Shows society at a crossroads--in one direction pollution, drought, and destruction, in the other solar cells, clean energy, and safe technology. Skeptical? You should be. This volume is fine as an abstract policy study, but it fails to confront those who are happy with the way things are: mining fossil fuel, clearing old-growth forests, legislating for special interests, and generally sticking it to the public. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Philosophical Essays is a pivotal volume in the collected works of Hans Jonas (1903-1993), one of most important German-American philosophers of the last half of the 20th century. Of the four books published in English during his lifetime, it is the only one to include contributions from his three primary areas of achievement: philosophical reflection on gnosticism, on biology, and on technology - hence the subtitle, "From Ancient Creed to Technological Man." The three sections of the book are, however, given in reverse order with essays on "Science, Technology, and Ethics" preceding papers on "Organism, Mind, and History" and "Religious Thought of the First Christian Centuries." The temporally ultimate project is that which Jonas sees as having philosophical priority. This collection of 18 essays originally published between 1965 and 1974 - that is, after completion of The Phenomenon of Life (1966) but before The Imperative of Responsibility (1984) - manifests the most intensive integration of Jonas's three projects. As such, this volume provides special witness to the inherent unity of what might otherwise be seen as more episodic work. In the Introduction Jonas himself argues for both a biographical and a philosophical unity, the latter of which is emphasized in a new foreword by Carl Mitcham of the European Graduate School.

The Military History of the Soviet Union and The Military History of Tsarist Russia treat Russian military history from the rise of the Muscovite state to the present, even peeking briefly into the future. The two volumes will cover Russia's land forces extensively, but will also cover the development of the Russian Navy, and the creation and development of the Russian Air Force, parts of the Russian military machine which are frequently neglected in general writings. The historical analysis will address the development and function of the Russian military whether in peace or in war, as well as the impact of war and changes in the military upon Russian society and politics.

Spitzer discusses the method he evolved for bringing together the two disciplines, linguistics and literary history, and examines the work of Cervantes, Racine, Diderot, and Claudel in the light of this theory. Originally published in 1967. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

This volume, first published in English in 1987 makes available an important part of Weil’s early writings. Although primarily known as a religious thinker, she devoted enormous energy in her formative years to her work as a political activist and as a philosopher/teacher. This book reveals these other sides of Weil and demonstrates the lines of continuity underlying her whole thought. Written between 1929 and 1941 the book covers a crucial and transitional period in Weil’s life. Taken together they represent invaluable primary source material on the evolution of Weil’s life and on her chosen method of abstracting elements from her personal experience and transmuting that experience into considered thought. Even when highly theoretical, her writing was always concerned with the application of her intelligence to concrete problems of human existence.

Based on a variety of classified military records, Lewy provides the first systematic analysis of the course of the Vietnam War, the reasons for the failure of American strategy and tactics, and the causes of the final collapse of South Vietnam.

Leopold von Ranke (1795-1886), generally recognized as the founder of the school of modern critical historical scholarship, and Jacob Burckhardt (1818-1897), the great Swiss proponent of cultural interpretation, are fathers of modern history--giants of their time who continue to exert an immense influence in our own. They are usually seen as contrasts, Ranke as representative of political history and Burckhardt of cultural history. In five essays, each flowing gracefully into the next, the distinguished historian Felix Gilbert shows that such contrasts are oversimplifications. Despite their interest in different aspects of the past, Ranke's and Burckhardt's views arose from common elements in the first half of the nineteenth century, the time in which they grew up and in which their first masterworks attracted such wide attention. This concise volume clarifies the beginnings of history as an autonomous discipline, while forcing us to examine our views on basic questions in historical scholarship. In the case of Ranke, relating his work to his times counteracts the current tendency to disregard the difference between the historical concepts of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. By focusing on this difference, Gilbert emphasizes the originality and novelty of Ranke's ideas about history. Although Burckhardt is often portrayed as an intellectually lonely figure, this book reveals the importance of relating his thought to the intellectual trends of his time. Originally published in 1990. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Whereas science, technology, and medicine have all called forth dedicated philosophical investigations, a fourth major contributor to the technoscientific world in which we all live - that is, engineering - has been accorded almost none of the philosophical attention it deserves. This volume thus offers a first characterisation of this important new field, by some of the primary philosophers and ethicists interested in engineering and leading engineers interested in philosophical reflections. The volume deals with such questions as: What is engineering? In what respect does engineering differ from science? What ethical problems does engineering raise? By what ethical principles are engineers guided? How do engineers themselves conceive of their profession? What do they see as the main philosophical challenges confronting them in the 21st century? The authors respond to these and other questions from philosophical and engineering view points and so illustrate how together they can meet the challenges and realize the opportunities present in the necessary encounters between philosophy and engineering - encounters that are ever more important in an increasingly engineered world and its problematic futures.