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A philosopher argues that we know little about our own inner lives.

Jargon Society (110), 1992. First edition, first printing. Softbound. New/with dust jacket around softcover wraps. A tight unread copy. POETRY MAIN COLLECTION.

Item in good condition. Textbooks may not include supplemental items i.e. CDs, access codes etc.

Since antiquity, opposed concepts such as the One and the Many, the Finite and the Infinite, and the Absolute and the Relative, have been a driving force in philosophical, scientific, and mathematical thought. Yet they have also given rise to perplexing problems and conceptual paradoxes which continue to haunt scientists and philosophers. In Oppositions and Paradoxes, John L. Bell explains and investigates the paradoxes and puzzles that arise out of conceptual oppositions in physics and mathematics. In the process, Bell not only motivates abstract conceptual thinking about the paradoxes at issue, but he also offers a compelling introduction to central ideas in such otherwise-difficult topics as non-Euclidean geometry, relativity, and quantum physics. These paradoxes are often as fun as they are flabbergasting. Consider, for example, the famous Tristram Shandy paradox: an immortal man composing an autobiography so slowly as to require a year of writing to describe each day of his life ― he would, if he had infinite time, presumably never complete the work, although no individual part of it would remain unwritten. Or think of an office mailbox labelled “mail for those with no mailbox”―if this is a person’s mailbox, how can they possibly have “no mailbox”? These and many other paradoxes straddle the boundary between physics and metaphysics, and demonstrate the hidden difficulty in many of our most basic concepts.

James Thurber was perhaps the most popular humorist of the first part of the 20th century in the USA. The 1931 collection, THE OWL IN THE ATTIC, that I picked up at a library sale, shows him at his peak as a writer who draws (as opposed to an artist who writes). The book is divided into three sections of essays. There's "Mr and Mrs Monroe", a series of vignettes about a young married couple in New York City. This is Thurber at his most familiar, dealing frankly with the battle of the sexes, depicted here more as a series of friendly skirmishes than as the more misanthropic wars he'd depict later in his career. Oddly, none of the accompanying illustrations depicted the couple themselves. There's "Ladies' and Gentlemen's Guide To Modern English Usage", a series of fractured essays where Thurber twists the rules of grammar in highly inappropriate ways. This is Thurber torturing the English language to hilarious ends, but the accompanying illustrations don't have all that much to do with the actual essays.

This classic work on early Canadian architecture explores the evolution of urban and rural house construction from settlement to conquest. It illustrates the ways climate, local materials, legislation and customs merged to shape original techniques and unique forms - and some of the most distinct and enduring buildings in the New World. This book also explores the day-to-day lives of craftsmen and those early Canadians whose nation was under construction. The result is a lively mix of insight and anecdote, and a vivid portrait of laying a unique foundation on North American soil. As Professor Moogk concludes, "more than a house was being built, a cultural nation was being built."

This classic work on early Canadian architecture explores the evolution of urban and rural house construction from settlement to conquest. It illustrates the ways climate, local materials, legislation and customs merged to shape original techniques and unique forms - and some of the most distinct and enduring buildings in the New World. This book also explores the day-to-day lives of craftsmen and those early Canadians whose nation was under construction. The result is a lively mix of insight and anecdote, and a vivid portrait of laying a unique foundation on North American soil. As Professor Moogk concludes, "more than a house was being built, a cultural nation was being built."

Unread book in perfect condition.

Since antiquity, opposed concepts such as the One and the Many, the Finite and the Infinite, and the Absolute and the Relative, have been a driving force in philosophical, scientific, and mathematical thought. Yet they have also given rise to perplexing problems and conceptual paradoxes which continue to haunt scientists and philosophers. In Oppositions and Paradoxes, John L. Bell explains and investigates the paradoxes and puzzles that arise out of conceptual oppositions in physics and mathematics. In the process, Bell not only motivates abstract conceptual thinking about the paradoxes at issue, but he also offers a compelling introduction to central ideas in such otherwise-difficult topics as non-Euclidean geometry, relativity, and quantum physics. These paradoxes are often as fun as they are flabbergasting. Consider, for example, the famous Tristram Shandy paradox: an immortal man composing an autobiography so slowly as to require a year of writing to describe each day of his life ― he would, if he had infinite time, presumably never complete the work, although no individual part of it would remain unwritten. Or think of an office mailbox labelled “mail for those with no mailbox”―if this is a person’s mailbox, how can they possibly have “no mailbox”? These and many other paradoxes straddle the boundary between physics and metaphysics, and demonstrate the hidden difficulty in many of our most basic concepts.

