Events Books

This book is an excellent summary of the holocaust and the controversies which have arisen around it in the past years. Everybody who has ever had any doubts about the holocaust should read this book to realize how dangerous is to deny a historical event for the collective memory of the people. Vidal-Naquet is brilliant in his sociological-discoursive method. A first-class historical treatise.

Great insights on the truth about the Holocaust

This book is an excellent summary of the holocaust and the controversies which have arisen around it in the past years. Everybody who has ever had any doubts about the holocaust should read this book to realize how dangerous is to deny a historical event for the collective memory of the people. Vidal-Naquet is brilliant in his sociological-discoursive method. A first-class historical treatise.

This is a commentary on our age as much as it is a series of essays about the people Vidal-Naquet calls assassins of memory. And a sad commentary it is. For it features some of our greatest minds and some of our most revered institutions.

Here is Chomsky, proudly proclaiming that "It is the responsibility of intellectuals to speak the truth and expose lies"... shortly before penning a preface to Robert Faurisson's book--a book that denied the Holocaust. (Chomsky later realized what he had done and frantically called the publisher to omit his preface).

Here is an institute that finances revisionis activities offering $50,000 to anyone who could prove the existence of a gas chamber. A gentleman who had seen his entire family murdered accepted only to find that the conditions of "proof" were set so high that only a person who HAD been gassed could, in fact, prove the existence of a gas chamber.

Here is Jean-Paul Sartre's report on genocide--a report which omits the Armenian genocide so as not to offend the Pakistani and Turkish authorities.

Here is the origin of the book's title for those who would deny the Holocaust, "chose their target well: they are intent at striking a community in the thousand painful fibers that continue to link itself to its own past."

Here is the French Court struggling with the concept of "crimes against humanity" on December 20, 1985.

And here is the state of the French libraries. "Neither at the Sorbonne nor at the Bibliotheque Nationale can one find fundamental documentation concerning Auschwitz, which has to be consulted, for the most part, at the Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaire, which itself is far from possessing all that it should."

It seems Vidal-Naquet is amply justified in concluding "Will the truth have the last word? How one would like to be sure of it....."

Michael Twohey sets aside the long-standing disposition to see political arguments in China in the past hundred years from a liberal or Marxist point of view, argues that to call them "Confucian" is too simple, and demonstrates their strikingly pragmatic continuity from Kang through Sun Yat-sen and the early Mao and Deng to the present. The result is a clear, powerful and persuasive intellectual history, of the first importance for understanding China in the twentieth century and its likely progress into the twenty-first.

Geoffrey Hawthorn University of Cambridge

Twohey's book re-thinks the usual Confucian-centered view of the development of Chinese political and economic thought. Focussing instead on the influence of Xunzi, Twohey convincingly demonstrates that China's leadership has, for centuries (and particualarly at the present time), relied extensively on the practical thought of Xunzi to provide sound economic and social moorings for the development of China. His views on New Authoritarianism help one better understand the philosophy and thought processes behind the decisions of China's modern leadership. I found the book to be readable, thorough, and well-researched. I strongly reccomend this book to academics, business people, or anyone else interested in China

In this thought-provoking study, Michael Twohey persuasively argues that the Confucian conception of the relationship between authority and welfare, informed by Xunzi's political thought, is a pertinent frame of reference for understanding contemporary Chinese statecraft. He has demonstrated that familiarity with Xunzi's ideas of group, natural inequality and great harmony can significantly enhance our appreciation of the rhetoric and ritual of exercising power in the People's Republic of China. His analysis of the debates on New Authoritarianism offers a fresh perspective on democracy and socialism in China.

Tu Weiming Professor of Chinese History and Philosophy, Harvard University and Director, the Harvard-Yenching Institute

Michael Twohey has written a book that is vast in scope, innovative in theme and clear in execution. Who would have thought Confucius irrelevant to Chinese political traditions? Who would have thought Deng Xiaoping a follower of ancient philosophical virtues? These and other revelations come to the fore as Twohey challenges one orthodoxy after another, supports his arguments with over six years of extensive research and re-positions contemporary Chinese authoritarianism on Xunzi's classical notion of welfare. The result is a must read for China specialists and non-specialists alike.

