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by Sharon Seitz, Adrian Benepe
ISBN: 0881506214
Binding/Media: Paperback - 282 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Gently read copy with with light reading wear. This is an EX LIBRARY copy in a very good condition. Library markings present, no additional markings.
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by William T. Keeton, James L. Gould (Editor: James L. Gould)
ISBN: 0393955389
Binding/Media: Paperback - 1294 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. This copy is in a very good condition. No writing, no highlighting. Minimal reading wear.
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Customer Reviews
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Still the best Biological text
Rating  (5)
Date: 2009-06-02
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book is timeless, and is still the best biological introduction and long term reference.
Keep this book once you have finished with it!
Supplements other subjects just as well.
Derek
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Thorough text at intelligent level
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-12-14
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I'm just through reading the first half of Vol. 1, but I am so far impressed with its thoroughness and clarity. When I looked at other biology text books for self-study, many seemed padded with extraneous material and gimmicks. Worse, these texts talked down to the reader. "Biological Sciences" is not chatty in a forced attempt to be 'relevant' but instead makes demands on the reader without being willfully obscure. Even better, the pages are not full of fashionable white space, but packed with text. The only caveat I have is that since 1996, surely many developments have cropped up since this last edition. But for basics, this is top notch.
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Excellent preparation for the AP Test
Rating (5)
Date: 1999-07-09
16 out of 24 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book is a treasure. I used it several years ago as a sophomore in high school to prepare for the AP Examination in Biology. Wonderfully illustrated, exceptionally written, and very easy to use! I got a "5" on the exam, which is the highest score attainable... I think that speaks for itself!
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by J. H. van Lint, R. M. Wilson
ISBN: 0521803403
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 550 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. This is a gently read copy in a very good condition. No writing, no highlighting.
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Customer Reviews
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A real math book
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-01-11
4 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
I am a lover of combinatorics, and I have read quite a few on the topic. This one is as good as any. Lucidly written, you can pretty much dive into any chapter, reading, scribbling, racking your brain, and come away with a deep sense of satisfaction and pride and vanity:). Price is so resonable with regard for its extensive content. You get a feel that the author really wants to share with readers his love and joy for the subject and not just to make some money. Thank you, my dear professors!
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Excellent book, but organized in a unorthodox and inconvenient manner
Rating  (4)
Date: 2006-06-11
8 out of 8 customers found this reveiw helpful
I think this is an excellent book but I have a few concerns about its organization.
The writing is very clear and there is a lot of explanation. Exercises are mixed in with the text, which I like very much; it makes them seem more natural, and it makes the book well-suited for self-study. I would say the difficulty level of this book is a bit inconsistent--but this is more a function of the material than of the writing style. The authors make everything as clear as possible, but they choose to include some difficult topics which require more thought.
My main criticism of this book is about the order of topics, which is not only unorthodox but can be inconvenient as well. Many concepts which are often presented earlier in combinatorics texts, such as binomial coefficients and stirling numbers, are relegated to later chapters, where their presentation depends on results from earlier chapters. I find it difficult to skip around in this book--if you do not read it from the beginning, in order, it will be hard to follow the arguments in some of the chapters. This sort of dependency is something I can accept in a more advanced text but I think is inappropriate for a text at this level.
I think this is an excellent book to add to your collection, but if you're going to grab only one or two books in combinatorics I would recommend other books. The organization issues I mentioned could make this book hard to use as a standalone text for a course if you did not wish to follow the same course of development chosen by the authors. Cameron's book is written at a similar level and covers a similar amount of material (although it has a very different style of presentation), and it is much easier to skip around in. Stanley's "Enumerative Combinatorics" is a denser, more advanced text that most will find more difficult to follow than this book, but it is still easier to skip around in as well.
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A nice tour of combinatorics
Rating (5)
Date: 2003-11-19
13 out of 14 customers found this reveiw helpful
The first word that comes to my mind when I think of this text is "encyclopedic". It contains around 40 chapters, hitting most of the high points of combinatorics that a graduate student should see. The exposition is generally good with nice examples. The one thing that I fault it for is the number of statements that the authors claim are "obvious". In a way, this is good, because it makes you pay attention and understand the material, but sometimes the statement isn't obvious until you've thought about it for an hour and written out a lengthy proof. At that point, it does become completely obvious and you can't believe that you ever thought it wasn't, so I can understand why van Lint and Wilson fell into the trap so often. (In fact, I've heard that Wilson even stumbles over some of those points in lectures.) This is a great book to have on your shelf if you need somewhere to look up combinatorial ideas.
