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Books > Science & Mathematics > Science: general issues
By Parallel Reasoning is the first comprehensive philosophical
examination of analogical reasoning in more than forty years
designed to formulate and justify standards for the critical
evaluation of analogical arguments. It proposes a normative theory
with special focus on the use of analogies in mathematics and
science.
As a graduate student at MIT, Steve Ramirez successfully created false
memories in the lab. Now, as a neuroscientist working at the frontiers
of brain science, he foresees a future where we can replace our
negative memories with positive ones. In How to Change a Memory,
Ramirez draws on his own memories of friendship, family, loss and
recovery to reveal how memory can be turned on and off like a switch,
edited and even constructed from nothing.
Three-fourths of scientific research in the United States is funded
by special interests. Many of these groups have specific practical
goals, such as developing pharmaceuticals or establishing that a
pollutant causes only minimal harm. For groups with financial
conflicts of interest, their scientific findings often can be
deeply flawed.
In recent decades there has been an explosion in work in the social and physical sciences describing the similarities between human and nonhuman as well as human and non-animal thinking. This work has explicitly decentered the brain as the sole, self-contained space of thought, and it has found thinking to be an activity that operates not only across bodies but also across bodily or cellular membranes, as well as multifaceted organic and inorganic environments. For example, researchers have looked at the replication and spread of slime molds (playfully asking what would happen if they colonized the earth) to suggest that they exhibit 'smart behavior' in the way they move as a potential way of considering the spread of disease across the globe. Other scholars have applied this model of non-human thought to the reach of data mining and global surveillance. In The Biopolitics of Alphabets and Embryos, Ruth Miller argues that these types of phenomena are also useful models for thinking about the growth, reproduction, and spread of political thought and democratic processes. Giving slime, data and unbounded entities their political dues, Miller stresses their thinking power and political significance and thus challenges the anthropocentrism of mainstream democratic theories. Miller emphasizes the non-human as highly organized, systemic and productive of democratic growth and replication. She examines developments such as global surveillance, embryonic stem cell research, and cloning, which have been characterized as threats to the privacy, dignity, and integrity of the rational, maximizing and freedom-loving democratic citizen. By shifting her level of analysis from the politics of self-determining subjects to the realm of material environments and information systems, Miller asks what might happen if these alternative, nonhuman thought processes become the normative thought processes of democratic engagement.
Tools of Chemistry Education Research meets the current need for information on more in-depth resources for those interested in doing chemistry education research. Renowned chemists Diane M. Bunce and Renee S. Cole present this volume as a continuation of the dialogue started in their previous work, Nuts and Bolts of Chemical Education Research. With both volumes, new and experienced researchers will now have a place to start as they consider new research projects in chemistry education. Tools of Chemistry Education Research brings together a group of talented researchers to share their insights and expertise with the broader community. The volume features the contributions of both early career and more established chemistry education researchers, so as to promote the growth and expansion of chemistry education. Drawing on the expertise and insights of junior faculty and more experienced researchers, each author offers unique insights that promise to benefit other practitioners in chemistry education research.
For modern scientists, history often starts with last week's
journals and is regarded as largely a quaint interest compared with
the advances of today. However, this book makes the case that,
measured by major advances, the greatest decade in the history of
brain studies was mid-twentieth century, especially the 1950s. The
first to focus on worldwide contributions in this period, the book
ranges through dozens of astonishing discoveries at all levels of
the brain, from DNA (Watson and Crick), through growth factors
(Hamburger and Levi-Montalcini), excitability (Hodgkin and Huxley),
synapses (Katz and Eccles), dopamine and Parkinson's (Carlsson),
visual processing (Hartline and Kuffler), the cortical column
(Mountcastle), reticular activating system (Morruzzi and Magoun)
and REM sleep (Aserinsky), to stress (Selye), learning (Hebb) and
memory (HM and Milner). The clinical fields are also covered, from
Cushing and Penfield, psychosurgery and brain energy metabolism
(Kety), to most of the major psychoactive drugs in use today
(beginning with Delay and Deniker), and much more.
Biomedical ethics is a burgeoning academic field with complex and
far-reaching consequences. Whereas in Western secular bioethics
this subject falls within larger ethical theories and applications
(utilitarianism, deontology, teleology, and the like), Islamic
biomedical ethics has yet to find its natural academic home in
Islamic studies.