Dr. Sepideh Gharai Thornhill, Ontario Canada

I picked this book up on a whim and couldn't put it down. Simple and easy to understand, it answers every question I hear about in the news almost daily. This is the first book that I have read which really explains how 9/11 unfolded.

This is the first book I've read that really explains why 9-11 happened. Nowhere else have I found the FAA failings detailed. It is scary to think that our government enabled the hijackers to do what they did. Even more scary is the fact that it could happen again - after all the billions and hassle.

As a resident of Massachusett's South Shore and a frequent user of Logan Airport, I am saddened and angry at what Mr. Thomas has revealed in his case study of Boston's Logan Airport - a culture of compromise. Despite the steps Logan has taken since 9/11, the genie is long since out of the bottle. FAA Civil Aviation Security was responsible for oversight of the airport and airlines at Logan and failed miserably in the lead up to 9/11. Massport, then and now, was the least culpable entity charged with security responsibility. The airlines and their fawning sycophants within the FAA's New England Region Civil Aviation Security Division have the blood of thousands on their hands. Willie Gripper and Mary Carol Turano should be fired. I thank Mr. Thomas for recording their wretched performance and at least holding them guilty in the court of public opinion. Mr. Thomas is absolutely correct when he says "No accountability - No justice - no progress." The state of aviation security today leaves much to be desired. We certainly are not getting what we've paid for from the TSA. The airline industry, so critical to the economic well being of our nation, remains vulnerable, but the margin of error has been reduced significantly. I can't imagine what would happen to the air industry and our economy should we experience another downed aircraft in a terrorist attack. The problem is, as before, it is not a question of if, but when. Without accountability we will continue to see a culture of bureaucracy more focussed on trying to convince the traveling public that it is safe to fly, rather than one which actually has the chutzpah to make it safe to fly. Where are our elected representatives who are charged with providing the necessary oversight to insure the American public is protected? What an outrage!!

In this riveting account, Thomas has pieced together the sad history of aviation security. A great read, it made me very angry. Intensive research and attention to detail show how aviation security BEFORE and AFTER 9/11 is still not taken seriously by our government. A necessary book for all Americans.

Although it felt like it took me a long time to read this book, I realize looking back over the past eleven days, that this is not a book that can be rushed. I had a hard time figuring out exactly how to classify this book. It reads like a memoir, yet it also contains lessons in history, battle analysis, and diplomacy.

Because Peter R. Mansoor was a colonel, and the commander of a brigade, this book is written from a commander's point of view, and thus includes more of an overview of how things come together in battle. He writes about policy, placement of forces, troop morale, and dealing with local leaders.

Other Iraq war stories that I have read (such as A Fist in the Hornet's Nest by Richard Engel, and The Devil's Sandbox by John R. Bruning) have been written about the common soldier in the heat of battle. This book, though still compelling, is quite different.

I think a lot of the difference comes from the fact that Colonel Mansoor has a graduate degree in military history from Ohio State University, and taught history at West Point. Woven into his recollections of his year in Iraq is an overview of the history of Iraq and the conflict between Sunni and Shi'ite Islam.

To date, of all the military books I have read, this book contains the most thorough treatment of the military issues in Iraq, and I found Colonel Mansoor's ideas for dealing with the insurgency to be quite enlightening.

Overall I thought this book contained excellent information, and if you have any interest in military policy in Iraq or military history I would highly recommend it.

Awesome book by an excellent Commander. Ready 6 takes the reader in a journey through the BCT's intense and extended deployment to Baghdad during the crawling stages of the war (2003-2004). The historical facts in this book help you understand the complexity of the situation, both leaders and Soldiers were faced with on a daily basis. His detailed narrative portrays without a doubt, the BCT's combat and civil operations. Colonel Mansoor also addresses full spectrum operations and the reorganization of the armed forces to better suit its current and future counterinsurgency operations abroad. As an OIF veteran and a proud member of this fine Brigade Combat Team during this and its subsequent deployment (2006-2007), I recommend this book, especially to fellow veterans and deployed service members.

