Methuen Monographs (a bibliography)
Methuen Monographs that have passed across my bookshelves.
Where two dates are given, the former is for the first edition,
and the latter is for the actual edition or reprint at hand.
| F.J.M.Farley (1956, 1959). |
|
Elements of Pulse Circuits,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| D.G.Kiely (1953). |
|
Dielectric Aerials,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| H.Motz (1951). |
|
Electromagnetic Problems of Microwave Theory,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| D.A.Wright (1950,1958). |
|
Semi-conductors,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| H.J.Josephs (1946, 1957). |
|
Heavyside's Electric Circuit Theory,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| F.Brailsford (1948). |
|
Magnetic Materials,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| A.Sommer (1946). |
|
Photoelectric Cells,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| L.C.Jackson (1944,1960). |
|
Wave Filters,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
| A.W.Porter (1931, 1946). |
|
Thermodynamics,
Methuen Monographs, London, UK. |
Observers Books (a bibliography)
Observers Books that still remain on my bookshelves.
| W.J.Stokoe (). |
|
Butterflies,
Observer's Books, Vol.3, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| W.J.Stokoe (1937, 1864). |
|
Trees,
Observer's Books, Vol.4, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| W.J.Stokoe (pre-1958, 1965). |
|
Wild Animals,
Observer's Books, Vol.5, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| A.Laurence Wells (1941, 1962). |
|
Freshwater Fishes,
Observer's Books, Vol.6, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| S.M.Lampson (1970, 1972). |
|
Dogs,
Observer's Books, Vol.8, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| I.O.Evans (). |
|
Geology,
Observer's Books, Vol.10, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| F.E.Dodman (1964). |
|
Ships,
Observer's Books, Vol.15, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| L.A.Lanwaring (1965). |
|
Automobiles,
Observer's Books, Vol.21, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| R.M.Lester (1955, 1967). |
|
Weather,
Observer's Books, Vol.22, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| S.H..Scott (1958). |
|
Cacti and Other Succulents,
Observer's Books, Vol.27, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| T.B..Bagenal (1972,1974). |
|
Sea Fishes,
Observer's Books, Vol.28, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| I.O.Evans (1962, 1964). |
|
Sea and Seashore,
Observer's Books, Vol.31, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| P.Moore (1962, 1964). |
|
Astonomy,
Observer's Books, Vol.32, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| J.Hatley (1972). |
|
Zoo Animals,
Observer's Books, Vol.45, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| R.Turnill (1972). |
|
Manned Spaceflight,
Observer's Books, Vol.48, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| R.Turnill (1974). |
|
Unmanned Spaceflight,
Observer's Books, Vol.52, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
| H.Priestley (1976). |
|
Ancient and Roman Britain,
Observer's Books, Vol.56, Frederick Warne, London, UK. |
Oxford University Press Very Short Introductions (a bibliography)
Oxford University Press A Very Short Introduction that still remain on my bookshelves.
These books are extremely good not only for giving a succinct introduction to the subject,
but for providing a structured skeleton
upon which to hang one's own thoughts and notes and cross-referencing, (particularly by use of marginalia).
| T. Pink (2004). |
|
Free Will, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.110,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-285358-5, 132pp.
The first half the book are spent introducing the work of Aquinas, Hobbes, et al,
and the conclusion that either actions and events are deterministic, and can be traced back to a prior cause,
or else they are random.
At page 82 the option is raised that there must be a third possibility,
and then spends the rest of the book wondering what it might be.
To me, it seems that it should be an edge-of-chaos liquid phase
between the determisitic crystalline phase and the random gaseous phase.
Surprisingly, the author does not mention Libet, or neural nets,
or Turing's (et al) work on morphogenesis (and gastrulatation, and patterns on cow's hides),
or Prigogine's work on patterns in out of equilibrium chemical reactions.
A self-organising region in the agent's brain that is initiating, or vetoing, the action.
A network of neurons, no individual one of which can be pointed to reducibly as being the original cause.
There is a brief mention of the overlap with the related discussions on consciousness, understanding, rationality,
and freedom (p109).
Indeed, this does seem to tie in with what Blackmore led up to about the role of memes in Consciousness
(before she concluded that consciousness might just be an illusion),
and Magee said about the role of propositional language in rational thought,
which keyed into what Mumford&Anjum said about causation,
and the role of the invention of writing in the emergence of human consciousness. |
| C. Janaway (1994, 2002). |
|
Schopenhauer, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.62,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-280259-0, 137 pp.
Janaway's attitude to his biographical subject, is summed up in the last paragraph of the book:
"Though Schopenhauer's metaphysics is not credible as a system (...)
Schopenhauer's is a unique and powerful philosophical voice that still deserves to be heard."
Schopenhauer's concept of Will seems to resonate with that of Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker. |
| C. Gosden (2018, 2003). |
|
Prehistory, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.96,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-880351-5, 132 pp.
Paraphrasing two lines (on pages 107 and 84):
A rethinking of our deep past is underway,
away from the old "path of continuous progress" view,
which has been challenged both from empirical evidence,
and by new thoughts on what it means to be human.