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A gentle introduction to combinatorics
Rating (4)
Date: 2000-07-22
34 out of 37 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book was the text for a graduate-level course I took. The presentation is very laid-back, much like the lecturing style of one of the authors (Wilson), and so it was quite readable (unlike many other math books which you have to stop every few pages and pick apart everything before it sinks in).Combinatorics is a relatively recent development in mathematics, one which is generally easy to explain, but with many difficult open questions. Van Lint and Wilson do an excellent job explaining, but there are a few places where the reader needs to know some background to place the particular problem in the appropriate mathematical context. Understandably, if the authors were to include all the mathematical machinery needed, the book would be huge! Instead, they have chosen to describe as many facets of the field as possible, and therefore have written a broad, well-balanced book which approaches the topic in a non-threatening way. My one criticism, then, is that there is a lack of depth in several areas of the book, with further discussion of advanced topics or open problems. But even so, I can appreciate the omission for the sake of accessibility. To fully appreciate the subject, the authors are correct in mentioning that the book is written with the graduate student in mind. But by no means does the reader require such a background to appreciate the remarkable concepts and the exciting questions revealed in this book.
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Proof that you can't judge a book by its cover
Rating (5)
Date: 1998-12-21
47 out of 66 customers found this reveiw helpful
The cover says, "...ideally suited for use as a text...at the advanced undergraduate or beginning graduate level." WRONG!! I'm a sixteen year old-- far from graduate school-- and I am reading, understanding, and LOVING this book. I cannot think of a greater introduction to combinatorics-- it has examples and problems to test your comprehension, and logical flow from one subject to another. This book is a rare find-- clear explanations and definitions at a fast pace that doesn't bore you. I would recommend this book unconditionally to ANYBODY interested in mathematics.
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by Dr. John Pernetta
ISBN: 1552979423
Binding/Media: Paperback - 240 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. EX LIBRARY copy in a good condition. Light reading wear. No marking other than the Library markings.
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Customer Reviews
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Wish all non-fiction was presented this well...
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-12-26
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Simply put, this is a fantastic little book. The subjects covered are well-written and well-illustrated. While the topics may be further detailed in a graduate level coursebook, I prefer the easier to carry, condensed yet readable, straightforward text in this guide. I wish I'd had books like this available throughout my high-school, university, and post-graduate years.
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by Clive Roots
ISBN: 031333546X
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 256 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. No publisher marks, no shelf wear.
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by Albert Einstein (Introduction: Roger Penrose) (Commentary: Robert Geroch)
ISBN: 0452287847
Binding/Media: Paperback - 288 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Previously UNREAD copy which has been removed from our store shelves.
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Customer Reviews
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An augmented version of Einstein's book for a general audience
Rating (4)
Date: 2010-06-12
There are many versions of Einstein's book on relativity, written for a general audience. This book was written in 1916, in German and then translated into English. The book being reviewed here uses a 1920 edition, but it is far from being the newest one that Einstein wrote. The newest, the 15th edition, was written in 1952, and it is the most complete, as it contains several appendices that are not in earlier editions, as well as some corrections of errors that appeared in earlier editions. I have read both the 15th edition and this one, and if you want the best version of Einstein's text I would definitely get the 15th edition, as opposed to the one being reviewed here. However, the edition being reviewed here has been augmented with new material, and I think that this makes it a better choice than the 15th edition.
This book contains an interesting introduction by Roger Penrose, which provides some insights concerning Relativity Theory and the cosmological advances that have grown out of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. The book contains lengthy commentaries by Robert Geroch that clarify many of Einstein's chapters. Finally, there is an essay by David Cassidy on the "Cultural Legacy of Relativity Theory". In my opinion these additions more than make up for the appendices that are provided in the more complete 15th edition of Einstein's book.
I liked this book and recommend it over the 15th edition, but I cannot give it 5 stars. I found Einstein's prose to be typical of 19th century scientific prose, that is to say somewhat tedious and less than clear. This is especially true of the latter half of the book, which is devoted to the General Theory. To make matters worse, it was originally written in German and may have lost some clarity in the translation. There is a final chapter on cosmology that, because of the rapid advances in this field, make this section largely only of historical interest.