This volume contains ten new essays focused on the exploration and articulation of a narrative that considers the notion of order within medieval and modern philosophy-its various kinds (natural, moral, divine, and human), the different ways in which each is conceived, and the diverse dependency relations that are thought to obtain among them. Descartes, with the help of others, brought about an important shift in what was understood by the order of nature by placing laws of nature at the foundation of his natural philosophy. Vigorous debate then ensued about the proper formulation of the laws of nature and the moral law, about whether such laws can be justified, and if so, how-through some aspect of the divine order or through human beings-and about what consequences these laws have for human beings and the moral and divine orders. That is, philosophers of the period were thinking through what the order of nature consists in and how to understand its relations to the divine, human, and moral orders. No two major philosophers in the modern period took exactly the same stance on these issues, but these issues are clearly central to their thought. The Divine Order, the Human Order, and the Order of Nature is devoted to investigating their positions from a vantage point that has the potential to combine metaphysical, epistemological, scientific, and moral considerations into a single narrative.
Bishop Harvey Spencer never thought he'd witness a pandemic-just as he never expected to see the election of a Black president, the election of a female vice president (Black or otherwise), or an insurrection. But all of those things have happened, and our lives have been forever altered. In this book, he seeks to discover what God is trying to reveal to us by letting COVID-19 run rampant. By studying the Bible, he discovered it is not silent when it comes to fighting an infectious disease. He answers questions such as: - How did ancient Israel fight the spread of another infectious disease-leprosy? - What does the Bible tell us about quarantining individuals who are sick or may be sick? - Why do some elected officials continue to display a lack of leadership amid the pandemic? The author also examines what the Bible says about using face coverings, what the world has done to fight other outbreaks of disease, and similarities between COVID-19 and other deadly viruses. Get simple, practical explanations from the Bible that will help you understand the spread of COVID-19-and how to protect yourself-with A Biblical Response to COVID-19.
The biological and social sciences often generalize causal
conclusions from one context or location to others that may differ
in some relevant respects, as is illustrated by inferences from
animal models to humans or from a pilot study to a broader
population. Inferences like these are known as extrapolations. The
question of how and when extrapolation can be legitimate is a
fundamental issue for the biological and social sciences that has
not received the attention it deserves. In Across the Boundaries,
Steel argues that previous accounts of extrapolation are inadequate
and proposes a better approach that is able to answer
methodological critiques of extrapolation from animal models to
humans.
Restoring Layered Landscapes brings together historians, geographers, philosophers, and interdisciplinary scholars to explore ecological restoration in landscapes with complex histories shaped by ongoing interactions between humans and nature. For many decades, ecological restoration - particularly in the United States - focused on returning degraded sites to conditions that prevailed prior to human influence. This model has been broadened in recent decades, and restoration now increasingly focuses on the recovery of ecological functions and processes rather than on returning a site to a specific historical state. Nevertheless, neither the theory nor the practice of restoration has fully come to terms with the challenges of restoring layered landscapes, where nature and culture shape one another in deep and ongoing relationships. Former military and industrial sites provide paradigmatic examples of layered landscapes. Many of these sites are not only characterized by natural ecosystems worth preserving and restoring, but also embody significant political, social, and cultural histories. This volume grapples with the challenges of restoring and interpreting such complex sites: What should we aim to restore in such places? How can restoration adequately take the legacies of human use into account? Should traces of the past be left on the landscape, and how can interpretive strategies be creatively employed to make visible the complex legacies of an open pit mine or chemical weapons manufacturing plant? Restoration aims to create new value, but not always without loss. Restoration often disrupts existing ecosystems, infrastructure, and artifacts. The chapters in this volume consider what restoration can tell us more generally about the relationship between continuity and change, and how the past can and should inform our thinking about the future. These insights, in turn, will help foster a more thoughtful approach to human-environment relations in an era of unprecedented anthropogenic global environmental change.
This book is a long-term history of optics, from early Greek theories of vision to the nineteenth-century victory of the wave theory of light. It shows how light gradually became the central entity of a domain of physics that no longer referred to the functioning of the eye; it retraces the subsequent competition between medium-based and corpuscular concepts of light; and it details the nineteenth-century flourishing of mechanical ether theories. The author critically exploits and sometimes completes the more specialized histories that have flourished in the past few years. The resulting synthesis brings out the actors' long-term memory, their dependence on broad cultural shifts, and the evolution of disciplinary divisions and connections. Conceptual precision, textual concision, and abundant illustration make the book accessible to a broad variety of readers interested in the origins of modern optics.
This book is a unique introduction to graph theory, written by one of its founding fathers. It is not intended as a comprehensive treatise, but rather as an account of those parts of the theory that have been of special interest to the author. Professor Tutte details his experiences in the area, and provides a fascinating insight into the processes leading to his proofs.
