Mon premier blog

A wizard of Mars by Diane Duane

Download A wizard of Mars

A wizard of Mars Diane Duane
Language: English
Format: mp3

Description:

It's not scientists who find the first signs of life on Mars. It's wizards. Young wizards Kit Rodriguez and Nita Callahan manage to wangle their way onto an elite team sent to investigate the mysterious, long-sought "message in a bottle" that holds the first clues to the secrets of the ancient Martian race. But not even wizardry is enough to cope with the strange events that start to unfold when the "bottle" is uncorked and life emerges once more to shake the Red Planet with its own terrifying and magnificent brand of magic. The good news is that the Martians seem friendly. The bad news is that now they're free to pick up where they left off on some old plans that could change the shape of more than one world...and they don't mind using their well-intentioned rescuers to achieve their goals. Kit's growing fascination with all things Martian unexpectedly enmeshes him in a terrible, age-old conflict -- turning him into both a possible key to its solution, and a tool which in the wrong hands could threaten the whole human race. Only Kit can stop the threat...and only Nita can tell for sure whose side he's on. But she's got her own problems. Nita finds herself facing a completely unexpected enemy that she can't conquer without giving up everything that matters to her. And if she does, she risks becoming far less than human. Or far more...

RF radiation safety handbook by Ronald Kitchen I Eng

Download RF radiation safety handbook

RF radiation safety handbook Ronald Kitchen I Eng
Language: English
Page: 331
Format: pdf
ISBN: 0750617128, 9780750617123
Publisher: Butterworth-Heinemann

This general introduction to the sources and nature of RF and Microwave radiation covers the problems of RF safety management, including the use of measuring instruments and methods.Radio frequency radiation can be dangerous in a number of ways. Hazards include electromagnetic compatibility and interference, electro-explosive vapours and devices, and direct effects on the human body. The book is designed for people responsible for, or concerned with, safety. This target audience will primarily be radio engineers, but include those skilled in other disciplines including medicine, chemistry or mechanical engineering. The book covers the problems of RF safety management, including the use of measuring instruments and methods, and a review of current safety standards. The implications for RF design engineers are also examined.

BlackBerry Java Application Development: Beginner's Guide by Bill Foust

Download BlackBerry Java Application Development: Beginner's Guide

BlackBerry Java Application Development: Beginner's Guide Bill Foust
Language: English
Page: 368
Format: pdf
ISBN: 1849690200, 9781849690201
Publisher: Packt Publishing

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Her name was Sarah Baartman. Born in South Africa in 1789, she died in Paris in 1815—after five years of being displayed (sometimes in a cage) for entertainment and scientific study; her pickled buttocks and genitalia remained on public display at the Musée de l'Homme until 1974 and her remains were finally returned to South Africa in 2002. During her period of fame and exploitation, she was known as the Hottentot Venus. Willis (Posing Beauty) offers a comprehensive, inclusive, and coherently organized anthology that embraces scholarly and lyrical, historical and reflexive responses to Baartman, as a woman, as a black woman, as an object, as an icon, as an inspiration to creative artists, and as a catalyst to scholars. The book moves from Baartman's life and times to an assessment of the figure of the Hottentot Venus in contemporary art and a broader consideration of the historic public display of black women. Appended is a photo gallery that is as essential and diverse as the texts. This remarkable volume satisfies the academic reader with scholarly essays and moves the general reader with its creative expression, making it fascinating and accessible to any one. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to the

edition.

"Her name was Sarah Baartman. Born in South Africa in 1789, she died in Paris in 1815oafter five years of being displayed (sometimes in a cage) for entertainment and "scientific study... During her period of fame and exploitation, she was known as the "Hottentot Venus." Willis offers a comprehensive, inclusive, and coherently organized anthology that embraces "scholarly and lyrical, historical and reflexive" responses to Baartman... The book moves from Baartman's life and times to an assessment of the figure of the "Hottentot Venus" in contemporary art and a broader consideration of the historic public display of black women.This remarkable volume satisfies the academic reader with scholarly essays and moves the general reader with its creative expression, making it fascinating and accessible to any one." - Pulblishers Weekly "Consisting of scholarly essays, poetical works, roundtable discussions, fictional reimaginings and historiographical research, Deborah Willis' outstanding edited collection, Black Venus 2010 is a radical tour de force... An invaluable addition to scholarship, Willis's [book] showcases a breathtaking array of forms and approaches to investigate Sarah Baartman's proliferating social, political aesthetic and historical identities." - The International Review of African American Art

Geomechanics of Failures. Advanced Topics. Eduardo E. Alonso, Nuria M. Pinyol, Alexander M. Puzrin

Download Geomechanics of Failures. Advanced Topics

Geomechanics of Failures. Advanced Topics Eduardo E. Alonso, Nuria M. Pinyol, Alexander M. Puzrin ebook pdf
Publisher: Springer
Language: English
Page: 280
ISBN: 9048135370, 9789048135387

