On Art and Life (Penguin Great Ideas) by John Ruskin Requirements: .ePUB reader, 1.6 MB | Retail Overview: Includes two of John Ruskin’s famous essays: “The Nature of the Gothic” and “The Work of Iron” from his book The Stones of Venice. Ruskin’s insights into the need for individual artistic freedom, and his disdain for the mass-production art of the Victorian era, radically altered society’s perception of creative design and remain powerfully relevant to our ideas of beauty today. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Downward Causation and the Neurobiology of Free Will by Nancey Murphy Requirements: .PDF reader, 3.2 Mb Overview: How is free will possible in the light of the physical and chemical underpinnings of brain activity and recent neurobiological experiments? How can the emergence of complexity in hierarchical systems such as the brain, based at the lower levels in physical interactions, lead to something like genuine free will? The nature of our understanding of free will in the light of present-day neuroscience is becoming increasingly important because of remarkable discoveries on the topic being made by neuroscientists at the present time, on the one hand, and its crucial importance for the way we view ourselves as human beings, on the other. A key tool in understanding how free will may arise in this context is the idea of downward causation in complex systems, happening coterminously with bottom up causation, to form an integral whole. Top-down causation is usually neglected, and is therefore emphasized in the other part of the book’s title. The concept is explored in depth, as are the ethical and legal implications of our understanding of free will. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Unaffordable: American Healthcare from Johnson to Trump by Jonathan Engel Requirements: .PDF reader, 1 Mb Overview: Written for nonexperts, this is a brisk, engaging history of American healthcare from the advent of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s to the impact of the Affordable Care Act in the 2010s. Step by step, Jonathan Engel shows how we arrived at our present convoluted situation, where generic drugs prices can jump 1,000 percent in a day and primary care physicians can lose 20 percent of their income at the stroke of a Congressional pen.
Unaffordable covers, in a conversational style punctuated by apt examples, topics ranging from health insurance, pharmaceutical pricing, and physician training to health maintenance organizations and hospital networks. Along the way, Engel introduces approaches that other nations have taken in organizing and paying for healthcare and offers insights on ethical quandaries around end-of-life decisions, neonatal care, life-sustaining treatments, and the limits of our ability to define death. While describing the political origins of many of the federal and state laws that govern our healthcare system today, he never loses sight of the impact that healthcare delivery has on our wallets and on the balance sheets of hospitals, doctors’ offices, government agencies, and private companies. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
God and the Scientist: Exploring the Work of John Polkinghorne by Fraser Watts, Christopher C. Knight Requirements: .PDF reader, 1.8 Mb Overview: This book presents a celebration, survey and critique of the theological work of arguably the most important and most widely-read contributor to the modern dialogue between science and theology: John Polkinghorne.Including a major survey by Polkinghorne himself of his life’s work in theology. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Uncommon Readers: Denis Donoghue, Frank Kermode, George Steiner and the Tradition of the Common Reader by Christopher J. Knight Requirements: .PDF reader, 27 Mb Overview: Impressive in scope and erudition, Christopher Knight’s Uncommon Readers focuses on three critics whose voices – mixing eloquence with pugnacity – stand out as among the most notable independent critics working during the last half-century. The critics are Denis Donoghue, Frank Kermode, and George Steiner, and their independence – a striking characteristic in a time of corporate criticism – is reflective of both their backgrounds (Donoghue’s Catholic upbringing in Protestant-ruled Northern Ireland; Kermode’s Manx beginnings; and Steiner’s Jewish upbringing in pre-Holocaust Europe) and their temperaments. Each represents a party of one, a fact that has, on the one hand, made them the object of the occasional vituperative dismissal and, on the other, contributed to their influence and remarkable longevity.
Since the 1950s, Steiner, Donoghue, and Kermode have each maintained a highly public profile, regularly contributing to such influential publications as Encounter, New Yorker, New York Review of Books, Times Literary Supplement, and the London Review of Books. This aspect of their work receives particular attention in Uncommon Readers, for it illustrates a renewed interest in the role of the public critic, especially in relation to the genre of the literary-review essay, and signals a sustained conversation with an educated public – namely the common reader.
Knight makes the argument for the review essay as a serious and still viable genre, and he examines the three critics in light of this assumption. He expounds upon the critics’ separate interests – Kermode’s identification with discussions of canonicity, Steiner’s with cultural politics, and Donoghue’s with the persistent claims of the imagination – while also revealing the ways in which their work often reflects theological interests. Lastly, he attempts to adjudicate some of the conflicts that have arisen between these critics and other literary theorists (especially the post-structuralists), and to discuss the question of whether it is still possible for critics to work independently. Original and deliberative, Uncommon Readers presents a renewed defense of the tradition of the common reader. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Getting Started with Data Science: Making Sense of Data with Analytics by Murtaza Haider Requirements: .ePUB reader, 20 Mb Overview: Master Data Analytics Hands-On by Solving Fascinating Problems You’ll Actually Enjoy!
