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Books > Language & Literature > Biography & autobiography > Science, technology & engineering
Moving, honest and inspiring - this is a nurse's true story of life
in a busy A&E department during the Covid-19 crisis. Working in
A&E is a challenging job but nurse Louise Curtis loves it. She
was newly qualified as an advanced clinical practitioner,
responsible for life or death decisions about the patients she saw,
when the unthinkable happened and the country was hit by the
Covid-19 pandemic. The stress on the NHS was huge and for the first
time in her life, the job was going to take a toll on Louise
herself. In A Nurse's Story she describes what happened next, as
the trickle of Covid patients became a flood. And just as
tragically, staff in A&E were faced with the effects of
lockdown on society. They worried about their regulars, now
missing, and saw an increase in domestic abuse victims and suicide
attempts as loneliness hit people hard. By turns heartbreaking and
heartwarming, this book shines a light on the compassion and
dedication of hospital staff during such dark times. 'An important
memoir that we all need to read right now.' - Closer
This book sheds new light on the life and the influence of one of
the most significant critical thinkers in psychology of the last
century, Theodore R. Sarbin (1911-2005). In the first section
authors provide a comprehensive account of Sarbin's life and
career. The second section consists in a collection of ten
publications from the last two decades of his career. The essays
cover topics such as the adoption of contextualism as the
appropriate world view for psychology, the establishment of
narrative psychology as a major mode of inquiry, and the rejection
both mechanism and mentalism as suitable approaches for psychology.
The book is historically informed and yet focused on the future of
psychological theory and practice. It will engage researches and
scholars in psychology, social scientists and philosophers, as well
general readership interested in exploring Sarbin's theories.
An unforgettable story of discovery and unimaginable destruction
and a major biography of one of America's most brilliant--and most
divisive--scientists, "Robert Oppenheimer: A Life Inside the
Center" vividly illuminates the man who would go down in history as
"the father of the atomic bomb." Oppenheimer's talent and drive
secured him a place in the pantheon of great physicists and carried
him to the laboratories where the secrets of the universe revealed
themselves. But they also led him to contribute to the development
of the deadliest weapon on earth, a discovery he soon came to fear.
His attempts to resist the escalation of the Cold War arms
race--coupled with political leanings at odds with post-war
America--led many to question his loyalties, and brought down upon
him the full force of McCarthyite anti-communism. Digging deeply
into Oppenheimer's past to solve the enigma of his motivations and
his complex personality, Ray Monk uncovers the extraordinary,
charming, tortured man--and the remarkable mind--who fundamentally
reshaped the world.
In this work, Carl Anthony shares his perspectives as an
African-American child in post-World War II Philadelphia; a student
and civil rights activist in 1960s Harlem; a traveling student of
West African architecture; and an architect, planner, and
environmental justice advocate in Berkeley. He contextualizes this
within American urbanism and human origins, making profoundly
personal both African American and American urban histories as well
as planetary origins and environmental issues, to not only bring a
new worldview to people of color, but to set forth a truly
inclusive vision of our shared planetary future. The Earth, the
City, and the Hidden Narrative of Race connects the logics behind
slavery, community disinvestment, and environmental exploitation to
address the most pressing issues of our time in a cohesive and
foundational manner. Most books dealing with these topics and
periods silo issues apart from one another, but this book
contextualizes the connections between social movements and issues,
providing tremendous insight into successful movement building.
Anthony's rich narrative describes both being at the mercy of
racism, urban disinvestment, and environmental injustice as well as
fighting against these forces with a variety of strategies. Because
this work is both a personal memoir and an exposition of ideas, it
will appeal to those who appreciate thoughtful and unique writing
on issues of race, including individuals exploring their own
African American identity, as well as progressive audiences of
organizations and community leaders and professionals interested in
democratizing power and advancing equitable policies for low-income
communities and historically disenfranchised communities.
