Customer Reviews:
Excellent beginner book for geology........2006-01-19
This book covers general geology and the fundamentals of earth processes and paleontology. From earthquakes to evolution, this book gives at least a superficial and fundamental view of each major topic. The images and diagrams are by far the most impressive part of this book. Full color diagrams, photos and drawings help to illustrate practically every page.
Chapter 1: historical theories in geology as well as the basics of geology from the rock cycle to geologic time.
Chapter 2: minerals, rock properties and types of rocks.
Chapter 3: basic scientific organization of life and fossils.
Chapter 4: environment and its relationship with life.
Chapter 5: sedimentary rocks, soils & environments including glaciers, lakes, deserts, rivers and the ocean.
Chapter 6: geologic time, stratigraphy basics and dating methods.
Chapter 7: evolution basics, concepts of extinction, evolutionary trends.
Chapter 8: plate tectonics - evidence, consequences and general mechanisms.
Chapter 9: orogenesis (mountain building) - processes, introduction to structural geology.
Chapter 10: introduction to geochemistry - chemical cycles, isotopes, atmospheric trends related to weathering rates, climate-related isotopes and mineralogy.
Chapter 11 - Chapter 20 each deal with a major phase in geologic time from the creation of the planet to the movement of the plates to the great ice ages and finally to the modern era.
The CD, while helpful, essentially contains the same information as the book. I personally did not find it any more or less helpful than the book itself.
As a text book, it's decent!.......2005-11-04
Earth System History, Second Edition was my textbook for Geology 1001, and to my surprise I could actually read it without falling asleep. This is not to say that it is a page turner, but the pictures are interesting and Stanley skips a lot of the cheesy textbook speak. I'm not sure I would buy this book if I wasn't required to, but if geology is your thing- it would be great.
It is wonderfull !.......2000-03-20
Everybody that is interested in historical geology and paleontology must have this book. It is clear with a lot of informations, has beautifull pictures and a fantastic CD ROM. One of the best I bought last year !
Average customer rating:
- Calculations are only as good as your numbers
- Pants on fire?
- Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed.
- Very Interesting
- History as Science Fiction
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History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
Anatoly Fomenko
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Similar Items:
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ASIN: 2913621058 |
Book Description
Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.
Customer Reviews:
Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03
Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.
Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19
Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.
Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09
There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.
For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.
Very Interesting.......2007-03-07
It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.
History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10
Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.
I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.
Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.
Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.
I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.
This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.
Book Description
In this collection of essays J. B. Harley (1932-1991) draws on ideas in art history, literature, philosophy, and the study of visual culture to subvert the traditional, "positivist" model of cartography, replacing it with one that is grounded in an iconological and semiotic theory of the nature of maps. He defines a map as a "social construction" and argues that maps are not simple representations of reality but exert profound influences upon the way space is conceptualized and organized. A central theme is the way in which power--whether military, political, religious, or economic--becomes inscribed on the land through cartography. In this new reading of maps and map making, Harley undertakes a surprising journey into the nature of the social and political unconscious.
Customer Reviews:
Don't bother.......2007-02-03
Marxist and post-modernistic verbiage from a cartographic historian who ought to have stuck to his area of expertise. This book is a mish-mash of politically correct essays on the evils of imperialism, racism, eurocentrism, etc. as expressed in maps. Harley was never one to let a trendy leftist ideology go unabsorbed and it shows in these tepid and unreadable essays. A fine example of what's wrong with contemporary academic thought.
Book Description
The scientific study of complex systems has transformed a wide range of disciplines in recent years, enabling researchers in both the natural and social sciences to model and predict phenomena as diverse as earthquakes, global warming, demographic patterns, financial crises, and the failure of materials. In this book, Didier Sornette boldly applies his varied experience in these areas to propose a simple, powerful, and general theory of how, why, and when stock markets crash.
