good short comprehensive introductory book on India myth and mythology, with all major information in one compact book

Although MacKenzie writes as a sociologist of science, his evaluation of the work of Francis Galton, Karl Pearson and R.A. Fisher provides an excellent summary of their contributions to the development of mathematical statistics as we know it today. His sociological thesis is that the primary concepts of statistics were "invented", not "discovered", and that the social position of these men strongly influenced the content of their works. While this not a radical position today (at least in sociological circles) it was, in 1987, relatively unfamiliar to many statisticians.

All three of the major figures studied were connected to the eugenics movement, and MacKenzie examines the relationship of eugenics and biometry to their work in mathematical statistics. He shows how Fisher's Genetical Theory of Natural Selection evidences the eugenics goals which are usually associated with Pearson. While it is a bit trickier to connect his books on Scientific Inference and Statistical Methods to eugenics, MacKenzie is quite convincing.

I regret not having read this book ten years ago, since it clarified several issues that I have been struggling with as a teacher of statistics. I looked it up as a result of a reference in an article by John Aldrich in the journal Statistical Science (Vol. 10, No. 4, 364-376) on Pearson and Yule's views of spurious correlation. Statistical Science, by the way, often contains interesting pieces on the history of statistics.

This is one of those very odd specialty books that always has you wondering who is the real audience.

The author has done an excellent job of researching the topic, and appears to be from the missile guidance community (or at least aerospace). His style is dry, but frank.

The book traces the US experience in missile guidance technology, then analyzes the sequence of RFP to field test to reveal the sociological dynamics of a technology.

For the information revolution, and a society that is becoming increasingly more technological, this book is an early example of what will likely be reproduced elsewhere for other technologies.

Throughout the book, the author debates what is accuracy. Traditionally, the Circular Error Probability (CEP) has been used, but some believe that a bias displaces the actual aiming point, and thus reduces the meaning of the CEP. Not addressed in this book is the debate concerning intelligence assets to support deep and strategic strikes, which accounts for many peoples belief in an accuracy bias. The author's bias arguement is along different lines than that used today, and is not well developed (the author argues against it).

The arguement being addressed is how credible is a nuclear deterent if systems are perfected to hit a test target on a Pacific island where all the navigational variables are known. This arguement is revisited by more recent books dealing with smart weapons; weapons which contractually meet their requirements to hit targets in arid Nevada, but appear incapable of doing likewise in a misty European battlefields.

The author does present an interesting sociological model that has a wide application: the certainty trough. This model implies that those with the greatest confidence in a technology are well informed on it, and between those that develop the technology, and those that know little about it.

While dealing only with strategic ballistic missiles, the author's approach to technological sociology is well worth reading and applying to current day arguements with other weapon systems.

This is a hallmark book, and not solely to those interested in the history of ballistic missile guidance systems (though it would be difficult for others to discover). Mr. MacKenzie's real contribution is to examine how theories compete, contend and clash, and how the "intellectual community" finds and/or accepts them. A careful reading of the book, with only a modicum of knowledge of the subject, could change the way one thinks about every aspect of life.

I found it brilliant and revelatory, and I have recommended it to many people who sought to have their conceptual conciousness raised, as was mine.

One of the few scholarly journals this "academaholic" would ever recommend to a general (though well-read) audience.

Keep a copy around for some deserving late teen ager whose mind is in full bloom - you will find yourself rewarded.

This book is regarded as groundbraking in nonproliferation circles. It describes invention and the institutions supporting invention.

This book describes the ideologies and nuclear strategies during the Cold War in an excellent way. And it has to. Because it tries to find an alternative to the prevailing perception of technological determism and realism. Historical Sosiology.

I found this book very difficult to read. The language is "scientific" and loaded with information. I will not recommend this book to the casual reader, but for history buffs in nuclear strategy, it is a must.

As I am very interested in the historical and mythological nature of Puck (aka Robin Goodfellow), best known for his role as the mischief-making fairy in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, I found these works by Kipling to be invaluable. These two novels are not only an excellent presentation of Puck, but an insight to British history. While considered children's books, I would recommend them to any adult in search of light reading. Truly two wonderful works of literature.