T.H. Berrios
SFC, USA
Provider One November (2003-2007)

My father-in-law received an advanced copy of Baghdad at Sunrise as a gift from the author. I began reading it with many questions about the handling of the Iraq War mixed with extreme respect for our nation's armed services. I am a lifetime civilian with very little exposure to military history and tactics, yet couldn't put the book down while learning a ton about what are servicemen and women have accomplished in their time in Iraq.

Col. Mansoor's book is a great mixture of military theory, Islamic history and cultural anthropology, all thrown into a personal account of his personal goals and associated challenges. I can't began to list off everything I learned and truthfully believe it would be great for everyone from military historians to those with no knowledge of military tactics and jargon (like yours truly).

On a separate note, I just finished two years of business school with a number of former officers who served in our nation's War on Terror. Reading this book left me with a clear picture of what life on the frontlines is really like, as well as a new appreciation for their hard work and sacrifice. I will hopefully be at the USMA in a few weeks to see a classmate and close friend of mine who is now a West Point professor. Although it may embarrass him in front of new colleagues, he will be getting a hug and a sincere 'thank you' from a friend whose freedom and safety he risked so much for.

Colonel Mansoor, thank you for such an enlightening read. My best for you and your family (Jana, the children and even the dogs) in the future.

I am an Army historian who has accessed many, if not most, of the existing (and they are relatively few) records pertaining to the Ready First Brigade Combat Team's operations in Iraq during the period discussed in this book. Therefore, I can set the "bar" a bit higher when it comes to informed analysis of the book's value. I am also acquainted with an extremely candid and capable senior non-commissioned officer from Colonel Mansoor's Brigade Reconnaissance Troop who interacted with the author on a daily basis during the 1st BCT's deployment in Iraq. If my friend did not believe that Colonel Mansoor was an effective combat leader, he would have told me so in no uncertain terms. Quite the contrary, Colonel Mansoor was a well-respected and credible leader who "figured out" what was happening long before other commanders.

All professional affilitations aside, this review represents my personal opinion. That said, I believe Colonel Mansoor has produced a forthright, factual, and valuable narrative of his experiences in the tumultuous months following the fall of Sadaam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

A respected historian prior to assuming brigade command, Colonel Mansoor took it upon himself to record each day's events in a notebook for posterity's sake. He does not rely solely on his memory, media reports, or the recollections of others. This fact alone sets his account apart from other OIF related personal accounts. His book is even more important given the relative lack of historical material, when compared to later OIF deployments, on the operations conducted by 1st Armored Division during the period 2003 - 2004.

If Mansoor has an unstated agenda, it is a subtle one focused on educating our nation's future political and military leadership. He is not trying to rehabilitate the public's perceptions of his actions in Iraq. Indeed, his candor and objectivity are very refreshing in comparison to other books covering that same period which I have recently read.

This play has emotion and creativity that brings the early chapters of Genesis to life. Not since CS Lewis have I read a fictionalization of the Garden story that gave me pause to think. Right after I read this - I read the chapters in the Bible. I have gone and purchased the remaining books in the series as I expect to enjoy each of them.

This first in a series entitled "The Chronicles of the Door" deals with creation and original sin from the viewpoint of the angels. It's a clever premise, and well carried out. The author's great reverence for God shines through. Through the fall of man, the close "hands-on" relationship with God and Heaven is closed off, but the foreshadowing for redemption is evident. In the epilogue, God calls out to Abram, who will of course become Abraham. At that point, I went back to Amazon.com and bought the rest of the series! I recommend The Beginning because it makes one reflect on the magnitude of sin and how it grieves God. The cost of our disobedience is something rarely preached in church. Churches more and more preach on God's love and all the positive things, and try to avoid the controversy of dealing with sin and Satan. This book will cause you to consider the importance of your day-to-day choices.

