Bradford Books

"We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are" (Anais Nin).

The Subtlety of Emotions is an intellectual exposé revealing the meaning, delineation, definition, difference between, and explanation of emotions. This book is the culmination of Ben-Ze'ev's intensive ten year study of emotions - fulfilling his desire to bring a conceptual framework to the classification and understanding of emotions. Ben Ze'ev argues that emotions are "functional, and in a sense also rationale" (p. 243) and it is within this environment that Ben-Ze'ev creates an atmosphere to explore the terrain where emotions and morality meet.

"Although emotions punctuate almost all the significant events in our lives, the nature, causes, and consequences of the emotions are among the least understood aspects of human experience" (p. xiii). While we deeply desire understanding, grasping the essence of emotion has been sometimes elusive. Within these pages, Ben Ze'ev introduces an interdisciplinary approach to focus on the aspects of emotion over which we have choice. Ben Ze'ev provides a liberating perspective, one that frees us to approach emotions with an expanded awareness concerning our locus of control.

Ben Ze'ev believes that knowledge is neither an "obstacle to happiness" nor is it a secure and guaranteed road to happiness (p. 533). He proposes that knowledge and insight offer the opportunity to increase positive emotions and decrease the intensity and frequency of negative emotions. He further suggests that the moral connection to emotions lives in the power of our own consciousness in understanding emotions, and then choosing rather than unconsciously reacting to life situations. The Subtlety of Emotions clearly presents the necessary knowledge and insight for empowering us to make intelligent and ethical choices.

Throughout the book, Ben-Ze'ev offers wise and humorous quotes from various sources ranging from pop music lyrics to diverse and timeless individuals such as Shakespeare and Mae West. The inclusion of quotes throughout the book not only brings levity but also offers a different, often lateral or wider perspective, to the content.

I carefully read every single word in this book - some passages two or three times.
Here is a philosophical text that is relevant to all of us and, in the purest sense, practical. Some aspects of the book that were of particular interest to me included the analysis of emotions through their division into four basic components: cognition, evaluation, motivation, and feeling. I find this useful for working with clients who desire a deeper understanding of themselves and their life choices; it is a powerful educational tool. This close scrutiny of the components of emotions is helpful in imparting a sense of inner power and efficacy, where conscious decision-making becomes more evident. Ben Ze'ev's discussion of emotions tendered the opportunity to view our innate human concerns from fresh perspectives and to further investigate my own perceptions, offering relevant applications for myself and for my influence on others. I also appreciate the way Ben Ze'ev borrows from a variety of theories without adopting any of them fully. He carefully chooses aspects of each in order to create something uniquely his own, allowing the incorporation of seeming ambiguities, without taking an either/or stance, but rather, an integrative one. His voice is warm and understanding and the accessibility of the material is strengthened by his humor, examples, and personal stories.

Ben Ze'ev writes, "I have tried in this book to reduce somewhat the mystery surrounding the emotions. Although this work is merely a small step toward understanding the emotions, it may indicate some initial directions and the importance of emotions to everyday life. Emotions are, and should be, central to human life" (p. 533). The landscape of understanding emotions is complex and multidimensional. Ben Ze'ev has shown courage, depth of insight, and strength of will in stepping forward in an arena many eschewed. This work is neither all inclusive nor conclusive, but I don't believe it was the author's intention to be either. The Subtlety of Emotions has created a conceptual point of reference regarding a topic that profoundly affects human experience. I am deeply grateful for Ben Ze'ev's dedication and contribution.

An overview of the material is implicit in the words, but not explicitly presented. Although for a philosophical text, the material is greatly accessible, I believe that the inclusion of more diagrams, figures, and tables would be very helpful for sorting through some of the complexity.

After reading and absorbing this book, I see myself differently, I see others differently, and I see the world differently. The experience of reading it is emotional in itself - taking one from lightness to intensity, from humor to thoughtful reflection. Any book that makes one think is worth reading. A book that invites a critique of how we think should be required reading. I strongly recommend The Subtlety of Emotions to psychologists, therapists, teachers, coaches - anyone who is interested in influencing the direction of change toward the cultivation of well-being; the insights contained in this book are ones that contribute greatly to beneficial transformational change efforts.

The Subtlety of Emotions is very thoroughly researched and supplied with an excellent bibliography.

A great selection for anyone interested in an overview of the Crusades or the Middle Ages generally. Bradford does not offer much detail on battle tactics or strategy, but does convey quite vividly the personalities of the key participants, their political, religious, and personal conflicts, and the cultural landscape of the period. Most interesting to me was Bradford's ability to trace important aspects of modern Western culture back to their roots in the Crusades.

When I was 13, I tried to build an artificial neuron in a test tube, storing the 'weight' of the neuron in electroplating of a mechanical pencil graphite rod. But, I burned myself badly with nitric acid and ended up in the emergency room. I unfortunately wasn't allowed to finish the project.