Professors and research advisors have always endeavored to make the opportunity to gain new knowledge available to their students. However, new knowledge takes different forms. From a student perspective, it comes from reading textbooks and primary literature or attending classes and seminars. Professors share in these activities with their students, but they know that physically taking part in the acquisition of new knowledge through active research is where the true excitement begins. For many, if not all, faculty members research is the source of passion for chemistry, and sharing it with a rising generation of chemists often comprises a substantial part of the decision to pursue a career in the field of undergraduate education. These chapters and additional ones provide starting points for developing such a culture at the department level. In several cases the starting point is redesigning introductory or research methods courses to place a stronger emphasis on authentic research and its associated skills. In other cases the establishment of a thriving research group by one faculty member is the catalyst for initiating the departmental transformation. There are also several examples of how to set up an undergraduate research group in departments that place a heavy emphasis on research, and those that place less emphasis on research. Many of these offer roadmaps for developing interdisciplinary research groups or translating resource-intensive graduate-level research to an environment that is resource-restrictive. In still other cases the research has an experiential learning component. For many of the above examples the departmental/institutional role is not always obvious and may not be influential or important. This is a reminder that undergraduate research need not be "institutional" to be successful.
Get the answers you need at your fingertips faster than any other source. Success in Physics is critical when entering the growing fields of technology, computer science and engineering that will support our future progress and innovation with breakthroughs and advances. To help retain the facts, equations and concepts essential to success in class and beyond, these 6 laminated pages can be referenced quickly and easily while studying, as a refresher before exams or even as a desktop reference beyond school. Expertly written by author, editor and professor Brett Kaabel PhD, and designed for quick use and high retention. Be sure to get our original Physics guide and Physics 2 for more complete coverage and better grades for an unmatched value. 6 page laminated guide includes: Introduction, Constants & Definitions Classical Mechanics Kinematics, Newton's Laws Work & Kinetic Energy, Potential Energy (U) Conservation of Energy, Momentum Simple Harmonic Motion (SHM) Gravitation Thermodynamics Temperature Scales Zeroth Law, First Law & Second Law of Thermodynamics Thermal Properties of Systems Kinetic Theory of Gasses Waves Types of Waves Transverse vs. Longitudinal Waves Wave Equation Electromagnetism Electric Charge, Electric Field Magnetic Field, Magnetic Fluz Gauss's Law for Magnetism Faraday's Law of Induction Electromagnetic Waves, Electric Circuits Special Relativity Einstein's Postulates, Time Dilation Length Contraction Lorentz Transformation, Velocity Transformation Relativistic Doppler Effect Relativistic Energy & Momentum Quantum Mechanics Quantized Atomic Energy Levels Nuclear Physics Atoms, Nuclei, Nuclear Forces Radioactivity, Nuclear Reactions Force Carriers
This volume brings together fourteen major essays on truth, naturalism, expressivism and representationalism, by one of contemporary philosophy's most challenging thinkers. Huw Price weaves together Quinean minimalism about truth, Carnapian deflationism about metaphysics, Wittgensteinian pluralism about the functions of declarative language, and Rortyian skepticism about representation to craft a powerful and sustained critique of contemporary naturalistic metaphysics. In its place, he offers us not nonnaturalistic metaphysics, or philosophical quietism, but a new positive program for philosophy, cast from a pragmatist mold. This collection will be essential reading for anyone interested naturalism, pragmatism, truth, expressivism, pluralism and representationalism, or in deep questions about the direction and foundations of contemporary philosophy. It will be especially important to practitioners of analytic metaphysics, if they wish to confront the presuppositions of their own discipline. Price recommends a modest explanatory naturalism, in the sense of Hume: naturalism about own linguistic behavior, regarded as a behavior of natural creatures in a natural environment. He shows how this viewpoint privileges use and function over truth and reference, and expression over representation, as useful theoretical categories for the core philosophical project; and thereby undermines the semantic presuppositions of contemporary analytic metaphysics. At the same time, it offers an attractive resolution of the so-called "placement problems", that so preoccupy metaphysical naturalists-a global expressivism, with affinities both to the more local expressivism of writers such as Blackburn and Gibbard, and to Brandom's global inferentialism.
This hands-on guide is primarily intended to be used in
undergraduate laboratories in the physical sciences and
engineering. It assumes no prior knowledge of statistics. It
introduces the necessary concepts where needed, with key points
illustrated with worked examples and graphic illustrations. In
contrast to traditional mathematical treatments it uses a
combination of spreadsheet and calculus-based approaches, suitable
as a quick and easy on-the-spot reference. The emphasis throughout
is on practical strategies to be adopted in the laboratory.
