Aristotle, and H Tredennick (translator), Metaphysics I-IX , Harvard University Press, William Heinemann 1980 Introduction: "[Aristotle] felt that there must be a regular system of sciences, each concerned with a different aspect of reality. At the same time it was only reasonable to suppose that there was a supreme science which was more ultimate, more exact, more truly Wisdom than the others. The discussion of ths science - Wisdom, Primary Philosophy or Theology, as it is variously called - and of its scope, forms the subject of the Metaphysics' page xxv. 
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Ashby, W Ross, An Introduction to Cybernetics, Methuen 1964 'This book is intended to provide [an introduction to cybernetics]. It starts from common-place and well understood concepts, and proceeds step by step to show how these concepts can be made exact, and how they can be developed until they lead into such subjects as feedback, stability, regulation, ultrastability, information, coding, noise and other cybernetic topics.' 
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Auyang, Sunny Y., How is Quantum Field Theory Possible?, Oxford University Press 1995 Jacket: 'Quantum field theory (QFT) combines quantum mechanics with Einstein's special theory of relativity and underlies elementary particle physics. This book presents a philosophical analysis of QFT. It is the first treatise in which the philosophies of space-time, quantum phenomena and particle interactions are encompassed in a unified framework.' 
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Cassirer, Ernst, Kant's Life and Thought, Yale University Press 1971 Jacket: 'Ernst Cassirer's own philosophical system and approach to the history of ideas developed under the continuous influence of Kant. Cassier looked on Kant's teachings as an expression of the permanent tasks of philosophy, and it was as an heir to Kant's work that he produced this intellectual biography which is at the same time as a survey of Kant's writing.' Note: 'Kants Leben und Lehre was first published in 1918, by Bruno Cassirer in Berlin, as a supplementary volume to the edition of Kant's works of which Ernst Cassirer was both general editor and also sole or coeditor of four individual volumes.' p xxii 
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Christie, Agatha, The Labours of Hercules, Berkley Publishing Group 1997 Amazon: 'The most intricate and clever criminal challenges of Hercule Poirot's illustrious career can be found in this classic that fans have been dying to rediscover.' 
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Dirac, P A M, The Principles of Quantum Mechanics (4th ed), Oxford UP/Clarendon 1983 Jacket: '[this] is the standard work in the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, indispensible both to the advanced student and the mature research worker, who will always find it a fresh source of knowledge and stimulation.' (Nature)  
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Einstein, Albert, and Robert W Lawson (translator) Roger Penrose (Introduction), Robert Geroch (Commentary), David C Cassidy (Historical Essay) , Relativity: The Special and General Theory, Pi Press 2005 Preface: 'The present book is intended, as far as possible, to give an exact insight into the theory of relativity to those readers who, from a general scientific and philosophical point of view, are interested in the theory, but who are not conversant with the mathematical apparatus of theoretical physics. ... The author has spared himself no pains in his endeavour to present the main ideas in the simplest and most intelligible form, and on the whole, in the sequence and connection in which they actually originated.' page 3  
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Feynman, Richard P, and Robert B Leighton, Matthew Sands, The Feynman Lectures on Physics (volume 3) : Quantum Mechanics, Addison Wesley 1970 Foreword: 'This set of lectures tries to elucidate from the beginning those features of quantum mechanics which are the most basic and the most general. . . . In each instance the ideas are introduced together with a detailed discussion of some specific examples - to try to make the physical ideas as real as possible.' Matthew Sands 
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Knox, Ronald, Enthusiasm: A Chapter in the History of Religion, University of Notre Dame Press 1994 Amazon customer review: 'Hard not to be very enthusiastic about this magnum opus of Msgr Ronald Knox. It deserves to be republished today -- in a lovely paperback edition. This has been one of my favorite books over the years; read and re-read for the sheer joy of reading! Knox takes us on a marvellous journey through history, unveiling some of the mystical and "enthusiastic" movements, going back to Corinth and Montanism, and some of the "enthusiastic" personalities behind these movements. His chapters on John Wesley are the best I know; alone worth the price of this book. You may be surprised--as Knox himself was--at his conclusions! ENTHUSIASM COMES FROM THE GREEK MEANING "GOD WITHIN!" ' gerard77 