_Puck of Pook's Hill_ is a set of stories, somewhat linked, about the history of England, built around a frame story involving two young children, Dan and Una, meeting Puck in a meadow near their Sussex home. Puck somehow arranges for a series of historical people, ghosts, I suppose, to come and tell stories of events near their home in the past 2000 years. There are four stories told by Sir Richard Dalyngridge, one of William the Conqueror's men, on the theme of assimilation of the Normans and Saxons into one people: the English. There are three Roman stories, set in 375 AD or so, about a Centurion from the Isle of Wight who holds Hadrian's Wall against the Picts and the Norsemen while Maximus, his general, declares himself Emperor and takes Gaul then heads into Rome (where the real Emperor had him killed, understandably enough). The three other stories deal with the rebuilding of the local church in Henry VII's time, a rebuilding project menaced by smugglers, with the flight of the fairies from England at the time of the Reformation, and with the role of a Jew in forcing John to sign the Magna Carta. (This last an uneasy mixture of anti-Semitism with an apparent attempt to not be anti-semitic.)

_Rewards and Fairies_ presents eleven more stories told by Puck's agency to Dan and Una. We meet some familiar characters again (the church builder, and Richard Dalynrydge), and even some major historical figures: Queen Elizabeth, George Washington, Napoleon. On the whole the stories aren't quite as good as those in _Puck_, though "Marklake Witches" is very good, very moving.

Both books include a number of poems, usually closely associated with the themes of the stories.

These are generally fine stories, but for my taste not up to the level of my favorite Kipling stories, such as "Mrs. Bathurst" and "'They'" and "The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes" and "The Story of Mohammed Din". Still, the plain craft of the stories is as ever with Kipling remarkable.

Kipling's prose has a very special quality - quintissentially English, proud and very robust.

I asked a scholar of English and a Buddhist meditation teacher to recommend a good book for me and she thought briefly before mentioning this.

The poems in it are sometimes dated - the one about queen and country but this is a warm and pleasant read containing many important and esoteric aspects that few care to appreciate.

Ideal to communicate something about being a whole human being and this earthy realm with some of its hidden and ancient forces.

I found this book, used, in a wonderfully dusty mom-and-pop store. It caught my attention initially because the cover illustration was a detail from John Duncan's "The Coming of Bride". It turns out that this is a collection of Scottish myths compiled from the oral tradition. I tried very hard not to jump up and down in the store; Scottish material is, for some reason, not the easiest to find. The collection begins with the story of Beira, queen of winter, and her battles with Angus and Bride, the lovers who bring sunny weather in spring. I've often heard this story alluded to, and read a summary of it in other books such as Monaghan's *Goddesses and Heroines*, but never before did I get the chance to read the whole story, and it is beautiful. Most of the other tales in this collection, while less well-known, are also good reads. Recommended for a variety of people--scholars, pagans, and anyone who wants cool stories to read to their kids.

UPDATE: Apparently, this is condensed from *Scottish Wonder Tales from Myth and Legend*, which is currently in print. I haven't read the larger book, but I'd definitely recommend it after what I've seen so far.

It's well put together, the only problems I had with the book were the author putting in mythology from other countries in. Studying mythology is hard enough without gettin them confused with other ancient religions as well. But it's a great start for learning the myths, not as many stories as you'd think by the title, there are short versions of stories (and mainly the popular ones which I already knew of), but it left me craving more stories and more of the stories that the author told and left out.

In general these folk tales are not the fairy tales we expect from Russia, but are tales of the folk who peopled Russia and the tsars who ruled the country. Nearest to a fairy tale is "The Lady of Moscow" which includes Princess Peerless, a dragon, a Golden Knight, and a Yaga. The story of Mikhail the Kringel Seller is a sentimental tale which not only draws a vivid picture of the vendors in a market but also tells us a tender tale of a boy taken young from his aristocratic parents and treated like a slave by Red Koko. Many of the rest of the stories draw from episodes in the lives of several of the tsars--from a small peasant (Ivan) being in the right place at the right time to be named Tsar, to an episode in the life of Tsar Ivan in 1581 when the Scottish people in Moscow swore to fight for Ivan in return for his allowing them to live in peace and build their own church. Wolves have figured in many Russian stories: here we have the tale of how one Russian man fought off the wolves in order to assure that a young girl can join her Scottish mother in crossing the frontier into Poland.