Perhaps if something is said over and over a hundred different ways, it will finally sink in. And perhaps not. But if it is seen just once.... This book is an offering by the Absolute; an expression of a realization ultimately had by no one. Part I is comprised of 15 essays. The dialogues in Part II are based on conversations with five other incarcerated men over a period of four years. The author is indebted to these men, and to the English philosopher and spiritual teacher Douglas E. Harding for the awareness exercises and many of the terms presented in this book, and for his unique and incomparable expression of non-dual wisdom.
A special collection of the best fiction, essays, poetry, and plays from annual PEN Prison Writing contest offers unique insights into the emotions and thoughts engendered by the prison experience, ranging from humor and empathy to rage, fear, and despair. 15,000 first printing.
J.C. Amberchele is a remarkably eloquent writer; the sixty-one succinct chapters of The Heavenly Backflip draw on conversations with fellow inmates and Buddhist group members and cover topics such as the nature of enlightenment, the Headless Way, the direct and the progressive path and the various concepts of Buddhism. Interspersed with these are taut chapters of prose informed by his own first-hand experience of Awakening. This is the Perennial Philosophy brought fully to life within the confines of a prison environment. This third book by Amberchele is made up of short chapters of alternating prose and dialogues with fellow prison inmates. A voracious reader and long-time Buddhist practitioner, his search found its conclusion in The Headless Way approach devised by Douglas Harding. As well as being an exposition of the Perennial Philosophy, Amberchele answers, via the dialogues, questions which come up along the path leading the reader towards a very practical seeing of one’s Original Face. Altogether, a concise, profound and exuberant text on the nature of identity.
A collection of interconnecting stories chronicles the life-altering repercussions of a terrible crime--for both the perpetrator and the victim--as it follows the lives of Melody, Alex, the man who shot her, and others, from the initial crime to Melody's visit to the prison a decade later to confront Alex to find out his motivations for the crime. Reprint.
Damien Broderick has been a leading Australian SF writer since the ‘70s. His novel The Dreaming Dragons was listed in SF: the 100 best novels. His recent nonfiction book, The Spike, is a mind-stretching look at the wonders of the high-tech future. Now in Transcension he brings to life one of the futures he imagined in The Spike, a world pervaded by nanotechnology and governed by artificial intelligence. Transcension may be Broderick’s best book yet. Amanda is a brilliant violinist, a mathematical genius, and a rebel. Impatient for the adult status her society only grants at age thirty, but determined to have a real adventure first, she has repeatedly gotten into trouble and found herself in the courtroom of Magistrate Mohammed Abdel-Malik, the sole resurrectee from among those who were frozen in the early twenty-first century, the man whose mind was the seed for Aleph, the AI that rules this utopia. Mathewmark is a real adolescent, living in the last place where they still exist, the reservation known as the Valley of the God of One's Choice, where those who have chosen faith over technology are allowed to live out their simpler lives. When Amanda determines that access to the valley is the key to the daring stunt she plans, it is Mathewmark she will have to lead into temptation. But just as Amanda, Mathewmark, and Abdel-Malik are struggling to find themselves and achieve their potentials, so is Aleph, and the AI's success will be a challenge to them and all of humanity. At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied.
From the bestselling author of the acclaimed Chaos and Genius comes a thoughtful and provocative exploration of the big ideas of the modern era: Information, communication, and information theory. Acclaimed science writer James Gleick presents an eye-opening vision of how our relationship to information has transformed the very nature of human consciousness. A fascinating intellectual journey through the history of communication and information, from the language of Africa’s talking drums to the invention of written alphabets; from the electronic transmission of code to the origins of information theory, into the new information age and the current deluge of news, tweets, images, and blogs. Along the way, Gleick profiles key innovators, including Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, Samuel Morse, and Claude Shannon, and reveals how our understanding of information is transforming not only how we look at the world, but how we live. A New York Times Notable Book A Los Angeles Times and Cleveland Plain Dealer Best Book of the Year Winner of the PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award
Chronicles the lives and careers of the men and women responsible for the creation of the digital age, including Doug Englebart, Robert Noyce, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and more.
The New York Times bestseller – a “crystal-clear, constantly engaging” (Jared Diamond) exploration of the role that religious belief plays in our lives and our interactions For all the thousands of books that have been written about religion, few until this one have attempted to examine it scientifically: to ask why—and how—it has shaped so many lives so strongly. Is religion a product of blind evolutionary instinct or rational choice? Is it truly the best way to live a moral life? Ranging through biology, history, and psychology, Daniel C. Dennett charts religion’s evolution from “wild” folk belief to “domesticated” dogma. Not an antireligious screed but an unblinking look beneath the veil of orthodoxy, Breaking the Spell will be read and debated by believers and skeptics alike.