As an ex-jock I'm not a real guy, but I wept like I had not wept in 20 years as I read Gene Edwards description of Adam meeting God. I wept when I read of Adam meeting his bride Eve. I wept at the tenderness with which God clothed his Children and sent them from the Garden. Although The Beginning is fiction, Gene Edwards has used Biblical truth to vividly and emotionally describe the events of the beginning of the world. If you have doubts of the glory and honor that it is to be a child of God you must read this book!

This book is incredible! Great reading for all ages. It really opens your mind to help you think outside the box of what "we" humans think about God. He created us in His image, yet we forget that He too has feelings and emotions. This is a great visual into the heart of The Father.

Forget Descartes and be prepared to review your mathmatical set theory-- Badiou will teach you how to understand the world as multiplicities instead of individuals. He will revolutionize how you think of thought and being. His discussion of the void is especially revealing-- there does not exist "one" in the beginning; there is only the empty set. If you are a student of modern philosophies or post-structuralism, you must read this book.

I had been hoping for some time that someone would write a review for this long-awaited translation. Unfortunately none has appeared and until a more comprehensive and useful review is written, I hope these brief comments will help.

(A brief disclaimer. This review does not summarize or critique the arguments in this book--it would be unjust to attempt to do so in the space of a few paragraphs. I hope only to give some indication of the relevance of this work for those who are interested in Badiou's work and/or those who have heard the name "Badiou" and are trying to find a way in to what his work is all about. If my comments are elliptic or obscure because I use Badiou's terms without providing explication, this is only because I hope that I give enough indication of the direction of his ideas to promote the reading of the actual text.)

Unfortunately, I cannot comment on the quality of the translation, since I have not seen the French text. Feltham's familiarity with Badiou's work is unquestionable, however. He was, for example, one of the editors of the collection "Infinite Thought" (also published by Continuum). He has also contributed to a recent issue of `Polygraph' devoted to a discussion of Badiou's work (#17, 2005).

Until this translation, American readers were denied significant access to Badiou's philosophical method and concepts. The key sources were commentaries by people like Peter Hallward, Keith Ansell-Pearson, and Eric Alliez (and, of course, Slavoj Zizek). The closest one got to Badiou himself was the collection called "Theoretical Writings" (also published by Continuum). With the exception of "Deleuze: The Clamor of Being", it was difficult to know what Badiou's work was all about since just about all of his other translated works presuppose knowledge of the concepts and terms developed in "Being and Event".

Those who have read Badiou's "Deleuze" will have some idea of what occupies "Being and Event". The title recalls, of course, Heidegger's "Being and Time", and Badiou explicitly agrees with Heidegger that philosophy can only be done on the basis of the ontological question. In "Deleuze", Badiou argues that that great thinker was at bottom a thinker of the One and, as Keith Ansell-Pearson points out, the real quarrel between Badiou and Deleuze is over who can speak of being as pure multiplicity. For Deleuze, the concepts are those found in Bergson and the differential calculus; for Badiou one must look to post-Cantorian set theory. In both cases, one cannot approach ontology without a firm understanding of mathematics (anyone who does not have a working grasp of set theory will not be prepared for "Being and Event").

The ontological question cuts a diagonal through various trajectories. Although Badiou accepts the gauntlet Heidegger threw down to philosophy, like Deleuze he thinks that ontology has to be done post-phenomenologically. Badiou even rejects the later Heidegger's notion of "forgetting". Badiou's answer to the ontological question involves a second project in "Being and Event": the articulation of a post-Cartesian (and even a post-Lacanian) subject. If, Badiou says, mathematics is ontology (that is, only mathematics can write being as it is, even if there is no intra-mathematical sense to this writing), the question is no longer the Kantian "how is mathematics possible?" but, rather, if mathematics is the science of being, how is a *subject* possible? In accord with his notion that there are four (and only four) "truth procedures", there are only artistic, scientific, political, and amorous subjects. It is on this idea that Badiou's other works on ethics, politics, art ("inaesthetic"), and so forth, are predicated. In a sense, none of Badiou's other translated works make much sense without the doctrine of the subject laid out in "Being and Event".