Most attempts to explain market failures seek to pinpoint triggering mechanisms that occur hours, days, or weeks before the collapse. Sornette proposes a radically different view: the underlying cause can be sought months and even years before the abrupt, catastrophic event in the build-up of cooperative speculation, which often translates into an accelerating rise of the market price, otherwise known as a "bubble." Anchoring his sophisticated, step-by-step analysis in leading-edge physical and statistical modeling techniques, he unearths remarkable insights and some predictions--among them, that the "end of the growth era" will occur around 2050.
Sornette probes major historical precedents, from the decades-long "tulip mania" in the Netherlands that wilted suddenly in 1637 to the South Sea Bubble that ended with the first huge market crash in England in 1720, to the Great Crash of October 1929 and Black Monday in 1987, to cite just a few. He concludes that most explanations other than cooperative self-organization fail to account for the subtle bubbles by which the markets lay the groundwork for catastrophe.
Any investor or investment professional who seeks a genuine understanding of looming financial disasters should read this book. Physicists, geologists, biologists, economists, and others will welcome Why Stock Markets Crash as a highly original "scientific tale," as Sornette aptly puts it, of the exciting and sometimes fearsome--but no longer quite so unfathomable--world of stock markets.
Customer Reviews:
A Good Book--But No Longer Pertinent........2007-10-07
I could not enjoy this wonderful book with the knowledge that the unprincipled 41st and 43rd Presidents of the United States have negated all the time-tested principles of good investment strategies. The oil-rich Arab nations will soon officially join Israel and North Korea who demanded that aid (free money) be paid in Euros. The harsh freezing winds of ignoring the laws of God and man are on their way. These winds are going to rip through America's financial institutions like George H.W. Bush and the CIA ripped through the S & Ls. Like Bush's friend, Ken Lay, ripped out the hearts of hard working Americans with his Enron scheme. Before you invest ten cents of your savings in the stock market you had better take a 110 minute crash course in financial survival. If these people didn't care about the state of California, what makes you think they'll care about you? Go now, this very second, and rent the documentary, "The Smartest Guys in the Room". I'm, Bob Miller, the creator of the FreeStockSystem.
2068.......2007-07-17
1 Lorenz Weather equations: The vertical axis is time, which goes from 0 to 5 in this plot. For each time, the third dimension in perspective show the probability distribution of the wind velocity v: the maximum of the initial bell-shape distribution corresponds to the best initial guess of what is the present state of the system. The width of the bell-shape curve quantifies the initial uncertainty of our observations: we perform an initial measurement of the wind velocity and we know that any measure has some uncertainty, here quantified by the probability that the true initial condition deviates from the best estimate corresponding to the peak. As the peak decreases in amplitude and widens this suggests increasing uncertainty in the value v.
2. "Regions of decreasing uncertainty may exist in chaotic dynamics." Increasing the forecast horizon does not always lead to a degradation of the prediction, in contrast to standard views on chaotic dynamics.
3. English mathematician F.P Ramsey proved that compete disorder is impossible. Every large set of numbers, such as an ensemble of financial price series or points or objects, necessarily contains highly regular patterns. The relevant question is then, to figure out how many stars, numbers, or figures are required to guarantee a certain desired pattern. How probable is it to find a certain pattern in a given set? 50 of the 400 week intervals since 1910-1996 were chosen at random. The terms of the fit parameters correspond with three crashes in 1929, 1962, and 1987. "The probability that the log-periodic component results from chance is about or less than one in twenty."
4. A crash is not the critical or singular point itself, but its triggering rate is strongly influenced by the proximity of the critical point: the closer to the critical time, the more probable is the crash.
5. The Law of One price, states that two assets should sell for the same price. If the price differs in two markets, a profitable opportunity arises to sell the asset where it is overpriced and buy where it is under-priced. "Clearly, a noise-free stock market with all information available occupied by fully rational traders of infinite analysis abilities would have a very small trade volume, if any." A significant number of traders exhibit rational behavior. Information is incomplete and stock traders have limited abilities with respect to analyzing the available information. The market becomes rational if there are many heterogonous agents working on limited information. Perfectly rational investing won out, not because it was perfect, but because it was useful. "The machinery behind market rationality is that each investor, using the market to serve his or her own self-interest, unwittingly makes prices reflect the investor's information and analysis." The irrationalities should be studied concerning how they aggregate in the complex, long-lasting, repetitive, and subtle environment of the market.
