You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
In this lighthearted yet serious look at the trials and tribulations of an academic dean, Josef Martin recounts stories that may astonish many members of the academic community but will sound hauntingly familiar to other deans. He describes the dean's role in such matters as tenure decisions, budgeting, affirmative action, and coping with "unreasonable demands" of faculty members, department chairs, vice presidents, parents, and students. His characterizations of typical faculty members will delight academics--except, perhaps, when they read about themselves.
None
Since the appearance in 1950 of Worlds in Collision, Immanuel Velikovsky's radical theories of planetary physics have been the center of controversy. This book presents an analysis of the Velikovsky affair, resolves the misunderstandings and arguments between opposing camps, and leads us to an understanding of the scientific process itself.
What is science? Is social science a science? Why are more and more so-called scientific discoveries being exposed as outright frauds? Henry Bauer tackles these and many more intriguing questions that are emerging from within the academic and scientific communities and attracting attention from the popular media and the general public. Whether one is a specialist or generalist, scientist or humanist, thinker or activist, it is important to understand the place of science and technology in modern life. Popular views about the nature of science and scientific activity contain serious misconceptions that were discarded decades ago by most historians and philosophers of science. The perpetuation...
This book discusses the ways in which science, the touchstone of reliable knowledge in modern society, changed dramatically in the second half of the 20th century, becoming less trustworthy through conflicts of interest and excessive competitiveness. Fraud became common enough that organized efforts to combat it now include a federal Office of Research Integrity. Competent minority opinions are sometimes thereby suppressed, with the result that policy makers, the media and the public are presented with biased or incomplete information. Evidence tending to challenge established theories is sometimes rejected without addressing its substance. While most would agree in the abstract that science can go wrong, few would consider—despite interesting contrary evidence—that official consensus about the origins of the universe or the causes of global warming might be mistaken.
This work challenges the belief that HIV is the cause of AIDS. Among the many topics explored are the failings of HIV testing, statistical evidence that HIV is not a sexually transmitted disease, and problems caused by the differing diagnostic criteria for AIDS around the world.
The nature of scientific activity has changed dramatically over the last half century, and the objectivity and rigorous search for evidence that once defined it are being abandoned. Increasingly, this text argues, dogma has taken the place of authentic science. This study examines how conflicts of interest--both institutional and individual--have become pervasive in the science world, and also explores the troubling state of research funding and flaws of the peer-review process. It looks in depth at the dominance of several specific theories, including the Big Bang cosmology, human-caused global warming, HIV as a cause of AIDS, and the efficacy of anti-depressant drugs. In a scientific environment where distinguished experts who hold contrary views are shunned, this book is an important contribution to the examination of scientific heterodoxies.
With style and imagination, this iconoclastic work covers the major issues in development economics. In eight carefully reasoned essays, P. T. Bauer challenges most of the accepted notions and supports his views with evidence drawn from a wide range of primary sources and direct experience. The essays were selected on the basis of their interest to students and general readers from Bauer's book, Dissent on Development: Studies and Debates in Development Economics. Reviewing the previous work, the Wall Street Journal wrote: "It could have a profound impact on our thinking about the entire development question... Quite simply, it is no longer possible to discuss development economics intelligently without coming to grips with the many arguments P. T. Bauer marshalled in this extraordinary work."