In particular, art is not a passive reflection of the world, but a means of shaping thought and action in it.
Statues, carvings, and paintings (and aestheically pleasing tools and other artefacts)
might be better seen as experiments rather than representations,
as people tried to understand how the world works,
and how they could work in the world. |
| P. Wilson (2004). |
|
Hieroglyphs, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.113,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-280502-7, 130pp.
We are immediately aware of the inefficiency of the writing form,
and the need to draw in even the individual feathers on the hieroglyph for a quail chick, falcon, owl, sparrow.
However, what we call Hieroglyphic text, the scribes simply referred to it as "Words of Gods",
so only understood by the gods.
The funeral chamber of a pharaoh would have been thought of as being a loud chatter of the walls
continuously speaking their texts to the gods. |
| S. Blackmore (2017, 2005). |
|
Consciousness, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.121,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-879473-8, 146pp.
An excellent tying together of most of the central ideas that have been around since the 1990s.
For me, though, the book should have ended at the inset box about memes,
and to have left out the final five pages in which the author argues that consciousness is, deep down,
all an illusion. For me, the explanation is more to be found in those memes, and mankind's invention of writing. |
| P. Atkins (2010). |
|
The Laws of Thermodynamics, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.226,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-957219-9, 103 pp.
At last, a book that has been able to explain to me
the purpose of the definitions of enthalpy, Gibbs free energy,
and the workings of Kelvin's Carnot-efficiency thermometer.
Moreover, there appears to be an intriguing connection between
the way that the demagnetised and magnetised curves of entropy against temperature necessarily converging at T=0,
to adhere to the third law of thermodynamics,
and the way that the electric current against voltage curves necessarily change quadrants exactly at the origin,
to adhere to the first law of thermodynamics. |
| K. Kalinak (2023, 2010). |
|
Film Music, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.231,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-762803-4, 152pp.
Primarily about music for the big screen,
but noting that the industry has been evolving to the small screen,
and to commercials and electronics games music for some decades.
As for CDs of film music, there is only one brief mention in the book,
seeming to indicate that it is just part of today's marketing culture
(you paid to see the film, and bought the book, and bought the T-shirt, now buy the CD of the main themes);
but let's note that this is not all negative,
since watching the film is transient, renewable by watching the film again
and by the purchase of souvenirs at the gift-shop. |
| F.A.J.L. James (2010). |
|
Michael Faraday, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.253,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-957431-5, 162pp.
It is surprising to see how positively Faraday's interventions,
in all of his spheres of activity (scientific, academic, social, religious),
were viewed throughout the whole of his life.
A man who showed that when intuitive understanding of new physics fails,
it might be possible to invent a new intuition (the concept of magnetic field lines, in his case)
which can be used even before being put back on a firm mathematical footing (Maxwell's equations, in his case). |
| T. Forest Kelly (2011). |
|
Early Music, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.265,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-973076-6, 130pp.
A great summary of what (I thought) I already knew about it, and a mountain of new stuff that I did not know.
It certainly puts it all into better context for me when I next come to play or listen to one of these pieces. |
| D. Ince (2011). |
|
The Computer, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.292,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-958659-2, 140pp.
A macro-computer is still a computer: each line in a high-level language is a HLL-computer instruction (p27)
as is each click on a link for a multiprocessor computer out on the Internet (p58)
and the danger facing society is that of the cloud ending up as a centralised, albeit remote and multiprocessor, computer
with only dumb terminals in the hands of the individual users (p126).
Meanwhile, the functional programming instruction sets of the 1980s (p118), and more recently with quantum and DNA computing,
attempt to shake us out of the rigid von Neuman model. |
| A. King (2012). |
|
Stars, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.322,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-960292-6, 120pp.
What hit me most from this book is how many parameters of a given star
(mass, orbital velocity, temperature, density, chemical make up, life cycle)
can be gleaned from the seemingly thin stream of invormation that trickles into the astronomer's telescope. |
| I. Stewart (2013). |
|
Symmetry, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.353,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-965198-6, 144 pp.
The importance is not whether something has this symmetry, or that symmetry,
but what group of symmetries it possesses; this is why, for example, SU(3) is referred to as a symmetry group. |
| S. Mumford, and R. Lill Anjum (2013). |
|
Causation, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.371,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-968443-4, 128pp.
Thanks to this book, I am increasingly impressed by Hume,
and the way that the mosaic view of it (due to David Lewis) keys into the block-universe (eternalist) view of spacetime.
Moreover, the Turing Halting Problem is just a facet of the problem of Inductive Logic,
and whether a pattern discerned in the mosaic can be assumed to apply in a call-by-reference or call-by-value way.
I would just contend the consillatory paragraph on page 68,
noting that since the recognition that energy is the common currency of the universe,
we have known that ice cubes cannot be considered to cool down the drink,
and that the positive time axis runs solely in the direction of the drink warming up the ice cube.
It is also strange that the book never mentions the speed of causality
as the more accurate name for what we normally refer to as the vacuum velecity of light. |
| J. Ismael(2021). |
|
Time, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.684,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-883266-9, 111pp.
