Indonesia, particularly in comparison to Thailand, Vietnam or the Philippines (another country with "ingredients", but a limited epidemic) would have added greatly to the value of the book.

In the end, it becomes apparent that Pisani became burned out and given the tone of the later chapters, it's neither unsurprising nor something that should be viewed unsympathetically. The later chapters raise issues and concerns but offer no solutions. I would guess that the solution for Pisani was to write a cathartic book and move into consulting work. I wish her well, but I really have trouble recommending that anyone read the book.

Genuinely enjoy getting the facts straight, June 19, 2008
I am seldom found without at least one book close at hand, and end up trying to give books away in order to keep my shelves from collapsing. But I'm not ready to give this one away, I intend to read it again in a while. What I might do, however, is to order a few extra copies and have them delivered to people I know. Why just this one? Because it is one of those books that you come across once in a while, that works on more than one level. It is a book that keeps me turning the pages, with the energy that comes from a genuinely engaging story. Then there is the author's solid knowledge of the topic, and her ability to present it in an accessible way. This is a writer who knows her tools: she knows how to structure a presentation and how to juggle angles to keep it interesting, all in a style that gets the message across clearly and simply, with a strong personality and sense of humor. But the main reason why I want to gently blackmail my friends into reading it by buying it for them, is the information it contains and the message that it spells out. It is an important book. It untangles the facts about HIV and HIV prevention from the myths, which is good. It also shows clearly how ideological/religious/political/economical agendas often play a bigger role than science, which is depressing ... but essential to know. Getting the facts straight, about the infection and about the HIV/AIDS industry, is vital. And in my mind, Elizabeth Pisani is exactly who you should turn to for those facts

books don't get better than this, June 25, 2008
I read a lot, on a wide variety of topics. If it has words on it, I'll try to read it, even if I _don't_ know the language, I'll try to decipher it. But some books are much more rewarding than others, and this is one of the most rewarding books I've ever read.

The other reviews cover the topic well: she's a great writer, a person who really cares about people and not just people who are like her, a scientist who can understand numbers and make them make sense to others. She has a wide-reaching understanding of how AIDS is transmitted, and how that transmission is partly biologically determined and partly culturally determined. And she can convey that complex and detailed understanding in a simple way. Repeatedly, so if you miss it the first time, you get a lot of additional chances. And with hilariously shocking illustrative stories, so there's no remote chance of boredom ever setting in.

I know there's no way she's going to slog through bureaucracy for a second cause -- that would be unfair to ask of anyone. But I hope global warming/climate change/peak oil/etc. gets someone half as brilliant as Pisani. Hopefully several someones.

From the front lines of the worldwide sexual battlefield, July 23, 2010
This stunning book describes the fight of medical professionals to fight global AIDS. Elizabeth Pisani's job was to collect data on sexual practices in Malaysia, Thailand, China and Africa for various UN agencies. Her book details the difficulty of gathering honest data. It also tells of the cultural assumptions that make data collection inaccurate and hence useless for saving lives. For instance, data collectors in Asia ran into combinations of drug users and sex workers that don't fit neatly onto their neat data sheets. A "waria" (a man who dresses and self-identifies as a woman) can service multiple men; her "husband" may do drugs and visit female prostitutes, who themselves have husbands. The myriad combinations of sex partners and drug use make it difficult to estimate the extent of HIV infection and to propose effective remedies for containing the spread of the disease. In Africa, Pisani describes casual cultural attitudes about sex outside marriage that are nearly impossible to abolish. Western religious groups come in for a drubbing for their naivete and "moral" opposition to life-saving practices like wearing condoms. Even US foreign aid is suspect, being restricted to spending money on US products, like condoms, which cost a tenth as much if purchased locally.

"The Wisdom of Whores" is a gritty, eye-opening look into actual sexual practices around the world, and their consequences for the spread of AIDS, this most dangerous of diseases. The book is also a look at the need or activists to sell reluctant governments, sometimes using cooked up data, on doing what is right or their citizens. Pisani is also not afraid to rock the boat when science is on her side. Her surprising, but well-grounded, argument that AIDS is actually very difficult to catch, goes against the popular thought that it spreads easily. But (to try to be delicate) it requires unlubricated, tissue-tearing sexual activity at a time when the infected partner is newly-loaded with the virus. This reality suggests ways to reduce the likelihood of infection that make people uncomfortable, and hence les willing to talk about it and save lives.

"The Wisdom of Whores" is a fact-filled, often funny and deeply affecting book on a great plague, and the difficulty of getting human beings and their governments and religions to do anything effective against it. ... Read more