Distributed for the Center for the Study of Language And Inf.
160 p. 6 x 9 2004
Cloth BB 1-57586-485-1 Fall 2004
Paper BB 1-57586-486-X Fall 2004
How can we ensure that the grighth person is elected to
office? Voter turnout, balloting methods, candidates, and, in the
case of the 2000 U.S. presidential election, the courts all
conspire to produce electoral results that are horrific to some,
wonderful to others, and tolerable to most. The Geometry of
Elections utilizes mathematical theories to analyze how people
vote and explores possible voting systems that could minimize the
likelihood of the gwrongh candidate being elected.
The Geometry of Elections examines real world elections held in
the United States, Britain, and France and asks: What criteria do
voters use to determine the grighth candidate or party, and
if there is a grighth candidate, how can we design a more
accurate voting system? Applying spatial modeling and insights
from geometry to real-world political elections, the authors
present an intriguing examination of how voters conceptualize and
eventually vote for politicians and policy positions.
Subjects:
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS: Formal Logic and Computational
Linguisti
POLITICAL SCIENCE: Political Behavior and Public Opinion
Distributed for the Center for the Study of Language And Inf.
250 p., 30 halftones (est.). 6 x 9 2004
Paper/CD BB 1-57586-484-3 Fall 2004
Tarskifs World is an innovative and exciting method of
introducing students to the language of first-order logic. Using
the courseware package, students quickly master the meanings of
connectives and qualifiers and soon become fluent in the symbolic
language at the core of modern logic. The program allows students
to build three-dimensional worlds and then describe them in first-order
logic. The program, compatible with Macintosh and PC formats,
also contains a unique and effective corrective tool in the form
of a game, which methodically leads students back through their
errors if they wrongly evaluate the sentences in the constructed
worlds.
A brand new feature in this revised and expanded edition is
student access to Grade Grinder, an innovative Internet-based
grading service that provides accurate and timely feedback to
students whenever they need it. Students can submit solutions for
the programfs more than 100 exercises to the Grade Grinder for
assessment, and the results are returned quickly to the students
and optionally to the teacher as well. A web-based interface also
allows instructors to manage assignments and grades for their
classes.
Intended as a supplement to a standard logic text, Tarskifs
World is an essential tool for helping students learn the
language of logic.
Subjects:
COMPUTER SCIENCE
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS: Formal Logic and Computational
Linguistics.
296 p., 34 halftones, 84 line drawings. 6 x 9 2004
Cloth 0-226-12111-9 Fall 2004
Nobel laureate and scientific luminary Enrico Fermi (1901-54) was
a pioneering nuclear physicist whose contributions to the field
were numerous, profound, and lasting. Best known for his
involvement with the Manhattan Project and his work at Los Alamos
that led to the first self-sustained nuclear reaction and
ultimately to the production of electric power and plutonium for
atomic weapons, Fermi's legacy continues to color the character
of the sciences at the University of Chicago. During his tenure
as professor of physics at the Institute for Nuclear Studies,
Fermi attracted an extraordinary scientific faculty and many
talented students--ten Nobel Prizes were awarded to faculty or
students under his tutelage.
Born out of a symposium held to commemorate the hundredth
anniversary of Fermi's birth, Fermi Remembered combines essays
and newly commissioned reminiscences with private material from
Fermi's research notebooks, correspondence, speech outlines, and
teaching to document the profound and enduring significance of
Fermi's life and labors. The volume also features extensives
archival material--including correspondence between Fermi and
biophysicist Leo Szilard and a letter from Harry Truman--with new
introductions that provide context for both the history of
physics and the academic tradition at the University of Chicago.
Edited by James W. Cronin, a University of Chicago physicist and
Nobel laureate himself, Fermi Remembered is a tender tribute to
one of the greatest scientists of the twentieth century.
864 p., 39 halftones, 31 line drawings, 3 tables. 6 x 9 2004
Cloth BB 0-226-11377-9 Fall 2004
Paper BB 0-226-11378-7 Fall 2004
According to the theory of relativity, we are constantly bathed
in gravitational radiation. When stars explode or collide, a
portion of their mass becomes energy that disturbs the very
fabric of the space-time continuum like ripples in a pond. But
proving the existence of these waves has been difficult; the
cosmic shudders are so weak that only the most sensitive
instruments can be expected to observe them directly. Fifteen
times during the last thirty years scientists have claimed to
have detected gravitational waves, but so far none of those
claims have survived the scrutiny of the scientific community.
Gravity's Shadow chronicles the forty-year effort to detect
gravitational waves, while exploring the meaning of scientific
knowledge and the nature of expertise.
Gravitational wave detection involves recording the collisions,
explosions, and trembling of stars and black holes by evaluating
the smallest changes ever measured. Because gravitational waves
are so faint, their detection will come not in an exuberant
moment of discovery but through a chain of inference; for forty
years, scientists have debated whether there is anything to
detect and whether it has yet been detected. Sociologist Harry
Collins has been tracking the progress of this research since
1972, interviewing key scientists and delineating the social
process of the science of gravitational waves.
Engagingly written and authoritatively comprehensive, Gravity's
Shadow explores the people, institutions, and government
organizations involved in the detection of gravitational waves.
This sociological history will prove essential not only to
sociologists and historians of science but to scientists
themselves