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  Typhoid Mary: The Notorious Life...

  Charles River Editors

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  Outbreaks of disease, much like wars, inevitably produce a series of public figures who serve as emblematic heroes or villains of the era and event, and in the case of Mary Mallon, now known around the world as “Typhoid Mary,” only a few deaths and a relatively small group of infections actually occurred before she was arrested. That her small but deadly outbreak incited such a firestorm among New York’s health agencies was certainly driven by the fact that the “ghetto disease” had suddenly appeared in New York City’s wealthy neighborhoods. A further difficulty lay in the late discovery of a few individuals who were not susceptible to the disease of typhoid itself, but who were nevertheless carriers. Invisible but contagious, these rare cases spread the pathogen both prolifically and unwittingly. As a natural social conflict rose, public debate came to the fore over the civil rights of those apprehended for carrying major diseases.  
  	The phenomenon of a carrier immune to typhoid and other afflictions had been noted by the early 19th century and can be found in the journals of obscure researchers. However, even prominent medical practitioners were generally unaware of ever having observed such an individual, and the chances are slim that an uneducated domestic servant from a rural county in Ireland would encounter the research or possess the knowledge with which to identify the carrier. In fact, in a state of disbelief maintained throughout her adult life, Mallon defied the medical community’s depiction of her as infected at all. Originating in a culture where disease was still believed to be the result of noxious vapors, and where one was not sick unless she appeared so, Mallon viewed the entire investigation as pure persecution. Along the way, she did herself little good with an aggressive, explosive temper, and a general belligerence toward any idea of cooperation with medical personnel whom she took to be frauds.

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  Restless Devices - Recovering...

  Felicia Wu Song

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  We're being formed by our devices. Today's digital technologies are designed to captivate our attention and encroach on our boundaries, shaping how we relate to time and space, to ourselves and others, even to God. Our natural longing for relationship makes us vulnerable to the "industrializing" effects of social media. While we enjoy the benefits of digital tech, many of us feel troubled with its power and exhausted by its demands for permanent connectivity. Yet even as we grow disenchanted, attempting to resist the digital "powers that be" might seem like a losing battle.
  Sociologist Felicia Wu Song has spent years considering the personal and collective dynamics of digital ecosystems. She combines psychological, neurological, and sociological insights with theological reflection to explore two major questions:
  
  - What kind of people are we becoming with personal technologies in hand?
  - And who do we really want to be?Song unpacks the soft tyranny of the digital age, including the values embedded in our apps and the economic systems that drive our habits. She then explores pathways of meaningful resistance that can be found in Christian tradition—especially counter-narratives about human worth, embodiment, relationality, and time—and offers practical experiments for individual and communal change.
  In our current digital ecologies, small behavioral shifts are not enough to give us freedom. We need a sober and motivating vision of our prospects to help us imagine what kind of life we hope to live—and how we can get there.

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  The Real World of Victorian...

  Simon Webbe

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  A look at the surprising nineteenth-century technology that inspires this literary and cultural movement: “I was very impressed by this book.” —SF Crowsnest   In recent decades, steampunk has grown from a rather obscure subgenre of science fiction into a striking and distinctive style of fashion, art, design, and even music. It is in the written word, however, that steampunk has its roots—and in this book Simon Webb explores and examines the real inventions that underpin the fantasy. In doing so, he reveals a world unknown to most people today.   Webb reveals the Victorian era as a surprising place: one of steam-powered airplanes, fax machines linking Moscow and St Petersburg, steam cars traveling at over 100 mph, electric taxis, and wireless telephones. It is, in short, the nineteenth century as you’ve never before seen it—a steampunk extravaganza of anachronistic technology and unfamiliar gadgets. Imagine Europe spanned by a mechanical internet, a telecommunication system of clattering semaphore towers capable of transmitting information across the continent in a matter of minutes. Consider too, the fact that a steam plane the size of a modern airliner took off in England in 1894. Drawing entirely on contemporary sources, we see how little-known developments in technology have been used as the basis for so many steampunk narratives. From seminal novels such as The Difference Engine to the steampunk fantasy of Terry Pratchett’s later works, this book shows that steampunk is at least as much solid fact as it is whimsical fiction.