Reading this unique oral history of neural nets, I discovered that Benard Widrow did the same thing in 1959 (minus the burn part - he was 30 at the time and didn't have to sneak the acid of the science store room at school) and invented the 'Memistor' and Memistor Corporation.

I learned a million other details about neural networks and their history in this book and now feel like I know some of the people interviewed here personally.

TEACHING MAKES A DIFFERENCE should be required for all educators in college. It takes the basics of effective instruction, and puts it all in one compact package. I still refer to it often, and I have had it for almost ten years. I also loan it to any new teachers who may be struggling or just want some extra help. I truly feel it would be worth any teacher's money to pick up and copy to have on their shelf.

From back cover:

"'Textured Embroidery' is Jenny Bradford's 9th book and is a companion volume to her bestseller, 'Bullion Stitch Embroidery.' In this book, Jenny introduced her new stitches and flowers to create beautiful textured designs which many know as Brazilian embroidery. She shows how these basic ideas can be worked in a variety of threads so that they can be applied to anything from miniature jewelery pieces toe exquisite wool embroidery designs. Clear instructions are given for all the techniques used and all the projects detailed. Other forms of textured embroidery, such as wool work and needle painting, are included to tempt everyone from the absolute beginner to the experienced embroiderer."

With articulation and intelligence that surpasses his peers; Bradford Martin has developed a significant historical argument worthy of anyone's attention. An excellent read, highly recommended.

It seems that two groups of cognitive scientists are moving in opposite directions: straight cognitive psychologists routinely show that adults can't reason themselves out of a bag, whereas developmental cognitive psychologists tell us that we were born scientists. If you think there's something goofy about this, you're right. And, as Barbara Koswolski shows, what's goofy is cognitive psychologists' model of science--i.e., logical positivism, the notion (inter alia) that scientific induction begins by checking our prior knowledge and theories at the lab door.

Following this Victorian notion of science, cognitive psychologists typically test adults' ability to find covariation by presenting them with tasks that--like logical positivism--fail to represent the features that scientists really face. That is, the tasks rule out the use of background knowledge; any causes of the variation to be identified is already known to be present among a clearly defined set of alternatives; all these potential causes are *stipulated* to be equally possible; and any hypotheses made about covariation must be rejected *in toto* rather than modified. In other words, these canned science experiments are about as representative of science as those cheesy tasks you find in "Hands-On Science" museums.

Faced with these tasks, adults ignore whether variables are confounded, refuse to gather information exclusively about covariation, fail to search for disconfirming evidence when testing hypotheses, cling to theories in the face of "disconfirming" evidence, ignore base-rate information, and are swayed by illusory correlations. Based on this portrait of adults, it is a wonder that we've managed to function at all, let alone land on the moon.

But, as Koslowski shows in a series of 16 elegant and ingenious experiments, the problem is not in ourselves but in our tasks. How adults and adolescents reason about covariation is perfectly sensible from a scientific perspective--they earnestly look for causal mechanisms. And by doing so, they don't look like logical positivists in search of Humean indices. That is, they ignore theoretically and causally trivial covariations and confounds, but look out for unexpected causal mechanisms, and they consider whether variation can be equally explained by rival alternative accounts (even for their own pet hypotheses).

To be sure, Koslowski doesn't whitewash adults' wrong-headed causal theories (like the notion that being an extrovert causes people to eschew library science). But she does find great reason for hope in even American adolescents' scientific capacities, and what's more--she delivers a devastating critique of positivism, a ringing endorsement of "theory-laden" science, and a profound defense of real human rationality.

One last bit of praise: Koslowski underscores her thesis stylistically--she treats the reader as if he is rational. She answers questions as they arise, formulates conclusions so they neither say too much nor too little, and always treats the positions of other researchers fairly. With so many popular books in the cognitive sciences these days, I hope that her book reaches an audience that isn't quite so used to these virtues.

I have only read about the first third of this book, so this review is only temporary. But if somebody stumbles into this page, then I want you know without delay that Gary Cziko is an authentically kind and intelligent researcher into the problem of what's going on with human behavior.

His book "Without Miracles" established his credibility with me. And I am extremely pleased to be able to benefit from his informed investigations into why I find myself doing things that otherwise mystify me.

Pointing me in the direction of internal reference levels has cleared away much of the fog that defied logical analysis with regard to examining the subject of motivating human purposes.

Thank you Gary!! I will flesh this review out when I finish reading your work.

Mabel Todd's The Thinking Body is a must read for every serious Yoga student. It's the source book for what's called ideokinesis, a wonderful system of body-mind education based on the use of creative imagery. Much of what I learned in Yoga classes in my early years as a student I found echoed in Todd's book, which was written in the 1930s. It's not always easy to find a copy, and if you can get one for under $20, snap it up.

Emergent research topic of biomimetic electronics is presented in structured and easy to understand manner. Book is highly recommended to any interested person ranged from professional to beginner.