(This project of a post-Cartesian subject is announced by the book itself in that it is written as a series of "meditations" that could not be more dissimilar in method to the meditations of either Descartes or Husserl. My own hunch is that any successful engagement and/or refutation of Badiou's work will have to be done on the question of method--viz., Badiou's axiomatic procedure.)

These theses on ontology and subjectivity cross the so-called analytic-continential divide in philosophy. Badiou offers readings of major thinkers throughout the history of philosophy and his readers are asked to have a similarly encyclopedic knowledge of both the post-Kantian analytic and continental traditions. This book is most certainly neither for laypersons, amateurs, or beginning students of philosophy. Throughout the introduction Badiou expresses consternation over the fact that his readers must not only be professional philosophers, but also well-trained in mathematics. One is usually well-trained in one or the other. Analytic philosophy tends to do better at this than Continental (indeed, one of Badiou's goals is to provide a way out of the aporias of the Vienna Circle), but Badiou equally draws from the continental tradition (by way of figures like Hegel, Heidegger, and Lacan) and continental readings of the history of philosophy. (And, until "Being and Event", one couldn't really find much after Quine on the philosophy of set theory except something like Mary Tiles' work from 1989.)

The ontological argument, premised on what Badiou has to say about the One and the presentation of multiplicity (i.e., the question that preoccupied the presocratics) hinges on this: "maintain the position that nothing is delivered by the law of the Ideas, but make this nothing be through the assumption of a proper name. In other words: verify, via the excedentary choice of a proper name, the unpresentable alone as existent; on its basis the Ideas will subsequently cause all admissible forms of presentation to proceed. ... It is because the one is not that the void is unique ... [which is equivalent] to saying that its mark is a proper name". This is how Badiou interprets the axiom of the null (or void) set and distills the question of the One and Many from Being and change (see, e.g., the history and development of the concepts of the calculus). The question is not simply "how does one think non-being?" but also (and Parmenides also recognized this) "how does one name non-being?" The proper name, as Badiou points out in a passage immediately following the above, is not the transcendent God or the promise of the One or presence but the "un-presentation and the un-being of the one" (cf. Derrida's comments on the possibility of a negative theology).

The payoff for working through Badiou's text is nothing less than a revitalization of philosophy (particularly for anyone who thinks philosophy in America has been boring since the waning of Rortyian pragmatism). The ontological debates surrounding Deleuze/Badiou have tended to be conducted in the margins of philosophical discourse in the US (with both thinkers more popular in circles of theory than philosophy and in the pages of journals on culture and politics than Nous or Mind), but the publication of "Being and Event" itself is precisely what Badiou means when he writes of an "event": something that disrupts the current situation. ("Event" and "situation" are, of course, technical terms for Badiou. The most succinct statement of these terms is probably "The Event as Trans-Being" in the Theoretical Writings.) Like his compatriot Ranciere (who too found his own voice after breaking with a youthful Marxism), Badiou is concerned with how it is possible that something new can be seen. "Being and Event" is compulsory for anyone who thinks ontology has been boring since Heidegger (even Millan-Puelles' ambitious "Theory of the Pure Object" fails to satisfy); and for those who weren't convinced by Deleuze that alternative ways to do ontology (viz. Bergson) were dead-ends, "Being and Event" the place to turn. (Whether one ultimately agrees with Deleuze or Badiou, however, is an open question. The basic difference is this: for Badiou, multiplicities are rigorously determined; Deleuze, obviously, denies this. In both cases being is pure multiplicity, nondenumerable, etc)