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Marr, David, Patrick White: A Life, Knopf 1992 Editorial review from Library Journal : 'From Library Journal An admirably readable biography of the Nobel Prize-winning author of Voss , The Tree of Man , and many other books, this work is full of detail on White's family and prosperous background, the events and people in his life, his writing habits, his religious beliefs, his cantankerousness and temper, his causes and doubts, his attraction to the theater, and much more. White helped Marr gain access to people and material, even authorizing him to collect his letters, "the backbone of this book." Marr deals intelligently with important issues (among them, White's rootedness in and dissatisfaction with Australia, his sense of himself as an outsider, his relation to his mother, and, in particular his homosexuality, which White considered central to his novelistic and theatrical ability), avoiding psychoanalytical speculations and other intrusions. White reviewed the book shortly before he died, finding it "so painful he often found himself reading through tears. He did not ask Marr to change a line."' Richard Kuczkowski Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. 
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Misner, Charles W, and Kip S Thorne, John Archibald Wheeler, Gravitation, Freeman 1973 Jacket: 'Einstein's description of gravitation as curvature of spacetime led directly to that greatest of all predictions of his theory, that the universe itself is dynamic. Physics still has far to go to come to terms with this amazing fact and what it means for man and his relation to the universe. John Archibald Wheeler. . . . this is a book on Einstein's theory of gravity. . . . ' 
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Peskin, Michael E, and Dan V Schroeder, An Introduction to Quantum Field Theory, Westview Press 1995 Amazon Product Description 'This book is a clear and comprehensive introduction to quantum field theory, one that develops the subject systematically from its beginnings. The book builds on calculation techniques toward an explanation of the physics of renormalization.'  
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Souder, William, On Farther Shore: The Life and Legacy of Rachel Carson, Crown 2012 'Published on the fiftieth anniversary of her seminal book, Silent Spring, here is an indelible new portrait of Rachel Carson, founder of the environmental movement She loved the ocean and wrote three books about its mysteries, including the international bestseller The Sea Around Us. But it was with her fourth book, Silent Spring, that this unassuming biologist transformed our relationship with the natural world. Rachel Carson began work on Silent Spring in the late 1950s, when a dizzying array of synthetic pesticides had come into use. Leading this chemical onslaught was the insecticide DDT, whose inventor had won a Nobel Prize for its discovery. Effective against crop pests as well as insects that transmitted human diseases such as typhus and malaria, DDT had at first appeared safe. But as its use expanded, alarming reports surfaced of collateral damage to fish, birds, and other wildlife. Silent Spring was a chilling indictment of DDT and its effects, which were lasting, widespread, and lethal. Published in 1962, Silent Spring shocked the public and forced the government to take action-despite a withering attack on Carson from the chemicals industry. The book awakened the world to the heedless contamination of the environment and eventually led to the establishment of the EPA and to the banning of DDT and a host of related pesticides. By drawing frightening parallels between dangerous chemicals and the then-pervasive fallout from nuclear testing, Carson opened a fault line between the gentle ideal of conservation and the more urgent new concept of environmentalism. Elegantly written and meticulously researched, On a Farther Shore reveals a shy yet passionate woman more at home in the natural world than in the literary one that embraced her. William Souder also writes sensitively of Carson's romantic friendship with Dorothy Freeman, and of her death from cancer in 1964. This extraordinary new biography captures the essence of one of the great reformers of the twentieth century. ' 
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White, Patrick, The Tree of Man, Vintage 1994 'Stan Parker, with only a horse and a dog for company journeys to a remote patch of land he has inherited in the Australian hills. Once the land is cleared and a rudimentary house built, he brings his wife Amy to the wilderness. Together they face lives of joy and sorrow as they struggle against the environment.' 
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White, Patrick, The Eye of the Storm, Penguin Books 1988 'Elizabeth Hunter, an ex-socialite in her eighties, has a mystical experience during a summer storm in Sydney which transforms all her relationships: her existence becomes charged with a meaning which communicates itself to those around her. From this simple scenario Patrick White unfurls a monumental exploration of the tides of love and hate, comedy and tragedy, impotence and longing that fester within family relationships.' 
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Landauer, Rolf, "Information is a physical entity", Physica A, 263, 1, 1 February 1999, page 63-7. 'This paper, associated with a broader conference talk on the fundamental physical limits of information handling, emphasizes the aspects still least appreciated. Information is not an abstract entity but exists only through a physical representation, thus tying it to all the restrictions and possibilities of our real physical universe. The mathematician's vision of an unlimited sequence of totally reliable operations is unlikely to be implementable in this real universe. Speculative remarks about the possible impact of that, on the ultimate nature of the laws of physics are included.'. back