6. What makes a share in a company valuable? It is earnings, which provide dividends and its potential appreciation, which gives rise to capital gains. Goldstone modes are the zero-energy infinite-wavelength mode fluctuations that attempt to restore broken symmetry. Value today is equal to its expected value tomorrow discounted by the discount factor. In the bubble component, there is not dividend! The bubble is playing the role of the Goldstone mode. "The bubble price can wander up or down and, in limit where it becomes very large in absolute value, dominate over the fundamental price, restoring the independence of the price with respect to dividend." Goldstone modes appear spontaneous since it has no energy cost, the rational bubble can be spontaneous without any dividend. There is a competition between the increasing growth of the company and the decreasing impact of dividends further in the future due to the effect of the discount factor. The increasing growth of dividends tends to raise price. Dividends are reduced to a risk-adjusted growth rate. When the risk adjusted growth rate becomes equal or larger than the discount rate, the fundamental valuation formula becomes meaningless. The price is the sum of all future presently adjusted dividends. Speculative phases are often stopped by successive increase of the discount rate. 1929 (3.25% to 6%), 1990 in Japan ( 2.55 to 6%)
7. The Crash Hazard rate quantifies the probability that a large group of agents place sell orders simultaneously and create enough of an imbalance in the order book for market makers to be unable to absorb the other side without lowering prices substantially. Cooperative behavior results from imitation. "Our working hypothesis is that agents tend to imitate the opinions of their connections." "A crash occurs when order wins. In stable markets buyers and sellers balance out each other, normal times are when disorder wins. When the imitation strength K gets close to a special critical value Kc, a very large group of investors share the same opinion, a may act in a coordinated way, an abrupt drop in price, infinite slope K/Kc, a crash occurs. "New demographic, technological, or economic developments prompt spontaneous innovation in financial markets and the first wave of investors and innovators become wealthy. Then imitators arrive and overdo the new techniques. In the ensuing crises, latecomers lose big before regulators and academics put out fires."
8. Log-periodic equation: Flp(t)=A2 +B2(tc-t)^m2*[C*Cos(w*log(tc-t)/T))]. Decimal year 365 days=1.00 year, Oct 19, 1987 = 87.800 or 1 day=.00274
9. Oct 19, 1987: A2=412, B2=-165, tc=87.74, C=12, w=7.4, T=2, m2=.33 Oct 1929: A2=61 B2=-0.56 Tc=29.84 C=0.08 W=5 T=3 M2=0.63
10. For a few weeks after the crash, a exponentially decaying sinusoidal function emerged. For a few weeks after the crash, a single dissipative harmonic oscillator, with a characteristic decay time of about one week equal to he period of the oscillations.
11. "The concept that emerges here is that the organization of traders in financial markets leads intrinsically to systemic instabilities, which probably result in a very robust way from the fundamental nature of human beings." "The global behavior of the market, with its log-periodic structures that emerge as a result of the cooperative behavior of traders, is reminiscent of the process of the emergence of intelligent behavior at a macroscopic scale that individuals at the microscopic scale cannot perceive."
12. It is estimated that the 25 companies that make up one-third of S&P500 index of market capitalization earn roughly half of their income from non-US sources. Oct 1987, to carry the bull-run, the market need to sustain corporate earnings, if not the cycle of rising prices would wither, concern over earnings may have been the straw that broke the camels back.
