From Booknews: -- looks at the political thought of the two contemporary 20th-centuries philosophers<-->Husserl the founder of phenomenology and Collingwood one of its most read writers. Considers them together because they were addressing the same historical epoch and similar audiences, because the political philosophy of both has been neglected by scholars, and in order to place them in the mainstream liberal political tradition rather than in its more radical fringes. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

From Booknews: --looks at the political thought of the two contemporary 20th-centuries philosophers<-->Husserl the founder of phenomenology and Collingwood one of its most read writers. Considers them together because they were addressing the same historical epoch and similar audiences, because the political philosophy of both has been neglected by scholars, and in order to place them in the mainstream liberal political tradition rather than in its more radical fringes. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

In the clash with Heidegger, Husserl's phenomenology came into close contact with a devisive bug named "intersubjectivity". After dealing with the differences inherent in their two positions, Husserl decided that the only way to remedy the situation, and therefore phenomenology, was to begin work on the phenomenological analytic of ethics, or how to found the possibility of an ethics (this comes thorugh in the Amsterdam lectures).

To the book's credit, it demonstrates clearly that where Heidegger lived a sum ergo cogito, Husserl rather thought the cogito ergo sum, all the way through to its "liminal" zone, the border. This began the confrontation, and would also soon end it. Thus some of the decisive problems addressed in this Encyclopedia Brittanica book with regards to phenomenology are: history, the subject, time, the other, the possibility of phenomenology with respect to the position on time, etc. Derrida would indeed, as another reviewer has unwittingly pointed out, characterize some of these problems as the break between "the laugh" and the laser-fine gaze of reason. That is, if time is a problem for phenomenology in Husserl's sense, one must laugh at the possibility of phenomenology. If it is rather a problem in Heidegger's sense, then one must phenomenologically laugh (see "An Intro to Husserl's 'Origin of Geometry'")...Well worth the money either way.

Edmund Husserl was the leading comedic writer of his time... This book is a strong example of his work and sheds new light on the relationship with his moronic sidekick, Martin Heidegger.

... for a 1st book on the subject, I would recommend this version. The author includes chapters on: "planets & character traits", "Rectification using Symbols", & info on using them for daily guidance (by using the Symbol for the sunrise degree). They can be used w/ Horary charts as well. If you've no book on the Sabian Symbols, definitely try this one.

Astrology is an area of spirituality that has been distorted by popular use. However, this book opens new possibilities for astrology both as a traditional predictive tool, and as a means of personality integration. The book has 1000 horoscope examples of real people, and some well-considered theory mundane and Horary Astrology, of which the last of these is original. Most importantly, this book presents the Sabian Symbols. To my knowledge this was the first publication of the symbols, yet many books have published them since.

What are the Sabian Symbols? Well, each of the 360 degrees of the zodiac is assigned a "symbol", such as for example "Taurus 22 - White dove over troubled waters". Then, this symbol is given a positive and a negative slant in a paragraph of text, as well as a keyword, in this case Taurus 22 degrees is "Guidance". The symbols add value to any horoscope, but there's more!

The symbols in this book are excellent and practical as a kind of modern day "I Ching". That is, you can ask a question (of your higher self), then select a symbol using a random selection to find out your answer. A good way to do this is for example, to have two stacks of normal playing cards. For the stack to select the zodiac sign use:- Aries - King of Hearts; Taurus - Queen of Hearts; Gemini - Jack of Hearts; Cancer - King of Diamonds; Leo - Queen of Diamonds; Virgo - Jack of Diamonds; Libra - King of Spades; Scorpio - Queen of Spades; Sagittarius - Jack of Spades; Capricorn - King of Clubs; Aquarius - Queen of Clubs; Pisces - Jack of Clubs.

Then, for the selection of the degree of that sign, use: hearts 1-10 for 1 to 10 degrees, diamonds 1-10 for 11 to 20 degrees, hearts 1-10 for 21 to 30 degrees.

So, for example, Taurus 22 degrees using this system would be denoted by "Queen of hearts" = Taurus, "2 of clubs" = 22 degrees.

I have used this book "off and on" over the past ten years together with the similar book by Dane Rudhyar. The latter I found had similar and complementary text descriptions for the symbols. In my opinion, the symbols have even more far-reaching possibilities. They can be used as a device to learn "clair-seeing" where the world we walk in can be interpreted prophetically by reading into the symbolisms noticed. This is a fascinating prospect but I've not seen any book working that way from the Sabian Symbols. The author Marc Edmund Jones spent 30 years on this one; a worthwhile endeavour as you can see from what I've said here.

