Virtual Art: From Illusion to ImmersionThe computer's ability to immerse a user in virtual image spaces "is not the revolutionary innovation its protagonists are fond of interpreting it to be," Grau writes. "The idea of virtual reality only appears to be without a history; in fact, it rests firmly on historical art traditions." Grau (lecturer in art history at Humboldt University in Berlin,) traces the lineage of virtual reality as far back as the frescoes of a villa in Pompeii.
Big History and the Future of Humanity presents an original theoretical approach that makes "big history" – the placing of the human past within the history of life, the Earth, and the Universe –– accessible to general readers while revealing insights into what the future may hold for humanity. •Provides an accessible and original overview of the entire sweep of history that places human history within the history of life, the Earth, and the Universe
In the Light of Evolution: Volume 1. Adaptation and Complex DesignIn December 2006, the National Academy of Sciences sponsored a colloquium (featured as part of the "Arthur M. Sackler Colloquia" series) on "Adaptation and Complex Design" to synthesize recent empirical findings and conceptual approaches towards understanding the evolutionary origins and maintenance of complex adaptations.
With only a yellowing photograph in hand, a young man - also named Jonathan Safran Foer - sets out to find the woman who might or might not have saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Accompanied by an old man haunted by memories of the war, an amorous dog named Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior, and the unforgettable Alex, a young Ukrainian translator who speaks in a sublimely butchered English, Jonathan is led on a quixotic journey over a devastated landscape and into an unexpected past.