13. Bubble pathology: a. The bubble starts smoothly with some increasing production and sales or demand for some commodity in an otherwise relatively optimistic market. B. The attraction in investments with good potential gains leads to increasing investment with leverage coming from international investors. Price appreciation occurs. C. This in turn attracts less sophisticated investors, leveraging is further developed which leads to the demand for stock rising faster than the rate at which real money is put into the market. (earnings) D. At this stage, the behavior of the market becomes weakly coupled or practically uncoupled from real wealth. E. As price skyrockets, the number of speculative investors decreases and a period of nervousness starts until a point when the instability is revealed and the market collapses.
14.Pollution: Life expectancy, which the best overall index of the pollution level, has improved markedly as the world population has grown. Food: There is compelling reason to believe that human nutrition will continue to improve into the infinite future. Land: The amount of agricultural land has increased substantially, and is likely to continue to increase where needed. Natural Resources: Natural resources will progressively become less costly, hence less scarce, and will constitute a small proportion of our expense in the future. Energy: The long-term impact of more people is likely to speed the development of cheap energy supplies that are almost inexhaustible. Standard of Living: per capita income is likely to be higher with a growing population than with a stationary one. Human fertility: the contention that poor breed without constraint is wrong. Population growth: Even though the population for the world is increasing, the density of population on most of the world's surface will decrease.
15. Parabolic Trend to get the (a,b,c coefficients of the Log peridocity function)
a. Create a Price Y column and input a range of prices then sum the prices into a variable called SumY
b. Create a time interval called X representing a numeric value. For example (1..n) and sum these values with the label SumX
c. Count the number of price values and store in a variable called n
d. Xmean=X/n
e. Create a column labeled x where x=X-Xmean values
f. Create a column labeled x^2 where x^2=x*x and sum values into a variable SumX^2
g. Create a column labeled x^4 where x^4=x*x*x*x and sum values into a variable SumX^4
h. Create a column labeled x times Y=x*Y and sum values into a variable Sumx_times_SumY
i. Create a column labeled x^2_times_Y=x*x*Y and sum into a variable Sum_x^2_times_Y
j. Solve for coefficients a,b,c where
Equation 1: SumY=a*n+c*Sumx^2
And
Equation 2: Sumx^2*SumY=a*Sumx^2+c*Sumx^4
And
Equation 3: b=Sumx_times_Y/Sumx^2
k. Solve for c using substitution of values into Equation 1 and Equation 2. Here's how. Multiple equation 1 by sumx^2-1, canceling the a coefficient and solving the c coefficient value.
l. Substitute the c coefficient value into equation 1 and solve for the a coefficient value
m. Substitute values for Sumx_timesY and Sumx^2 into Equation 3 and solve for the b coeffient.
n. Plot the curve using the Y and x columns and a new column called Yprime where Yprime=a+b*x+c*x^2
Very convincing.......2007-07-07
Buy low and sell high: In trading stocks this cliché is obvious, but its ramifications can be extremely painful for all those involved, as well as many who are not, especially when a large collection of traders act in concert and engage in massive sell-offs. Financial bubbles, stock market crashes, and out-of-control speculation have been the subject of countless books and research papers and dozens of Hollywood movies, and mathematicians, economists, systems analysts, and financial engineers have spent thousands of hours of time attempting to understand and predict financial meltdowns, all with varying degrees of success. Some of these researchers have argued that it is the large-scale, collective properties of the financial markets that must be understood if stock market crashes are to be predicted or at least anticipated quantitatively.
The author of this book, a geophysicist by training, is one of these and has taken the "buy low-sell high" strategy and some straightforward mathematical constructions to give an interesting and plausible explanation of why stock markets crash. Intuitively, traders synchronously try to buy low and sell high, and a "herding effect" results in a rapid sell-off that results in a market crash. This behavior is analogous to what one observes in physical systems that are close to a `critical point', where they can undergo `phase transitions' and their behavior as they near the critical point has been shown to be "universal" in the sense that quantities called `scaling exponents' can be calculated explicitly and measure the "universality" of the systems near the critical point.