A Theory of Justice - Wikipedia, A Theory of Justice - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A Theory of Justice is a work of political philosophy and ethics by John Rawls, in which the author attempts to solve the problem of distributive justice (the socially just distribution of goods in a society) by utilising a variant of the familiar device of the social contract.' back

Albert Aitkin (Stanford Ecyclopedia of Philosophy), Peirce's Theory of Signs, ' Peirce's Sign Theory, or Semiotic, is an account of signification, representation, reference and meaning. Although sign theories have a long history, Peirce's accounts are distinctive and innovative for their breadth and complexity, and for capturing the importance of interpretation to signification. For Peirce, developing a thoroughgoing theory of signs was a central philosophical and intellectual preoccupation.' back

Andrew J Hoffman ad Ellen Hughes-Cromwisk, Nobel award recognizes how economic forces can fight climate change, ' Yale economist William Nordhaus has devoted his life’s work to understanding the costs of climate change and advocating the use of a carbon tax to curb global warming. . . . But Nordhaus’ work is not about whether or not people and policymakers “believe” in climate change. It’s about the market and its ability to address the most serious issue facing humanity in the coming years.' back

Aquinas 388, I, 78, 4: Whether the interior senses are suitably distinguished, 'I answer that, As nature does not fail in necessary things, there must needs be as many actions of the sensitive soul as may suffice for the life of a perfect animal. If any of these actions cannot be reduced to the same one principle, they must be assigned to diverse powers; since a power of the soul is nothing else than the proximate principle of the soul's operation.' back

Christopher McLeod (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), John Stuart Mill, ' John Stuart Mill (1806–73) was the most influential English language philosopher of the nineteenth century. He was a naturalist, a utilitarian, and a liberal, whose work explores the consequences of a thoroughgoing empiricist outlook. In doing so, he sought to combine the best of eighteenth-century Enlightenment thinking with newly emerging currents of nineteenth-century Romantic and historical philosophy.' back

Constantine the Great and Christianity - Wikipedia, Constantine the Great and Christianity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Constantine's conversion was a turning point for Early Christianity, sometimes referred to as the Triumph of the Church, the Peace of the Church or the Constantinian shift. In 313, Constantine and Licinius issued the Edict of Milan legalizing Christian worship. The emperor became a great patron of the Church and set a precedent for the position of the Christian emperor within the Church and the notion of orthodoxy, Christendom, and ecumenical councils that would be followed for centuries after 380 as the State church of the Roman Empire. He is revered as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Oriental Orthodox Church for his example as a "Christian monarch."' back

David Pride and Chandrabali Ghose, Meet the trillions of viruses that make up your virome, 'It has been estimated that there are over 380 trillion viruses inhabiting us, a community collectively known as the human virome. But these viruses are not the dangerous ones you commonly hear about, like those that cause the flu or the common cold, or more sinister infections like Ebola or dengue. Many of these viruses infect the bacteria that live inside you and are known as bacteriophages, or phages for short. The human body is a breeding ground for phages, and despite their abundance, we have very little insight into what all they or any of the other viruses in the body are doing.' back

Dot product - Wikipedia, Dot product - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In mathematics, the dot product, or scalar product (or sometimes inner product in the context of Euclidean space), is an algebraic operation that takes two equal-length sequences of numbers (usually coordinate vectors) and returns a single number obtained by multiplying corresponding entries and then summing those products. The name "dot product" is derived from the centered dot " " that is often used to designate this operation; the alternative name "scalar product" emphasizes the scalar (rather than vector) nature of the result.' back

Elliot Ross, When Melania went to Africa wearing pith helmet, ' This week the first lady of the United States, Melania Trump, was in Kenya for a "stop" on her "Africa tour". Her decision to appear at Nairobi National Park wearing a white pith helmet, crisp white shirt and light brown jodhpurs made headlines in international media, which correctly described the pith helmet as a symbol of colonial rule.' back

Equivalence class - Wikipedia, Equivalence class - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In mathematics, when the elements of some set S have a notion of equivalence (formalized as an equivalence relation) defined on them, then one may naturally split the set S into equivalence classes. These equivalence classes are constructed so that elements a and b belong to the same equivalence class if and only if a and b are equivalent.' back