I recommend this book if you really want to read Einstein, albeit in translation, but there are better choices if you want an introduction to Relativity Theory. If you want a better introductory treatment of Relativity, I highly recommend Martin Gardners "Relativity Simply Explained" and if you want an introductory treatment with a little more scientific detail (but still without any math) I recommend Richard Wolfson's "Simply Einstein - Relativity Demystified".
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Something Important Is Missing.
Rating  (1)
Date: 2009-01-21
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
This version does not have any diagrams, only refs to nonexistant GIF image files.
This is involved stuff here, a reader needs the illistrations.
Please explore the other versions even if they cost more. Without the formula images this is just about unreadable.
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This is a HORRIBLE Kindle Version
Rating (1)
Date: 2008-02-06
5 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
This was my first bad experience with the Kindle. Had I picked this book up at a store, I would've flipped through the pages and realized that it was poorly formated. There are carriage returns at all the wrong places, it's nearly impossible to read. I wish I'd paid a few bucks more and gotten one of the other versions.
If you're a kindle owner - go elsewhere.
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Harder than it needs to be
Rating (1)
Date: 2007-09-01
4 out of 5 customers found this reveiw helpful
This Dodo Press edition is riddled with annoying typos -- even in some equations and variable names. In addition the section numbers referred to in the text are only found in the table of contents, making navigation cumbersome.
A classic like this deserves better. Look for another edition.
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Bah!
Rating (1)
Date: 2007-08-10
9 out of 9 customers found this reveiw helpful
No, Einstein's Relativity IS amazingly brilliant and eloquent, I assure you of this. My review, although, is a buyer beware scenario. I ordered this exact copy of the text and the one that arrived had all sorts of horrendous typos. One? Two? No, more like...a ton. In an example of this, the 'aether' where the character 'ae' is a single one, somehow in the process of printing it, the character got repaced by a space and question mark! So when Einstein talks about the 'process by which the? ther happens...' or some such example, I translate it as 'bad' and not 'aether'.
By all means, buy Einstein's copy of Relativity, but please be cautious when ordering from this particular publisher. I'm unaware of whether or not this problem is widespread, but to those who get the one with the maddening typos riddled all over it, just bear through it and appreciate Einstein's eloquence and not the translator or publisher's, in my own personal opinion, bad spellchecking.
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by Berry D
ISBN: 1588341828
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 176 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Gently read copy with with light reading wear. This is an EX LIBRARY copy in a very good condition. Library markings present, no additional markings.
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Customer Reviews
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A great foundation to begin studying astronomy
Rating (5)
Date: 2010-02-11
I must say that I was a very happy to have stumbled on this book. I have been looking into Astronomy a lot lately and wanted something to act as a good primer, something that not only explained what we currently know about our solar system but our galaxy and, even farther out, our universe, but to also show me. Smithsonian Intimate Guide to the Galaxy did just this and even more than I had hoped.
You are immediately taken aback by the breath taking photos of our solar system. Couple this with the narrative nature of Dana Berry, one as though we were there exploring as we moved farther and farther away from Earth, and you feel as though you have a very good view and understanding of our solar system. In addition the scientific breakthroughs of late as well as the possible future of future exploration was titillating. She moves out in to our greater galaxy, exploring other stars, nebula and so on, all the while explaining succinctly what is currently known as well as what is hypothesized.
I found that by the end of the book I was well primed for further research, to dig further myself and have a very good general base to stand upon. The only drawback of this book is that it was published in 2004 and the field of astronomy/astrophysics advances so much that the book could become dated very fast. She mentions a lot of missions that were either going to be launched, just being launched or will be launched and you want to know what happened to them, what did they discover. So a good primer to research more. A recommend for a very sound base from which to build upon.
5 stars.
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An informative and engaging tour of the Universe!
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-03-23
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
The Smithsonian Intimate Guide to the Cosmos is an informative and engaging read that is more like a personal tour through the Universe with author Dana Berry as our guide. Backed by stunning images, we begin our tour in our own solar system as Barry guides us from there as we pass by the Alpha Centauri system, monstrous black holes, star clusters, and meteors as we drift towards the moment of the Big Bang and the creation of the universe. Barry is an excellent guide and you don't have to know a lot about science/astronomy (or even like it) to be awed and amazed at the wonders of the universe and our place in it. Besides offering an amazing tour Barry also discusses the possibility of life in the universe (how should we communicate with aliens?), spaceflight, how our universe may not be the only one (there may be up to nine others co-existing with ours), the ultimate fate of humans and our home planet and how the universe may one day all end. Though earth may be but a small planet that orbits around a rather average star in the suburbs of the Milky Way, it is still awe-inspiring to learn more about the wonders of the Universe and both its possible origins and ultimate fate. Through astronomy we learn a little more about ourselves. I highly recommend Intimate Guide to the Cosmos to anyone, its engaging and informative and a enlightening read. Here are the chapters:
Chapter 1 - Our Place Among the Stars
Chapter 2 - Earth and Environs
Chapter 3 - Is There Life in Outer Space?