Quantum physics has a gaseous view of the time axis, able to run equally in either direction,
and the block-universe view of relativity has a static, crysalline view of the time axis.
Human scales are somewhere between these extremes, at the always interesting edge of chaos,
a chaotically constructive liquid phase.
The perception of the flow of time only encounters the physics time axis
as observations of successive movements of the positions of the hands of the clock, or rotation of the planet on its axis. |
| A. Kahn(2021). |
|
The Short Story, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.688,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-875463-3, 142pp.
Brings home (to me) in what ways The Short Story is not just a normal length story in shortened form,
but a completely flexible form in its own right.
The standard story form that seems characteristic for our species (beginning-middle-end) is still there,
though not necessarily applied in the obvious way. |
| D. Swade (2022). |
|
The History of Computing, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.714,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0-19-883175-4, 140pp.
Previous histories of the computer have been written by technical professionals with no training as historians
(or oaccasionally professional historians with no training in the technical aspects).
By implication (he never states it explicitly) Swade's account is a remedy to this; certainly a very enjoyable read. |
| P. Coles (2001). |
|
Cosmology, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.51,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0192854162. |
| M. Redfern (2003). |
|
The Earth, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0192803078. |
| M. O'Shea (2005). |
|
The Brain, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0192853929. |
| J. Gribbin (2008). |
|
Galaxies, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0199234349. |
| D.A. Rothery (2010). |
|
Planets, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0199573509. |
| K. Blundell (2015). |
|
Black holes, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0199602667. |
| D.A. Rothery (2015). |
|
Moons, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0198735274. |
| R. Passingham (2016). |
|
Cognitive Neuroscience, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0198786221. |
| J. Binney (2016). |
|
Astrophysics, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0198752851. |
| P.I. Palmer (2017). |
|
The Atmosphere, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0198722038. |
| F. Close (2023). |
|
Particle Physics, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.nnn,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0192873750. |
| J.K. Foster (2026). |
|
Memory, A Very Short Introduction, Vol.194,
Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, ISBN: 978-0198898412. |
Cambridge University Press Student's Guides (a bibliography)
Cambridge University Press Student's Guides that still remain on my bookshelves.
| S.M.Moser, P-N.Chen (2012). |
|
A Student's Guide to Coding and Information Theory,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-107-60196-3.
To quote the first paragraph, "systems dedicated to the communication (in space or time)
information are commonplace in everyday life."
Perhaps processing, too, can be considered to be a type of communication,
related to adding redundancy or data compression. |
| D.S.Lemons (2013). |
|
A Student's Guide to Entropy,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-107-65397-9.
To quote the last and first paragraphs in the book,
"Entropy is an additive measure of the number of possibilities available to a system."
and is thereby a parameter to "quantify the irreversibility of a thermodynamic process."
ToC= thermodynamic entropy, statistical entropy, entropy of classical systems, entropy of quanized systems,
entropy of a non-isolated system, entropy of a fermion system,
entropy of systems of bosons, entropy of information. |
| J.F.James (1995, 2011). |
|
A Student's Guide to Fourier Transforms,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-0-521-17683-5.
The significance of Fourier transforms is summed up by the first two sentences of the book,
"Ninety percent of all physics is concerned with vibrations and waves of one sort or another.
The same basic thread runs through most branches of physical science,
from acoustics through engineering, fluid mechanics, optics, electromagnetic theory
and X-rays to quantum mechanics and information theory." |
| P.Hamill (2014). |
|
A Student's Guide to Lagrangians and Hamiltonians,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-107-61752-0.
To quote from p4, "the only general technique for solving the equations of motion
is the procedure embodied in the Hamilton-Jacobi equations.
All of the solutions (such as those encountered at school) are special cases involving very simple acceleration." |
| D.Fleisch (2008). |
|
A Student's Guide to Maxwell's Equations,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-521-70147-1.
This book presents an excellent stepping through of the meaning of each term in each equation
(in both differential and integral forms). |
| D.Fleisch (2020). |
|
A Student's Guide to the Schrödinger Equation,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-108-81978-7.
To quote from p105, "in classical physics, ...
regions in which an object's potential energy exceeds it total energy are called 'classically forbidden'
but in quantum mechanics, solving Schrödinger's Equations in (such regions)
leads to perfectly acceptable wavefunctions... (and) decay exponebtially with distance within those regions."
|
| D.Fleisch (2012). |
|
A Student's Guide to Vectors and Tensors,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-0-521-17190-8.
ToC= vectors, vector operations, vector applications, covariant and contravariant vector components,
higher-rank tensors, tenor applications. |
| D.Fleisch and L.Kinnaman (2015). |
|
A Student's Guide to Waves,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, ISBN 978-1-107-64326-0.
An odometer is to displacement as speed is to velocity (no accounting for direction changes);
and therefore as a time-traveller's body-clock is to time,
and entropy increase is to bits being erased, and memory is to history. |
|
Miscellaneous other bibliographies
|
