Gurcharan Das, 2023, Penguin Random House; 9780670092710
Subject: Biography
Source: Telegraph
Review: Gurcharan Das admits he's a natural show-off, and prone to name-drop to gesticulate a wrinkle in time. But he tries to curb his instincts here. The former head of Procter & Gamble takes us through the 1960s and the 1970s in Boston and Oxford and describes uniquely how his feet remain rooted in Indian soil. He encounters Sanskrit, rhetorical questions, white women he wants to sleep with, his own ge...Read More
Another sort of freedom
Gurcharan Das admits he's a natural show-off, and prone to name-drop to gesticulate a wrinkle in time. But he tries to curb his instincts here. The former head of Procter & Gamble takes us through the 1960s and the 1970s in Boston and Oxford and describes uniquely how his feet remain rooted in Indian soil. He encounters Sanskrit, rhetorical questions, white women he wants to sleep with, his own genius, and the fact that even Harvard graduates have to do something with their lives. Each chapter is artistically named (one is called The Mouse Merchant, after a story in the English translation of the Sanskrit volume called Kathasaritsagara) and has a quoted epigram (The Mouse Merchant has one from The Office (US) character, Jim Halpert, a hearty asynchrony of reference; for comparison, another chapter's adage is from the thinker, Nietzsche).
Annette Bay Pimentel, 2023, The MIT Press; 9781419757068
Subject: Science and Technology
Source: Strategy + Business
Review: Before Colors is a gorgeously illustrated and, of course, colorful book that introduces readers to the origins of different pigments and dyes used throughout history and in the present day. This may seem like a difficult topic to organize into a single narrative, but author Annette Bay Pimentel cleverly ties the stories of each color together. The book's discussion of the color brown, for example,...Read More
Before colors: where pigments and dyes come from
Before Colors is a gorgeously illustrated and, of course, colorful book that introduces readers to the origins of different pigments and dyes used throughout history and in the present day. This may seem like a difficult topic to organize into a single narrative, but author Annette Bay Pimentel cleverly ties the stories of each color together. The book's discussion of the color brown, for example, eventually reveals how brown roots can make yellow dye. Each subsequent color is connected to the next in a similar manner, echoing the children?s classic Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?nPimentel?s introductions to each color are very straightforward and accessible, even for young children. They feature detailed illustrations and a brief summary of how a pigment or dye of that color might be made using minimal technology. Readers learn, for example, that brown pigment can be made by mixing burnt rock with water. Subsequent pages present scientific explanations of color perception as well as historical vignettes, the latter of which are mainly focused on individuals who made important contributions to dyeing or color preservation techniques. Iwan Tirta, for example, was an Indonesian fashion designer who preserved the traditional methods of fabric art called batik, while also modernizing the techniques for use with different fabric types and patterns. Each color section concludes with a collection of plants, animals, and minerals from which the pigments or dyes of that color might be made in different eras and geographic locations.
Review: Few scientific subjects are as vast as the ocean. Yet oceans often seem invisible, remarks physicist Helen Czerski Growing up in Manchester, UK, Czerski had access only to the freezing North Sea to the east and the grey Irish Sea to the west, neither of which much appealed. But why did her three physics degrees omit the ocean, she wonders Having finished a PhD in experimental explosive physics and...Read More
Blue machine: how the ocean shapes our world
Few scientific subjects are as vast as the ocean. Yet oceans often seem invisible, remarks physicist Helen Czerski Growing up in Manchester, UK, Czerski had access only to the freezing North Sea to the east and the grey Irish Sea to the west, neither of which much appealed. But why did her three physics degrees omit the ocean, she wonders Having finished a PhD in experimental explosive physics and looking for a new subject as a postdoc, she encountered a giant frame in her Californian laboratory that had buoys on the corners and waterproof boxes of sensors in the middle, used by colleagues to make marine measurements. ?It was their gateway to another world?, she says, and it soon hooked her, too. She began research on the bubbles created by breaking ocean waves, and their influence on weather and climate across the world.nnCzerski?s profound, sparkling book is a global ocean voyage mingling history and culture, animals and people, natural history and geography, in a quest to understand the physics of the ?blue machine?: the ocean engine, powered by sunlight, that shunts energy from Equator to poles. ?It has components on every scale, from the mighty Gulf Stream gliding across the Atlantic to the tiny bubbles bursting at the top of a breaking wave.?
