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How do ant colonies get anything done, when no one is in charge? An ant colony operates without a central control or hierarchy, and no ant directs another. Instead, ants decide what to do based on the rate, rhythm, and pattern of individual encounters and interactions--resulting in a dynamic network that coordinates the functions of the colony. Ant Encounters provides a revealing and accessible look into ant behavior from this complex systems perspective. Focusing on the moment-to-moment behavior of ant colonies, Deborah Gordon investigates the role of interaction networks in regulating colony behavior and relations among ant colonies. She shows how ant behavior within and between colonies a...
A Stanford professor redefines how nature organizes itself--based on nearly two decades of research in the Arizona desert--in a revolutionary book that maintains that the ant queen is not in charge: there are no leaders. 14 line drawings.
Today there are over a billion vehicles in the world, and within twenty years, the number will double, largely a consequence of China's and India's explosive growth. Given that greenhouse gases are already creating havoc with our climate and that violent conflict in unstable oil-rich nations is on the rise, will matters only get worse? Or are there hopeful signs that effective, realistic solutions can be found? Blending a concise history of cars and their impact on the world, leading transportation experts Daniel Sperling and Deborah Gordon explain how we arrived at this state, and what we can do about it. Sperling and Gordon assign blame squarely where it belongs-on the auto-industry, short...
In No Standard Oil, environmental policy expert Deborah Gordon examines the widely varying climate impacts of global oils and gases, and proposes solutions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in this sector while making sustainable progress in transitioning to a carbon-free energy future. The next decade will be decisive in the fight against climate change. It will be impossible to hold the planet to a 1.5o C temperature rise without controlling methane and CO2 emissions from the oil and gas sector. Contrary to popular belief, the world will not run out of these resources anytime soon. Consumers will continue to demand these abundant resources to fuel their cars, heat their homes, and produce ev...
The culture of contemporary medicine is the object of investigation in this book; the meanings and values implicit in biomedical knowledge and practice and the social processes through which they are produced are examined through the use of specific case studies. The essays provide examples of how various facets of 20th century medicine, including edu cation, research, the creation of medical knowledge, the development and application of technology, and day to day medical practice, are per vaded by a value system characteristic of an industrial-capitalistic view of the world in which the idea that science represents an objective and value free body of knowledge is dominant. The authors of th...
Experts describe the latest research in a rapidly growing multidisciplinary field, the study of groups of individuals acting collectively in ways that seem intelligent. Intelligence does not arise only in individual brains; it also arises in groups of individuals. This is collective intelligence: groups of individuals acting collectively in ways that seem intelligent. In recent years, a new kind of collective intelligence has emerged: interconnected groups of people and computers, collectively doing intelligent things. Today these groups are engaged in tasks that range from writing software to predicting the results of presidential elections. This volume reports on the latest research in the...
The book provides a first comprehensive overview of both experimental and theoretical research on information processing in insect societies. Its purpose is to make the reader familiar with the methodology and ways of thinking followed by scientists at the leading edge of the field. The book is aimed at postgraduate students and researchers working on social insects and insects that live in groups as well as any reader interested in behavioural ecology, communication and social organization.
'Family Talk' presents a close examination of talk and its role in the day-to-day life of the American family. The text analyses an extensive body of data to identify ways in which family members create and enact their identities within the family.
This book focuses on six women who are often seen as particularly tough-minded: Simone Weil (1909-1943, French philosopher), Hannah Arendt (1906-1975, German-American philosopher), Mary McCarthy (1912-1989, American writer), Susan Sontag (1933-2004, American writer), Diane Arbus (1923-1971, American photographer, and Joan Didion (1934, American writer). It traces the careers of these women and their challenges to the pre-eminence of empathy as the ethical posture from which to examine pain.
"Writers at Work: From Sentence to Paragraph is the first book in a four-book series that provides students with a solid foundation in writing skills. Through the study of vocabulary and grammar, the book helps students to write accurate sentences relating to a topic. In the last three chapters, the book introduces the fundamentals of paragraph writing, and students progress to write basic paragraphs"--