What do we see? We are visually conscious of colors and shapes, but are we also visually conscious of complex properties such as being John Malkovich? In this book, Susanna Siegel develops a framework for understanding the contents of visual experience, and argues that these contents involve all sorts of complex properties. Siegel starts by analyzing the notion of the contents of experience, and by arguing that theorists of all stripes should accept that experiences have contents. She then introduces a method for discovering the contents of experience: the method of phenomenal contrast. This method relies only minimally on introspection, and allows rigorous support for claims about experience. She then applies the method to make the case that we are conscious of many kinds of properties, of all sorts of causal properties, and of many other complex properties. She goes on to use the method to help analyze difficult questions about our consciousness of objects and their role in the contents of experience, and to reconceptualize the distinction between perception and sensation. Siegel's results are important for many areas of philosophy, including the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. They are also important for the psychology and cognitive neuroscience of vision.
The interactions of microbes with surfaces are important to many
natural and engineered processes, affecting a wide range of
applications from decontamination of surfaces or drinking water,
prevention of microbial colonization of biomaterials, and bacterial
processes in the environment. Therefore, there is great interest in
understanding the fundamental behavior of microbes at surfaces.
Topics are included that address interactions of cells with a
number of surfaces for antifouling and microbial cell-based sensor
applications; mechanistic studies of antimicrobial peptides and
quorum sensing; exploration of experimental and theoretical models
of a cell surface; cell surface display of peptides and enzymes as
biofabrication techniques; the fate and transport of bacteria in
the natural environment, as well as new experimental tools or
modeling techniques to study interactions at the microbial
surface.
When we think of yoga today, we envision spandex-clad, perspiring, toned people brought together in a room filled with yoga mats and engaged in a fitness ritual set apart from day-to-day life. Their aim is to enhance something they all deem sacred: their bodies. In Selling Yoga, Andrea Jain looks at the development of modern, popular yoga and suggests that its practitioners are strategic participants in the contemporary global market for self-developmental products and services. Pre-colonial and early modern yoga systems comprise esoteric techniques that aim at transcendent states of detachment from ordinary and conventional life. In contrast, contemporary popularized yoga aims at immediate self-development through the enhancement of the mind-body complex according to dominant health and fitness paradigms. Postural yoga is prescribed not as an all-encompassing worldview or system of practice, but as one part of self-development that provides increased beauty and flexibility as well as reduced stress; it can be combined with various other worldviews and practices available in the global marketplace. However, Jain argues that yoga systems cannot be reduced to mere commodities-that yoga is, in fact, a religion of consumer culture. It functions as a social ritual that removes individuals from everyday life for the sake of self-development. Yoga brands destabilize the basic utility of yoga commodities and assign to them new meanings that represent the fulfillment of self-developmental needs deemed sacred in contemporary consumer culture.
Reprogenetic technologies, which combine the power of reproductive techniques with the tools of genetic science and technology, promise prospective parents a remarkable degree of control to pick and choose the likely characteristics of their offspring. Not only can they select embryos with or without particular genetically-related diseases and disabilities but also choose embryos with non-disease related traits such as sex. Prominent authors such as Agar, Buchanan, DeGrazia, Green, Harris, Robertson, Savulescu, and Silver have flocked to the banner of reprogenetics. For them, increased reproductive choice and reduced suffering through the elimination of genetic disease and disability are just the first step. They advocate use of these technologies to create beings who enjoy longer and healthier lives, possess greater intellectual capacities, and are capable of more refined emotional experiences. Indeed, Harris and Savulescu in particular take reprogenetic technologies to be so valuable to human beings that they have insisted that their use is not only morally permissible but morally required. Rethinking Reprogenetics challenges this mainstream view with a contextualised, gender-attentive philosophical perspective. De Melo-Martin demonstrates that you do not have to be a Luddite, social conservative, or religious zealot to resist the siren song of reprogenetics. Pointing out the flawed nature of the arguments put forward by the technologies' proponents, Rethinking Reprogenetics reveals the problematic nature of the assumptions underpinning current evaluations of these technologies and offers a framework for a more critical and sceptical assessment.