Review: Towards the end of Vivek Shanbagh's (2023: 160) novel Sakina's Kiss, its compulsively self-exposing narrator observes, The intensity of a life can be measured in stupid decisions. I have always been envious of those who manage to be reckless.Stupid here does not mean thoughtless or banal; it means, instead, that which is uncalculated, spontaneous, without reck or care for one's own interest. ...Read More
Body on the barricades
Towards the end of Vivek Shanbagh's (2023: 160) novel Sakina's Kiss, its compulsively self-exposing narrator observes, The intensity of a life can be measured in stupid decisions. I have always been envious of those who manage to be reckless.Stupid here does not mean thoughtless or banal; it means, instead, that which is uncalculated, spontaneous, without reck or care for one's own interest.
Scott Eyman, 2023, Simon and Schuster; 9781982176372
Subject: Political Science
Source: Financial Times
Review: Scott Eyman's biography of Charlie Chaplin commences in 1952, a peculiar phase in the artist's life when he is unexpectedly barred from re-entering the United States due to opaque dealings in the US State Department. Chaplin, once considered the most famous man globally, finds himself on the RMS Queen Elizabeth, headed for England, facing the risk of becoming a reflection of his iconic tramp chara...Read More
Charlie Chaplin vs. America: when art, sex, and politics collided
Scott Eyman's biography of Charlie Chaplin commences in 1952, a peculiar phase in the artist's life when he is unexpectedly barred from re-entering the United States due to opaque dealings in the US State Department. Chaplin, once considered the most famous man globally, finds himself on the RMS Queen Elizabeth, headed for England, facing the risk of becoming a reflection of his iconic tramp character?"stateless, impoverished." As Eyman notes, "Charlie Chaplin had been cancelled."
In today's context, Chaplin's life would likely be subject to cancellation, not for his alleged communist sympathies, but for his troubling and well-documented relationships with young women and girls. His marriages to young women, such as his second wife Lita Grey, who began working with him at the age of 12, and his love affair with Oona O'Neill, who was 18 when they met and later became his wife, would likely be met with considerable controversy.
Scott Eyman, an experienced film critic who has previously written biographies on Mary Pickford, John Ford, and Cecil B DeMille, does not shy away from these uncomfortable details in "Charlie Chaplin vs America." Despite this, the biography aims to offer an empathetic portrayal of the iconic artist.
Review: The material basis of human consciousness is one of the biggest unsolved issues in science, admits cellular and molecular pharmacologist John Parrington in his pithy addition to a vast literature dating from the time of ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. He considers many theories and proposes his own. Humans, he argues, are distinguished by conceptual thought and language, along with skills in ...Read More
Consciousness: how our brains turn matter into meaning
The material basis of human consciousness is one of the biggest unsolved issues in science, admits cellular and molecular pharmacologist John Parrington in his pithy addition to a vast literature dating from the time of ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. He considers many theories and proposes his own. Humans, he argues, are distinguished by conceptual thought and language, along with skills in designing tools and technologies. The evolution of these powers transformed our brains, creating meaning and consciousness.
Anupam Chander (Editor), 2023, Oxford University Press; 9780197582794
Subject: Information Technology
Source: Strategy + Business
Review: In an era of escalating global polarization, when jurisdictions enforce data sovereignty, imposing governance or control over the data produced within their borders, the news you see, the facts you see, and even the maps you see change depending on where you are, observes legal scholar Mark Lemley (1). And with the expanding role of artificial intelligence in society, constraints on access to the ...Read More
Data sovereignty: from the digital silk road to the return of the state
In an era of escalating global polarization, when jurisdictions enforce data sovereignty, imposing governance or control over the data produced within their borders, the news you see, the facts you see, and even the maps you see change depending on where you are, observes legal scholar Mark Lemley (1). And with the expanding role of artificial intelligence in society, constraints on access to the data on which such technologies are trained can have severe and systemic ramifications.nIn their timely tome Data Sovereignty, editors Anupam Chander and Haochen Sun aim to provide a comprehensive understanding of this issue. The book is divided into four parts, covering digital sovereignty basics, the intersection of technologies and institutions with data sovereignty, trade regulations related to data flows, and issues specific to data localization.
