Topic: Books (Page 6)

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πŸ”— Mariko Aoki Phenomenon

πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Psychology πŸ”— Japan

The Mariko Aoki phenomenon (ι’ζœ¨γΎγ‚Šγ“ηΎθ±‘, Aoki Mariko genshō) is a Japanese expression referring to an urge to defecate that is suddenly felt after entering bookstores. The phenomenon's name derives from the name of the woman who mentioned the phenomenon in a magazine article in 1985. According to Japanese social psychologist Shozo Shibuya, the specific causes that trigger a defecation urge in bookstores are not yet clearly understood (as of 2014). There are also some who are skeptical about whether such a peculiar phenomenon really exists at all, and it is sometimes discussed as one type of urban myth.

The series of processes through which being in a bookstore leads to an awareness of a defecation urge is something that cannot be explained from a medical perspective as a single pathological concept, at least at present. According to a number of discussions on the topic, even if it can be sufficiently found that this phenomenon actually exists, it is a concept that would be difficult to be deemed a specific pathological entity (such as a "Mariko Aoki disease", for example). On the other hand, it is also a fact that a considerable number of the intellectuals (particularly clinicians) who discuss this phenomenon have adopted existing medical terminology such as from diagnostics and pathology. Borrowing from this approach, this article also uses expressions from existing medical terminology for convenience.

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πŸ”— Goethe's Theory of Colors

πŸ”— Physics πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Alternative Views πŸ”— Color πŸ”— Physics/Publications

Theory of Colours (German: Zur Farbenlehre) is a book by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe about the poet's views on the nature of colours and how these are perceived by humans. It was published in German in 1810 and in English in 1840. The book contains detailed descriptions of phenomena such as coloured shadows, refraction, and chromatic aberration.

The work originated in Goethe's occupation with painting and mainly exerted an influence on the arts (Philipp Otto Runge, J.Β M.Β W. Turner, the Pre-Raphaelites, Wassily Kandinsky). The book is a successor to two short essays entitled "Contributions to Optics".

Although Goethe's work was rejected by physicists, a number of philosophers and physicists have concerned themselves with it, including Thomas Johann Seebeck, Arthur Schopenhauer (see: OnΒ Vision and Colors), Hermann von Helmholtz, Rudolf Steiner, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Werner Heisenberg, Kurt GΓΆdel, and Mitchell Feigenbaum.

Goethe's book provides a catalogue of how colour is perceived in a wide variety of circumstances, and considers Isaac Newton's observations to be special cases. Unlike Newton, Goethe's concern was not so much with the analytic treatment of colour, as with the qualities of how phenomena are perceived. Philosophers have come to understand the distinction between the optical spectrum, as observed by Newton, and the phenomenon of human colour perception as presented by Goetheβ€”a subject analyzed at length by Wittgenstein in his comments on Goethe's theory in Remarks on Colour.

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πŸ”— The Cathedral and the Bazaar

πŸ”— Computing πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Computing/Software

The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary (abbreviated CatB) is an essay, and later a book, by Eric S. Raymond on software engineering methods, based on his observations of the Linux kernel development process and his experiences managing an open source project, fetchmail. It examines the struggle between top-down and bottom-up design. The essay was first presented by the author at the Linux Kongress on May 27, 1997 in WΓΌrzburg (Germany) and was published as part of the book in 1999.

The illustration on the cover of the book is a 1913 painting by Liubov Popova titled Composition with Figures and belongs to the collection of the State Tretyakov Gallery. The book was released under the Open Publication License v2.0 around 1999.

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πŸ”— Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil

πŸ”— Germany πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Politics πŸ”— Women writers πŸ”— Jewish history πŸ”— Israel

Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil is a 1963 book by political thinker Hannah Arendt. Arendt, a Jew who fled Germany during Adolf Hitler's rise to power, reported on the trial of Adolf Eichmann, one of the major organizers of the Holocaust, for The New Yorker. A revised and enlarged edition was published in 1964.

