Category Archives: New Books

A simple exercise to increase your happiness and lower depression, the greatest maps of imaginary places, David Foster Wallace on leadership, and more

Celebrated Italian novelist, philosopher, essayist, literary critic, and list-lover Umberto Eco has had a long fascination with the symbolic and the metaphorical, extending all the way back to his vintage semiotic children’s books. Half a century later, he revisits the … Continue reading

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The American Nations Today

The borders of my eleven American nations are reflected in many different types of maps—including maps showing the distribution of linguistic dialects, the spread of cultural artifacts, the prevalence of different religious denominations, and the county-by-county breakdown of voting in … Continue reading

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Book Review: The Great University Gamble: Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education | Impact of Social Sciences

McGettigan’s new book is specifically about the situation in the United Kingdom, but I think it offers critiques that would elucidate aspects of the American system as well. McGettigan’s argument is that this market talk drives a wider discourse of … Continue reading

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Book Review: Peer Review, Research Integrity, and the Governance of Science: Practice, Theory, and Current Discussions | LSE Review of Books

The fact that this scholarly book about fairness and integrity in research is edited by (mostly) U.S. scholars but published by a Chinese press should not mislead readers into believing that this is a boastful text seeking to bestow upon … Continue reading

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‘Preparing for Life in Humanity 2.0′ hits shelves just in time for Halloween

Steve Fuller’s latest book, Preparing for Life in Humanity 2.0, hits shelves just in time for Halloween. I find the timing of the book’s release interesting, since it introduces the most frightening philosophic character since Nietzsche’s Übermensch — the ‘moral … Continue reading

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MesoFacts & Other Deteriorating Knowledges

[Samuel] Arbesman’s book expands on a piece he wrote in 2010 for the Ideas section of the Boston Globe. That short essay, called “Warning: Your reality is out of date,” laid out a theory of what Arbesman named the mesofact. “When people … Continue reading

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