What a heady time were the late 1700's. For hundreds, even thousands, of years, Western man had been saddled with monarchy; kings who were said to rule by divine right. But by the end of the 18th century, Martin Luther, John Locke and Adam Smith had propounded the essential framework for modern liberal capitalist democracy and the Revolution in America had launched a grand experiment based on those ideas. Then came the French Revolution and it was blithely assumed that here again Liberty was on the march. When suddenly, rising to meet the tide of history, came Edmund Burke to excoriate the Jacobins and denounce the Revolution. In so doing, he not only did mankind a great service, by sounding the alarms against unchecked liberty, he also basically gave birth to modern Conservatism. Today, after a long period in the wilderness, particularly during the Cold War, Edmund Burke has come roaring back into fashion. In a sense, he has finally won his argument with the defenders of the French Revolution, two hundred years after the fact, and is reaping the spoils.

For two centuries a controversy has raged over Burke's political philosophy, in particular whether the great defender of American, Irish and Indian rights was inconsistent in opposing the French Revolution. The very existence and the stubborn persistence of this controversy seem to demonstrate either a complete misunderstanding or a willful misrepresentation of Burke's basic arguments. One suspects it's a bit of both. The greatness of Burke lies in the fact that he was among the first, and certainly the most eloquent, defenders of democracy to recognize the dangers it entails; that power in the hands of the masses is just as great a threat to liberty as when it lies in the hand of a dictator or king. This point had been amply demonstrated in France, where the revolutionists had quickly abandoned any concern for personal freedom and had moved on to a bloody demand for equality--freedom's enemy.

It is here that we arrive at the key point that divides the modern Left and Right. The Left believes (a la Rousseau) that man is by nature "good" and all men are born with equal abilities, but that environmental factors and corrupt institutions warp individuals, making some evil and keeping others from realizing their full potentials; which if realized would make them equal to other men. The goal of the Left is therefore to remove, by any means necessary, these environmental and institutional impediments and return to an imagined state of nature where all men are good and are equally able; where Man will be governed by pure reason.

The Right, on the other hand, recognizes that man is inately "evil"; that is, evil in the sense that he is self centered and will generally act in his own interest not the interest of others. Moreover, men are inherently unequal; in the state of nature, the able will tyrannize the less able. It is for these reasons that men form governments in the first place; to protect themselves from one another. The goal of the Right is to provide each individual with the greatest personal freedom and utmost opportunity to realize his potential, consistent with the basic safety concerns that gave birth to the state in the first instance. Conservatives realize that pure reason will not lead men to treat each other with justice, by nature, men will always seek advantage over one another. The State and other institutions safeguard us against this eventuality.

This fundamental difference can not be overstated. Prior to the 18th century, the Left would have included all democrats, while the Right would have been made up of monarchists and supporters of aristocracy. But beginning with the French Revolution, this fissure separated the regnant liberal forces into two competing camps, setting the stage for the two century long contest that ended in the early 1990's with the fall of the Soviet Union. Both sides would produce great men, original theorists, brilliant writers and magnificent orators, but none of them would ever surpass Burke and his mastery of all these fields. Rare are the men who so clearly perceive the fundamental issues that confront mankind. They seem at times to be travelers from the future, come to warn us about what horrors the years to come will hold unless we obey their counsel. Rarer still are the occasions when we heed them. We can only imagine the millions of lives that would have been saved had people followed Burke's vision rather that that of Rousseau and Jefferson and Marx.

Happily, here in America, James Madison's Constitution embodies many of the same ideas and protects against many of the concerns which Burke expressed. The adoption of representative, rather than direct, democracy; the bicameral legislature and tripartite government; the careful system of checks and balances; the protection of basic rights from government interference: these are all, though we seldom discuss them in these terms, intended to protect the individual from the potentially tyrannical effects of democracy. When commentators speak of the genius of the American system, whether they realize it or not, it is to this central fact that they refer. So while critics have struggled to understand a false dichotomy in Burke's thought, we (and to a lesser extent the Brits) have enjoyed the fruits of a political system which assumes that his critique of democracy is less theory than received wisdom. For whatever reason, it took two hundred years and countless millions of lives before the rest of the world recognized what Burke (the bard) and Madison (the draftsman) had known all along; two centuries that proved them indisputably correct.

GRADE: A+

If Ronald Reagan is the great communicator, Burke must be the extraordinary communicator. Someone once said that pages of Burke are like sheets of fire.

        During the time he lived, in the 18th century, most political leaders were hereditary aristocrats, but Burke, like Cicero, did not descend from generations of prominent leaders. He earned his leadership in British politics through the power of his mind, by studying political principles and applying them to real circumstances. A superficial look at Burke's career might tempt one to dismiss him as a failure. Most of the causes to which he devoted himself were not successful in his lifetime.

