<p>This volume rethinks the work of Jacques Ellul (1912-1994) on the centenary of his birth, by presenting an overview of the current debates based on Ellul's insights. As one of the most significant twentieth-century thinkers about technology, Ellul was among the first thinkers to realize the importance of topics such as globalization, terrorism, communication technologies and ecology, and study them from a technological perspective. </p> <p>The book is divided into three sections. The first discusses Ellul’s diagnosis of modern society, and addresses the reception of his work on the technological society, the notion of efficiency, the process of symbolization/de-symbolization, and ecology. The second analyzes communicational and cultural problems, as well as threats and trends in early twenty-first century societies. Many of the issues Ellul saw as crucial – such as energy, propaganda, applied life sciences and communication – continue to be so. In fact they have grown exponentially, on a global scale, producing new forms of risk. </p> <p>Essays in the final section examine the duality of reason and revelation. They pursue an understanding of Ellul in terms of the depth of experience and the traditions of human knowledge, which is to say, on the one hand, the experience of the human being as contained in the rationalist, sociological and philosophical traditions. On the other hand there are the transcendent roots of human existence, as well as “revealed knowledge,” in the mystical and religious traditions. The meeting of these two traditions enables us to look at Ellul’s work as a whole, but above all it opens up a space for examining religious life in the technological society. </p>
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<p>Mitigating climate change is one of the most profound challenges facing humankind. In industrialized countries, the residential housing sector produces roughly one-fourth of the greenhouse gas emissions. One solution to reduce these emissions is the availability of building codes that require high levels of energy efficiency. Given the current scientific knowledge, more research is needed to gain a proper systemic understanding of the underlying socio-economic and technical system. Such an understanding is crucial for developing high energy-efficiency standards because this system develops gradually over time and cannot be changed swiftly. </p> <p>This book creates a feedback-rich simulation model for analyzing the effects of different administrative policies on energy demand, the improvement of energy efficiency by means of building codes, and reductions in the greenhouse gas emissions. The dynamic model can contribute substantially to the discourse on energy policies and guide effective administrative interventions. The book will be a valuable resource for officials in the public energy administration, as well as researchers in the areas of innovation, diffusion processes, co-evolution, standardization, and simulation modelling.</p>
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<p>This book foregrounds the role of the Royal Navy in creating the British Atlantic in the eighteenth century. It outlines the closely entwined connections between the nurturing of naval supremacy, the politics of commercial protection, and the development of national and imperial identities – crucial factors in the consolidation and transformation of the British Atlantic empire. The collection brings together scholars working on aspects of the Royal Navy and the British Atlantic in order to gain a better understanding of the ways that the Navy protected, facilitated, and shaped the British-Atlantic empire in the era of war, revolution, counter-revolution, and upheaval between the beginning of the Seven Years War and the end of the conflict with Napoleonic France. Contributions question the limits – conceptually and geographically – of that Atlantic world, suggesting that, by considering the Royal Navy and the British Atlantic together, we can gain greater insights into Britain’s maritime history.</p>
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Is naval conflict in the Asia-Pacific region becoming more likely? On the face of it, this seems likely; nearly all countries in the region are rapidly modernising their navies and expanding their maritime capabilities at a time of increasingly rancorous disputes over sovereignty. This is especially the case in the East and South China Seas, with their supply of fish and largely untapped resources in oil and gas. Across the region there is a growing recognition of the economic importance of the sea, both for its resources and for the crucial shipping it facilitates. But economic growth goes both ways, developing increasing interdependence between the countries of the region. Expanding trade is subject to serious threats from pirates, drug-smugglers and other forms of maritime crime, and navies and coastguards are coming together to combat them. Which will prevail, the tendency to compete, or the tendency to cooperate? In reviewing the maritime policies of the major countries of the region, this volume aims to answer this question.
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The concept of Wiener chaos generalizes to an infinite-dimensional setting the properties of orthogonal polynomials associated with probability distributions on the real line. It plays a crucial role in modern probability theory, with applications ranging from Malliavin calculus to stochastic differential equations and from probabilistic approximations to mathematical finance. This book is concerned with combinatorial structures arising from the study of chaotic random variables related to infinitely divisible random measures. The combinatorial structures involved are those of partitions of finite sets, over which Möbius functions and related inversion formulae are defined. This combinatorial standpoint (which is originally due to Rota and Wallstrom) provides an ideal framework for diagrams, which are graphical devices used to compute moments and cumulants of random variables. Several applications are described, in particular, recent limit theorems for chaotic random variables. An Appendix presents a computer implementation in MATHEMATICA for many of the formulae.
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<p>Landscape studies provide a crucial perspective into the interaction between humans and their environment, shedding insight on social, cultural, and economic topics. The research explores both the way that natural processes have affected the development of culture and society, as well as the ways that natural landscapes themselves are the product of historical and cultural processes.</p> <p>Most previous studies of the landscape selectively focused on either the natural sciences or the social sciences, but the research presented in <em>African Landscapes</em> bridges that gap. This work is unique in its interdisciplinary scope. Over the past twelve years, the contributors to this volume have participated in the collaborative research center ACACIA (Arid Climate Adaptation and Cultural Innovation in Africa), which deals with the relationship between cultural processes and ecological dynamics in Africa’s arid areas.</p> <p>The case studies presented here come from mainly Sahara/Sahel and southwestern Africa, and are all linked to broader discussions on the concept of landscape, and themes of cultural, anthropological, geographical, botanical, sociological, and archaeological interest. The contributions in this work are enhanced by full color photographs that put the discussion in context visually.</p>
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Please note this is a 'Palgrave to Order' title (PTO). Stock of this book requires shipment from an overseas supplier. It will be delivered to you within 12 weeks. A central concern of this study is the relationship between Wagner the artist and Wagner the social phenomenon. Many of the essays within explore the most difficult yet most crucial issue in Wagner studies: the impact of the composer's problematic world view and complex personal life on his musical/dramatic creations.
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This collection makes available for the first time a rich archive of materials that illuminate the history of racial thought and practices in sixteenth and seventeenth century England. A comprehensive introduction shows how these writings are crucial for understanding the pre-Enlightenment lineages of racial categories.
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