Naturally the stock market crashes of 1929 and 1987 are ones that that will stand out in every reader's mind and ones that must be test examples for the author's assertions. He discusses these two examples and many others in enough detail that a convincing case is made. The techniques he uses however are out of the mainstream of econometrics, and no doubt some in this mainstream will there be highly skeptical of his conclusions. The physicist-turned-financial engineer however will be delighted, as there will be many familiar concepts and constructions throughout the book. There may be a few new ones to such a reader however, such as `algorithmic complexity' and `computationally irreducible'. The clarity of the author's writing and the many real-world examples that he employs makes the assimilation of these concepts and others much more palatable than would be the case in a standard mathematical monograph on the subject. In addition, the techniques he uses can be applied to areas of finance that are not discussed in the book, such as the mortgage "antibubble" in net credit losses for second-lien (HELOC) loans that began in the second quarter of 2006. And with respect to applications, the author is honest enough to note that he refrains from discussing many of them in detail since his involvement in them is strictly proprietary. Most refreshingly, charts, graphs, and tables appear throughout the book, as would be necessary in the validation of any algorithm or predictor in financial theory.
There are also many interesting "toy models" in the book that enhance the didactic quality. One of these concerns the dependences that can occur in successive price variations. The author constructs a model where there is zero correlation but where one can predict the current price variation with an accuracy of over 50% by only knowing the variations in the past two days. This example serves as a good counter to the idea that the frequency distribution and two-point correlation function must always be non-zero in order to obtain successful prediction. The author goes on to use this example to show how "drawdowns", rather than the correlation structure, play the predominant role in measuring price changes. This example, among others, also illustrates the author's belief that the "standard" models in the financial industry have great difficulty in dealing with large financial crashes.
Although the author uses somewhat elementary mathematics in the book, its implications are profound. One will find for example discussions of log-periodic oscillations in hierarchical systems, the renormalization group, and complex fractal dimension. Central to the author's case is the concept of discrete scale invariance, which is a specialization of the continuous case, and which is manifested in real data by log-periodic oscillations. These should be viewed as corrections to simple power law scaling. The author discusses a few natural systems that exhibit log-periodicity, such as bats and dolphins, and in evolutionary biology. He also discusses other examples in mathematics such as the Newcomb-Benford law. Pre-crash stock market data is fitted to expressions that have log-periodic corrections to a pure power law and the validity of the fits discussed in great detail. The author's arguments are powerful and convincing, and the formalism that he outlines needs to be part of every financial analyst's toolbox.
why this stock market book should crash.......2006-11-09
After reading the book, I still didn't know why stock markets crash other than it's a greater than 3-sigma event. However, one doesn't need this book to find that out. Just a quick glance at any major stock market indices for the last 100 years indicates that crashes occur only rarely. But more to the point, how does one use any of the data presented by the author to develop a safer strategy for investing in the market? The author never once definitively enumerated the specific "a priori" signs, indications, or patterns indicative of an impending crash.
While the author presents diverse data and arguments as to why stock markets have crashed in the past, she never assembles them into an integrated and cohesive postulate as to why they really do. Nor does she take the data and extract information for predicting future trends. This book was written too early in the developmental cycle of any unified theory purporting to quantify any stock market behavior. Once I finished the book, I had this nagging feeling that this book was a "publish or perish" driven event.
If you must spend money on stock market investing, buy a simple and inexpensive book on stock charting or candlesticks or visit a John Murphy internet website. You'll have a better probability of determining a downtrend following a double top or a head and shoulder formation than you will predicting an imminent stock market crash based on any of the disintegrated data discussed in her book. And when all is said and done, who cares about why stock markets crashed? What any reasonable investor wants to know is what the market is going to do tomorrow, next month, next year, and between now and the time one retires. And that trend has always been positive in spite of the rare three-sigma events to the downside.
