Science Informer - An Incomplete Education: 3,684 Things You Should Have Learned but Probably Didn't

	List Price: $35.00 Our Price: $21.90 Your Save: $ 13.10 ( 37% ) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
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Binding: Hardcover Dewey Decimal Number: 031.02 EAN: 9780345468901 ISBN: 0345468902 Label: Ballantine Books Manufacturer: Ballantine Books Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 720 Publication Date: 2006-04-25 Publisher: Ballantine Books Release Date: 2006-04-25 Studio: Ballantine Books
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Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Excellent quality and service! Comment: The book arrived in pristine condition and I was proud to give it as a Christmas present. Thank you for the speedy shipment and care in packaging. Customer Rating: Summary: elitist snobbery wrapped in infanitle humor and factually plain wrong Comment: a short skim reading of this interesting-looking book revealed several things. First, they get their facts wrong. Small facts here and there for sure, but definetly just plain wrong. My field is religious studies, and they really do not know what they are talking about. They make silly, basic mistakes that my students would pick up. Second, they are extremely left leaning and (to boot)intellectual snobs, which might be fine if you are as well, just do not go looking for a balanced view on anything like religion. Their humor is childish because it makes fun of the material, reducing its importance (again depending on their enlightenment liberal sensibilities) and thus denegrates the cultural heritage. This shows that their ongoing humorous attempts to "popularize" include an agenda. They ridicule constantly those ideas and thinkers they do not seem to like. This betrays a lack of understanding of such thinkers as (for instance) Augustine, who managed to shape european culture for about 1500 years. Its weak humor at best. It is never witty, just cutting. That works for the Simpsons, but not for a book like this. The slant is so ingrained in this book, it is hard to find something good to say about it. Christians , Muslims, Anyone who is proud to be an American, and many others would find this book very insulting. Customer Rating: Summary: I thought I knew eveything! Comment: I am only about 1/2 way through this book, but I am delighted with the funny way this material is presented. Customer Rating: Summary: a good resource Comment: This book is an excellent resource. It is written so that it leads people to "dip into" it for information that you may or may or may not know; or are unsure of. There are pictures, photographs, charts, and the style is light. Its fascinating to just browse through. I got one for each of my college aged sons, and I believe they both got some good use out of it. Customer Rating: Summary: An Incomplete Education Comment: I've seen this book in numerous catalogs and knew that my 15 year old daughter would love it. In the catalogs it was around $35 + shipping. I found it here at a much lower price; the book arrived promptly; and it was in excellant condition. I come here first for any of my online shopping needs. Great job guys! More Reviews
Editorial Reviews: When it was originally published in 1987, An Incomplete Education became a surprise bestseller. Now this instant classic has been completely updated, outfitted with a whole new arsenal of indispensable knowledge on global affairs, popular culture, economic trends, scientific principles, and modern arts. Here’s your chance to brush up on all those subjects you slept through in school, reacquaint yourself with all the facts you once knew (then promptly forgot), catch up on major developments in the world today, and become the Renaissance man or woman you always knew you could be! How do you tell the Balkans from the Caucasus? What’s the difference between fission and fusion? Whigs and Tories? Shiites and Sunnis? Deduction and induction? Why aren’t all Shakespearean comedies necessarily thigh-slappers? What are transcendental numbers and what are they good for? What really happened in Plato’s cave? Is postmodernism dead or just having a bad hair day? And for extra credit, when should you use the adjective continual and when should you use continuous? An Incomplete Education answers these and thousands of other questions with incomparable wit, style, and clarity. American Studies, Art History, Economics, Film, Literature, Music, Philosophy, Political Science, Psychology, Religion, Science, and World History: Here’s the bottom line on each of these major disciplines, distilled to its essence and served up with consummate flair. In this revised edition you’ll find a vitally expanded treatment of international issues, reflecting the seismic geopolitical upheavals of the past decade, from economic free-fall in South America to Central Africa’s world war, and from violent radicalization in the Muslim world to the crucial trade agreements that are defining globalization for the twenty-first century. And don’t forget to read the section A Nervous American’s Guide to Living and Loving on Five Continents before you answer a personal ad in the International Herald Tribune. As delightful as it is illuminating, An Incomplete Education packs ten thousand years of culture into a single superbly readable volume. This is a book to celebrate, to share, to give and receive, to pore over and browse through, and to return to again and again.