'I think you have something here' I said, 'This could lead to a
whole new way of understanding criminal behaviour. As far as I know
no one's ever tried to figure out why serial killers kill. The
implications are profound.' Haunting, heartfelt, and deeply human,
Dr Ann Burgess's remarkable memoir combines a riveting personal
narrative of fearless feminism and ambition, bone-chilling
encounters with real-life monsters, and a revealing portrait of the
ever-evolving US criminal justice system. A Killer By Design will
inspire, terrify, and enlighten you in equal measure. It forces us
to confront the age-old question 'What drives someone to kill, and
how can we stop them?' 'Of all the colleagues I've worked with, Ann
is one of the sharpest - and one of the toughest ... She taught us
how to harness the chaos of serial killers' minds and helped us
decipher the undecipherable. I'd recommend that everyone read A
Killer By Design; not only is it a great page-turner, but it's
about time Ann's story was heard' - JOHN E. DOUGLAS, former FBI
criminal profiler and bestselling author of Mindhunter.
An inside look at one of the nation's most famous public hospitals,
Cook County, as seen through the eyes of its longtime Director of
Intensive Care, Dr. Cory Franklin. Filled with stories of strange
medical cases and unforgettable patients culled from a thirty-year
career in medicine, Cook County ICU offers readers a peek into the
inner workings of a hospital. Author Dr. Cory Franklin, who headed
the hospital's intensive care unit from the 1970s through the
1990s, shares his most unique and bizarre experiences, including
the deadly Chicago heat wave of 1995, treating some of the first
AIDS patients in the country before the disease was diagnosed, the
nurse with rare Munchausen syndrome, the first surviving ricin
victim, and the famous professor whose Parkinson's disease hid the
effects of the wrong medication. Surprising, darkly humorous,
heartwarming, and sometimes tragic, these stories provide a
big-picture look at how the practice of medicine has changed over
the years, making it an enjoyable read for patients, doctors, and
anyone with an interest in medicine.
This fascinating portrait of an amateur astronomy movement tells
the story of how Charles Olivier recruited a hard-working cadre of
citizen scientists to rehabilitate the study of meteors. By 1936,
Olivier and members of his American Meteor Society had succeeded in
disproving an erroneous idea about meteor showers. Using careful
observations, they restored the public's trust in predictions about
periodic showers and renewed respect for meteor astronomy among
professional astronomers in the United States. Charles Olivier and
his society of observers who were passionate about watching for
meteors in the night sky left a major impact on the field. In
addition to describing Olivier's career and describing his
struggles with competitive colleagues in a hostile scientific
climate, the author provides biographies of some of the scores of
women and men of all ages who aided Olivier in making shower
observations, from the Leonids and Perseids and others. Half of
these amateur volunteers were from 13 to 25 years of age. Their
work allowed Olivier and the AMS to contradict the fallacious
belief in stationary and long-enduring meteor showers, bringing the
theory of their origin into alignment with celestial mechanics.
Thanks to Olivier and his collaborators, the study of meteors took
a great leap forward in the twentieth century to earn a place as a
worthy topic of study among professional astronomers.
L. Ron Hubbard exposed the brutal truth of a psychiatric chemical
onslaught, the likes of which this world has never seen. This,
then, is the story of 21st century cultural wastage. Also detailed
is Mr. Hubbard s clear and understandable solution to all chemical
toxins, with the Purification Program and the worldwide network of
Narconon rehabilitation centers. Narconon is the by far most
successful drug rehabilitation program, with the maximum percentage
of those who never revert to drugs again. This volume covers L. Ron
Hubbard's development and discoveries, as well as a history of its
organizations, that have saved hundreds of thousands of lives by
getting them off of drugs permanently.
Luigi L. Pasinetti (born 1930) is arguably the most influential of
the second generation of the Cambridge Keynesian School of
Economics, both because of his achievements and his early
involvement with the direct pupils of John Maynard Keynes. This
comprehensive intellectual biography traces his research from his
early groundbreaking contribution in the field of structural
economic dynamics to the 'Pasinetti Theorem'. With scientific
outputs spanning more than six decades (1955-2017), Baranzini and
Mirante analyse the impact of his research work and roles at
Cambridge, the Catholic University of Milan and at the new
University of Lugano. Pasinetti's whole scientific life has been
driven by the desire to provide new frameworks to explain the
mechanisms of modern economic systems, and this book assesses how
far this has been achieved.