Something Old, Something New: Contemporary Entanglements of Religion and Secularity offers a fresh perspective on debates surrounding a significant if underappreciated relationship between religious and secular interests. In entanglement, secularity competes with religion, but neither side achieves simple dominance by displacing the other. As secular ideas and practices entangle with their religious counterparts, they interact and alter each other in a contentious but oddly intimate relationship. In each chapter, Wayne Glausser focuses on a topic of contemporary relevance in which something old-e. g., the sacrament of extreme unction, Greek rhetorical tropes, scholastic theology-entangles with something new: psilocybin therapy for the dying, new atheism, cognitive science. As traditional religious knowledge and values come into conflict with their secular counterparts, the old ideas undergo stress and adaptation, but the influence works in both directions. Those with primary allegiance to secular interests find themselves entangled with aspects of religious thinking. Whether they do it intentionally or without knowing, entangled secularists engage with and sometimes borrow from older paradigms they believe they have surpassed. Glausser's approach offers a new perspective in the conversation between believers and secularists. Something Old, Something New is a book that theists, atheists, agnostics, and everyone still searching for the right label will find respectful but provocative.
When Sir Cyril Burt died in 1971, he was widely recognized as Britain's most eminent educational psychologist whose studies of gifted and delinquent children, contributions to the development of factor analysis, and research on the inheritance of intelligence brought widespread acclaim. Within five years of his death, however, he was publicly denounced as a fraud who had fabricated data to conclude that intelligence is genetically determined. Examiners of the published data found serious inconsistencies that raised questions about their authenticity; the case has divided the scientific community ever since. Were the charges justified, or was he a victim of critics fearful of validating such a politically unacceptable scientific theory? This is an up-to-date and unbiased analysis of one of the most notorious scandals in science, now more timely and widely discussed than ever with the publication of The Bell Curve, the best-selling polemic that raises arguments comparable to Burt's. The distinguished contributors examine the controversial areas of Burt's work and argue that his defenders have sometimes, but by no means always, been correct, and that his critics have often jumped to hasty conclusions. In their haste, however, these critics have missed crucial evidence that is not easily reconciled with Burt's total innocence, leaving the perception that both cases are seriously flawed. An introductory chapter lays the background to the case, followed by an examination of Burt's work that relates to the controversy. The book concludes with a chapter on Burt's character, other cases of apparent scientific fraud, and the impact of Burt's alleged fabrications. These findings have profound implications not only for the study of psychology, but for the wider issues relating to integrity in scientific research, and the impact of intelligence testing on social policy.
Was Plato a Pythagorean? Plato's students and earliest critics thought so, but scholars since the 19th century have been more skeptical. In Plato and Pythagoreanism, Phillip Sidney Horky argues that a specific type of Pythagorean philosophy, called "mathematical" Pythagoreanism, exercised a decisive influence on fundamental aspects of Plato's philosophy. The progenitor of mathematical Pythagoreanism was the infamous Pythagorean heretic and political revolutionary Hippasus of Metapontum, a student of Pythagoras who is credited with experiments in harmonics that led to innovations in mathematics. The innovations of Hippasus and other mathematical Pythagoreans, including Empedocles of Agrigentum, Epicharmus of Syracuse, Philolaus of Croton, and Archytas of Tarentum, presented philosophers like Plato with new approaches to science that sought to reconcile empirical knowledge with abstract mathematical theories. Plato and Pythagoreanism shows how mathematical Pythagoreanism established many of the fundamental philosophical questions Plato dealt with in his central dialogues, including Cratylus, Phaedo, Republic, Timaeus, and Philebus. In the process, it also illuminates the historical significance of the mathematical Pythagoreans, a group whose influence over the development of philosophical and scientific methods have been obscured since late antiquity. The picture that results is one in which Plato inherits mathematical Pythagorean method only to transform it into a powerful philosophical argument concerning the essential relationships between the cosmos and the human being.
This book is about pleasure. It's also about pain. Most important, it's about how to find the delicate balance between the two, and why now more than ever finding balance is essential. We're living in a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting... The increased numbers, variety, and potency is staggering. The smartphone is the modern-day hypodermic needle, delivering digital dopamine 24/7 for a wired generation. As such we've all become vulnerable to compulsive overconsumption. In Dopamine Nation, Dr. Anna Lembke, psychiatrist and author, explores the exciting new scientific discoveries that explain why the relentless pursuit of pleasure leads to pain...and what to do about it. Condensing complex neuroscience into easy-to-understand metaphors, Lembke illustrates how finding contentment and connectedness means keeping dopamine in check. The lived experiences of her patients are the gripping fabric of her narrative. Their riveting stories of suffering and redemption give us all hope for managing our consumption and transforming our lives. In essence, Dopamine Nation shows that the secret to finding balance is combining the science of desire with the wisdom of recovery. |
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