Evil and suffering have always been part of human experience, but they present a significant challenge to Christian belief in a good and all-powerful God. The biblical writers have no time for unreal idealism, in which the life of faith is supposed to be free from anguish, pain and perplexity. But they are confident that God's power and wisdom are sufficient to overcome and transform evil and suffering, and to enable us to be "more than conquerors" in a broken and hurting world. Peter Hicks expounds a range of relevant biblical texts that enable readers to set the issue of evil and suffering in the context of the nature and purposes of God. They may, he says, be a mystery to us, but they are not a mystery to God. Central to his approach is the conviction that the key lies in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the suffering and triumph of God himself. He also explores the Bible's teaching on how we are to live in a world of evil and suffering. The author writes warmly and clearly, not only shedding light on two challenging biblical themes, but also offering valuable insights for those currently afflicted. His book thus bears the Bible Speaks Today marks of readability, reliability and relevance. It will be particularly useful for ministers and preachers, committed church members and theology students. As a companion to the Bible Speaks Today commentaries, the Bible Speaks Today Bible Themes Series focuses on the message of key biblical texts supporting differing facets of Christian doctrine in conversation with the history of Christian tradition. Rooted in Christian heritage and interactive with contemporary culture, the series provides a rich resource for preaching, teaching and spiritual growth.

The premise of this book is that, like spoken language, music should be experienced as sound before it is learned in its symbolic form, and that when presented this way, a learner is better prepared to navigate the tangles and perplexities of music notation. Drawing on his extensive background as performer, teacher, composer and lecturer, the author cuts through the traditional, sometimes irrational, language of music teaching and reduces terminology to simple and basic ideas. He begins with a discussion of sound itself, and from there proceeds to demonstrate how we hear and organize the specific perceptual structures we call music. Discussions of perception and conception are not clinical in content or style; they are simply based on common experiences and logical conclusions. Plentiful aural and graphic illustrations are provided, enabling the reader to actually hear and see how combinations of pitches and rhythms become meaningful musical expressions. The focus then turns to music notation, showing how music can be captured on paper and later re-created in performance.

Ethical Life sets out to act as a guide for those of us who want to better understand ethics. It offers answers to the two simplest and yet most difficult questions facing individuals who have fallen into the perplexities of contemporary life: Why be ethical, and how? Redner enlightens his readers with a comprehensive survey of the nature of ethics, touching briefly in his introduction on present ethical concerns and then drawing his readers into a deeper examination of the ethical systems and cultures from which those concerns emerge. The author poses the question: To what extent is our global technological civilization conducive or averse to ethical matters, and how does it compare in this respect to the cultures of the past, both in the West and the East? The book is an excellent and thought provoking introduction to ethics, and an engaging resource for new students of ethics and moral theory. Ethical Life is distinctive in its format and approach, synthesizing in one book both an historical and comparative account of ethical systems, and an engaging discussion of contemporary ethical challenges. The book begins with an introduction to the ethics of ancient Israel, Greece, China, India, and Persia, before moving on to a diagnosis of the twentieth century crisis in ethics, and finally, a discussion of contemporary ethical concerns, exploring our social, cultural, and individual responses to them.

The objects we encounter in ordinary life and scientific practice -- cars, trees, people, houses, molecules, galaxies, and the like -- have long been a fruitful source of perplexity for metaphysicians. The Structure of Objects gives an original analysis of those material objects to which we take ourselves to be committed in our ordinary, scientifically informed discourse. Koslicki focuses on material objects in particular, or, as metaphysicians like to call them "concrete particulars", i.e., objects which occupy a single region of space-time at each time at which they exist and which have a certain range of properties that go along with space-occupancy, such as weight, shape, color, texture, and temperature. The Structure of Objects focuses in particular on the question of how the parts of such objects, assuming that they have parts, are related to the wholes which they compose.

Death Comes for the Archbishop sprang from Willa Cather’s love for the land and cultures of the American Southwest. Published in 1927 to both praise and perplexity, it has since claimed for itself a major place in twentieth-century literature. When Cather first visited the American Southwest in 1912, she found a new world to imagine and soon came to feel that "the story of the Catholic Church in [the Southwest] was the most interesting of all its stories." The narrative follows Bishop Jean Latour and Father Joseph Vaillant, friends since their childhood in France, as they organize the new Roman Catholic diocese of Santa Fe subsequent to the Mexican War. While seeking to revive the church and build a cathedral in the desert, the clerics, like their historical prototypes, Bishop Jean Lamy and Father Joseph Machebeuf, face religious corruption, natural adversity, and the loneliness of living in a strange and unforgiving land. The Willa Cather Scholarly Edition presents groundbreaking research, establishing a new text that reflects Cather’s long and deep involvement with her story. The historical essay traces the artistic and spiritual development that led to its writing. The broad-ranging explanatory notes illuminate the elements of French, Mexican, Hispanic, and Native American cultures that meet in the course of the narrative; they also explain the part played by the land and its people—their history, religion, art, and languages. The textual essay and apparatus reveal Cather’s creative process and enable the reader to follow the complex history of the text.

