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In a world where people struggle to find heroes and gather up courage it is a shame not many people know this story. I think many people would be amazed at the sacrafices one very proud man would endure to save the world. Please read this book, you will not be disappointed.


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Heisenberg's role in Germany's effort to develop atomic weapons has been the topic of much speculation, historians tending to place him on one side or the other of the moral dividing line. There are those who paint him as an evil tool of the Nazis, someone who willingly devoted himself to Germany's scientific efforts to develop an atomic weapon. From their perspective, there has been a tendency to read Heisenberg's 1941 visit to Bohr as an effort to recruit Bohr to the German scientific fold. There are others who see the visit as more enigmatic, who do not ascribe such clear intentions to Heisenberg, and who see in the historical record evidence that Heisenberg was a passive opponent of the Nazis' objectives, a scientist who quietly undermined the German scientific effort while ostenbibly remaining a "good" German.
Frayn brilliantly depicts the uncertainty of Heisenberg's motivations, as well as the uncertainty of what occurred at the meeting between the two scientists, using the theory of these physicists to illumine not the physical world, but the psychological world of human motives. "Uncertainty" thus describes not merely the behavior of the atom, but also the behavior of individuals living in ethically difficult historical circumstances. As Frayn notes in his Postscript to the text of this play, "thoughts and intentions, even one's own-perhaps one's own most of all-remain shifting and elusive. There is not one single thought or intention of any sort that can ever be precisely established."
"Copenhagen" is lucidly and sparely written, a play of dialogue among only three characters-Heisenberg, Bohr and Bohr's wife, Margrethe. There are, of course, numerous references to the esoteric world of theoretical physics, particularly as it developed in the 1920s, and the Postscript to the text is therefore especially helpful in understanding both the scientific and historical frames of reference for the play.
Read this little play-better yet, see it if you can-because "Copenhagen" is a dramatic work that truly deserves to be recognized as one of outstanding plays of recent years.


Heisenberg's role in Germany's effort to develop atomic weapons has been the topic of much speculation, historians tending to place him on one side or the other of the moral dividing line. There are those who paint him as an evil tool of the Nazis, someone who willingly devoted himself to Germany's scientific efforts to develop an atomic weapon. From their perspective, there has been a tendency to read Heisenberg's 1941 visit to Bohr as an effort to recruit Bohr to the German scientific fold. There are others who see the visit as more enigmatic, who do not ascribe such clear intentions to Heisenberg, and who see in the historical record evidence that Heisenberg was a passive opponent of the Nazis' objectives, a scientist who quietly undermined the German scientific effort while ostenbibly remaining a "good" German.
Frayn brilliantly depicts the uncertainty of Heisenberg's motivations, as well as the uncertainty of what occurred at the meeting between the two scientists, using the theory of these physicists to illumine not the physical world, but the psychological world of human motives. "Uncertainty" thus describes not merely the behavior of the atom, but also the behavior of individuals living in ethically difficult historical circumstances. As Frayn notes in his Postscript to the text of this play, "thoughts and intentions, even one's own-perhaps one's own most of all-remain shifting and elusive. There is not one single thought or intention of any sort that can ever be precisely established."
"Copenhagen" is lucidly and sparely written, a play of dialogue among only three characters-Heisenberg, Bohr and Bohr's wife, Margrethe. There are, of course, numerous references to the esoteric world of theoretical physics, particularly as it developed in the 1920s, and the Postscript to the text is therefore especially helpful in understanding both the scientific and historical frames of reference for the play.
Read this little play-better yet, see it if you can-because "Copenhagen" is a dramatic work that truly deserves to be recognized as one of outstanding plays of recent years.

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The problem that I usually encounter with references which cover the entire "suite" is that there is very little coverage of of the advanced features. This book is only partly guilty of these kinds of omissions. The advanced features ARE covered but just a tad lightly (I suppose we'll be seeing very in-depth, application-specific books someday in the future). Having used StarOffice for about 8 months now, this book made me aware that StarCalc had its own version of Microsoft Excel's Pivot-Tables.
This covers version 5.1 as was released by the original StarDivision or as is available now from Sun Microsystems. It covers both the Windows and Linux/Unix/Solaris versions and identifies subtle differences which you might encounter. Overall, it's a very good first reference with enough advanced topics.

