ISBN: 1439130094
Author: James L. Kugel
TEN YEARS AGO, Harvard professor James Kugel was diagnosed with an aggressive, likely fatal, form of cancer. “I was, of course, disturbed and worried. But the main change in my state of mind was that the background music had suddenly stopped—the music of daily life that’s constantly going, the music of infinite time and possibilities. Now suddenly it was gone, replaced by nothing, just silence. There you are, one little person, sitting in the late summer sun, with only a few things left to do.”
Despite his illness, Kugel was intrigued by this new state of mind and especially the uncanny feeling of human smallness that came with it. There seemed to be something overwhelmingly true about it—and its starkness reminded him of certain themes and motifs he had encountered in his years of studying ancient religions. “This, I remember thinking, was something I should really look into further—if ever I got the chance.”
In the Valley of the Shadow is the result of that search. In this wide-ranging exploration of different aspects of religion—interspersed with his personal reflections on the course of his own illness—Kugel seeks to uncover what he calls “the starting point of religious consciousness,” an ancient “sense of self” and a way of fitting into the world that is quite at odds with the usual one. He tracks these down in accounts written long ago of human meetings with gods and angels, anthropologists’ descriptions of the lives of hunter-gatherers, the role of witchcraft in African societies, first-person narratives of religious conversions, as well as the experimental data assembled by contemporary neuroscientists and evolutionary biologists.
Though this different sense of how we fit into the world has largely disappeared from our own societies, it can still come back to us as a fleeting state of mind, “when you are just sitting on some park bench somewhere; or at a wedding, while everyone else is dancing and jumping around; or else one day standing in your backyard, as the sun streams down through the trees . . . ” Read the rest of this entry »
ISBN: 0691147787
Author: Richard Crossley
This stunningly illustrated book from acclaimed birder and photographer Richard Crossley revolutionizes field guide design by providing the first real-life approach to identification. Whether you are a beginner, expert, or anywhere in between, The Crossley ID Guide will vastly improve your ability to identify birds. Unlike other guides, which provide isolated individual photographs or illustrations, this is the first book to feature large, lifelike scenes for each species. These scenes–640 in all–are composed from more than 10,000 of the author’s images showing birds in a wide range of views–near and far, from different angles, in various plumages and behaviors, including flight, and in the habitat in which they live. These beautiful compositions show how a bird’s appearance changes with distance, and give equal emphasis to characteristics experts use to identify birds: size, structure and shape, behavior, probability, and color. This is the first book to convey all of these features visually–in a single image–and to reinforce them with accurate, concise text. Each scene provides a wealth of detailed visual information that invites and rewards careful study, but the most important identification features can be grasped instantly by anyone. By making identification easier, more accurate, and more fun than ever before, The Crossley ID Guide will completely redefine how its users look at birds. Essential for all birders, it also promises to make new birders of many people who have despaired of using traditional guides. Revolutionary. This book changes field guide design to make you a better birder A picture says a thousand words. The most comprehensive guide: 640 stunning scenes created from 10,000 of the author’s photographs Reality birding. Lifelike in-focus scenes show birds in their habitats, from near and far, and in all plumages and behaviors Teaching and reference. The first book to accurately portray all the key identification characteristics: size, shape, behavior, probability, and color Practice makes perfect. An interactive learning experience to sharpen and test field identification skills Bird like the experts. The first book to simplify birding and help you understand how to bird like the best An interactive website–www.crossleybirds.com–includes expanded captions for the plates and species updates
Pages: 544
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Binding: Hardcover
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| Publisher: Princeton University Press |
Year: 2011 |
ISBN: 0470930225
Author: Andrew Liveris
America used to define itself by the things it built. We designed and produced the world’s most important innovations, and in doing so, created a vibrant manufacturing sector that built the middle class. We manufactured our way to the top and became the undisputed economic leader among all nations. But over the last several decades, and especially in the last ten years, the sector that was America’s great pride has eroded, costing millions of jobs and putting our long-term prosperity at risk. Now, as we struggle to recover from the worst recession in generations, our only chance to turn things around is to revive the American manufacturing sector—and to revolutionize it. In MAKE IT IN AMERICA: The Case for Reinventing the Economy, Andrew Liveris — Chairman and CEO of The Dow Chemical Company—offers a thoughtful and passionate argument that America’s future economic growth and prosperity depends on the strength of its manufacturing sector. The book
- Explains how a manufacturing sector creates economic value at a scale unmatched by any other, and how central the sector is to creating jobs both inside and outside the factory.