David W. Orr (Editor), 2023, The MIT Press; 9780262048590
Subject: Political Science
Source:
Review: Environmentalist David Orr writes in the introduction to this timely collection that the planet faces two interlinked crises: rapid climate change and potentially lethal threats to democracy. The US Constitution rigorously protects private property but does not mention ecological systems, he observes. Contributors, almost all US-based, from a wide range of fields examine the need for political ref...Read More
Democracy in a hotter time: climate change and democratic transformation
Environmentalist David Orr writes in the introduction to this timely collection that the planet faces two interlinked crises: rapid climate change and potentially lethal threats to democracy. The US Constitution rigorously protects private property but does not mention ecological systems, he observes. Contributors, almost all US-based, from a wide range of fields examine the need for political reform. The book is in four parts: the nature of democracy; roadblocks to change; policy and law; and education, including academic culture.
Review: Among the South Asian nations, the least is known about the Maldives. Its distance of over 2,000 km from India has allowed it to remain detached from the rest of its neighbours. To outsiders, the archipelago of the Maldives and its string of atolls spread over the Indian Ocean is a tropical paradise. For years, it attracted high-end European travellers who, until the pandemic, made up 50% of the t...Read More
Descent into paradise: a journalist's memoir of the untold Maldives
Among the South Asian nations, the least is known about the Maldives. Its distance of over 2,000 km from India has allowed it to remain detached from the rest of its neighbours. To outsiders, the archipelago of the Maldives and its string of atolls spread over the Indian Ocean is a tropical paradise. For years, it attracted high-end European travellers who, until the pandemic, made up 50% of the tourists. Now a sizable number of people from India and China visit the Maldives. But those who come to the Maldives hardly ever get to know the real country or its people. Most avoid going to Male, the capital where the bulk of its 600,000 people live, and return home after their dream holiday is over.
Michael J. Benton, 2023, Thames and Hudson; 9780500025468
Subject: Science and Technology
Source:
Review: When palaeontologist Michael Benton learned about dinosaurs as a boy, he "loved the fact they were extinct". They were like real science fiction. Perhaps he also intuited that their extinction permitted his existence. As his deeply informed and readable book reveals, the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period 66 million years ago allowed a new cohort of creatures - including mammals....Read More
Extinctions: how life survives, adapts and evolves: how life survived, adapted and evolved
When palaeontologist Michael Benton learned about dinosaurs as a boy, he "loved the fact they were extinct". They were like real science fiction. Perhaps he also intuited that their extinction permitted his existence. As his deeply informed and readable book reveals, the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period 66 million years ago allowed a new cohort of creatures - including mammals.
Review: "Is fire alive?" the journalist and author John Vaillant asks early in his new book, "Fire Weather." I rolled my eyes, even as Vaillant ticks off a dozen lifelike characteristics - it grows, it breathes, it travels in search of nourishment - because the answer seemed so obvious: No. Of course not.... Vaillant tells the story of a colossal wildfire that, in the spring of 2016, torched much of Fort...Read More
Fire weather: a true story from a hotter world
"Is fire alive?" the journalist and author John Vaillant asks early in his new book, "Fire Weather." I rolled my eyes, even as Vaillant ticks off a dozen lifelike characteristics - it grows, it breathes, it travels in search of nourishment - because the answer seemed so obvious: No. Of course not.... Vaillant tells the story of a colossal wildfire that, in the spring of 2016, torched much of Fort
Lindsay Schakenbach Regele, 2023, University of Chicago Press; 9780226829609
Subject: Political Science
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Review: In the winter of 1828, Joel Roberts Poinsett, the U.S. minister to Mexico, was exploring a tropical forest about 100 miles southwest of Mexico City. He was in the habit of sharing unfamiliar species of plants with his far-flung correspondents, hoping the plants might be useful in agriculture or gain him diplomatic favor. Along the slopes of the forest's steep canyons, he came across a bush that wo...Read More