The Special Edition book is a volumous tome of information that every skill level can use. The book is written in a manner that appeals to both the computer expert and the newbie user.
Each section of the book discusses the basic techniques that are used on a regular basis and then it progresses to more powerful techniques. Examples and illustrations are plentiful - which many people find helpful.
The index and table of contents is written is plain english - so it is not difficult to find the answer to any question you may have. The book also discusses the compatibility of StarOffice and other major office suites.
For expert level user tasks - macro designing, the book offers very little information on this area. But to find the answers on building the macros - I simply went to the Sun Microsystem's (The Makers of StarOffice) website and did some poking around until I found my answer.
Sadly, StarOffice 5.2 will debut this year and this book may be obsolete by teh time you read it - but if you plan to use or continue to use StarOffice 5.1 - then consider buying this book.
The price may be a bit higher then some of the "thinner" books - but in this case - you get what you pay for. Don't be a "Dummy." Purchase this book!

The StarBasic programming section is particularly instructive. The book's programming tutorial nicely complements the SO Online Help system and the SO SDK downloadable from the internet.
For old hacks, like me, this material (and Linux) is the best of times for computing.






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It's a handy reference guide for wither self interest or research.

If you have ever tried to fix an event in history in terms of what else was happening at the same time then this book is extremely useful. If you are into genealogy then it can help understand what was going on in the lives of your ancestors. If you are into science you can follow which scientists were contemporaries and what items were influencing them.
If you have any interest in history and want to get an overall picture of what was happening around the world at a particular time then this book can be a useful addition to your studies. A recommended resource for those who are interested in such things I value it for it's ability to let me know what was going on during the time of my ancestors for my genealogy hobby.

First of all, the general structure of the book is like a giant Excel program with the years listed on the side. Each square is separated into different categories such as Politics, literature, art, science and so on. For example, if you want to know the winner of the 1965 World Series, you just find the page for 1965, and look under the appropriate category. The index is also helpful. For each entry, it lists each year the item is mentioned and which category.
I find this book helpful in that it gives one a perspective on historical events. For example, for a history project involving the years 1900- 1910, I noticed that there were a great deal of scientific, social, and artistic events that radically changed our way of life that all happened in this short period of time. I was able to make connections very easily with the aid of this book.
I would recommend this book for literary and theatre students who need to research a time period as well as fans of movies who wish to have a better understand of the era in which their film is set.

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His major problem was to deal with idealism and empirism. For evident reasons, empirists cannot go very far. On the other hand, idealism doesn't produce the "clear and distinct" thoughts (Descartes: idées claires et distinctes) it's suposed to. Paradoxically, images that come from our sensations are sometimes very distincts. Kant tries to rehabilitate empirism and to keep the advantages idealism had: this was archieved with the invention of the transcendantal field.
So the CRP deals with metaphysics, but the book also tackles other problems, such as: is it possible to do a demonstration of God's existence? (see "Ideal of pure reason", second division, second book, third chapter). Personally, that's my favorite part, but it took me three months to begin to understand it.
The only reason why I shouldn't have rated this book five stars is: it is hard to read. Kant's german is awful (I have tried, reading quite fluently both german and english), and no translation can make it clearer. The readers who know something of translations's problems with Heidegger can only have a glimpse of Kant's german. So, the best is to read a translation but always to keep an eye on a german text, because german words are constituted in order to help us understand. For instance: "to have to" can be said with two verbs: müssen (idea of physical obligation) and sollen (intervention of moral principles). And that's only one.

Reason operates within cognition `as if' (als ob) it makes sense of the empirical world. Reason is a necessary fiction for knowledge claims, but its feet is made of clay. However, we have to recognize those limits and work within in them because "to soar beyond its limits, outside which there is for us nothing but empty space." [CPuR, B 730]
This text is dense, odd in style, and a perpetual student horror; but once mastered it gives you the key to open philosophy and science in an authoritive way. Remember, existentialists, romantics, analytic logicians, mathematicians, physicists, deconstructionists, and most anything that involves the messy mudfight of interpretation give homage to Kant. Kant's 1st Critique is the 1st Big Bang of the western tradition since Plato. Heidegger's `Being and Time' is a footnote in comparison.
It's not that bad once you get going. Really! I was terrified and got an F on my first paper, but a 95% in the course. But it is not to be read wiithout instruction. If you take one philsophy course, make it this one.