The problems that taxed the minds of people during the Renaissance were much the same as those confronting us today. In their perplexity many deep-thinking people sought the advice of Marsilio Ficino, the leader of the Platonic Academy in Florence, and through his letters he advised them, encouraged them, and sometimes reproved them. Ficino was utterly fearless in expressing what he knew to be true. His letters cover the widest range of topics, mixing philosophy and humor, compassion and advice, and offering a profound glimpse into the soul of the Renaissance.This is the only accessible collection of Ficino's writings available in English.

The Cratylus has always been a source of perplexity to the student of Plato. While in fancy and humour, and perfection of style and metaphysical originality, this dialogue may be ranked with the best of the Platonic writings, there has been an uncertainty about the motive of the piece, which interpreters have hitherto not succeeded in dispelling. We need not suppose that Plato used words in order to conceal his thoughts, or that he would have been unintelligible to an educated contemporary. In the Phaedrus and Euthydemus we also find a difficulty in determining the precise aim of the author. Plato wrote satires in the form of dialogues, and his meaning, like that of other satirical writers, has often slept in the ear of posterity.

FOUNDATIONALISM IN PHILOSOPHY n his autobiographical work, The Education of Henry Adams, this I brooding and disillusioned offspring of American presidents confronted, at age sixty, his own perplexity concerning the new scientific world-view that was emerging at the end of the century. He noted that the unity of things, long guaranteed morally by the teachings of Christianity and scientifically by the Newtonian world-view, was being challenged by a newer vision of things that found only incomprehensible multiplicity at the root of the world: What happened if one dropped the sounder into the ab­ yss-let it go-frankly gave up Unity altogether? What was Unity? Why was one to be forced to affirm it? Here every­ body flatly refused help. . . . [Adams] got out his Descartes again; dipped into his Hume and Berkeley; wrestled anew with his Kant; pondered solemnly over his Hegel and Scho­ penhauer and Hartmann; strayed gaily away with his Greeks-all merely to ask what Unity meant, and what happened when one denied it. Apparently one never denied it. Every philosopher, whether sane or insane, naturally af­ firmed it. I Adams, then approaching with heavy pessimism a new century, felt instinc­ tively that, were one to attack the notion of unity, the entire edifice of human knowledge would quickly collapse. For understanding requires the unification of apparently different phenomena.

Through close analysis of the historical and conceptual roots of modern science and technology, Brian Brock here develops a theological ethic addressing a wide range of contemporary perplexities about the moral challenges raised by new technology.

FOUNDATIONALISM IN PHILOSOPHY n his autobiographical work, The Education of Henry Adams, this I brooding and disillusioned offspring of American presidents confronted, at age sixty, his own perplexity concerning the new scientific world-view that was emerging at the end of the century. He noted that the unity of things, long guaranteed morally by the teachings of Christianity and scientifically by the Newtonian world-view, was being challenged by a newer vision of things that found only incomprehensible multiplicity at the root of the world: What happened if one dropped the sounder into the ab­ yss-let it go-frankly gave up Unity altogether? What was Unity? Why was one to be forced to affirm it? Here every­ body flatly refused help. . . . [Adams] got out his Descartes again; dipped into his Hume and Berkeley; wrestled anew with his Kant; pondered solemnly over his Hegel and Scho­ penhauer and Hartmann; strayed gaily away with his Greeks-all merely to ask what Unity meant, and what happened when one denied it. Apparently one never denied it. Every philosopher, whether sane or insane, naturally af­ firmed it. I Adams, then approaching with heavy pessimism a new century, felt instinc­ tively that, were one to attack the notion of unity, the entire edifice of human knowledge would quickly collapse. For understanding requires the unification of apparently different phenomena.

This provocative, ambitious collection explores the intersection of the infinite world of physics with the perplexities of the human condition. Employing both narrative and cinematic structure, A. Van Jordan re-creates the lives of his subjects: Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, comic-book superheroes (The Green Lantern, The Atom), along with aspects of himself revealed in poems of recollection and loss. With lyric intensity he suggests that contemporary physicists are also metaphysical poets.