Worth the effort, but still..........2005-12-21
This is a very interesting book, with some intriguing propositions about the nature of stock market bubbles and crashes, but saying this there also seem to be some fundamental problems with the positions being taken. Perhaps the largest reservation I have with the arguments in this book is that they presume that financial markets are governed by the same kind of invariances as physical phenomena, which is the only way it seems to me that these arguments can be expected to hold. These assumed 'invariances' take the form of "fundamental prices," "efficient markets," and "rational expectations," the proofs for which are by no means established in anything close to the same degree as the Galilean local invariances to which they are being compared. I also found it difficult to determine whether the author does or does not advocate equilibrium theories of markets, which again are highly dubious assumptions in regards to actual markets (especially General Equilibrium assumptions, which have been definitively refuted at least as far back as 1968, with Roy Radner's "Competitive Equilibrium Under Uncertainty"). However, saying all this, the author does present an intriguing analysis of crashes being quantitatively different from the regular activity of stock markets, and he does provide some plausible techniques for perhaps discovering when these differences are present.
Still, for this treatment, as for most treatments purporting to be able to statistically identify trends in as nonstationary an environment as the stock market, the feeling I keep returning to is the same one articulated by the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Eugene Wigner in his seminal paper "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences" in which the question is asked "How do we know that, if we made a theory which focuses its attention on phenomena we disregard and disregards some of the phenomena now commanding our attention, that we could not build another theory which has little in common with the present one but which, nevertheless, explains just as many phenomena as the present theory?" (and this question was being asked in the context of the natural sciences, which as mentioned before are actually subject to local invariances, which are themselves not above suspicion...).
For a more realistic and grounded treatment of physics and finance, I would definitely recommend Dynamics of Markets by Joseph L. McCauley (who is coincidentally another reviewer of Sornette's book), as well as the writings of Giovanni Dosi, who is unique among economists for his emphasis on empirical support and verification of his theories and models. In addition, I would suggest that anyone interested in this book should also read "Comment on recent claims by Sornette and Zhou," which is a disclaimer by Anders Johansen, who was a recent collaborator with Sornette.
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Abysmal: A Critique of Cartographic Reason
Gunnar Olsson
Manufacturer: University Of Chicago Press
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ASIN: 0226629309 |
Book Description
People rely on reason to think about and navigate the abstract world of human relations in much the same way they rely on maps to study and traverse the physical world. Starting from that simple observation, renowned geographer Gunnar Olsson offers in Abysmal an astonishingly erudite critique of the way human thought and action have become deeply immersed in the rhetoric of cartography and how this cartographic reasoning allows the powerful to map out other people’s lives.
A spectacular reading of Western philosophy, religion, and mythology that draws on early maps and atlases, Plato, Kant, and Wittgenstein, Thomas Pynchon, Gilgamesh, and Marcel Duchamp, Abysmal is itself a minimalist guide to the terrain of Western culture. Olsson roams widely but always returns to the problems inherent in reason, to question the outdated assumptions and fixed ideas that thinking cartographically entails. A work of ambition, scope, and sharp wit, Abysmal will appeal to an eclectic audience—to geographers and cartographers, but also to anyone interested in the history of ideas, culture, and art.
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Land-Ocean Systems in the Siberian Arctic: Dynamics and History
Manufacturer: Springer
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ASIN: 3540656766 |
Book Description
The Arctic and its surrounding marginal seas are considered some of the most sensitive elements of the global environment, which may respond rapidly to climate change. However, due to various reasons, our knowledge of the processes which drive the Arctic system today and in the past is still relatively sparse. Based on a multidisciplinary approach, German and Russian scientists describe in this book the natural paleorecords and modern data which were collected over the past 6 years. These marine and terrestrial datasets provide important new insights into the causes, impacts, and feedback mechanisms of this extreme Arctic environment.
Book Description
A novel work in the history of cartography, The Sovereign Map argues that maps are as much about thinking as seeing, as much about the art of persuasion as the science of geography. As a classicist, Christian Jacob brings a fresh eye to his subject—which includes maps from Greek Antiquity to the twentieth century—and provides a theoretical approach to investigating the power of maps to inform, persuade, and inspire the imagination.