Flowers, guns, and money: Joel Roberts Poinsett and the paradoxes of American patriotism
In the winter of 1828, Joel Roberts Poinsett, the U.S. minister to Mexico, was exploring a tropical forest about 100 miles southwest of Mexico City. He was in the habit of sharing unfamiliar species of plants with his far-flung correspondents, hoping the plants might be useful in agriculture or gain him diplomatic favor. Along the slopes of the forest's steep canyons, he came across a bush that would later be named after him: the
Matthew Shindell, 2023, University of Chicago Press; 9780226821894
Subject: Science and Technology
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Review: When it comes to Mars, humanity's conceptions of the "angry red planet" have been surprisingly mercurial. It has been seen variously as a deity or an oracle; a world rife with life or hopelessly sterile; a setting for utopias, dystopias, even Ziggy Stardust. For many, though, such imaginative possibilities from the past are irrelevant. Mars's rosy future is what beckons now: a new frontier awaitin...Read More
For the love of mars: a human history of the red planet
When it comes to Mars, humanity's conceptions of the "angry red planet" have been surprisingly mercurial. It has been seen variously as a deity or an oracle; a world rife with life or hopelessly sterile; a setting for utopias, dystopias, even Ziggy Stardust. For many, though, such imaginative possibilities from the past are irrelevant. Mars's rosy future is what beckons now: a new frontier awaitin
Review:
"One of these days (please God), I shall retire from catching thieves, and try my hand at growing roses." So says Sgt. Cuff in Wilkie Collins's 1868 detective novel, "The Moonstone." According to Marta McDowell, Cuff was the mystery genre's first "horticulturally inclined investigator," but he was hardly the last. Ms. McDowell's delightful "Gardening Can Be Murder: How Poisonous Poppies, Siniste...Read More
Gardening Can Be Murder: How Poisonous Poppies, Sinister Shovels, and Grim Gardens Have Inspired Mystery Writers
"One of these days (please God), I shall retire from catching thieves, and try my hand at growing roses." So says Sgt. Cuff in Wilkie Collins's 1868 detective novel, "The Moonstone." According to Marta McDowell, Cuff was the mystery genre's first "horticulturally inclined investigator," but he was hardly the last. Ms. McDowell's delightful "Gardening Can Be Murder: How Poisonous Poppies, Sinister Shovels, and Grim Gardens Have Inspired Mystery Writers" covers other plant-obsessed detectives, from Agatha Christie's flower enthusiast, Miss Marple, and Rex Stout's orchid authority, Nero Wolfe, to Susan Wittig Albert's herbalist, China Bayles.
Erin Silver, 2023, Orca Book Publishers; 9781459830912
Subject: Enviornment
Source: Strategy + Business
Review: In recent years, the Western world has seen a proliferation of food-based entertainment in the form of social media content, TV shows, books, podcasts, magazines, and more. However, very few resources are invested in educating people on the consequences of food waste. In Good Food, Bad Waste, author Erin Silver takes young readers on an emotional journey through the overaccumulation of food and th...Read More
Good food, bad waste: let's eat for the planet
In recent years, the Western world has seen a proliferation of food-based entertainment in the form of social media content, TV shows, books, podcasts, magazines, and more. However, very few resources are invested in educating people on the consequences of food waste. In Good Food, Bad Waste, author Erin Silver takes young readers on an emotional journey through the overaccumulation of food and the production of exceptional amounts of food waste in the industrialized world. The book describes how the problem of food waste emerged and how we reached the critical situation in which we now find ourselves. It analyzes the consequences of food waste at individual and planetary levels and provides a very welcome large section on what we, as individuals and citizens, can do to minimize it.nAlong the way, readers meet incredible ?food-waste heroes??everyday people who, through their day-to-day efforts, promote a more sustainable and healthier future for the planet and its inhabitants. ?Food for Thought? and ?Bits + Bites? sections feed the reader?s cravings for data and provide valuable points of discussion for family dinner table conversation. In the second part of the book, Silver introduces small- and large-scale strategies to reduce food waste and raise awareness about its consequences.
