This just came across my desk. These are not amazing deals, but they are pretty good deals. I’ll put the list price and asking price down so you can decide if you want to ignore this.
A Global Warming Primer: Answering Your Questions About The Science, The Consequences, and The Solutions
The Greatest Story Ever Told–So Far: Why Are We Here?
Welcome to the Universe: An Astrophysical Tour
Ruby Wizardry: An Introduction to Programming for Kids
Have you read the breakthrough novel of the year? When you are done with that, try:
In Search of Sungudogo by Greg Laden, now in Kindle
or Paperback
*Please note:
Links to books and other items on this page and elsewhere on Greg Ladens' blog may send you to Amazon, where I am a registered affiliate. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, which helps to fund this site.
or Paperback
*Please note:
Links to books and other items on this page and elsewhere on Greg Ladens' blog may send you to Amazon, where I am a registered affiliate. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, which helps to fund this site.
Nearly forgot to make sure kevin doesn’t read this article either!
This is why Kevin can’t have nice things.
Well, he’d only find it boring that a book has a lot of pages all one after the other, saying stuff.
One day even Betty will have said something worth thinking about. I’m still waiting for it to happen, but I don’t just give up and not read just because the loon is a loon.
Spencer Weart’s book is still available to purchase, too. The bit that should be interesting for “deniers” who are just ignorant and lazy, is that it shows when the questions that they’ve been told are being asked and are going unanswered were asked over a century ago and answered nearly a century ago. For many who just accept whatever they are told that fits really don’t understand the history and never have heard it. Knowing that in the 1920s the scientists were all “Oh, it’s saturated” and were only proving that it wasn’t all that saturated in the 1950s really brings home how zombie that argument is, when they thought that it was still going unanswered (why else would Real Important People be asking it today?!?!?).
But would they bother to read a book like that, and even if they did, would they buy the presentations made in it when they’ve already comfortable denying everything the science says?
I like the programming books and other tech aimed at kids. One of our department members has set up “stem days” for kids from local elementary schools: we bring in several classes of 4th, 5th, and or 6th graders, and they are exposed to different topics: I’ve done presentations on fairly simple encryption, but some of the CS people have introduced the older groups to some programming basics. It’s fun — but it is amazing how much more tired we are after a day with kids that age than we are with “traditional” age college kids.
The point for some is they read on newspaper “opinion” pieces or hear on the radio “Well it’s saturated!!!” and don’t realise how long ago that had been answered and how many years it was accepted by those who had asked. They don’t KNOW how long ago some of the zombie arguments were asked, they think that these are new questions!
So the history teaches them that these aren’tnew questions and that before those who had asked were answered and accepted it. They may then jump to other dumb arguments, but the oldest ones will be dropped and a crack in the anti-side will have developed: “Well, maybe it has been answered like the other ones they are still asking…”.
They don’t know how old some of the arguments are. At the very least they can be educated in the history, even if the maths and science isn’t their thing.