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For anyone whose best-laid plans have been foiled by faulty thinking, Blunder reveals how understanding seven simple traps-Exposure Anxiety, Causefusion, Flat View, Cure-Allism, Infomania, Mirror Imaging, Static Cling-can make us all less apt to err in our daily lives.
For the second time this decade, the U.S. economy id sinking into a recession due to the collapse of a financial bubble. The most recent calamity will lead to a downturn deeper and longer than the stock market crash of 2001. Dean Baker's Plunder and Blunder chronicles the growth and collapse of the stock and housing bubbles and explains how policy blunders and greed led to the catastrophic --but completely predictable --market meltdowns. An expert guide to recent economic history, Baker offers policy prescriptions to help prevent similar financial disasters.
"Drawing on the lives of five great scientists -- Charles Darwin, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Linus Pauling, Fred Hoyle and Albert Einstein -- scientist/author Mario Livio shows how even the greatest scientists made major mistakes and how science built on these errors to achieve breakthroughs, especially into the evolution of life and the universe"--
With unrivalled political savvy and a keen sense of irony, distinguished political scientists Anthony King and Ivor Crewe open our eyes to the worst government horror stories and explain why the British political system is quite so prone to appalling mistakes.
The 'bonus rule' of 1953-1957 required baseball players who signed a contract for more than $4,000 to remain on the major league roster for two full seasons. Kelley tells the stories of the 'bonus babies' who reaped the benefits, and the others whose careers were destroyed by the rule.
Engaging with a critical analysis of the base and superstructure thesis, regarding which a surprising number of reputed Marxist thinkers betray a perpetual ambivalence – by frequently deploying it in a variety of contexts, but simultaneously airing various reservations about it – this book proposes a radical departure from the presently predominant understanding of it. The popular view of the base as comprising economics, and superstructure as encompassing almost all other spheres of social life, is criticised as “panoramic”, or “panoptic”, or the “extended” version, to which Marx’s rigorously defined base of production relations and superstructure of politico-legal spheres is juxtaposed. Revisiting Marx’s formulations in his famous 1859 Preface, described here as his purloined letters, the study rehabilitates his restricted version, and upholds its conceptual superiority over its extended avatar that is currently ubiquitous. The substitution of Marx’s restricted version with the widely believed extended version of the thesis is characterised here as a blunder, and this book traces the biography of this blunder, through the intricate and tortuous theoretical developments that traverse a transnational and multidisciplinary territory, constituting the history of Marxism. The last chapter argues for a paradigm shift, in favour of the mode of production thesis, in order to redeem the holistic vision of Marx. This shift is necessitated by the extenuation of the status of the base and superstructure thesis that results from the restoration of Marx’s restricted version. This chapter grapples with the issues involved in preparing the ground for that shift. It also contends that, although these theoretical shifts are never formulated in a conscious and conclusive manner – as is done here – the best practices in Marxist analyses are always inspired by the methodological implications of the mode of production thesis, and, for this reason, the thesis is claimed to be the “conceptual unconscious of Marxism”.
The Indian military setback against the Chinese attack in 1962 was high time for an honest soul-searching. Quite a few books written by Army officers have tried to tell their version of the untold story. Brig. Dalvi's account of the Sino-Indian War is by far the most remarkable and authentic. He was present in the theatre of war throughout, commanded a brigade and was held captive by the Chinese for seven months. In discussing the day-to-day events from 8 September to 20 October 1962 the author graphically tells the truth which only an actual participant could experience and know. The background of the war is drawn from his first-hand information as a high-ranking commander.
BLOOPER: BALL SQUIRTS THROUGH BILLY BUCKNER'S LEGS. BLUNDER: BILLY BUCKNER'S MANAGER LEFT HIM IN THE GAME. Baseball bloopers are fun; they're funny, even. A pitcher slips on the mound and his pitch sails over the backstop. An infielder camps under a pop-up...and the ball lands ten feet away. An outfielder tosses a souvenir to a fan...but that was just the second out, and runners are circling the bases (and laughing). Without these moments, the highlight reels wouldn't be nearly as entertaining. Baseball blunders, however, can be tragic, and they will leave diehard fans asking why...why...why? Rob Neyer's Big Book of Baseball Blunders does its best to answer all those whys, exploring the worst decisions and stupidest moments of managers, general managers, owners, and even commissioners. As he did in his Big Book of Baseball Lineups, Rob Neyer provides readers with a fascinating examination of baseball's rich history, this time through the lens of the game's sometimes hilarious, often depressing, and always perplexing blunders. · Which ill-fated move cost the Chicago White Sox a great hitter and the 1919 World Series? · What was Babe Ruth thinking when he became the first (and still the only) player to end a World Series by getting caught trying to steal? · Did playing one-armed Pete Gray in 1945 cost the Browns a pennant? · How did winning a coin toss lead to the Dodgers losing the National League pennant on Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard 'round the World"? · How damaging was the Frank Robinson-for-Milt Pappas deal, really? · Which of Red Sox manager Don Zimmer's mistakes in 1978 was the worst? · Which Yankees trade was even worse than swapping Jay Buhner for Ken Phelps? · What non-move cost Buck Showalter a job and gave Joe Torre the opportunity of a lifetime? · Game 7, 2003 ALCS: Pedro winds up to throw his 123rd pitch...what were you thinking? These are just a few of the legendary (and not-so-legendary) blunders that Neyer analyzes, always with an eye on what happened, why it happened, and how it changed the fickle course of history. And in separate chapters, Neyer also reviews some of the game's worst trades and draft picks and closely examines all the teams that fell just short of first place. Another in the series of Neyer's Big Books of baseball history, Baseball Blunders should win a place in every devoted fan's library.
From a bold voice in African fiction comes a satirical and unputdownable reimagining of an overlooked episode in Cameroon's colonial past. Cameroon, 1929. As colonial powers fight for influence in Africa, French military surgeon Eugène Jamot is dispatched to Cameroon to lead the fight against sleeping sickness there. But despite his humanitarian intentions, the worst comes to pass: seven hundred local villagers are left blind as a result of medical malpractice by a doctor under Jamot's watch. Damienne Bourdin, a young white woman, ventures to Cameroon to assist in the treatment effort. Reeling from the loss of her child, she's desperate to redeem herself and save her reputation. But the tides of rebellion are churning in Cameroon, and soon after Damienne's arrival, she is enlisted in a wild plot to staunch the damage caused by the blunder and forestall tribal warfare. Together with Ndongo, a Pygmy guide, she must cross the country on foot in search of Edoa, a Cameroonian princess and nurse who has gone missing since the medical blunder was discovered. As Damienne races through the Cameroonian forest on a farcical adventure that unsettles her sense of France's "civilizing mission," she begins to question her initial sense of who needed saving and who would save the day.