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  The Martians - Evidence of Life...

  Nick Redfern

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  "The Martians opens a door into a possibility that most would reject as impossible. But Nick Redfern in this provocative and exciting book makes a startling case for there being life on Mars—and, in fact, for the whole history of Mars being very, very different from what we have supposed. A wonderful adventure and a very exciting story!"—Whitley Strieber, #1 New York Times bestselling author, CommunionThe Martians is an in-depth study of the theory that Mars was once a world that teemed with life. Perhaps, even, life not too dissimilar to ours. Incredibly, the Martians may still be there. Alive. The questions that this book asks and answers include the following:  •What kind of society did the Martians have?•What caused their world to become harsh and desertlike? •Did global warming or nuclear war ensure the extinction of the Martians?•Are Martian artifacts strewn about the surface, just waiting to be found by the likes of NASA?•Has NASA already found such evidence, but chosen to withhold such monumental finds from the public and the media?•Could some form of the Martians still exist, deeply below the surface of the planet, in secure installations that allow them to ensure their civilization continues?•What do we know about the Martian environment, its atmosphere, and its landscape?The Martians explores the CIA's top-secret search for the Martians, multiple photos of strange anomalies, and the latest revelations about the environment and water on Mars. And most tantalizing of all: Did an ailing Martian race come to Earth in past eons and were they confused with gods? The questions concerning life on Mars—then and now—are many. The answers are astounding.

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  Personal Knowledge - Towards a...

  Michael Polanyi

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  An expanded edition of the classic philosophical work that enquires into the nature and justification of scientific knowledge. 
   
  The publication of Personal Knowledge in 1958 shook the science world, as Michael Polanyi took aim at the long-standing ideals of rigid empiricism and rule-bound logic. Today, Personal Knowledge remains one of the most significant philosophy of science books of the twentieth century, bringing the crucial concepts of “tacit knowledge” and “personal knowledge” to the forefront of inquiry. 
   
  In this remarkable treatise, Polanyi attests that our personal experiences and ways of sharing knowledge have a profound effect on scientific discovery. He argues against the idea of the wholly dispassionate researcher, pointing out that even in the strictest of sciences, knowing is still an art, and that personal commitment and passion are logically necessary parts of research. In our technological age where fact is split from value and science from humanity, Polanyi’s work continues to advocate for the innate curiosity and scientific leaps of faith that drive our most dazzling ingenuity. 
   
  For this expanded edition, Polyani scholar Mary Jo Nye set the philosopher-scientist’s work into contemporary context, offering fresh insights and providing a helpful guide to critical terms in the work. Used in fields as diverse as religious studies, chemistry, economics, and anthropology, Polanyi’s view of knowledge creation is just as relevant to intellectual endeavors today as when it first made waves more than fifty years ago. 
   
  Praise for Personal Knowledge 
   
  “Polanyi’s monumental work . . . takes the shape of an orderly rejection of the false ideal of wholly explicit and wholly impersonal, so-called objective knowledge. The human mind, for him, is not an impersonal machine engaged in the manufacture of truth. In fact, Personal Knowledge represents a compelling critique of the positivist claim for total objectivity in scientific knowledge. . . . Polanyi, the scientist-philosopher, calls forth an enormous array of examples to show that the scientist himself is engaged in acts of personal acceptance and judgment in the very doing of science.” —Philosophy Today 
   
  “Rich in insights, groundbreaking in its interpretations, Personal Knowledge deserves to be better known.” —Science and Education

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  The Old Roller Towel

  Bert Leston Taylor

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  LibriVox volunteers bring you 12 recordings of The Old Roller Towel by Bert Leston Taylor. This was the Weekly Poetry project for February 27, 2011.

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