Chapter 4 - Other Planets, Other Suns
Chapter 5 - The Milky Way and Beyond
Chapter 6 - The Starry Messengers
Chapter 7 - The Big Picture
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Truly amazing work
Rating (5)
Date: 2004-11-12
18 out of 18 customers found this reveiw helpful
Well, it is very comforting to know that the Universe will not end in a "big crunch" and that the Sun will not run out of hydrogen for another five billion years. But jokes aside, didn't you ever wanted to ask someone who knows about life universe and everything, and get a real answer illustrated with awesome pictures? Didn't you ever wanted to listen to someone telling the story of cosmos in a clear, understandable, yet scientific language with all the terminology and the buzz words? Didn't you ever try to read about latest discovery in astrophysics just to find out that the writer either overloads you with the facts that you would never understand anyway or tells it in such baby terms that you fall asleep before finishing the second sentence? For a person who has always been interested in the secrets of the Universe but never had enough time to keep up with the scientific news, for a person who wants to dazzle his kids with explanations how the stars work but realizes that the phrase "they are very hot" no longer cuts it, for a person like myself, this book is a real treasure. What made this book so unique is author's amalgamation of skills and experience. He is a talented artist, knowledgeable scientist, and a great writer with unbelievable access to the vast graphical material some of which he probably created himself during his association with Hubble and Chandra programs. This book should be in every household. It is a fantastic reference to the world around us from Sun to the back wall of the Universe and even beyond.
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by Allen Angel
ISBN: 0201549964
Binding/Media: Paperback
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. No writing, no highlighting. This is a used copy with reading/ shelf wear.
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by Robert Kaplan, Ellen Kaplan
ISBN: 0195176065
Binding/Media: Paperback - 336 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. No publisher marks, no writing. Minimal shelf/ reading wear.
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Customer Reviews
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Math errors found in the book
Rating  (2)
Date: 2010-01-29
1. On page 98, the authors mis-define what they call a tower, defining it as x raised to the x-th power, then that raised to the x-th power, and so on and so on. In other words, if f(n) is defined to be the value of the tower after n steps, then:
f(n+1) = f(n)^x, for every positive integer n.
However, with that definition, and x= sqrt(2), the tower's terms quickly diverge - A spread sheet shows that f(20) is greater than 10 to the 108-th power. Instead, they should have defined the tower by the rule:
g(n+1) = x^g(n), for every positive integer n.
With that definition, and x = sqrt(2) the series {g(n)} converges to the number 2, as they claim. Indeed, a spread sheet shows that g(20) is approximately 1.999586. Also, with this new definition, the book's proof is legitimate, because the proof used the rule:
x^y = y, where y is the limiting value of the tower as n approaches infinity. That equation is not true with the book's definition of y, because it uses f(n) instead of g(n).
The heart of the matter is that the operation of taking successive powers is not "associative", even when the sequence is finite. For example,
(3^3)^3 = 27^3 = 19683, and that is not equal to
3^(3^3) = 3^27 = 7.6256E+12. Associativity fails!
2. The first term in the equation at the top of page 97 should be 1 - 1/2,
not (1 - 1/2)/2.
George Monser
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an infinity of infinities
Rating (4)
Date: 2007-06-21
It is said that the invention of zero was a fundamental advance for the art of mathematics. And so it is. But at least there is only one zero! The other end of the scale to nothing, is everything - infinity. I guess that we should have expected there to be more than one infinity - even up to an infinity of them. It's just that 'everything' is so hard to define. The set of everything that is male is very large - infinite probably across time as it marches into the future. So too is the set of everything that is female. It can hardly surprise us that these two infinite sets put together produces a greater infinity.
But what sort of a mind does it take to pare this down to the austere elements of logical and mathematical reasoning - to show that it is in fact so - to prove it? And not just once - but over and over again. It is a fascinating story culminating with Georg Cantor - the possessor of the mind and the will.
Still, it nags away at my mind. What practical use can this insight bring?
