The Natural History of Nonsense
Author: Bergen Evans
Publisher:
Published: 1974
Total Pages: 269
ISBN-13:
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Fashionable Nonsense
Author: Alan Sokal
Publisher: Picador
Published: 2014-01-14
Total Pages: 317
ISBN-13: 1466862408
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn 1996 physicist Alan Sokal published an essay in Social Text--an influential academic journal of cultural studies--touting the deep similarities between quantum gravitational theory and postmodern philosophy. Soon thereafter, the essay was revealed as a brilliant parody, a catalog of nonsense written in the cutting-edge but impenetrable lingo of postmodern theorists. The event sparked a furious debate in academic circles and made the headlines of newspapers in the U.S. and abroad. In Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science, Sokal and his fellow physicist Jean Bricmont expand from where the hoax left off. In a delightfully witty and clear voice, the two thoughtfully and thoroughly dismantle the pseudo-scientific writings of some of the most fashionable French and American intellectuals. More generally, they challenge the widespread notion that scientific theories are mere "narrations" or social constructions.
Nonsense on Stilts
Author: Massimo Pigliucci
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2010-05-15
Total Pages: 340
ISBN-13: 0226667871
DOWNLOAD EBOOKRecent polls suggest that fewer than 40 percent of Americans believe in Darwin’s theory of evolution, despite it being one of science’s best-established findings. More and more parents are refusing to vaccinate their children for fear it causes autism, though this link can been consistently disproved. And about 40 percent of Americans believe that the threat of global warming is exaggerated, despite near consensus in the scientific community that manmade climate change is real. Why do people believe bunk? And what causes them to embrace such pseudoscientific beliefs and practices? Noted skeptic Massimo Pigliucci sets out to separate the fact from the fantasy in this entertaining exploration of the nature of science, the borderlands of fringe science, and—borrowing a famous phrase from philosopher Jeremy Bentham—the nonsense on stilts. Presenting case studies on a number of controversial topics, Pigliucci cuts through the ambiguity surrounding science to look more closely at how science is conducted, how it is disseminated, how it is interpreted, and what it means to our society. The result is in many ways a “taxonomy of bunk” that explores the intersection of science and culture at large. No one—not the public intellectuals in the culture wars between defenders and detractors of science nor the believers of pseudoscience themselves—is spared Pigliucci’s incisive analysis. In the end, Nonsense on Stilts is a timely reminder of the need to maintain a line between expertise and assumption. Broad in scope and implication, it is also ultimately a captivating guide for the intelligent citizen who wishes to make up her own mind while navigating the perilous debates that will affect the future of our planet.
A Book of Nonsense
Author: Edward Lear
Publisher:
Published: 1862
Total Pages: 216
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA collection of over 100 limericks with the author's original illustrations.
The Borderlands of Science
Author: Michael Shermer
Publisher:
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 369
ISBN-13: 0195157982
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe editor-in-chief of "Skeptic" magazine and author of the bestselling "Why People Believe Weird Things" takes readers to the place where real science (such as the big bang theory), borderland science (superstring theory), and just plain nonsense (Big Foot) collide with one another. 20 halftones. 36 line illustrations.
The Natural History of Edward Lear, New Edition
Author: Robert McCracken Peck
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 2021-04-13
Total Pages: 241
ISBN-13: 0691217238
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"Edward Lear is well known as the brilliant writer of nonsense poetry, children's books, and travel books who popularized the limerick, and wrote verses such as "The Owl and the Pussycat." But few people are aware that Lear was one of the most talented and accomplished painters of natural history subjects in the nineteenth century, and worked with British scientists, collectors, and publishers to make Britain the nexus for scientific investigation and its circulation. One of the best ornithological artists of his generation, Lear published his first book, a monograph on the parrot family, at age 18, and established a format that would be followed by decades by such publishers as John Gould, with whom he worked closely and often anonymously. Over his career, Lear produced a multitude of drawings of birds and mammals from around the world for scientific publications, public institutions, and individual patrons, not just of English species, but of birds and mammals from Australia, New Zealand, and the Americas. He is also the Lear in the name of the rare species Lear's Macaw. In this book, Peck has assembled the first comprehensive view of this important part of Lear's career. Featuring over 200 illustrations and a foreword by Sir David Attenborough, the book also examines the influence Lear had on modern artists such as Walton Ford and Tony Foster. This new edition includes a new chapter that addresses Lear's continued fascination with wildlife and the natural world after giving up his career as a scientific illustrator, and his fascination with domestic pets, from his own beloved cat which he cartooned repeatedly, to the portraits of dogs owned by his family and friends, alongside thirteen never-before-published illustrations, including fully finished watercolors, rough preliminary sketches, and whimsical cartoons"--
Body Sense, Body Nonsense
Author: Seymour Simon
Publisher: Courier Corporation
Published: 2012
Total Pages: 50
ISBN-13: 0486485285
DOWNLOAD EBOOKInvestigates the sense and nonsense in twenty-two familiar sayings about the body, such as "An apple a day keeps the doctor away."