Eye in the Sky (2015 film) - Wikipedia, Eye in the Sky (2015 film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Eye in the Sky is a 2015 British thriller film starring Helen Mirren, Aaron Paul, Alan Rickman, and Barkhad Abdi.[3] Directed by Gavin Hood and based on a screenplay by Guy Hibbert, the film explores the ethical challenges of drone warfare. Filming began in South Africa in September 2014.' back

James E. Crimmins (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Jeremy Bentham, ' Jeremy Bentham, jurist and political reformer, is the philosopher whose name is most closely associated with the foundational era of the modern utilitarian tradition. Earlier moralists had enunciated several of the core ideas and characteristic terminology of utilitarian philosophy, most notably John Gay, Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, Claude-Adrien Helvétius and Cesare Beccaria, but it was Bentham who rendered the theory in its recognisably secular and systematic form and made it a critical tool of moral and legal philosophy and political and social improvement.' back

Jeremy Hodges, World to Install Over One Trillion Watts of Clean Energy by 2023, back

Joan of Arc - Wikipedia, Joan of Arc - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Saint Joan of Arc (French: Jeanne d'Arc[ c. 1412[ – 30 May 1431) is a national heroine of France and a Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, claiming divine guidance, and was indirectly responsible for the coronation of Charles VII. She was captured by the English, tried by an ecclesiastical court, and burned at the stake when she was nineteen years old. Twenty-four years later, the Holy See reviewed the decision of the ecclesiastical court, found her innocent, and declared her a martyr. She was beatified in 1909 and later canonized in 1920.' back

Jonathan Rauch, The Constitution of Knowledge, ' America has faced many challenges to its political culture, but this is the first time we have seen a national-level epistemic attack: a systematic attack, emanating from the very highest reaches of power, on our collective ability to distinguish truth from falsehood. "These are truly uncharted waters for the country," wrote Michael Hayden, former CIA director, in the Washington Post in April. "We have in the past argued over the values to be applied to objective reality, or occasionally over what constituted objective reality, but never the existence or relevance of objective reality itself." To make the point another way: Trump and his troll armies seek to undermine the constitution of knowledge.' back

Kamila Shamsie, What has Malala Yousafazi done to the Taliban, 'The attempted assassination of a 14-year-old girl was driven by pathological hatred of women – not politics, as the Taliban claim' back

Karen Tumuty, The nation's investigations into the Catholic Church are only just the beginning, ' It has been nearly eight weeks since a Pennsylvania grand jury released a bombshell report alleging that more than 300 priests across the state sexually abused children over seven decades, and that the church hierarchy in six Pennsylvania dioceses was complicit in covering it up. Since then, Shapiro has been sought out by attorneys general in more than 40 other states seeking advice on how they might conduct similar probes. A dozen have already announced publicly that they are pursuing investigations.' back

Lee Fang, At Secretive Retreat, Evsnglicls Celerate Brett Kavanaugh's Confirmation, ' As the Senate prepared to vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court on Saturday afternoon, evangelical Christian leaders were gathered at a secretive retreat in North Carolina to plan the conservative movement’s path forward. The Council for National Policy, which operates covertly and brings together faith-based conservatives to discuss political strategy, was holding a planning meeting in a second-floor ballroom at the Westin hotel in Charlotte when the Senate confirmed President Donald Trump’s second Supreme Court pick by a 50-48 vote.' back

Mike Sosteric, Star Wars is a religion that primes us for war and violence, 'The Sasanian nodes most obvious in Star Wars are the idea of an oppositional binary between good and evil, the idea of a cosmic battle between the two, the notion that you have to make a choice and pick a side, and the notion that if you make the right choice you get to enter through the fancy gates and be rewarded at an altar of light. But if you make the wrong choice then, like Anakin Skywalker, it is “fire and brimstone” for you. back

Minkowski space - Wikipedia, Minkowski space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In mathematical physics, Minkowski space or Minkowski spacetime is a combination of Euclidean space and time into a four-dimensional manifold where the spacetime interval between any two events is independent of the inertial frame of reference in which they are recorded. Although initially developed by mathematician Hermann Minkowski for Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism, the mathematical structure of Minkowski spacetime was shown to be an immediate consequence of the postulates of special relativity.' back

Neil MacFarquhar, Russia-Ukraine Tensions Set Up the Biggest Christian Schism Since 1054, ' MOSCOW — Vyacheslav Gorshkov, who teaches the catechism at a Kiev cathedral, was among the majority of Orthodox Christians in Ukraine who had reconciled themselves to the fact that their church answers to the Russian Orthodox patriarch in Moscow. No longer. Mr. Gorshkov does not want to break with the faith, but does want to split with the Russian Orthodox Church, incensed by what he sees as the Kremlin using the church as an instrument of its old imperial control.' back

Paul Collins, Fifty years after Vatican II, Catholics are still hoping for new vision, 'Catholicism today is incomprehensible without some knowledge of the Second Vatican Ecumenical or General Council. It was the 21st such gathering of Catholic leaders in the history of the church. It opened 50 years ago today in Rome's St Peter's Basilica. . . .