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On the other hand, there is a spectacularly lame attempt to write a Book of Ages, yes, with Capitalisation of Words involved and some of the most fruity prose you will see this side of a Creationist text. Let me give you an example
"These modest assymetric molecular geneses were nursed with information from photons coming in from the cosmos. The nascent molecules suckled photons, as it were."
Nursed? Suckled? Do you have a picture of a nascent molecules with breasts? Probably a diatomic molecule. Here's another,
"In our journey down the information stream, we shunted our boat, by a little sleight of hand, to the 'mainstream' in the DNA-to-protein segment. Had we sailed down by the book, we might have been sucked in sideways and gone in dizzying circles"
Follow? Follow the stream, I mean? I would have thought that metaphors be treated gently with good writing, but they're rife in this book.
Nevertheless, when Lowenstein isn't trying to be Keats, this is quite a majesterial survey of molecular biology. This is particular evident in the discussion of inter-cellular communication, of which Lowenstein is one of the undisputed masters. Indeed, when discussing his own work, the prose is suddenly emptied of metaphors and sharpens into tight well-written scientific prose.
However, I find a serious problem with one of the central tenets of the book - that all of molecular biology can be united into the central idea of information. The problem is, no one knows how to calculate information in molecular or cellular systems. True the equation of Shannon's information and Boltzmann's entropy is the same. But to calculate the information of, say a DNA molecule, which Lowenstein argues you can in principle do, one must specify all of the other states from which the DNA molecule is constructed out of. That is, you must find the boundary condition.
But this is hopelessly ambiguous. Is it the atoms stripped apart in a soup? Or is it the sum of all possible DNA sequences of all possible lengths? And I haven't even considered the difficulties of non-equilibrium statistical mechanics. The problems multiply once you consider interactions between DNA and any, or all other molecules. Given there is no way to calculate or algorithmically unambiguously pin down information, it is simply a rhetoric ploy to talk about the transfer of information.
Anyway, I ignored all the musings on the Power of Information and what remains is a substantial meditation on the state of the art molecular biology. If you're willing to work through the dense material, some of the most cutting edge ideas on DNA, RNA, replication, structural biology of cells are here.

Loewenstein takes us from a simple problem that was not answered until the concept of information was discovered by science. This field of information will no doubt be the proof that either spoils or makes the pudding in the evolution vs. creation debate. The communication within a living organism and the information exchange mechanism is quite fascinating as Loewenstein points out quite thoroughly by the use of analogy. The book is difficult to read in places and he gets quite technical so the reader should not expect to sail through it but it is definitely worth the effort.
After reading Gitt's book I was left with the impression that Loewenstein did not understand the full nature of meaningful information. Claude Shannon deals with information from a mostly statistical and mechanical perspective and Loewenstein does not go beyond that level in the book. The mechanics are fascinating but I am afraid that Dr Loewenstein has failed to explain where the 'foundations of life' comes from. His constant answer when he reaches a gap in knowledge is to say that 'Lady evolution' did it. Werner Gitt on the other hand goes way beyond the statistical level and shows the true nature of the coded information contained in DNA.
Loewenstein's book however is invaluable especially as it explores cell communication. I am quite happy that I purchased the book and I will probably use it as a reference tool for years to come. I only rated it with four stars because I think he over did it a little in his constant references to 'Lady evolution' and what 'she' supposedly did. This is a rather typical 'evolution in the gaps' argument and it is to be expected now days but I had to chuckle a few times when he inserted 'her' into the discussion as if we all know that 'she' can do just about anything if she is given enough time and if the reader has enough faith. Read Gitt's book and his and decide for yourself who or what is the foundation of life. I am the author of "The Blind Atheist".
Heisenberg, the most famous physicist in wartime Germany, was chosen to head Germany's nuclear research program. Yet, in his own version of events after the war, Heisenberg stated that there was never a danger of a German atomic bomb, despite fear in the U.S. at the time, because the German nuclear research program never focused on weapons and most of the project's scientists had no interest in making such a weapon for the National Socialists. Heisenberg's story, however, was treated with intense skepticism after the war by his friends and colleagues outside Germany, who forever saw Heisenberg as guilty by association. Powers, however, has challenged this accepted belief through intensive research into both new and old documents, and through a number of interviews with those who were in some way involved with the events. Powers conducts a thorough investigation and uses his expertise in writing about secret activities to expose the prejudices that have condemned Heisenberg. Powers addresses the issue from a different starting point and relies on the evidence to generate a new conclusion which ultimately exonerates Heisenberg from the guilt by association judgment.
Powers' conclusions about Heisenberg and the German bomb may not satisfy everyone, especially since the subject has always been emotionally and politically charged, and the record incomplete. However, his book is intellectually stimulating because it addresses so many gray areas, not only in this particular subject but also in what constitutes accurate history. On the first note, Powers' reinterpretation of the events is compelling because he also simultaneously addresses how the condemnation of Heisenberg was created and perpetuated: by people who were most immediately traumatized by the Nazis, or somehow connected to the American bomb program. Secondly, Powers has treated the subject with about as much energy and time as any one person can, approaching the truth of the matter more closely than any other work to date. Yet, despite such considerable effort, the history is still incomplete and will likely remain so, which gives credence to the idea that history is only a representation of truth, and that hopefully all historians will approach history with as much hard work, honesty and objectivity as possible, setting aside their purposeful judgments in the pursuit of more accurate conclusions.