- Explores how other nations are building their manufacturing sectors to stay competitive in the global economy, and describes how America has failed to keep up.
- Provides an aggressive, practical and comprehensive agenda that will put the U.S. back on track to lead the world.
It’s time to stop accepting as inevitable the shuttering of factories and staggering job losses that have come to define manufacturing. It’s time to acknowledge the cost of inaction. There is no better company to make the case for reviving U.S. manufacturing than the Michigan-based The Dow Chemical Company, one of the world’s largest manufacturers and one of its most global corporations. And there’s no better book to show why it needs to be done and how to do it than MAKE IT IN AMERICA.
Andrew Liveris is Chairman and CEO of The Dow Chemical Company, one of the largest multinational corporations in the world and a leader in science and technology.
Q&A with Author Andrew Liveris
What is the biggest factor to explain the dramatic loss of U.S. manufacturing sector jobs that began in the 1970s?
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| Author Michael Burchell |
There are a lot of reasons that the U.S. manufacturing sector has lost jobs over the last four decades, but they boil down to this. The world changed, and our policy approach did not change with it. Read the rest of this entry »
ISBN: 1400202078
Author: John MacArthur
Best-selling author and pastor Dr. John MacArthur reveals one crucial word that revolutionizes what it means to follow Jesus.
Throughout the Bible, followers of Jesus are commanded to submit to Him as their King. They are told to obey and follow, faithfully and without hesitation. Every time Christians utter the word Lord, they make a subtle yet profound declaration-that God is their Master and that they belong to Him. In fact, the Bible describes believers as His slaves. They have been bought with a price and now live for Christ as a people for His own possession.
But go into most churches today, even flip through most Bible translations, and you won’t see or hear the word slave anywhere. That’s because it has been lost in translation. In this gripping book, Dr. John MacArthur uses deep Bible teaching and historical evaluation to expertly uncover the one forgotten word that restores the Bible’s definition of true Christian freedom.
What does it mean to be a Christian the way Jesus defined it? MacArthur says it all boils down to one word: Slave. “We have been bought with a price. We belong to Christ. We are His own possession.”
Endorsements:
“Dr. John MacArthur is never afraid to tell the truth and in this book he does just that. The Christian’s great privilege is to be the slave of Christ. Dr. MacArthur makes it clear that this is one of the Bible’s most succinct ways of describing our discipleship. This is a powerful exposition of Scripture, a convincing corrective to shallow Christianity, a masterful work of pastoral encouragement… Read the rest of this entry »
ISBN: 0767932773
Author: Hal Edward Runkel
Through the best-selling ScreamFree Parenting, Hal Runkel showed thousands of parents how keeping their cool can revolutionize their family life. In his groundbreaking new book, ScreamFree Marriage, Runkel now shows couples how learning to stay calm, in the face of common marital conflicts, is the key to creating and enjoying a deep, lifelong connection.
Every committed couple strives to hold on to the marriage they envisioned back when they first said “I do”–before the end of the honeymoon phase, before kids, mortgages, health crises, and all life’s inescapable issues. But the truth is this: conflict is unavoidable–it’s impossible for two people to see every single thing, face every issue, and experience every situation in exactly the same way. What results are couples “screaming” at each other–sometimes literally yelling out loud, sometimes shutting themselves down and shutting their partners out, and sometimes avoiding the issue altogether–none of which leads to the passionate, intimate connection we all crave.
In ScreamFree Marriage, Hal introduces some radical new concepts about marriage, teaching couples how to embrace this inevitable conflict as a profound vehicle for strengthening a marriage. Read the rest of this entry »