From the Back Cover

The backbone of Geotechnical Engineering does not concern the development of more or less sophisticated tools and theories. It remains in a previous step. When facing a real problem it is necessary to isolate its fundamental aspects and to achieve a correct conceptual representation of its nature. This phase requires abstract thinking, which is certainly assisted by a proper understanding of paradigms and theories of Soil and Rock Mechanics. The process of abstract thinking with the aim of identifying the key issues usually renounces to complexity and secondary details. To be successful, concepts should be simple and rooted on well established mechanical and physical knowledge. Only when the relevant mechanisms or phenomena which define the problem are well understood, additional sophistication may be added for a more accurate analysis or interpretation. This book remains in this first "simple" stage. The correct identification of the essential traits of a geotechnical situation relies heavily also on accumulated experience and on educated intuition. But, how to educate intuition and how to transfer practical experience? Geotechnical failures, specially the catastrophic ones, are an excellent experience and a source of inspiration to improve our current understanding of phenomena and our procedures and tools for analysis and prediction. This unconventional manner to learn Geomechanics is the essence of this book which teaches how to build the necessary models to understand failures. Balance and equilibrium equations are formulated at different scales which are selected having in mind the abstract representation of the key concepts of each case.

About the Author

Eduardo E. Alonso, born in 1947, got his degree in Civil Engineeering (Ingeniero de Caminos, Canales y Puertos) in Madrid in June 1969. He got a PhD in Northwestern University in 1973. At present he is Professor of Geotechnical Engineering at the UPC in Barcelona. He is the author of more than 300 papers published in Proceedings of Conferences and learned journals. Professional activities include foundation problems, deep excavations, nuclear power plants, slope stability, breakwaters, earthdams, tunneling and underground waste disposal. Awards: Thomas Telford Medal (ICE) in 1994 and 2007; Crampton Prize (ICE) in 2006; J. Torán Prize in 1995; N. Monturiol medal in 2000; Second Coulomb lecturer in 2003 and Eleventh Buchanan Lecturer, Texas A&M in 2003; Tenth Sowers Lecturer, GeorgiaTech, Atlanta in 2005. He is member of the Royal Academy of Engineering of Spain since 1995 and member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Art of Barcelona since 2007.   Núria M. Pinyol, born in 1978, got her degree in Civil Engineering (Ingeniero de Caminos, Canales y Puertos) in Barcelona in June 2004. At present she is a Researcher of the International Center for Numerical Methods in Engineering (CIMNE, Barcelona). She has worked on the development of constitutive models for bonded expansive soils and in the analysis and modeling of the geotechnical behaviour of earth and rockfill dams. One of her papers ("A review of Beliche dam") was awarded the Crampton Prize (ICE, UK) in 2006. Her main research interests are: behavior of unsaturated soils, expansive soils and rocks, hard soils and soft rocks, numerical analysis in Geomechanics, dams, slope stability and rapid slides. Alexander M. Puzrin, born in 1965, studied Structural Engineering at Moscow Institute of Civil Engineers (1982-1987) and Applied Mathematics at Moscow State University (1990). He received his Ph.D. in Geotechnical Engineering from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology in 1997, where he joined the faculty. In 2002 he became a faculty at the Georgia Institute of Technology (USA). He has been Professor of Geotechnical Engineering at the ETH Zurich since 2004. Prof. Puzrin has been involved as an expert in geotechnical projects in Russia, Israel and Switzerland. His expertise lies in progressive and catastrophic failure and constitutive modeling of geomaterials. He is the author of more than 60 papers. Awards: Technion Excellence in Teaching Award in 2001; ASCE (Student Chapter) Outstanding Faculty Award in 2003; ICE Bishop Medal in 2004.

Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism by Benedict Anderson

Download Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism

Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism Benedict Anderson
Language: English
Page: 256
Format: pdf
ISBN: 0860915468, 9780860915461
Publisher: Verso

What makes people love and die for nations, as well as hate and kill in their name? While many studies have been written on nationalist political movements, the sense of nationality - the personal and cultural feeling of belonging to the nation - has not received proportionate attention. In this widely acclaimed work, Benedict Anderson examines the creation and global spread of the 'imagined communities' of nationality. Anderson explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialisation of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time. He shows how an originary nationalism born in the Americas was modularly adopted by popular movements in Europe, by the imperialist powers, and by the anti-imperialist resistances in Asia and Africa. This revised edition includes two new chapters, one of which discusses the complex role of the colonialist state's mindset in the development of Third World nationalism, while the other analyses the processes by which all over the world, nations came to imagine themselves as old.