Beginning with a historical overview of maps and their creation—from those traced in the dirt by primitive hands to the monumental Dutch atlases and ornate maps on Italian palace walls—Jacob goes on to consider the visual components of cartography: the decorative periphery, geometric grid, topographical lines, dots, details of iconographic figures, and many other aspects. Considering text on maps—titles, toponyms, legends, and keys—Jacob proposes that writing can both clarify and interfere with a map's visual presentation. Finally Jacob examines the role of the viewer in decoding a map's meaning and the role of society in defining the power of maps as authoritative depictions of space.
Innovative in its philosophical motivation and its interdisciplinary approach to looking at and writing about maps, The Sovereign Map is eagerly awaited by scholars from many different fields.
Book Description
This book is a completely new version of the highly successful Principles of Geographical Information Systems for Land Resources Assessment which was first published in 1986. GIS are not just used for electronic map-making but today are major tools for the management of our physical and social environment. GIS are used to assist political decisions and play a part in market research, in the management of utility services, in automated navigation systems and in many other fields. This book presents a strong theoretical basis for GIS, which is often lacking in other texts. Spatial data are usually based on two, dichotomous paradigms, exactly defined entities in space, such as land parcels, or the continuous variation of single attributes, such as temperature or rainfall. Methods for modelling both kinds of phenomena and storing them in spatial databases are described in detail, including the use of geostatistics for interpolating from points to continuous fields. Examples of how spatial data and an analysis of their spatial interactions are used to solve a wide range of practical problems ranging from site-location analysis through land degradation, the optimizing of timber extraction from forests and the redistribution of Chernobyl radioactivity by floods are explained clearly and in detail. Much attention is paid to the problems of data quality and how statistical errors in spatial data can affect the results of spatial modelling based on the two paradigms of space. Fuzzy logic and continuous classification methods are presented as methods for linking the two spatial paradigms. The book concludes with an investigation of current developments in providing spatial data for the whole world over the Internet. As such the new volume provides a comprehensive and concise introduction to the theory and practice of Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Targeted at undergraduates, graduates, and professionals in disciplines such as physical and human geography, hydrology, geology, environmental science, cartography, epidemiology, radioecology, agriculture, spatial planning, land tenure, and land evaluation the book explains why spatial data and the information systems based on them are important in the modern world.
Customer Reviews:
Comprehensive, Thorough and Clear.......2003-02-21
I'm currently a student in a GIS program. This is the required text for one of my courses this session. My previous session I used the Heywood book and I found it dated and out of touch and dull. I much prefer this one. While it is very detailed, I appreciate the more comprehensive explanations of how things actually work behind the scenes. Managing data is one of the most crucial aspects of GIS and having a broader overview is proving most helpful. It is written in a formal, rather "dense" style, but I didn't find the British English to be much of a hindrance. I'm actually quite tired of books that "fluff" over topics and talk down to the audience by giving overly simple explanations.
Good book for all GIS users.......2002-10-12
This is one of the best texts currently available on the topic of GIS. It gives an overall perspective of GIS to any level of user, from the basic to the advanced. After being educated in the American system (BS, Geography, United States Military Academy) and the British system (MSc, GIS, Cranfield University and U.K. Army Survey Course) I found this book to be the most unbiased and easy to follow GIS text on the market. In fact, I am recommending it to be the reference text for the GIS curriculum at NIMA's National Geospatial Intelligence School.
This book remains true to its aim: "To provide an introduction to the theoretical and technical principles that need to be understood to work effectively and critically with GIS."
It is neither a geography text nor an earth science text, so those involved in that educational environment should choose another book.
