Perspective Books

The notion of causality enters in math (both in its elementary
forms, as well as in its brand new research trends). While the
notion comes from physics, it is equally significant in math and in its applications. In math, it is present in the most basic
notions from Fourier series, as well as in its specialized non-commutative and geometric incarnations. In physics, it is crucial for the theory of waves,-- both classical and quantum. In quantum theory, for example, it serves as a basis for the construction of the Hilbert space which carries the quantum states, and it constitutes the math behind renormalization and time reflection. In engineering, it underlies our understanding of signal analysis.

Many social scientists recognize self identity as a precious aspect of individuality, but most social scientists are interested in generalizing, hence the stuggle to conceptualize, define and measure the group identity. There are good legal and political reasons for categorizing people, how else for example could you measure the effects of a genocide--or commit it for that matter. The Nazis and the analysts who attempted to measure the atocities of the Nazis used administrative records with information about ethnicity and religion to do their jobs.

CENSUS AND IDENTITY is a nice compendium of essays about the attempts of governments around the world to collect and use information about race, language, and ethnicity in censuses. David Kertzer and Dominique Arel provide an overview of the book in which they state, "identity is a constructed thing and it is constructed over time and with a shifting awareness of values and meaning attached to certain categories, some of which are more meaningful than others."

Melissa Nobles' essay, "Racial categorization and the censuses" focuses on two large census efforts--Brazil and the United States. Both countries have attempted over the past two hundred years to define and measure race with mixed results.

Calvin Goldscheider compares the efforts of Israel, Canada, and the United States to categorize ethnicity in censuses. The Israeli government stresses religion, while the U.S. government eschews it.

Dominique Arel's essay, "Language categories in censuses.." covers the efforts of several countries to define and measure language fluency. Just when does one become fluent in a language. Professor Higgins told Eliza Doolittle that most English ladies could not speak English!

Alain Blum discusses the trials of the French in his essay, "Resistance to identity categorization in France." Seems the Algerian descent folks have a different idea of what it means to be French.

Peter Uvin's essay, "On counting, categorizing, and violence in Burundi and Rwanda" is a chilling example of ethnic identification gone wrong. How did the Tutsis and Hutus know who to kill? Population exchanges between the two countries seemed to be the only way to avoid additional killing. But who just who was what and how their "papers" were created became a nightmare.

My favorite essay was written by David Abramson, " Identity counts: the Soviet legacy and the census in Uzbekistan." Just what is a Tajik anyway, and when is a Tajik really an Uzbek? Some funny things happened in the censuses taken over several decades as the size of the population of Tajiks and Uzbeks changed rather dramatically. While one side pointed at the data and said it was a sure sign of genocide, social scientists aren't so sure. Sometimes people change their "official" identities when the census taker comes knocking on the door.

This is a wonderful set of essays for anyone who is interested in the difficulties associated with identifying and measuring "ethnic" groups and what happens to them.

In line with the increased emphasis by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on the warfighting and employment aspect of campaign planning, combatant commanders are now required to specify in JSCP directed OPLANS how they intend to fight their campaign forces. Additionally, the Chairman has directed that certain campaign plan elements be incorporated into the CINCs' deliberate plans. These elements include phasing of operations; strategic operational centers of gravity, both friendly and enemy; and, the commander's overall intent as well intent by phase. Inclusion of these elements not only provides the National Command Authorities a basis to establish intheater priorities, but more importantly, these elements provide a focus to the planners and warfighters responsible for coordinating multiple operations into a single campaign and then executing that campaign.



Efective preparation and execution of war plans require that Joint planners share a common mature understanding of the relationship between the centers of gravity and critical vunerabilities. A solid grasp of this relationship is essential to the art of war. Despite the importance of these terms, current Joint and Service doctrinal manuals and publications still reflect divergent interpretations. Moreover, the baseline definition of centers of gravity proscribed in Joint Pub 3-0 is flawed to begin with, in that is at odds with Clausewitz and the commonly understood meaning of the term. For example, according to the Joint Pub definition, neither Saddam Hussein nor the Republican Guard would be considered Iraqi centers of gravity during the recent Persian Gulf War.



This monograph by Dr. Joe Strange of the Marine Corps War College is a welcome step toward solving these challenges. Dr. Strange contends that we should retain the current concept of critical vunerabilities, but should return to the original Clausewitzian concepts of centers of gravity, and that Joint Pub 3-0 should be revised accordingly. It also introduces two new conceptual terms, "critical capabilities" and "critical requirements." These latter terms bridge the gap and explain the relationship between centers of gravity and critical vunerabilities, and provide Service and Joint planners a logical and ueful aid in designing OPLANS to protect friendly sources of power while facilitating the defeat of the enemy's sources of strength.

---- excerpt from book's Introduction

The Analysis of the complexity behind the enlargement of NATO into Central Europe couldn't be better presented. Gardner is an expert in the subject matter and has remarkable knowledge. I have personally learned a lot by reading his books, each peace of work presented by Gardner is unique and brilliantly written. All I can say it that I highly recommend buying this book to whoever has a thirst for an accurate, deep and realistic picture of Central and South Eastern Europe following the enlargement of NATO Which is affecting each and everyone of us in both a positive and a negative manner. Moreover, I would recommend buying "Surviving the Millennium" and Dangerous Cross Roads" by the same Author. Thank you Hall Gardner for sharing your knowledge so eloquently.

