The Clock Of The Long Now

Author: Stewart Brand
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 0786722924
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 210

Book Description
Using the designing and building of the Clock of the Long Now as a framework, this is a book about the practical use of long time perspective: how to get it, how to use it, how to keep it in and out of sight. Here are the central questions it inspires: How do we make long-term thinking automatic and common instead of difficult and rare? Discipline in thought allows freedom. One needs the space and reliability to predict continuity to have the confidence not to be afraid of revolutions Taking the time to think of the future is more essential now than ever, as culture accelerates beyond its ability to be measured Probable things are vastly outnumbered by countless near-impossible eventualities. Reality is statistically forced to be extraordinary; fiction is not allowed this freedom This is a potent book that combines the chronicling of fantastic technology with equally visionary philosophical inquiry.

The Science of Time 2016

Author: Elisa Felicitas Arias
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319599097
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 381

Book Description
The uses of time in astronomy - from pointing telescopes, coordinating and processing observations, predicting ephemerides, cultures, religious practices, history, businesses, determining Earth orientation, analyzing time-series data and in many other ways - represent a broad sample of how time is used throughout human society and in space. Time and its reciprocal, frequency, is the most accurately measurable quantity and often an important path to the frontiers of science. But the future of timekeeping is changing with the development of optical frequency standards and the resulting challenges of distributing time at ever higher precision, with the possibility of timescales based on pulsars, and with the inclusion of higher-order relativistic effects. The definition of the second will likely be changed before the end of this decade, and its realization will increase in accuracy; the definition of the day is no longer obvious. The variability of the Earth's rotation presents challenges of understanding and prediction. In this symposium speakers took a closer look at time in astronomy, other sciences, cultures, and business as a defining element of modern civilization. The symposium aimed to set the stage for future timekeeping standards, infrastructure, and engineering best practices for astronomers and the broader society. At the same time the program was cognizant of the rich history from Harrison's chronometer to today's atomic clocks and pulsar observations. The theoreticians and engineers of time were brought together with the educators and historians of science, enriching the understanding of time among both experts and the public.

The Clock Book

Author: Wallace Nutting
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Clock and watch makers
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Book Description
Contains 250 black and white photographs of clocks, followed by a List of American Clockmakers and a List of Foreign Clockmakers. Indexed. Note publication date of 1924.

The Clock of Ages

Author: John J. Medina
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521594561
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 352

Book Description
Anyone who has watched a wrinkle slowly gouge their face like a strip mine, or has been disturbed by a loss of memory, has uncomfortably confronted the human ageing process. The inexorable march of time on our bodies begs an important question: why do we have to grow old? Written in everyday language, The Clock of Ages takes us on a tour of the ageing human body - all from a research scientist's point of view. From the deliberate creation of organisms that live three times their natural span to the isolation of human genes that may allow us to do the same, The Clock of Ages also examines the latest discoveries in geriatric genetics. Sprinkled throughout the pages are descriptions of the aging of many historical figures, such as Florence Nightingale, Jane Austen, Bonaparte and Casanova. These stories underscore the common bond that unites us all: they aged, even as we do. The Clock of Ages tells you why.

The Clock Without a Face

Author: Scott Teplin
Publisher: McSweeneys Books
ISBN: 9781934781715
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 30

Book Description
Twelve emerald-studded numbers have been stolen, so readers are asked to search the detailed illustrations of the 13 floors of Ternky Tower for clues hidden among the puzzles that show who and how.

Creating Things That Matter

Author: David Edwards
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1250147190
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Book Description
Most things we create will not matter. This book is about creating things that do, from a master innovator who brings science and art together in his cutting edge labs. Art and science are famous opposites. Contemporary innovation mostly keeps them far apart. But in this book, David Edwards—world-renowned inventor; Harvard professor of the practice of idea translation; creator of breathable insulin, edible food packaging, and digital scents—reveals that the secret to creating very new things of lasting benefit, including innovations we will need to sustain human life on the planet, lies in perceiving art and science as one. Here Edwards shares how he discovered a way of creating that transcends disciplines and incorporates the principles of aesthetics. He introduces us to cutting-edge artists, musicians, architects, physicists, mathematicians, engineers, chefs, choreographers, and novelists (among others) and uncovers a three-step cycle they all share in creating things that durably matter. This creator cycle looks unlike what we associate with game-changing innovation today, and aligns the most expressive art and the most revolutionary science in a radical reimagining of how we live. David Edwards and the innovators he profiles belong to an emerging grassroots renaissance flourishing in special environments that we all can make in our schools, companies and homes. Creating Things That Matter is a book for anyone wondering what tomorrow might be, and at last half believing that what they do can make a difference.