Ruchira Gupta, 2023, Simon and Schuster; 9780861546961
Subject: Biography
Source: Telegraph
Review: Daruma dolls are a popular part of Japanese culture. Round, hollow, and weighted at the bottom, they are seen as symbols of perseverance. No matter how often they are put down, their constitution is such that they spring back up. The same holds true for Heera, the 14-year-old protagonist of "I Kick and I Fly" (published by Rock the Boat), Ruchira Gupta's debut novel, which alternates between despa...Read More
I kick and I fly
Daruma dolls are a popular part of Japanese culture. Round, hollow, and weighted at the bottom, they are seen as symbols of perseverance. No matter how often they are put down, their constitution is such that they spring back up. The same holds true for Heera, the 14-year-old protagonist of "I Kick and I Fly" (published by Rock the Boat), Ruchira Gupta's debut novel, which alternates between despair and triumph.
S. Y. Quraishi, 2023, HarperCollins; 9789356993655
Subject: Political Science
Source: Telegraph
Review: Conscious that his personal life coincides with that of politically-independent India, the former chief election commissioner, guitar player, the first Muslim officer of the Indian Administrative Service from "old Delhi" after 1947, born into a family of Islamic scholars and the son of a man who insisted that his children be benefitted by "modern education," Shahabuddin Yaqoob Quraishi is a public...Read More
India's experiment with democracy: the life of a nation through its elections
Conscious that his personal life coincides with that of politically-independent India, the former chief election commissioner, guitar player, the first Muslim officer of the Indian Administrative Service from "old Delhi" after 1947, born into a family of Islamic scholars and the son of a man who insisted that his children be benefitted by "modern education," Shahabuddin Yaqoob Quraishi is a public figure with a difference.
Review: Sleep and dreaming are human universals. Yet only in the past century has science begun to appreciate how centrally important they are for many facets of our health and well-being, and to address the many, profound questions that sleep and dreaming pose. Why do humans sleep, and what happens when they don't? What is happening when someone dreams? What constitutes "good" sleep, and how can physicia...Read More
Mapping the darkness: the visionary scientists who unlocked the mysteries of sleep
Sleep and dreaming are human universals. Yet only in the past century has science begun to appreciate how centrally important they are for many facets of our health and well-being, and to address the many, profound questions that sleep and dreaming pose. Why do humans sleep, and what happens when they don't? What is happening when someone dreams? What constitutes "good" sleep, and how can physicians diagnose and treat disordered sleep?
Noah Whiteman, 2023, Simon and Schuster; 9780861544523
Subject: Science and Technology
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Review: The plants in "Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature's Toxins-From Spices to Vices" come off as very smart, even cunning. They deploy chemicals to repel herbivores or attract animals that will spread their pollen. Tobacco plants produce nicotine as an insecticide that deters predators; skunk cabbage and corpse flowers emit the stench of death to trick carrion-feeding insects into becoming the...Read More
Most delicious poison: from spices to vices: the story of nature's toxinsn
The plants in "Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature's Toxins-From Spices to Vices" come off as very smart, even cunning. They deploy chemicals to repel herbivores or attract animals that will spread their pollen. Tobacco plants produce nicotine as an insecticide that deters predators; skunk cabbage and corpse flowers emit the stench of death to trick carrion-feeding insects into becoming the.
George Musser, 2023, Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 9780374238766
Subject: Science and Technology
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Review: "Popular science often feels like a kind of voyeurism. Those who can't manage the real thing are given a thrilling glimpse of its intrigue and excitement but kept at a distance. So a book that tackles the mind-boggling triad of physics, consciousness, and artificial intelligence might be expected to provide little more than intellectual titillation. The science journalist George Musser even says a...Read More
Putting ourselves back in the equation: why physicists are studying human consciousness and ai to unravel the mysteries of the universe
"Popular science often feels like a kind of voyeurism. Those who can't manage the real thing are given a thrilling glimpse of its intrigue and excitement but kept at a distance. So a book that tackles the mind-boggling triad of physics, consciousness, and artificial intelligence might be expected to provide little more than intellectual titillation. The science journalist George Musser even says at its end that 'many physicists and neuroscientists are just as perplexed as the rest of us.'
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