        Prior to the American Revolution, he wrote brilliantly on behalf of conciliation between Britain and the American colonies. He argued for fair treatment of India by Britain. He argued for fair treatment of the Irish by the British and for Catholic emancipation in England. In time these positions won acceptance, but the acceptance came after Burke's death.

        Fortunately, he did live long enough to see the triumph of the greatest work of his life: his effort to awaken his country to the fundamentally destructive but superficially attractive nature of the French Revolution. His thorough and, I believe, inspired condemnation of the French Revolution swept British majority opinion. To Burke, more than any other politician of his time, goes the credit for creating the intellectual force which saved Europe from revolutionary chaos and dictatorship.

        Modern-day conservatives are also profoundly in his debt, as his writings against the French revolution provided the philosophical foundation for anti-communism in particular and ordered liberty in general. Read Burke. All his writings on government and politics are a rich ore, studded with gems of wisdom.

Sams' argument has not been accepted by the 'academic establishment', but in my opinion the case which he makes in this book that "Edmund Ironside" is an early Shakespeare play, is very strong.

The idea that the author of the Shakespeare-folio suddenly started writing masterworks is at last proven to be nonsense. Eric Sams makes the case for Edmund Ironside being an early Shakespeare-play so masterly, that only the very stubborn (& the very stupid) can harbour any doubt after reading "Shakespeare's Lost Play". All the same, "Edmund Ironside" stinks, and should (I hope) never be performed on stage. But this monstrosity is fascinating reading-matter, written by a very young and unexperienced bard, who started, just like any other normal being, his professional career not simply by being the best, but at the bottom, by trying - and failing many times. It makes the author of Shakespeares works almost human! This book shouldn't be missed by any serious Shakespeare-student; Eric Sams shows how authorship can and should be proven - and how opponents should be silenced. That Sams apparently completed this study without the benefit of a computer opens new horizons for humanity!

This book contains all of Spenser's important poems with the exception of the Faeie Quuene which Penguin also sells. This book is hefty at almost 900 pages, 500 of which are poems including his Shepherd Calendar. I rarely read introductions and notes but found them helpful in the case of Spenser who uses some words that are archaic, but his verse is actually very easy to get the gist of almost immediately. I found reading it aloud (much to the annoyance of my sleepy cat) helped.
AS my first introduction to Spenser I was concerned about just how difficult the poems would be to understand, but as I said his language is actually understandable and even add to the enjoyment. I was surprised how emotionally affecting the poems still are, how modern in their concerns about politics, love, life and death. I have underlined sections that I plan to revisit. I agree with the other reviwer that Spenser is a major poet who should be read by all.

There are few writers in this world (or any other conceiveable) that meet the writing skills that a certain English poet, writer and genius did posess, i.e., that of Edmund Spenser. Spenser is defintely in the realm of that of his contemporaries, e.g., Philip Sidney, William Shakespeare et al. "The Shepherds Calender" is awesome in it is range, depth and intellectual prowess. The rest of the poems (which are to many to recall without having a photographic memory; something that I unfortunately do not posess) are also on a level that is rarely seen or read. As written earlier, I do consider him, i.e., Spenser to be one of the finest writers/poets to have written in the English language and I would verily say, state and write that if one is an affecionado of world class poetry; then Spenser is the natural , rightfull and logical selection and every learned man/scholar should have either read or being the owner of this book, i.e., The Shorter Poems (Penguin Classics) by Edmund Spenser, Richard A. McCabe (Editor) to be truly be called a civlized man.

I've been using this book to source the meanings of scientific terms since 1980 while I was taking chordate anatomy and mammalogy at the Univ. of Washington. I now use this book routinely in preparing lesson plans and lectures for my high school biology classes. Knowing the meaning of the base words often helps the students retain and integrate the term into their vocabulary. The book is invaluable. My favorite word breakdown so far has been the scientific name of the Long Tailed Weasel, Mustela frenata. The literal translation is "the masked ones" (frenata) "who carry off mice"(mus- tela). If you are unsure which reference book in this category is the best book for you, I suggest that you go to the science library of a university near you and find this book and compare it to the books near by. It is by far the easiest to use.

This book is invaluable for anyone who has trouble learning scientific terminology or latin based nomenclature. I have yet to find a term, or latin root that was clearly contained with this text. This text should be standard issue for any science based course..high school, college or graduate level!