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Number theory set to poetry
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-12-28
6 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
Fifty years ago, if you were to randomly select a book from the mathematics section in the library, it most likely would have been uniformly colored grey, or some other neutral/dark hue, with a drab but utilitarian title in the language of professional mathematicians. Well, things certainly have changed. The standard grey hardbacks have given way to covers filled with color, while the utilitarian titles - boring in their simplicity - have given way to poetry and hyperbole that would make a thespian blush.
In days past the Kaplan's book would have been called "introduction to number theory. Now, it's called "The art of the infinite." I'd have called it "number theory set to poetry, with story problems."
I selected this book because I thought it might have something to do with infinity. After leafing through it, though, it was immediately apparent that it covers lots more than just the "infinite." I can imagine conversations between the Kaplans and their publisher. Publishers are fond of telling science/mathematics authors that most people won't buy a book with lots of equations, and that they needed to make the cover snazzier by including a catch word like "infinite," or something like that.
Robert and Ellen Kaplan have written what turns out to be a first-rate book, showing that it's possible to make number theory understandable and very interesting. It's particularly fun the way they make frequent use of mental or mathematical "experiments," to tune "intuition" as a means for solving mathematical problems. While this style may offend or at least annoy pure mathematicians, others will see in their examples key insights into how the human mind works through mathematical problems, and how learn. The Kaplans are both accomplished mathematicians, but they are also excellent teachers.
The authors used geometry and pictures to show how to construct the counting numbers, the set of integers (positive and negative), the rational numbers, the real numbers, and finally complex numbers. The interesting thing about this book is that the reader learns all this stuff while having fun with some of the most interesting mathematical asides you can imagine.
Yes, infinity does enter into the book. Again, the Kaplans do a masterful job of describing the mathematics of sets. It's a common misconception that infinity is a number - many (most?) people don't understand that it's a quality of sets. You will, though, after reading this book.
The book is chuck full of diagrams, and plenty of equations, too. It's an easy book to understand (for the most part) but it's not for intellectual slouches, either. Mostly, I found the explanations to be clear and understandable, with the exception of the chapter that deals with perspective. I was able to glean new concepts from the chapter, but I think I would have been lost, had I not already understood the subject fairly well before I read the book.
When you get to the end, don't stop reading. The Appendix has some of the most interesting and worthwhile reading in the book.
I've criticized other authors for being too poetic with their math books. The Kaplans do it a lot, but they manage to do it in a way that doesn't interfere with understanding the key mathematical concepts.
Needless to say, I highly recommend this book for anyone who enjoys mathematics, and wants to brush up on what numbers mean, how we invented them, and how to have fund with counting - and a whole lot of other stuff.
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An excellent tome... entertaining.
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-07-30
1 out of 5 customers found this reveiw helpful
This is an excellent tome... entertaining. Written with whit and charm, it gives one pause for thought and contains a lovely subtle humor... which is too bad for the authors as this dooms the book to wide rejection from those who are still in need of redrafting their sixth grade expositions on 'Where The Red Fern Grows'... too bad, too bad. Now, will those of you who are playing in the match this afternoon move your clothes down onto the lower peg immediately after lunch, before you write your letter home, if you're not getting your hair cut, unless you've got a younger brother who is going out this weekend as the guest of another boy, in which case, collect his note before lunch, put it in your letter after you've had your hair cut, and make sure he moves your clothes down onto the lower peg for you... ok?
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Good but really for math buffs
Rating (4)
Date: 2005-04-29
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book trys to present math to the millions and does a pretty good job. It is simple and sometimes witty but often the literary allusions intrude and the text bogs down in pages of relentless math--lovely if you like it and horrid if you don't. If you already know alot of math you will still probably find the discussions of general math, geometry, projective geometry, and infinite series to be a nice refresher. If you don't know any and don't have a natural talent for it, you will find it very dense or impossible. Being somewhere in the middle I skimmed thru most of it and slowed down when it got interesting. If you have only a little time I would suggest the last chapter 'The Abyss` about Georg Cantor and transfinite arithmetic.
At points they wax philosophical and ask the perennial question: is math is out there in the world or in here in our heads. Why not ask this about art or music or literature or computer programs or philosophy itself? In a very general way math must come from the same place that words and ideas and images come from---our brain evolved to make them and they must in many ways(every way?) reflect the structure of our brains, which reside in our dna which was shaped by natural selection which was shaped by the geology of the earth and the structure of our universe which comes from particle physics which comes from the laws of nature which are just there.
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