And for those who may be interested by Deleuze but are wedded to more traditionally analytic ways of writing: Badiou's writing is often praised for its clarity and in many ways it mimes the economy of analytic philosophy, avoiding the obscurity (while preserving the density) of many of his French contemporaries. Badiou has often been compared to Sartre (both being novelists and playwrights in addition to philosophers), but not only does Badiou in many ways stand apart from the French traditions of Sartre and Hyppolite, "Being and Event" is eminently more readable than "Being and Nothingness". Even if Badiou's writing lacks the brilliance of Derrida or Deleuze, this may be because he explicitly tells us that the poetic is subordinate; indeed, Badiou's writing itself is probably best described as "mathematical". While he is not immune to some amount of obscurity in some others of his writings, "Being and Event" certainly cannot be so faulted. At worst one might fault the author for demanding too much of his reader; but if this be a fault it is an admirable one to have, since it is a rare author indeed who can make such a demand.

Badiou's work is something of a hybrid. His use of analytical philosophy and logical notation runs at variance with the usual Continental practice of abstract linguistic poetizing. The book was completed nearly 20 years ago, though at the time it did not lend itself to ready comprehension because Badiou made four affirmative assumptions that went against the spirit of the time.
For Badiou situations are nothing more than pure in different multiplicities. Consequently differences do not point to norms. If true truths exist they are in different to differences. So cultural relativism can never go beyond trivial statements that different situations exist. Such relativism cannot tell us anything about what, among the differences, looked legitimately matters to subjects. Furthermore the structures of situations in themselves do not deliver truths per se. As a consequence, nothing normative can be drawn from the simple realist examination of the becoming of things. In particular, a truth is solely constituted by a rupturing with the order which supports it, never as in effect of that order. This insight seems to be restating Godel's theorem. Badiou names this type of rupture "the event". For him authentic philosophy begins, not in structural facts such as cultural, linguistic or political perspectives, but uniquely in what takes place in what remains in the form of a strictly incalculable emergence.
Next Badiou claims a subject is nothing other than an active fidelity to the event of truth. This means the subject is a militant truth. Badiou philosophically reintroduced the notion of militant during a time when the consensus of thinkers was that any engagement of this type was archaic. Not only did he found this notion, but also considerably enlarged it. Badiou sees the militant in the political activist working for human rights and environmental justice, but also for the artist-creator, the scientists who opens up by new theoretical field, or the lover who enchants the world. For Badiou the being of truth is generic because it proves itself an exception to any pre-constituted predicate of a situation in which that truth is deployed. In other words, although it is situated within a world, a truth does not retain anything expressible from that situation. A truth concerns everyone in his much as it is a multiplicity that no particular predicate can circumscribe. Therefore, the infinite work of a truth is thus that of a generic procedure. And to be a subject, and not just a simple individual animal, is to be a local active dimension of such a procedure.
Badiou has created a philosophical classic that will puzzle and confound many graduate students and colleagues for years to come. The work is modular a series of 37 meditations upon the previous postulates of classic Western thinkers. Plato and Cantor are taken to task about the meaning of the multiple and the nature of the void. Heidegger and Galileo are examined with regards to the nature of time and infinity, event and ontology. Pascal and Holderlin are interrogated about the nature of choice and inference. Leibniz and Godel are contrasted with regards to the nature of quantity in the limits of formal systems. Badiou becomes more constructive when reviewing the nature of the event as construed by P.J. Cohen. In many ways the event becomes a way of dealing with multiple change and conditions without presuming upon consciousness of time. Likewise, Badiou reinvents the nature of the subject, going beyond the classic critique of Lacan. Grasped in its being, the subject is solely be finitude of the generic procedure, the local effects of an eventual fidelity. What the subject produces is the truth itself, which is an indiscernible part of the situation. However the infinity of this truth transcends it. It is abusive to say that truth is a subjective production. Rather a subject is much taken up in fidelity to the event and suspended from truth; from which it is forever separated by chance. For Badiou the subject is ever situated between the decidable and the ineluctable. As such, he does not have a theory of consciousness so much as a mirroring of events without limit.