The British mystery author, Michael Innes a.k.a. John Innes Mackintosh Stewart wrote the introduction to "Swan Song," wherein he claims that Crispin solved the dilemma of the 'Great Detective versus the bumbling police' scenario that many Golden Age mystery authors had to contend with. The dilemma in a nutshell: why would a twentieth-century policeman, who was much more adept and scientifically trained than his counterpart in the late Victorian era of Sherlock and Mycroft, call in an amateur (no matter how intelligent) to help him with his inquiries?

According to Innes, "The Great Detective was, curiously, often a person of title, like Dorothy Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey, or at least the familiar of persons of title. It is never easy to render plausible the acceptance of a meddlesome private investigator by a group of professional policemen standing round a corpse, and novelists appear to have felt that a lord will be better received..."

Innes himself wrote a series of mysteries starring the titled Sir John Appleby.

Crispin avoided the 'blue-blooded detective' solution. His detective, Gervase Fen is part of the same social milieu as the police. He is a professor of English literature at Oxford, but his cherished hobby is criminal investigation. His detective counterpart (Sir Richard Freeman in "Swan Song") has a passion for literary scholarship. Their dialogues (mainly disagreements) keep "Swan Song" swimming right along. It's definitely not a 'Great Detective versus bumbling policeman' relationship---it's more like two crotchety friends with mutual interests who keep running into each other in various Oxford pubs and murder scenes.

"Swan Song" starts out rather unpromisingly:

"There are few creatures more stupid than the average singer. It would appear that the fractional adjustment of larynx, glottis and sinuses required in the production of beautiful sounds must almost invariably be accompanied---so perverse are the habits of Providence---by the witlessness of a barnyard fowl."

I would have thought that the above statement applied to tenors and sopranos only (singing in such a high register seems to destroy their brain cells), but it is the bass in "Swan Song" who sets himself up for murder. Several members of "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg" cast have good reasons for wishing Edwin Shorthouse dead, in spite of his voice and its drawing power.

Even his composer-brother has a motive for killing the bass, and after a meeting with him, Fen is also made to question the intelligence of composers: "As a general rule, composers aren't the brightest of mortals, except where music's concerned."

Since Crispin himself composed music, it might be better if the reader did not take his commentary on the intelligence of musicians too seriously!

One of my favorite characters from "The Moving Toyshop" shows up in "Swan Song"-the deaf and (according to Fen) senile Professor Wilkes who makes a habit of stealing Fen's whisky. He and Fen are always good for a round or two of acrimonious repartee whenever they meet.

A third dialogue element that threads merrily through the book is a crime writer's attempt to interview Fen about his most famous cases. Every time Fen clears his throat and begins, "The era of my greatest successes..." someone is bound to interrupt him.

We never do get to learn what Fen considers his greatest successes, but surely the outcome of "Swan Song" must be counted among them.

NOTE: "Swan Song" was also published under the title "Dead and Dumb."

The ubiquitous Gervaise Fen finds himself literally "on stage" and proves again that his powers of observation and deduction are second to none. The language and style of Crispin are reminiscent of Dorothy Sayers and are fully as entertaining. Great vacation reading, as it is very hard to put down.

I am a great fan of Edmund Bergler. I consider him to be not only as the greatest psychoanalyst, but also the greatest thinker of the modern times. It is a pity that the prodigious works of this unique author are not as popular as they deserve. To me works of Bergler were always tremendously important. The particular book on stupidity is as ingenious as the previous works; it is educational and entertaining at the same time. Read it. This book will teach you about the mainsprings of the human behavior.

This is a technical work, and assumes at least a passing familiarity with Freud and Psychoanalysis. However, it is one of the most important missing pieces in understanding motivation and interpersonal dynamics. As most psychiatry has been reduced to a moronized adjunct to the pharmaceutical industry, we begin to appreciate the necessity of Bergler's contributions. In this book, Bergler explores the possibility of incompetence as a strategic choice. The incompetent, or as we ought to distinguish, the pseudo-incompetent (as opposed to the ignorant, uninformed, or confused) uses his or her intelligence to sabotage the flow of events. Bergler sees this sabotage as a form of self abnegation via masochistic need for failure and shame. Others may feel that incompetence may serve as a conciously chosen pseudo-identity in order to escape responsibility. After all, one cannot ask much of one of whom little is expected. Bergler's theories are thus useful and necessary, but incomplete. Both the intrapsychic dynamics of the punitive super-ego and the masochistic, shriveled, insect-self (see Kafka, Metamorphosis) AND the real world environment of power dynamics must be taken into account to develop a well formed understanding of a person's true life situation. Nonetheless, anyone with pretensions or intentions of being well informed in this field must read Bergler thoroughly.