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πŸ”— Dilbert Principle

πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Business πŸ”— Comics πŸ”— Comics/Comic strips

The Dilbert principle is a concept in management developed by Scott Adams, creator of the comic strip Dilbert, which states that companies tend to systematically promote incompetent employees to management to get them out of the workflow. The Dilbert principle is inspired by the Peter principle, which holds that employees are promoted based on success in their current position until they reach their "level of incompetence" and are no longer promoted. Under the Dilbert principle, employees who were never competent are promoted to management to limit the damage they can do. Adams first explained the principle in a 1995 Wall Street Journal article, and expanded upon it in his 1996 business book The Dilbert Principle.

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πŸ”— Amusing Ourselves to Death

πŸ”— Books

Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985) is a book by educator Neil Postman. The book's origins lay in a talk Postman gave to the Frankfurt Book Fair in 1984. He was participating in a panel on George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four and the contemporary world. In the introduction to his book, Postman said that the contemporary world was better reflected by Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, whose public was oppressed by their addiction to amusement, rather than by Orwell's work, where they were oppressed by state control.

Postman's book has been translated into eight languages and sold some 200,000 copies worldwide. In 2005, Postman's son Andrew reissued the book in a 20th anniversary edition.

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πŸ”— Hacker's Delight

πŸ”— Computing πŸ”— Books

Hacker's Delight is a software algorithm book by Henry S. Warren, Jr. first published in 2002. It presents fast bit-level and low-level arithmetic algorithms for common tasks such as counting bits or improving speed of division by using multiplication.

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πŸ”— De Bono's Six Thinking Hats

πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Systems πŸ”— Business πŸ”— Psychology πŸ”— United Kingdom πŸ”— Engineering πŸ”— Invention πŸ”— Systems/Project management πŸ”— Method engineering

Six Thinking Hats was written by Dr. Edward de Bono. "Six Thinking Hats" and the associated idea parallel thinking provide a means for groups to plan thinking processes in a detailed and cohesive way, and in doing so to think together more effectively.

In 2005, the tool found some use in the United Kingdom innovation sector, where it was offered by some facilitation companies and had been trialled within the United Kingdom's civil service.

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πŸ”— Systems of Survival

πŸ”— Philosophy πŸ”— Philosophy/Philosophical literature πŸ”— Books

Systems of Survival: A Dialogue on the Moral Foundations of Commerce and Politics is a book written by American urban activist Jane Jacobs in 1992.

It describes two fundamental and distinct ethical systems, or syndromes as she calls them: that of the Guardian and that of Commerce. She argues that these supply direction for the conduct of human life within societies, and understanding the tension between them can help us with public policy and personal choices.

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πŸ”— PiHKAL: β€œPhenethylamines I Have Known and Loved”

πŸ”— Books πŸ”— Alternative Views πŸ”— Chemistry πŸ”— Psychoactive and Recreational Drugs

PiHKAL: A Chemical Love Story is a book by Dr. Alexander Shulgin and Ann Shulgin, published in 1991. The subject of the work is psychoactive phenethylamine chemical derivatives, notably those that act as psychedelics and/or empathogen-entactogens. The main title, PiHKAL, is an acronym that stands for "Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved".

The book is arranged into two parts, the first part being a fictionalized autobiography of the couple and the second part describing 179 different psychedelic compounds (most of which Shulgin discovered himself), including detailed synthesis instructions, bioassays, dosages, and other commentary.

The second part was made freely available by Shulgin on Erowid while the first part is available only in the printed text. While the reactions described are beyond the ability of people with a basic chemistry education, some tend to emphasize techniques that do not require difficult-to-obtain chemicals. Notable among these are the use of mercury-aluminum amalgam (an unusual but easy to obtain reagent) as a reducing agent and detailed suggestions on legal plant sources of important drug precursors such as safrole.

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