The feats of set theory are here employed as a proof that multiplicity (Deleuzian "virtuality", Nitzschean "chance" or "eternal return") defines the structure of being. More deeply, this entails the projection of Deleuze's structural design whereby he conceived of the virtual level of being (multiplicity of singularities) onto actual being itself, onto actuality, at the expense of any ontic configuration whatsoever, which henceforth acquires a transitory character. There remains, however, the problem related to the emergence of the "event" from the horizontal and homogenous texture of multiplicity. Through this rupture, Badiou unconsciously reproduces that duality he (and Zyzek too) accuses Deleuze of perpetrating in his ontological argument. And yet, seen from the Bergsonian standpoint, Badiou's scheme seems far more dual than Deleuze's. Most possibly, Badiou should do away with the notion of event altoghether.

Mr. Mirlis' capacity to capture the thoughts and recollections of these wonderful sportsmen (and women) really made me (and my friends) feel like I was "being there" (of course, no pun intended!). In all seriousness, this book held my interest and I'm proud to say that I am not only a friend of Mr. Mirlis', but that I also own his wonderfully written book.

Having attended several of the sporting events and watched many of the others described by many of the contributors, I really enjoyed re-living these moments in time. I think a sequel would be a great follow up read. Mr. Mirlis should be commended on his ability to gather such a strong group of contributors.

This book is so great! I've bought several copies for FATHER'S DAY gifts for family members and friend who love sports.

I would totally recommend this book for all to read. Nice and relaxing and makes you wonder about the events you have been to in your lifetime. Maybe they should be in "Being There II"

While the Bell Curve has stirred up a whirlwind of controversy, the Bell Curve Debate is actually the better of the two books. This book has great rebuttals by the likes Stephen Jay Gould, Howard Gardner, Carl Rowan and many more. It even includes some of the classic papers on these matters such "On Breeding Good Stock" by Karl Pearson. Given a choice between reading the Bell Curve or the Bell Curve Debate, the Bell Curve Debate is the clear choice.

It is regrettable to see that this valuable work is now out of print. This book is mandatory reading for anyone desiring to delve deeper into this controversial subject matter. Russell Jacoby and Naomi Glauberman do a splendid job of bringing together authors with widely differing views on the "The Bell Curve." Irving Louis Horowitz, Stephen Jay Gould, and Christopher Hitchens are only among a few of the highly regarding thinkers contributing to this collection. The editors even included a couple of insightful pieces by Walter Lippmann written in 1922 taking to task scientists similar to Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray. I particularly recommend the article by Hugh Pearson entitled "Breaking Ranks." Pearson, aptly argues that the anti-intellectualism embraced by many Afro-American males afraid of being perceived as race traitors, does much to explain the low I.Q. scores of this group.

There is, though, one major complaint I have with each and every writer that has tackled "The Bell Curve." Not one that I'm aware of has made reference to the great philosopher, Karl Popper. This fact flabbergasts me to no end. Karl Popper warned that scholars, at best, present tentative indications for their theories which may eventually be proven false. How can we forget that fully credentialled scientists, not perceived crack pots, encouraged the bleeding of patients only a few hundred years ago? Another area of study now discredited is phrenology. All students in their formative years must read the serious scholarship of those bygone days when such views were highly respected. It is, I dare say, a humbling experience. Scientists may earn our respect, but we should never consider them infallible.

The measuring of intelligence is hindered by its intrinsic nebulousness. Thus, the study of this phenomenon is not restricted to members of the hard sciences. The arrogant premise of Logical Positivism is found wanting. Poets, artists, philosophers, and other denizens of the often derided Liberal Arts will forevermore continue to have a seat at the table. Debates over the nature vs. nurture aspects of intelligence are doomed to take place until the end of time. Nobody will ever be able to claim they have exhausted this ultimate conundrum of human existence.

... .

This is a worthwhile collection of old and new articles dealing with the controversy over IQ.Both pro and con groups are well represented in the various selections.The best article is written by S J Gould.
It is interesting that practically none of the selections question the very basic methodological question concerning the data upon which IQ calculations are constructed-standarized,fill in the circle,multiple choice,pattern recognition tests.No one explains why such tests are relevant to the measurement of intelligence.Such tests appear to measure memorization,recall,and effective "drill and kill " tutoring.It would appear that this is what some academics mean by intelligence- how well a test taker can regurgitate past training in taking such tests.