About Time: A History of Civilization in Twelve Clocks

Author: David Rooney
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393867943
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 314

Book Description
A captivating, surprising history of timekeeping and how it has shaped our world. For thousands of years, people of all cultures have made and used clocks, from the city sundials of ancient Rome to the medieval water clocks of imperial China, hourglasses fomenting revolution in the Middle Ages, the Stock Exchange clock of Amsterdam in 1611, Enlightenment observatories in India, and the high-precision clocks circling the Earth on a fleet of GPS satellites that have been launched since 1978. Clocks have helped us navigate the world and build empires, and have even taken us to the brink of destruction. Elites have used them to wield power, make money, govern citizens, and control lives—and sometimes the people have used them to fight back. Through the stories of twelve clocks, About Time brings pivotal moments from the past vividly to life. Historian and lifelong clock enthusiast David Rooney takes us from the unveiling of al-Jazari’s castle clock in 1206, in present-day Turkey; to the Cape of Good Hope observatory at the southern tip of Africa, where nineteenth-century British government astronomers moved the gears of empire with a time ball and a gun; to the burial of a plutonium clock now sealed beneath a public park in Osaka, where it will keep time for 5,000 years. Rooney shows, through these artifacts, how time has been imagined, politicized, and weaponized over the centuries—and how it might bring peace. Ultimately, he writes, the technical history of horology is only the start of the story. A history of clocks is a history of civilization.

Communication Maintenance in Longue Durée

Author: Gabriele Balbi
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 104014960X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 212

Book Description
This interdisciplinary volume focuses on the politics, economics, technologies, uses, and cultures of maintenance of different forms of communication over long time or in Longue Durée. Throughout the chapters, contributors from a wide range of fields explore transversal and trans-temporal issues of communication maintenance. Among these are the struggles to keep communication infrastructures functioning, the hidden work of maintenance done by both experts and non-experts such as everyday users, the political significance of maintaining communications (or not maintaining them), and the different habits and significance of maintenance in different times and world regions. The forms of communication covered include broadcasting, telecommunications such as the telegraph and telephone, digital and popular media as computers and mobile phones, mostly forgotten media like pneumatic tubes, transportation infrastructures, maps as used as tools to politically control land, the clock as a medium and a material artifact, and many more. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of communication and media studies, the history of science and technology, general history, geography, maintenance studies, and other related disciplines. The Introduction, Chapter 5 and 8 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.

Monument Culture

Author: Laura A. Macaluso
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 153811416X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 301

Book Description
Monument Culture: International Perspectives on the Future of Monuments in a Changing World brings together a collection of essays from scholars and cultural critics working on the meanings of monuments and memorials in the second decade of the twenty-first century, a time of great social and political change. The book presents a broad view of the challenges facing individuals and society in making sense of public monuments with contested meanings. From the United States to Europe to Africa to Australia and New Zealand to South America and beyond, the contributors tackle the ways in which different places approach monuments in a landscape where institutions and ideas are under direct challenge from political and social unrest. It also discusses sharply changed attitudes about the representation of history and memory in the public sphere. The goal is to acknowledge shared experiences through a wider perspective; to contribute to the work of the world-wide heritage community; and to document the history and shifting cultural attitudes towards monument culture across the world, encouraging a more informed approach to monuments and their meanings especially for the public and those outside of academia.

Dot Dot Dot 7

Author: Stuart Bailey
Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
ISBN: 9789077620014
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 108

Book Description
Dot Dot Dot is not your father's design magazine -- a high-gloss tombstone with decontextualized, overproduced work by the "usual suspects." Instead, what you'll find is a groundbreaking journal that fills a longstanding gap in graphic arts publishing: a venue for creative, interdisciplinary journalism on subjects that affect the way we think about and make design. We're proud to add it to our growing catalog of books and journals. For each issue, Dot Dot Dot invites a multidiscipllinary group of contributors to both write and design pieces about the past, present, and future of visual culture. Smart, passionate, and imaginatively designed, Dot Dot Dot is for graphic designers and anyone interested in the creative practice of the visual arts. Issue 7 includes "The Problem with Posters" by Rob Giampietro, "Mexico 1968/Rotterdam 2003" by Peter Bilak, "'Landy's (Failed) Gesture' and the General Intellect" by J.J. King, "The Every Day Story of Flesh-Eating, Blood-Sucking Freaks" by Steve Rushton (with John Russell), "Eno and the Long Now" by Michael Bracewell (with Brian Eno and Lucy McKenzie), and "Writing on Money" by Paul Elliman, among others.