Over the Moon by Angela Knight, Virginia Kantra, MaryJanice Davidson, Sunny

Download Over the Moon

Over the Moon Angela Knight, Virginia Kantra, MaryJanice Davidson, Sunny ebook
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
Page: 336
ISBN: 9780425213438

Tables of integral transforms. Arthur Erdelyi

Download Tables of integral transforms

Tables of integral transforms Arthur Erdelyi ebook djvu
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Inc.,US
Language: English
Page: 410
ISBN: 0070195498, 9780070195493

Appleseed: Hypernotes by Masamune Shirow, Masamune Shirow

Download Appleseed: Hypernotes

Appleseed: Hypernotes Masamune Shirow, Masamune Shirow ebook
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Page: 160
ISBN: 9781593074463

Consciousness: A User's Guide by Adam Zeman

Download Consciousness: A User's Guide

Consciousness: A User's Guide Adam Zeman
Language: English
Page: 416
Format: pdf
ISBN: 0300092806, 9780300135312
Publisher:

From The New England Journal of Medicine

Consciousness is all the rage. It seems to pop up everywhere. It is now a legitimate subject of study. No longer can it be talked about only in nooks and crannies at conferences. One can publicly hold one of many, sometimes completely contradictory, beliefs about it. For example, one can believe that consciousness can never be understood, that it will always be private and subjective, never to be invaded by the probing, dispassionate eyes of science. Or, alternatively, one can believe that consciousness can be understood only in some mystical, noncomputational way, thereby necessitating other mysteries, such as quantum mechanics, and (when the physicists are brought in) making it even more incomprehensible. Or one can believe that consciousness is not really a problem at all; just don't look at it too long, or it will correspond to mere neural activity, suitably shuttling about in the brain circuits. If I want to learn more about my consciousness, should I go to this book? The answer is yes and no. Yes, because it is a well-written account of the wiring that makes up the brain and of the neural activities involved in the creation of consciousness. After a brief introduction to the various possible meanings of "consciousness" (e.g., awareness, being awake, mental content, and, as a different feature, self-consciousness or recognition of the self), Zeman gives a clear description of the measurements that indicate the awake state of the brain (electroencephalographic and related measurements of brain activity). Possible distortions of consciousness (e.g., pathologic changes in consciousness that occur under the influence of drugs or in a coma, trance, or similar states) are smoothly described. Vision is then analyzed, from the retina and beyond, to blindsight. The evolution of consciousness in animals is then discussed, from a Darwinian perspective. Finally, scientific theories and the nature of consciousness are considered. The more philosophical problems of other minds, of determining what it is like to be someone else, of animals' minds, and of aliens' minds, are all briefly and entertainingly described. In all, then, it was a tour de force to cram so much about this most subtle of all human experiences -- indeed, its very core -- into a reasonably sized book. But why do I then say "no" as well as "yes" to the use of this book? The answer is simple: I go to a car manual because it is written by someone who knows what a car is for -- to be driven by a working engine, with other components (such as window wipers) also working. I need the manual in case something goes wrong. If the car does not work, the manual will, I hope, tell me why not and how it might be mended, if possible on the spot. The situation is rather different with consciousness, according to this book. Zeman does not know how consciousness works. He says so succinctly, in terms of a lack of understanding of how the subtle structures of the brain (which he describes so lucidly) create consciousness: "We can see that the liquidity of water necessarily follows from the properties of the molecules of water. We lack any comparable insight into the connection between experience and the molecules of the brain. It is not yet certain that science can supply this." If science cannot, then scientific analysis of the brain may never lead us to an understanding of the uses of consciousness. Consciousness may well have all sorts of uses, such as helping us to approach God or to commune with our true quantum nature by tapping into the wave function of the universe. Zeman's suggestion -- that consciousness is part of a control circuit -- is also my way of thinking. But controlling what? One possibility, he suggests, is the control of choices among possible actions in an unpredictable world. I agree that this is one use, but surely there are many more. What about thinking? Or feeling? Moreover, Zeman's suggestion is just a guess. How can it be implemented in neural terms? If we do not know for certain how consciousness works or what it is for, how can we be sure how to advise on its use? The situation may not be as bad as all that, but Zeman misses an important area, that of diseases of consciousness. It is here that ideas about the uses of consciousness need to be tested. The most important of these diseases is schizophrenia, in which there are deep disturbances of the sense of self. I do not think that a person with schizophrenia would gain from reading this book or from knowing that his or her disappearing consciousness is needed only to help sharpen choices of actions. Something much more dramatic is happening to that person's sense of self: it becomes at times too strong, and at other times too weak. So I recommend this book to those who are beginners in the field of consciousness studies; it is a valuable contribution. But if you are a puzzled user, if you are at the end of your consciousness tether, then I am afraid you will have to wait. The user's manual is still unobtainable. John G. Taylor, Ph.D.
Copyright © 2003 Massachusetts Medical Society. All rights reserved. The New England Journal of Medicine is a registered trademark of the MMS.

Review

. . . . Students and researchers. . . .will find his book a helpful resource. . . . Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals. -- Choice