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Books > Reference & Interdisciplinary > Controversial knowledge
There is ample evidence that it is difficult for the general public
to understand and internalize scientific facts. Disputes over such
facts are often amplified amid political controversies. As we've
seen with climate change and even COVID-19, politicians rely on the
perceptions of their constituents when making decisions that impact
public policy. So, how do we make sure that what the public
understands is accurate? In this book, Steven L. Goldman traces the
public's suspicion of scientific knowledge claims to a broad
misunderstanding, reinforced by scientists themselves, of what it
is that scientists know, how they know it, and how to act on the
basis of it. In sixteen chapters, Goldman takes readers through the
history of scientific knowledge from Plato and Aristotle, through
the birth of modern science and its maturation, into a powerful
force for social change to the present day. He explains how
scientists have wrestled with their own understanding of what it is
that they know, that theories evolve, and why the public
misunderstands the reliability of scientific knowledge claims. With
many examples drawn from the history of philosophy and science, the
chapters illustrate an ongoing debate over how we know what we say
we know and the relationship between knowledge and reality. Goldman
covers a rich selection of ideas from the founders of modern
science and John Locke's response to Newton's theories to Thomas
Kuhn's re-interpretation of scientific knowledge and the Science
Wars that followed it. Goldman relates these historical disputes to
current issues, underlining the important role scientists play in
explaining their own research to nonscientists and the effort
nonscientists must make to incorporate science into public
policies. A narrative exploration of scientific knowledge, Science
Wars engages with the arguments of both sides by providing
thoughtful scientific, philosophical, and historical discussions on
every page.
From Aristophanes' Lysistrata to the notorious Mata Hari and the
legendary Tokyo Rose, stories of female betrayal during wartime
have recurred throughout human history. The myth of Hanoi Jane,
Jerry Lembcke argues, is simply the latest variation on this
enduring theme. Like most of the iconic femmes fatales who came
before, it is based on a real person, Jane Fonda. And also like its
predecessors, it combines traces of fact with heavy doses of
fiction to create a potent symbol of feminine perfidy--part erotic
warrior-woman Barbarella, part savvy anti-war activist, and part
powerful entrepreneur. Hanoi Jane, the book, deconstructs Hanoi
Jane, the myth, to locate its origins in the need of Americans to
explain defeat in Vietnam through fantasies of home-front betrayal
and the masculation of the national will-to-war. Lembcke shows that
the expression "Hanoi Jane" did not reach the eyes and ears of most
Americans until five or six years after the end of the war in
Vietnam. By then, anxieties about America's declining global status
and deteriorating economy were fuelling a populist reaction that
pointed to the loss of the war as the taproot of those problems.
Blaming the anti-war movement for undermining the military's
resolve, many found in the imaginary Hanoi Jane the personification
of their stab-in-the back theories. Ground zero of the myth was the
city of Hanoi itself, which Jane Fonda had visited as a peace
activist in July 1972. Rumours surrounding Fonda's visits with U.S.
POWs and radio broadcasts to troops combined to conjure allegations
of treason that had cost American lives. That such tales were more
imagined than real did not prevent them from insinuating themselves
into public memory, where they have continued to infect American
politics and culture. Hanoi Jane is a book about the making of
Hanoi Jane by those who saw a formidable threat in the Jane Fonda
who supported soldiers and veterans opposed to the war they fought,
in the postcolonial struggle of the Vietnamese people to make their
own future, and in the movements of women everywhere for gender
equality.
Capital punishment for murder was suspended in Great Britain in
1965, an Act finally made permanent in 1969, but remained as the
punishment for treason until as recently as 1998, demonstrating how
seriously we take the crime of betraying your country. But even
with the threat of the noose hanging over them, many still chose
the path of treachery during the cataclysmic events of last
century. British Traitors examines the lives and motivations of a
number of the perpetrators of this most heinous of crimes,
following the footsteps of Fascist traitors such as William Joyce
(Lord Haw-Haw) and John Amery to the gallows, investigating what
drove men such as Wilfred Macartney and John Herbert King to betray
their country during the war to end all wars and delving into the
mysterious web of espionage and subterfuge surrounding the
Cambridge Spy Ring that spied for the Soviet Union from the
nineteen-thirties until the early nineteen-fifties. People commit
treason for many reasons - some seek adventure, some seek reward,
some are motivated by political philosophy, while others are sucked
into it by their own foolishness. British Traitors provides a
fascinating look at the lives and impulses of those who chose to
betray their country.
In June 2021, U.S. National Intelligence publicly admitted that
UFOs are real physical objects and that they have been penetrating
restricted military airspace since at least 2004. Despite this
bombshell and further recent admissions by the Pentagon, the
identity of these mysterious craft remains unknown. This book
brings the full scientific method to bear on this enigmatic issue.
Written by Daniel Coumbe, a former research scientist at the Niels
Bohr Institute in Copenhagen with a PhD in theoretical particle
physics, this book defines one of the first scientifically credible
studies of UFOs in the modern era. Anomaly reveals new results
derived from radar, optical sensors, and scientific instruments,
rather than speculating on unreliable eyewitness testimony. This
scientific approach provides the reader with clear and reliable
answers, something that is desperately needed in the murky field of
UFOs.
Shedding light onto sometimes sinister and coercive groups, Secret
Societies: The Complete Guide to Histories, Rites, and Rituals is
packed with details on nearly 200 organisations, their histories,
found members, backgrounds and suspected conspiracies. It uncovers
and examines the hidden, overlooked, and buried history of some of
the most notorious groups, including the Illuminati, the
Freemasons, Skull and Bones, World Bankers, the Secret Government
and extraterrestrial invaders, to name a few.
This book provides new answers to who and psychologically why
individuals sometimes adopt conspiracy beliefs and thoughts of
violence. Five conspiracy beliefs are considered: Government
Malfeasance, Malevolent World Power, Extra-terrestrial Cover-up,
Personal Well-being Threat, and Control of Information. Using a
survey of 977 US citizens, the book compares thirteen possible
demographic characteristics (who?) to see which ones are most
associated with extreme beliefs. The book then evaluates a
three-step psychological sequence (why?) in which individuals
experiencing intense life stressors (health, money, or loneliness),
combined with powerlessness (displayed as PTSD symptoms), have
increased risk for extreme beliefs, perhaps because they offer a
sense of understanding, strength, and community.
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