It was a genuinely worldwide gathering of 2500-2800 bishops from almost every country. It met over four sessions between 1962 and 1965. , , ,

Pope John died in June 1963. He was succeeded by Paul VI (1963-1978) who continued the council and generally supported the thrust of the large majority of the bishops. But psychologically Paul was a hesitant man, a ditherer even. He was afraid of alienating reactionary bishops especially those from the Roman Curia, the Vatican bureaucracy. He feared that they would walk out of the council, leading to schism.

The result was that key documents of Vatican II were compromises. For instance, the document on the nature of the church first envisions the church as a community drawn together by God's spirit and built not on the hierarchy but the people. But then, almost as if the community model didn't exist, the church is characterised as an authority-driven, clerical institution dominated by Pope, bishops and the Vatican.' Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/fifty-years-after-vatican-ii-catholics-are-still-hoping-for-a-new-vision-20121010-27d7w.html#ixzz28wFLGy4b back

Robyn J. Whitaker, On gender and sexuality, Scott Morrison's 'blind spot' may come from reading the Bible too literally, ' Why is our prime minister so poor on matters of gender and sexuality? Why won’t he clearly state that no institution in Australia, including schools, should be able to discriminate against children on the basis of their sexuality? Why won’t he condemn gay conversion therapy, despite widespread agreement within the medical community that it has no therapeutic value and is likely to harm?' back

Sean Greene, Watchh science and art in action in these award winning microscopic videos, ' Sometimes there’s a fine line between science and art. Nikon Instruments recently unveiled the winners of its annual Small World in Motion contest, a microscopic videography competition that highlights the beautiful and strange sights of an often unseen world. This year’s top winners, Elizabeth Haynes and Jiaye "Henry" He of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, captured a time-lapse video of a zebrafish nervous system as it developed over 16 hours. The entire thing was condensed into a 40-second clip.' back

Sharon Bradford Franklin, Looking Down Under for a Back Door, ' For years, U.S. law enforcement has tried, and failed, to convince Congress to require tech companies to provide backdoor access to encrypted data and communications. But it might not need such legislation after all: It may end up with a back door to a back door, by way of the land Down Under. The Australian government is working to enact legislation to make it easier for law enforcement and intelligence agencies to access electronic communications information, including data protected by encryption, by forcing companies to weaken the security of their products. And the United States appears to be pushing for, and ready to exploit, that new law—a practice known as policy laundering.' back

SMH Editorial, A rancorous debate when politics gets personal., 'It would be difficult for many observers to restrain their feelings of gall at Gillard's defence of the indefensible. She made a ringing speech in service of an ignoble cause - the survival of an office-holder whose words and behaviour have aroused widespread revulsion. In making defence the best form of attack, Gillard had to speak for female dignity to save the job of Peter Slipper, a man given to making despicable comments about women.' Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/editorial/a-rancorous-debate-when-politics-gets-personal-20121010-27dhk.html#ixzz29DeQWSmj back

Sue Prideaux, Far right, misogynist, humourless? Why Nietzsche is misunderstood?, ' As for the myths that have grown up around him, the last word surely should belong to the man himself. “I am frightened,” he wrote, “by the thought of what unqualified and unsuitable people may invoke my authority one day. Yet that is the torment of every teacher … he knows that, given the circumstances and accidents, he can become a disaster as well as a blessing to mankind.” ' back

Thomas L. Friedman, Donald Trump Versus the Jungle, ' Robert Kagan, in his incisive, elegantly written, new book about America’s unique role in the world, “The Jungle Grows Back,” makes that clear. Kagan’s core thesis, as he explained in an interview, is that if you look at the broad sweep of human history, “democracy is the rarest form of government.” That’s because for most of history great powers constantly clashed and most people were constantly poor. “But for the last 70-plus years we have been living in the greatest prosperity ever known — globally — and we’ve witnessed the most widespread booming of democracy and the longest period of great-power peace ever known.” ' back