Harvard Business Review recently called data science “The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century.” It’s not just sexy: For millions of managers, analysts, and students who need to solve real business problems, it’s indispensable. Unfortunately, there’s been nothing easy about learning data science–until now.
Getting Started with Data Science takes its inspiration from worldwide best-sellers like Freakonomics and Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers: It teaches through a powerful narrative packed with unforgettable stories.
Murtaza Haider offers informative, jargon-free coverage of basic theory and technique, backed with plenty of vivid examples and hands-on practice opportunities. Everything’s software and platform agnostic, so you can learn data science whether you work with R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS. Best of all, Haider teaches a crucial skillset most data science books ignore: how to tell powerful stories using graphics and tables. Every chapter is built around real research challenges, so you’ll always know why you’re doing what you’re doing. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man by Marshall McLuhan Requirements: .ePUB, .MOBI/.AZW reader, 3.6 Mb Overview: When first published, Marshall McLuhan’s Understanding Media made history with its radical view of the effects of electronic communications upon man and life in the twentieth century. This edition of McLuhan’s best-known book both enhances its accessibility to a general audience and provides the full critical apparatus necessary for scholars.
In Terrence Gordon’s own words, “McLuhan is in full flight already in the introduction, challenging us to plunge with him into what he calls ‘the creative process of knowing.’” Much to the chagrin of his contemporary critics McLuhan’s preference was for a prose style that explored rather than explained. Probes, or aphorisms, were an indispensable tool with which he sought to prompt and prod the reader into an "understanding of how media operate" and to provoke reflection. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Donald J. Trump: A President Like No Other by Conrad Black Requirements: .ePUB reader, 329 kb Overview: Conrad Black, bestselling author of Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Champion of Freedom and Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full, turns his attention to his “friend” President Donald J. Trump and provides the most intriguing and significant analysis yet of Trump’s political rise. Ambitious in intellectual scope, contrarian in many of its opinions, and admirably concise, this is surely set to be one of the most provocative political books you are likely to read this year. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
Write Naked: A Bestseller’s Secrets to Writing Romance & Navigating the Path to Success by Jennifer Probst Requirements: .ePUB, .MOBI/.AZW reader, 2.7 Mb Overview: Learn how to transform your passion for writing into a career. New York Times best-selling author Jennifer Probst reveals her pathway to success, from struggling as a new writer to signing a seven-figure deal. Write Naked intermingles personal essays on craft with down-to-earth advice on writing romance in the digital age. Probst will teach you how to:
Commit to your current work-in-progress, get focused, and complete it on schedule
Reveal raw emotions and thoughts on the page to hook your readers
Assemble a street team to promote and celebrate your books
Overcome writer’s block with ease
Develop themes that tie together your books and series
Write the most difficult elements of romance–including sex scenes–with skill and style
Regardless of the genre, every novelist faces a difficult task. Creating authentic characters and an engaging plot are challenging enough. But attempting to break into the hotter-than-ever romance genre, which is constantly flooded with new titles and fresh faces? It can feel impossible. This is where Probst’s Write Naked comes in. To survive–and thrive–you need the help and wisdom of an expert.
Written in Probst’s unmistakable and honest voice, Write Naked is filled with the lessons and craft advice every writer needs in order to carve out a rewarding career. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
101 Ways to Teach Children Social Skills: A Ready-to-Use Reproducible Activity Book by Lawrence E. Shapiro Requirements: .PDF reader, 5 mb Overview: Some children seem to be socially adept from birth, while others struggle with various challenges of social acceptance, some children make friends easily; others are loners, some children have self-control, and others have quick tempers, some are natural leaders, while others are withdrawn.
This book is designed to teach social skills to many different types of children, particularly those with social problems, often labeled as having a social skills deficit, these children may be considered aggressive, socially isolated, or shy. The underlying concept is that to proceed through the expected stages of their social development, children should posses all the skills addressed by this book, written for use by groups of children, such as a classroom or a counseling group, the activities are intended to help children in every aspect of their social development, as they relate their peers, their parents and their teachers. While many activities can be used with just one child, it is hard to argue with the concept that social skills are best learned in a social environment. Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational
