Finding the "Lost Continent" 2. Africa's Many Natural Environments 3. A Virtual Tour of the Great Land 4. The Cradle of Humankind 5. Crops, Cattle, Iron-Taming a Continent 6. Kinship and Community-Societies Take Shape 7. Like Nothing Else-The Ancient Nile Valley 8. Soul and Spirit-Religion in Africa 9. Ethiopia-Outpost of Christianity 10. West Africa's "Golden Age" 11. The Swahili Commercial World 12. Great Zimbabwe and the Cities of the South 13. The Atlantic Slave Trade-The Scope 14. The Atlantic Slave Trade-The Impact 15. South Africa-The Dutch Cape Colony 16. South Africa-The Zulu Kingdom 17. South Africa-The Frontier and Unification 18. South Africa-Diamonds and Gold 19. Prelude to the "Scramble for Africa" 20. European Conquest and African Resistance 21. Colonial Africa-New Realities 22. Colonial Africa-Comparisons and Change 23. The Lion Awakens-The Rise of Nationalism 24. The Peaceful Paths to Independence 25. The Congo-Promise and Pain 26. Segregation to Apartheid in South Africa 27. The Armed Struggles for Independence 28. The First Taste of Freedom 29. The Taste Turns Sour 30. The World Turns Down-The "Permanent Crisis" 31. A New Dawn? The Democratic Revival 32. The South African Miracle 33. The Unthinkable-The Rwanda Genocide 34. The New Plague-HIV/AIDS in Africa 35. Zimbabwe-Background to Contemporary Crisis 36. Africa Found

    Gleick's story begins at the turn of the twentieth century with the young H. G. Wells writing and rewriting the fantastic tale that became his first book, an international sensation, The Time Machine. A host of forces were converging to transmute the human understanding of time, some philosophical and some technological the electric telegraph, the steam railroad, the discovery of buried civilizations, and the perfection of clocks. Gleick tracks the evolution of time travel as an idea in the culture from Marcel Proust to Doctor Who, from Woody Allen to Jorge Luis Borges. He explores the inevitable looping paradoxes and examines the porous boundary between pulp fiction and modern physics. Finally, he delves into a temporal shift that is unsettling our own moment: the instantaneous wired world, with its all-consuming present and vanishing future.

    Never before in history have we been able to acquire, record, communicate, and use information in so many different forms. Never before have we had access to such vast quantities of data of every kind. This revolution goes far beyond the limitless content that fills our lives, because information also underlies our understanding of ourselves, the natural world, and the universe. It is the key that unites fields as different as linguistics, cryptography, neuroscience, genetics, economics, and quantum mechanics. And the fact that information bears no necessary connection to meaning makes it a profound puzzle that people with a passion for philosophy have pondered for centuries.Table of ContentsLECTURE 1The Transformability of Information 4LECTURE 2Computation and Logic Gates 17LECTURE 3Measuring Information 26LECTURE 4Entropy and the Average Surprise 34LECTURE 5Data Compression and Prefix-Free Codes 44LECTURE 6Encoding Images and Sounds 57LECTURE 7Noise and Channel Capacity 69LECTURE 8Error-Correcting Codes 82LECTURE 9Signals and Bandwidth 94LECTURE 10Cryptography and Key Entropy 110LECTURE 11Cryptanalysis and Unraveling the Enigma 119LECTURE 12Unbreakable Codes and Public Keys 130LECTURE 13What Genetic Information Can Do 140LECTURE 14Life’s Origins and DNA Computing 152LECTURE 15Neural Codes in the Brain 169LECTURE 16Entropy and Microstate Information 185LECTURE 17Erasure Cost and Reversible Computing 198LECTURE 18Horse Races and Stock Markets 213LECTURE 19Turing Machines and Algorithmic Information 226LECTURE 20Uncomputable Functions and Incompleteness 239LECTURE 21Qubits and Quantum Information 253LECTURE 22Quantum Cryptography via Entanglement 266LECTURE 23It from Bit: Physics from Information 281LECTURE 24The Meaning of Information 293

    This is a world tour of prehistory with profound links to who we are and how we live today.2.5 Million Years of HistoryThis 36-lecture narrative covers human prehistory from our beginnings more than 2.5 million years ago up to and beyond the advent of the world's first preindustrial civilizations.Due to the large spans of time and geography covered in this series, these lectures are divided into six sections:Section I: BeginningsThis section surveys the archaic world of the first humans, you travel into the remote past, learning why the late Harvard biologist Stephen Jay Gould was probably right to observe that we all come from the same African twig on the bushy tree of human evolution.You examine prehistory from Australopithecus africanus through Homo habilis (the first tool-making hominid), and Homo erectus (whose remains were first found on Java but whose origins lie in Africa) through the hardy Neanderthals who lived and hunted successfully in Europe despite the bitter grip of the last Ice Age 100,000 and more years ago. You focus on the first human settlement of Africa as early as 800,000 years ago.Section II: Modern HumansThis section tells the story of the great diaspora of anatomically modern humans in the late Ice Age. Whether and how these modern humans spread from the African tropics into southwestern Asia and beyond remains one of the great controversies among scholars of prehistory.You follow Homo sapiens sapiens north into Europe some 45,000 years ago. You meet the Cro-Magnons, among the first known artists as well as hunter-gatherers, who exhibited degrees of spiritual awareness, social interaction, and fluid intelligence.You venture into the frigid open plains of the Ukraine and Eurasia, where big-game hunters flourished in spite of nine-month winters. Moving to the Americas, debate over the origins of the first human settlement continues.Section III: Farmers and HerdersThis section describes perhaps the most important development in all human prehistory: the beginnings of agriculture and animal domestication.This defining chapter began about 12,000 years ago, when hunter-gatherers in the Near East broke from the long human tradition of intensely mobile foraging and turned to more settled ways of life built around cultivating cereal grains or tending animals.Section IV: Eastern Mediterranean CivilizationsProfessor Fagan describes early civilizations in an increasingly complex eastern Mediterranean world, discussing many theories accounting for the appearance of urban civilization and overall attributes of preindustrial civilizations.You examine Sumerian civilization in Mesopotamia and the intricate patchwork of city-states between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. You explore ancient Egypt, the Minoan civilization of Crete, the Mycenaeans, and the Hittites.You learn about the Uluburun shipwreck of southern Turkey, a sealed capsule of international trade from 3,000 years ago.Section V: Africans and AsiansYou analyze the beginnings of South Asian civilization and the mysterious Harappan civilization of the Indus, which traded with Mesopotamia. Professor Fagan resumes the story of South Asian civilization after the collapse of the Harappan and shows how Mauryan rulers on the Ganges encouraged trading much farther afield.You see the impact of monsoons which revolutionized maritime trading among Africa, India, and Southeast Asia, and explore Meroe, Aksum, and the coastal civilization of East Africa.Several lectures cover the beginnings of civilization in China and Southeast Asia.Section VI: Ancient AmericansProfessor Fagan takes you into sophisticated chiefdoms and civilizations that developed in the Americas over the past 3,500 years, including Pueblo cultures of the North American Southwest and the Mississippian culture of the South and Southeast. You learn about Mesoamerican civilization, primordial Olmec culture of the lowlands, and the spectacular ancient Maya civilization.Moving to the highlands, you visit the city-states of Monte Albán in the Valley of Oaxaca and Teotihuacán near the Valley of Mexico. Professor Fagan also describes the rise of Aztec civilization, followed by a journey to the Andes. Finally, you explore the southern highlands, with the rise of Tiwanaku near Lake Titicaca, the Chimu civilization of the coast, and the huge Inka empire.The series closes by analyzing the closing centuries of prehistoric times during the European age of discovery and summarizing the main issues and themes of the course: * What was involved in the archaic world * The appearance and spread of modern humans * Food production * The development of states.

    Professor DeGennaro uses simple analogies to explain the origin of stocks and other securities, as well as their relative risks. He stresses the danger of trying to beat the market by trying to pick winners, predict price trends, or otherwise find opportunities that other investors have missed. Far better, he counsels, to own a well-diversified portfolio of individual stocks or stock funds, which tend to grow as the economy grows. He offers detailed guidance on how to pursue this course.Among the topics covered in these 18 lectures are how to open a brokerage account and choose a financial advisor; the essentials of mutual funds, including index funds, and exchange traded funds (ETFs); how to trade individual stocks, including how to use options; the relative advantages of traditional IRAs, Roth IRAs, and 401(k) plans; how to minimize transaction costs and use tax laws for your benefit; the dangers of frequent trading; and the basics of corporate balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements.For anyone who owns stocks or is thinking of entering the market, this course provides indispensable advice. If you entrust the management of your assets to a financial advisor, this course will give you the background you need to communicate more knowledgeably with him or her and be an informed participant in your own financial well-being.Disclaimer: Please note that this recording may include references to supplemental texts or print references that are not essential to the program and not supplied with your purchase.©2014 The Great Courses (P)2014 The Teaching Company, LLC

    

    Most scholars are historians of either Greek or Roman history and perform research solely in that specific field, an approach that author and award-winning Professor Robert Garland considers questionable.In these 36 passionate lectures, he provides an impressive and rare opportunity to understand the two dominant cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world in relation to one another - a relationship that has virtually no parallel in world history. He shows you how these two very different cultures intersected, coincided, and at times, collided.You'll discover the extraordinary culture that we call Greco-Roman: a unique fusion of civilizations that encompasses statecraft, mythology, language, philosophy, fine arts, architecture, science, and much else. Who were the Greeks and the Romans? How did they organize their societies? How did they interact?In this unique integrated historical approach, you'll see how Greece and Rome's relationship resembled a marriage: two distinct personalities competing in some areas, sharing in others, and sometimes creating a new synthesis of the two civilizations. And you'll consider their more substantive cultural differences, including religion, their views of foreigners, and their ways of thinking.You'll delight in the variety of sources - literature, archaeology, the visual arts, coinage, inscriptions - that Professor Garland draws upon to assemble a fascinating and complex picture of these two great civilizations. And you'll appreciate how he keeps Greece and Rome focused on how this material affects us today.

    

    He describes parenting as “a million different gears turning in a million different directions, all of them covered in sour milk.” In this inspiring and unconventional book of essays, he sheds light on the darker yet hilarious side of domestic life.Owning up to all his mishaps and dumbassery, Edwards shares essays on just about every topic fellow spouses and parents can appreciate, including: stupid things he’s said to his pregnant wife, the trauma of taking a toddler shopping, revelations on buying a minivan and the struggle to not fight the nosy neighbor (who is five years old).Clint’s funny, heartwarming account of the terrifying yet completely rewarding life of a parent is a breath of fresh air. Each essay in I’m Sorry...Love, Your Husband will have you thinking finally, someone gets it.

    Our Inheritance 2. Mendel and Genes 3. Genes and Chromosomes 4. The Search for the GeneDNA 5. DNA Structure and Replication 6. DNA Expression in Proteins 7. Genes, Enzymes, and Metabolism 8. From DNA to Protein 9. Genomes 10. Manipulating GenesRecombinant DNA 11. Isolating Genes and DNA 12. BiotechnologyGenetic Engineering 13. Biotechnology and the Environment 14. Manipulating DNA by PCR and Other Methods 15. DNA in IdentificationForensics 16. DNA and Evolution 17. DNA and Human Evolution 18. Molecular MedicineGenetic Screening 19. Molecular MedicineThe Immune System 20. Molecular MedicineCancer 21. Molecular MedicineGene Therapy 22. Molecular MedicineCloning and Stem Cells 23. Genetics and Agriculture 24. Biotechnology and Agriculture

    Our language even has a word—Machiavellian—that encapsulates the images those responses conjure up: An indistinct figure quietly making his way through the darkest corridors of power, hatching plots to play one rival against another A cold-blooded political liar, ready to justify any duplicity undertaken in the name of a noble end that will ultimately justify the most malignant means A coolly practical leader—amoral at best—willing to do whatever is necessary in a world governed not by ideas of right or wrong, but by solutions dictated by realpolitik.But does the Machiavelli most of us think we know bear any resemblance to the Machiavelli who lived, pondered, and wrote?According to Professor William R. Cook, a reading of Machiavelli that considers only those qualities that we today call "Machiavellian" is incomplete, and Machiavelli himself "certainly would not recognize" such sinister interpretations or caricatures of his writings and beliefs. Indeed, The Prince—on the pages of which so much of this image was built—was not even published in his lifetime.In the 24 lectures that make up Machiavelli in Context, Professor Cook offers the opportunity to meet an extraordinarily thoughtful and sincere student of history and its lessons, and to learn that there is far more to him than can be gleaned from any reading of The Prince, no matter how thorough.Although The Prince is the work by which most of us think we know Machiavelli, and although some have indeed called it the first and most important book of political science ever written, it was not, according to Professor Cook, either Machiavelli's most important work or the one most representative of his beliefs. Those distinctions belong, instead, to his Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy, a longer work started at about the same time and which would, like The Prince, not be published until well after his death."Everyone who has seriously studied the works of Machiavelli agrees that he ... believed in the superiority of a republican form of government, defined as a mixed constitution with elements of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy."Once we recover the context of the writing of The Prince, and analyze it along with the Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy, it will be clear how The Prince can be read as a book designed to guide leaders in the creation—for Machiavelli, restoration—of republican government in Italy."Ultimately, Machiavelli's goal wasn't much different from ours. It was to live in a free and equal participatory society, because he believed that was the greatest way in which human beings could live and flourish."In fact, says Professor Cook, "Machiavelli's republican thought influenced the development of institutions and values both in Europe and in America."To present a complete and well-rounded picture of Machiavelli's ideas on how human societies should be organized and governed, Professor Cook sets aside much of Machiavelli's written output—which included the political work The Art of War, a biography, many letters, and even some plays—to focus on The Prince, the Discourses, and, more briefly, his Florentine Histories.In doing so, Professor Cook draws on the same qualities so evident in his previous courses for The Teaching Company: Tocqueville and the American Experience, Dante's Divine Comedy, Francis of Assisi, and St. Augustine's Confessions.Teaching in the relaxed and informal style of those courses, Professor Cook moves easily among the different disciplines so pertinent to an understanding of Machiavelli's ideas, including history, philosophy, government, and the elements of leadership. He is unfailingly clear, always provides any definitions needed to understand the material at hand, and is always ready with a touch of wit whenever that is appropriate.Because so much of our contemporary misunderstanding of Machiavelli's ideas comes from a lack of context, Professor Cook carefully sets the stage for a complete perspective of Machiavelli's world.Long before he turns to the works themselves, you'll have learned about Florence and its political history, both before and during Machiavelli's lifetime; the developing Renaissance culture of Machiavelli's time, especially as it bears on the use of ancient political thought by writers and political leaders; and Machiavelli's own life story, including his education, service to the Florentine Republic, years spent in exile south of Florence, and the ways each period of his life affected his writings.The result is a thorough grounding in the information one needs to understand and appreciate this stunningly original thinker.You'll learn, for example, what Machiavelli means when he discusses the important ideas of virtù and Fortuna.Though these are today invariably translated as virtue and fortune, Machiavelli's meanings can involve much more. Though he sometimes uses virtù in the sense we would understand today, he often uses the word—which comes from the classical Latin word for Man—as a means of describing the way one practices successful statecraft: aggressively, with no reluctance to use lies, deceit, and cruelty that may be required to maintain power, and hence the stability the people deserve.In a similar way Machiavelli uses Fortuna in a different sense than might have been used by, say, Dante when he describes the vagaries of fate over which we have no control.Instead, Machiavelli uses the adage, "Fortune is like a river." Though we cannot control fortune, which may well choose to make the river flood, a good ruler, practicing virtù, can indeed prepare for it, and thus modify its effects.You'll see how Machiavelli first became exposed to history and one of its earliest great practitioners—the Roman historian, Livy—through his own experience of Fortuna.Though printed books such as Livy's Early History of Rome were too expensive for a family like the young Machiavelli's in the 15th century, his father did own a copy. He had written the index, and a copy of the book had been part of his payment. Thus Machiavelli grew up with the volumes about which he would one day write his own most important work, Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy.You'll be introduced to Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI and the man regarded as Machiavelli's model for The Prince, especially in the way his actions embodied the virtù so important to Machiavelli.Professor Cook brings this out in a shocking story of Borgia's use of a tough and merciless Spaniard—Ramiro d'Orco—to impose order and stability on the area of north central Italy known as the Romagna that had come under Borgia's rule and was beset by crime and violence.D'Orco's brutal methods had the desired effect. And when the job was completed, the local people emerged from their homes one morning to find the two halves of Ramiro d'Orco's body on opposite sides of the town square of Cesana, because d'Orco had been too tough, and Cesare Borgia needed a way to advertise further his concern for the people whose loyalty he wanted.The story also embodies, for Machiavelli, the idea that cruelty can be "well-used," just as being merciful—withholding such cruelty when a leader deems it needed—may be less than merciful in its long-term impact.Finally, you will get to see, throughout these lectures, the development of Machiavelli's reliance on history for its lessons, his role as a Renaissance Humanist thinker, and the emergence of his republican views, which still have tremendous influence today as we ask how republics start, grow, succeed, or fail.As Professor Cook notes, we are not going to agree with all of Machiavelli's answers. But his commitment to asking the right questions—to thinking, reflecting, and learning everything history has to teach us about the best ways to govern and safeguard the future—was total.