The Natural History of Make-Believe
Author: John Goldthwaite
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1996-02-22
Total Pages: 397
ISBN-13: 0198020856
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Man in the Moon has dropped down to earth for a visit. Over the hedge, a rabbit in trousers is having a pipe with his evening paper. Elsewhere, Alice is passing through a looking glass, Dorothy riding a tornado to Oz, and Jack climbing a beanstalk to heaven. To enter the world of children's literature is to journey to a realm where the miraculous and the mundane exist side by side, a world that is at once recognizable and real--and enchanted. Many books have probed the myths and meanings of children's stories, but Goldthwaite's Natural History is the first exclusively to survey the magic that lies at the heart of the literature. From the dish that ran away with the spoon to the antics of Brer Rabbit and Dr. Seuss's Cat in the Hat, Goldthwaite celebrates the craft, the invention, and the inspired silliness that fix these tales in our minds from childhood and leave us in a state of wondering to know how these things can be. Covering the three centuries from the fairy tales of Charles Perrault to Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are, he gathers together all the major imaginative works of America, Britain, and Europe to show how the nursery rhyme, the fairy tale, and the beast fable have evolved into modern nonsense verse and fantasy. Throughout, he sheds important new light on such stock characters as the fool and the fairy godmother and on the sources of authors as diverse as Carlo Collodi, Lewis Carroll, and Beatrix Potter. His bold claims will inspire some readers and outrage others. He hails Pinocchio, for example, as the greatest of all children's books, but he views C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia as a parable that is not only murderously misogynistic, but deeply blasphemous as well. Fresh, incisive, and utterly original, this rich literary history will be required reading for anyone who cares about children's books and their enduring influence on how we come to see the world.
Mr. Lear
Author: Jenny Uglow
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published: 2018-04-17
Total Pages: 610
ISBN-13: 1466828234
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA sparkling biography of the poet and artist Edward Lear by the award-winning biographer Jenny Uglow Edward Lear, the renowned English artist, musician, author, and poet, lived a vivid, fascinating life, but confessed, “I hardly enjoy any one thing on earth while it is present.” He was a man in a hurry, “running about on railroads” from London to country estates and boarding steamships to Italy, Corfu, India, and Palestine. He is still loved for his “nonsenses,” from startling, joyous limericks to great love poems like “The Owl and the Pussy Cat” and “The Dong with a Luminous Nose,” and he is famous, too, for his brilliant natural history paintings, landscapes, and travel writing. But although Lear belongs solidly to the age of Darwin and Dickens—he gave Queen Victoria drawing lessons, and his many friends included Tennyson and the Pre-Raphaelite painters—his genius for the absurd and his dazzling wordplay make him a very modern spirit. He speaks to us today. Lear was a man of great simplicity and charm—children adored him—yet his humor masked epilepsy, depression, and loneliness. Jenny Uglow’s beautifully illustrated biography, full of the color of the age, brings us his swooping moods, passionate friendships, and restless travels. Above all, Mr. Lear shows how this uniquely gifted man lived all his life on the boundaries of rules and structures, disciplines and desires—an exile of the heart.
Do You Believe in Magic?
Author: Paul A. Offit
Publisher: Harper Collins
Published: 2013-06-18
Total Pages: 291
ISBN-13: 0062223003
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA physician offers an impassioned and meticulously researched exposé of the alternative medicine industry, separating the sense from the nonsense. A half century ago, acupuncture, homeopathy, naturopathy, Chinese herbs, Christian exorcisms, dietary supplements, chiropractic manipulations, and ayurvedic remedies were considered on the fringe of medicine. Now these practices—known variably as alternative, complementary, holistic, or integrative medicine—have become mainstream, used by half of all Americans today to treat a variety of conditions, from excess weight to cancer. But alternative medicine is an unregulated industry under no legal obligation to prove its claims or admit its risks, and many popular alternative therapies are ineffective, expensive, or even deadly. In Do You Believe in Magic?, health advocate Dr. Offit debunks the treatments that don’t work and tells us why, and takes on the media celebrities who promote alternative medicine. Using dramatic real-life stories, he separates the sense from the nonsense, explaining why any therapy—alternative or traditional—should be scrutinized. As Dr. Offit explains, some popular therapies are remarkably helpful due to the placebo response, but “there’s no such thing as alternative medicine. There’s only medicine that works and medicine that doesn’t.”