The partnership of Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace was one that
would change science forever. They were an unlikely pair - one the
professor son of a banker, the other the only child of an acclaimed
poet and a social-reforming mathematician - but perhaps that is why
their work was so revolutionary. They were the pioneers of computer
science, creating plans for what could have been the first
computer. They each saw things the other did not: it may have been
Charles who designed the machines, but it was Ada who could see
their potential. But what were they like? And how did they work
together? Using previously unpublished correspondence between them,
Charles and Ada explores the relationship between two remarkable
people who shared dreams far ahead of their time.
No one expected this journey. Jessica Carmel was born with a severe
congenital heart condition. At four days old, her parents learned
she would need heart surgery. They had no idea that her future held
multiple surgeries and even more unexpected challenges.
Fast-forward sixteen years. As Jessica sat in her cardiologist's
office for a routine checkup, he told her and her mom that there
was nothing more he could do for her. Jessica needed a heart
transplant. Three weeks later, Jessica underwent heart transplant
surgery. Her recovery was long, but good. Feeling healthier than
ever, she went on to graduate high school and college. Soon after
her college graduation,however, she began to feel "off." She
visited the emergency room for what she thought was severe stomach
pain, but it turned out her heart was the real issue. She was
admitted to the hospital to relieve fluid, and a couple of days
into her stay, a transplant nephrologist informed her she was going
to need a kidney transplant. Nearly ten years had passed since
Jessica had received her heart transplant, and now she was in
desperate need for a kidney. Her only hope to survive was her hero
and sister, Amy. Amy came through-right away, she agreed to offer
up one of her kidneys. Now, it wasn't enough that Jessica's mom was
going to see one daughter off to the operating room, as she had
done with Jessica many times before. She would be seeing both her
daughters heading into surgery. In The Hearts of a Girl, Jessica
shares that story and the story of her many years of struggle to
survive and thrive after a long history of challenging surgeries.
It's a story that informs and inspires.
In The Private Science of Louis Pasteur, Gerald Geison has written
a controversial biography that finally penetrates the secrecy that
has surrounded much of this legendary scientist's laboratory work.
Geison uses Pasteur's laboratory notebooks, made available only
recently, and his published papers to present a rich and full
account of some of the most famous episodes in the history of
science and their darker sides--for example, Pasteur's rush to
develop the rabies vaccine and the human risks his haste entailed.
The discrepancies between the public record and the "private
science" of Louis Pasteur tell us as much about the man as they do
about the highly competitive and political world he learned to
master. Although experimental ingenuity served Pasteur well, he
also owed much of his success to the polemical virtuosity and
political savvy that won him unprecedented financial support from
the French state during the late nineteenth century. But a close
look at his greatest achievements raises ethical issues. In the
case of Pasteur's widely publicized anthrax vaccine, Geison reveals
its initial defects and how Pasteur, in order to avoid
embarrassment, secretly incorporated a rival colleague's findings
to make his version of the vaccine work. Pasteur's premature
decision to apply his rabies treatment to his first animal-bite
victims raises even deeper questions and must be understood not
only in terms of the ethics of human experimentation and scientific
method, but also in light of Pasteur's shift from a biological
theory of immunity to a chemical theory--similar to ones he had
often disparaged when advanced by his competitors. Through his
vivid reconstruction of the professional rivalries as well as the
national adulation that surrounded Pasteur, Geison places him in
his wider cultural context. In giving Pasteur the close scrutiny
his fame and achievements deserve, Geison's book offers compelling
reading for anyone interested in the social and ethical dimensions
of science. Originally published in 1995. The Princeton Legacy
Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make
available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished
backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the
original texts of these important books while presenting them in
durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton
Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly
heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton
University Press since its founding in 1905.