It's hard to imagine a better or more balanced collection of essays on the topic of intelligence testing and _The Bell Curve_. The essays present various sides of the debate, featuring perspectives from psychologists, biologists, historians, and theorists. Especially illuminating were sections dealing with _TBC_'s authors' funding source, a clandestine eugenics think-tank in New York. Also, you can find some good pro-Bell Curve articles here, although the bias certainly seems to be in favour of con- (a relection, I believe, of the academic consensus_.

It's a long book, so I thought it would last. No such luck. The writing is simply amazing, across the board. Buy it, enjoy it.

No one could possibly take The New Yorker, National Geographic, Rolling Stone, Esquire,The American Scholar, the Atlantic Monthly, GQ, Time, Gourmet, Harper's and Vanity Fair and read all the stories in them every month for a year. But what if the greatest experts, The American Society of Magazine Editors read 1,586 stories and picked just the best 17 of them for you to read. Even if you didn't think you'd like the subject, you will love reading each and every one of these. I'm using it for a seminar I'm giving -- one article and its author to discuss each week for 14 weeks. It's Terrific!!!

For anyone who enjoys feature writing and investigative journalism this is an excellent read. I have made it through 9 of the 17 stories and have thoroughly enjoyed 8 of them. The topics are broad (John McCain, seal hunting in Greenland, a fat wine critic, campaign finance reform and many more.) The writing is so good that even topics that usually bore me (wine for one) became interesting.

No matter who you are, what your interests or where your political affiliations lie, if you enjoy reading good writing, you will enjoy this book. It represents some of the tightest, best researched and most insightful writing of a year's worth of magazine articles. The magazines in which the articles were originally published range from The Atlantic Monthly to Zoetrope: All-Story (did they include the ends of the alphabet for such a sentence as this?). The subjects, writing styles and tones of the stories smatter widely, but have in common one thing: they are stories worth your while. You could be forced to walk, sit and suffer with John McCain through his torturous 5-year imprisonment in a North Vietnamese p.o.w. camp, as well as with the cast of characters behind one week of McCain's presidential campaign tour. You could bask in the glory of Bob Parker, a burly, middle-aged Maryland guy whose freakishly acute sense of smell, coupled with his rigid integrity, led to his publication of The Wine Advocate and the author's well-founded claim that Parker may be "single-handedly changing the history of wine." The book is replete with the end product of authors whose diligence, sensitivity and dexterity with the English language have culminated in some rock-solid reading.

This is a wonderful resource for obtaining meanigful quotes for anyone who posseses insight into the nature of our existance here in America, and in the world.

This book is a wonderful collection of quotations that showcase the good in soceity and human nature. While there are a few pages devoted to poking at the far right, most of the book is filled with positive, uplifting thoughts. If you're a liberal, you're sure to feel a sense of pride regarding your beliefs, if you're a Conservative, it will help you to understand the REAL meaning of what it is to be a Liberal. I absolutely loved it.

I agree with Jim Hightower's assessment on the book cover, "This is a bible of progressive wisdom." This is not just a reference book, but a celebration of the virtues of liberal thought. I sat down and read it cover to cover. It's a one-of-a-kind digest and resource for taking our country back!

I have been searching for a compact book of quotes to use in opening and closing arguments in court - this book is perfect! It is not so long that hours are spent searching and not so short that only the most familiar quotes are included. Instead, it has many qulates which we may have heard at one time, but they are not so cliche'ridden that we know the end of every one. Instead, it reminds us of quotes which we would like to remember, and will either buy the book to keep, or spend time "borrowing" it from friends to copy the quotes we want.

The book is loaded with quotations appropriate to issues of justice, human rights, equity, honesty, fairness and a multitude of other positive liberal American virtues. It is good reading by itself but is also invaluable for anyone who does any issue writing in any field!