American readers/students look elsewhere.......2001-10-01
This text will be a chore to read for most American students who are new to GIS. Although the author(s) manage to cram alot of information into the relatively short chapters, the sentences are long and difficult to understand because of the overly wordy, jargon-filled 'proper' use of British English & spellings. If you decide to purchase this book, then I highly recommend the 'Oxford Unabridged English Dictionary' to go along with it. The majority of the students in my class "Geographic Information Systems I" at Southwest Texas State University, which has one of the best geography programs in the nation, felt the same way I do, and also thought that the book was too advanced for an introductory GIS class. I think that the professors at Southwest Texas State University are now using a different text for that class. Also, people always complain that books tend to be geared toward a single software program- Well, like it or not, in the United States, ESRI has a monopoly on geographic software so you are going to have to learn ArcView/Info one way or another.
Very Good book........2001-07-22
I checked out this book from the library for reference and decided to get a personal copy of the same book. This is probably one of the best books that one can get for GIS introduction. Other books do not talk as much about the specifics of the spatial data and its nuances. They are busy selling the applications of GIS (geographic information systems) to their domain.
Good luck.
An essential introduction to GIS.......2000-04-16
This is arguably the best introduction to GIS available. A worthy successor to Burrough's earlier work, this book provides a very broad perspective of spatial information systems, ranging from the basics of data modelling and representation, to more complex (but essential) issues such as geostatistics, fuzzy logic and data quality. A lot of so-called "introduction to GIS" books are in reality books about one commercial product. Not this one. Many books only cover the very basics, and thus narrow the reader's perspective. This book will open your mind about many aspects of GIS, since it provides a very rich perspective of the field. I have been using this book in my graduate courses on GIS, with excellent results.
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The History of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) (Prentice Hall Series in Geographic Information Science)
Timothy Foresman
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall PTR
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ASIN: 0138621454 |
Book Description
To understand the power of Geographical Information Systems and Geographical Positioning Systems today, it is essential to understand their background and history, and the needs they were designed to answer .This is the first comprehensive history of GIS for both practitioners and students.From GPS systems that help you find your destination in a rented car, to satellite imaging for locating new petroleum reserves, GIS technology is changing the world. This book brings together for the first time the expert testimonies of the pioneers, key scientists and entrepreneurs who created the GIS field and made it what it is today. It covers both the raster and vector sides of GIS development. From remote sensing to PC-based systems; from Land Information Systems to defense applications, this is the definitive history of GIS.For all GIS and GPS professional practitioners, developers and students.
Book Description
A comprehensive survey of the technology of mapping and its relationship to the battle against disease, this look at medical mapping advances a radical argument that maps are not merely representations of spatial realities but a way of thinking about relations between viral and bacterial communities, human hosts, and the environments in which diseases flourish. The history of medical mapping is traced—from its growth in the 19th century during an era of trade and immigration to its renaissance in the 1990s during a new era of globalization. Referencing maps older than John Snow's famous cholera maps of London in the mid-19th century, this survey pulls from the plague maps of the 1600s, while addressing current issues concerning the ability of GIS technology to track diseases worldwide.
Customer Reviews:
Plenty of charts and detail throughout.......2005-10-14
What do early medical maps have to do with modern GIS maps? How can patterns of diseases from the past relate to those in modern times created by GIS? Dr. Koch is a geographer, bioethicist, and here explores relationships between medicine and mapmaking from paper-based to computer-based today. Chapters follow early epidemics, mapmaking processes and myths, public health and medical developments, and more as it examines those who made maps, cartography issues, and medical history. Plenty of charts and detail throughout.
Books:
- Ecology and Classification of North American Freshwater Invertebrates
- Essential Cell Biology: An introducton to the Molecular Biology of the Cell
- Extreme Animals: The Toughest Creatures on Earth
- Fairyopolis
- Field Guide to Beetles of California (California Natural History Guides)
- Field Guide to Coastal Wetland Plants of the Southeastern United States
- Field Guide to Old-Growth Forests: Exploring Ancient Forest Ecosystems from California to the Pacific Northwest
- Flow Cytometry: First Principles
- Fossil Collecting in the Mid-Atlantic States: With Localities, Collecting Tips, and Illustrations of More than 450 Fossil Specimens
- Foundations of Tropical Forest Biology: Classic Papers with Commentaries
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