"The son of a prominent Japanese mathematician who came to the
United States after World War II, Ken Ono was raised on a diet of
high expectations and little praise. Rebelling against his
pressure-cooker of a life, Ken determined to drop out of high
school to follow his own path. To obtain his father's approval, he
invoked the biography of the famous Indian mathematical prodigy
Srinivasa Ramanujan, whom his father revered, who had twice flunked
out of college because of his single-minded devotion to
mathematics. Ono describes his rocky path through college and
graduate school, interweaving Ramanujan's story with his own and
telling how at key moments, he was inspired by Ramanujan and guided
by mentors who encouraged him to pursue his interest in exploring
Ramanujan's mathematical legacy. Picking up where others left off,
beginning with the great English mathematician G.H. Hardy, who
brought Ramanujan to Cambridge in 1914, Ono has devoted his
mathematical career to understanding how in his short life,
Ramanujan was able to discover so many deep mathematical truths,
which Ramanujan believed had been sent to him as visions from a
Hindu goddess. And it was Ramanujan who was ultimately the source
of reconciliation between Ono and his parents. Ono's search for
Ramanujan ranges over three continents and crosses paths with
mathematicians whose lives span the globe and the entire twentieth
century and beyond. Along the way, Ken made many fascinating
discoveries. The most important and surprising one of all was his
own humanity."
A vibrant graphic adaptation of the classic science memoir Regarded
as one of the world's preeminent biologists, Edward O. Wilson spent
his boyhood exploring the forests and swamps of south Alabama and
the Florida panhandle, collecting snakes, butterflies, and
ants--the latter to become his lifelong specialty. His memoir
Naturalist, called "one of the finest scientific memoirs ever
written" by the Los Angeles Times, is an inspiring account of
Wilson's growth as a scientist and the evolution of the fields he
helped define. This graphic edition, adapted by Jim Ottaviani and
illustrated by C.M.Butzer, brings Wilson's childhood and celebrated
career to life through dynamic full-color illustrations and
Wilson's own lyric writing. In this adaptation of Naturalist, vivid
illustrations draw readers in to Wilson's lifelong quest to explore
and protect the natural world. His success began not with an elite
education but an insatiable curiosity about Earth's wild creatures,
and this new edition of Naturalist makes Wilson's work accessible
for anyone who shares his passion. On every page, striking art adds
immediacy and highlights the warmth and sense of humor that sets
Wilson's writing apart. Naturalist was written as an invitation--a
reminder that curiosity is vital and scientific exploration is open
to all of us. Each dynamic frame of this graphic adaptation deepens
Wilson's message, renewing his call to discover and celebrate the
little things of the world.
In May 1961, President Kennedy announced that the United States
would attempt to land a man on the moon and return him safely to
the earth before the end of that decade. Yet NASA did not have a
specific plan for how to accomplish that goal. Over the next
fourteen months, NASA vigorously debated several options. At first
the consensus was to send one big rocket with several astronauts to
the moon, land and explore, and then take off and return the
astronauts to earth in the same vehicle. Another idea involved
launching several smaller Saturn V rockets into the earth orbit,
where a lander would be assembled and fueled before sending the
crew to the moon. But it was a small group of engineers led by John
C. Houbolt who came up with the plan that propelled human beings to
the moon and back-not only safely, but faster, cheaper, and more
reliably. Houbolt and his colleagues called it "lunar orbit
rendezvous," or "LOR." At first the LOR idea was ignored, then it
was criticized, and then finally dismissed by many senior NASA
officials. Nevertheless, the group, under Houbolt's leadership,
continued to press the LOR idea, arguing that it was the only way
to get men to the moon and back by President Kennedy's deadline.
Houbolt persisted, risking his career in the face of overwhelming
opposition. This is the story of how John Houbolt convinced NASA to
adopt the plan that made history.
This is a revealing account of the family life and achievements of
the Third Earl of Rosse, a hereditary peer and resident landlord at
Birr Castle, County Offaly, in nineteenth-century Ireland, before,
during and after the devastating famine of the 1840s. He was a
remarkable engineer, who built enormous telescopes in the cloudy
middle of Ireland. The book gives details, in an attractive
non-technical style which requires no previous scientific
knowledge, of his engineering initiatives and the astronomical
results, but also reveals much more about the man and his
contributions - locally in the town and county around Birr, in
political and other functions in an Ireland administered by the
Protestant Ascendancy, in the development and activities of the
Royal Society, of which he was President from 1848-54, and the
British Association for the Advancement of Science. The Countess of
Rosse, who receives full acknowledgement in the book, was a woman
of many talents, among which was her pioneering work in
photography, and the book includes reproductions of her artistic
exposures, and many other attractive illustrations. -- .
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