This is an outstanding anthology. The introductory essay by the anthology's editor distinguished Chaucer scholar Professor Lawrence Besserman ably sets the agenda of the anthology , summarizing the articles to follow, and providing insight into the whole dilemna of ' periodization'. A highly recommended work.

This book describes a realistic depiction of urban schools. I highly recommend prospective and current urban educators to read this book.

Way to rock the law world Riddhi! When you get a chance hit up my studybreak man. Just rock it man!

This book had such a unique way of dealing with chronic pain. The author reveals methods which run counter to our automatic response of avoidance and fear when living with a long-term physical ailment. What is remarkable is how these ideas help readjust our conditioned brain pattern reactions. You can pretty much apply the practice to other problems besides the physical realm. I found her examples enlightening and helpful.

This larger hardcover book, though similiar to the softcover Battleground Europe book on the channel islands, offers a much more depth of detail and pictorial coverage.

These 4 islands of less than 100,000 people, were occupied by the Germans for 5 years during World War II. The Germans invaded in the summer of 1940, and were there until 1945. Through those years they were occupied and fortified. Though the occupation was fairly pacific, the "hunger winter" of 1944-45 took its toll. The islands were also to see much activity by German civilian bureaucrats, and Organization Todt (OT).

The original troops earmarked for invasion were there only for a short time, when they were pulled out, to be replaced by other older less battle worthy. With the original troops to be sent to the Eastern Front. The original commandant Major Dr. Lanz would himself too die on the Russian front. All the island troops were known as the "Canada" troops, for most German soldiers felt that should the islands be retaken by the Allies, the occupying German troops would end their days in a Canadian POW camp.

These islands came to direct German notice due their proximity to France during the air war of 1940. They were to be used as part of Operation Sea Lion, the German invasion of Britain that never occured. Adolf Hitler always held great and continuing interest in these 4 islands, intending their use as a place for rest and relaxtion for the German peoples after the war ended.

The subtitle of this volume is "A German Perspective" and as such uses many photographs taken by the German occupiers themselves. There are maps and photographs in abundance.

As stated in my review of the softcover, "Channel Islands," my interest was piqued by the fictional writings of Jack Higgins. He has included bits and pieces in some of his novels, plus he is reported to reside on one of them. So, if you are somewhat like me, you may find this book, or the softcover, of riveting interest.

Semper Fi.

This book comes out with much anticipation from two of the world-renowned experts on nonlinear time series. Indeed, the once superhot chaos theory (cf The Theory of Chaotic Attractors) in physics and math in the 80s was only introduced to statistics by Howell Tong in his 1990 book on Non-Linear Time Series: A Dynamical System Approach (Oxford Statistical Science Series, Vol 6), H. Tong and R. L. Smith's 1992 RSS Chaos Day workshop and subsequent JRSS B special issue on chaos and L M Berliner and others's 1992 review articles in Statistical Science. Now 10 years after, what has achieved in between and what has not materialized as once seemed so promising? There are several PhD theses written in this area and there are continuing applications of chaos theory in science, from physics, mechanics, atmospheric sciences to biomedical and physiological data analysis. We can safely say that chaos theory is probably just another area or another tool that one can use to understand or interprete apparent randomness in simulations or in observed data. With purely stochastic tools that are dominant in modeling high-dimenional and un-parameterizable processes, chaos theory provides the crucial link between deterministic and computer modeling, and uncertainty in observed output and model simulations. Maybe with the ever closer collaboration between statisticians, mathematicians, and physical scientists in understanding and using the most daunting PDE and large scale models or computer models, chaos theory may finally come to be appreiated more by statisticians, who have traditionally been over-concerned with modeling noise, while overlooking modeling the overall deterministic patterns and structures in data.

Finally, some words about the book itself. I think it is a fairly comprehensive survey on the statistical work in the last decade, though understandably it is biased toward the authors' own research and collaborators' work. I think in order for it to be used as a textbook, it needs to be supplemented by a more balanced account of other aspects of chaos theory, such as geometrical theory and dimension reduction techniques. For example, the review chapter of dimension theory by C. Cutler in a book Dimension Estimation and Models (Nonlinear Time Series and Chaos, Vol 1) edited by H. Tong himself in 1990 (published by World Scientific) and Michael Kirby's recent book:Geometric Data Analysis: An Empirical Approach to Dimensionality Reduction and the Study of Patterns. The significance of fractal geometry theory on multivariate data analysis and time series statespace when the vector may lie on an manifold or lower-dimensional intrinsic space has recently been demonstrated by Z.Q. Lu in Nonparametric Regression With Singular Design in J. of Multivariate Analysis 1999, vol. 70, pp.177-201. It appears that the potentials of chaos theory for motivating newer statistical techniques and developing new statistical theory to understand better deterministic systems and related data analysis remain to be explored, see Modelling and Forecasting Financial Data: Techniques of Nonlinear Dynamics (Studies in Computational Finance, Volume 2) (Studies in Computational Finance). In conclusion, I warmly recomend this book to next generation students and time series lovers, and to scientists who might be wondering what statisticians are up to in this important area.