    His language and culture - those of Elizabethan England - are greatly different from our own, and his poetry, thick with metaphorical imagery and double meanings, can be hard to penetrate.Yet the keys to understanding Shakespeare are written into the plays themselves. If you can learn to recognize the playwright's own clues, you'll become able to engage meaningfully with his language, to follow the plot structures and themes that drive his plays, and to track the development of his characters.Over the course of 24 lectures, this innovative and penetrating exploration of Shakespeare's plays reveals how to enter Shakespeare's dramatic world, how to grasp what's happening in any of his plays, and how to enjoy them fully both on the page and the stage.Under Professor Conner's expert guidance, shaped by decades of studying and performing Shakespeare, you learn more than 40 interpretive tools, drawn from the texts themselves, that give you direct insight into the plays. These guiding principles allow you to follow the narratives of the plays as they unfold, with a clear understanding of how the plays function and fit together.The professor also reveals fascinating details of Shakespeare's era, which shed further light on the plays and the way his contemporary audiences perceived them.This course builds the skills that allow you to reach your own understanding of the plays - to deeply comprehend Shakespeare's transcendent poetic language, the spellbinding world of his great characters and stories, and his revelatory reflections on human experience.Disclaimer: Please note that this recording may include references to supplemental texts or print references that are not essential to the program and not supplied with your purchase.©2013 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2013 The Great Courses

    A great vocabulary can enhance your speaking, writing, and even thinking skills. This course will boost your vocabulary, whether you want to enhance your personal lexicon, write or speak more articulately in professional settings, or advance your knowledge of the English language. For anyone who has ever grasped for the perfect word at a particular moment, this course provides a research-based and enjoyable method for improving your vocabulary. Building a Better Vocabulary offers an intriguing look at the nuts and bolts of English, teaches you the etymology and morphology - or the history and structure - of words, and delves into the cognitive science behind committing new words to long-term memory. By the end of the 36 enjoyable lectures, you will have a practical framework for continuing to build your vocabulary by discovering new words and fully mastering the nuances of familiar ones. If you are an avid reader, you may have previously encountered some of the words in this course. But even the most voracious reader will be surprised and delighted by these eye-opening lectures, which delve into the building blocks of the English language and reveal intriguing new nuances to words you thought you knew well. These lectures will kindle a passion for the process by which words are created and for the beauty of the words you read, speak, and hear every day.

    ItalyA Geographical Expression 2. The Question of Sovereignty 3. The Crusades and Italian Wealth 4. VeniceA Maritime Republic 5. The Terraferma Empire 6. Genoa, La Superba 7. Bankers and Dukes 8. Pisa 9. Christians vs. Turks in the Mediterranean 10. RomePapal Authority 11. Papal Ambition 12. Papal Reform 13. NaplesA Matter of Wills 14. Naples and the Threat to Italian Liberty 15. Milan and the Visconti 16. The Sforza Dynasty 17. Mantua and the Gonzaga 18. Urbino and the Montefeltro 19. Ferrara and the Este Family 20. Siena and the Struggle for Liberty 21. Florence and the Guild Republic 22. Florence and the Medici 23. The Italian MosaicE Pluribus Gloria 24. CampanilismoThe Italian Sense of Place

    Over the course of 36 insightful lectures, you'll follow the Egyptians, the Mycenaean Greeks, the Persians, the Carthaginians, and others as they rise to glory, create administrative and military structures, clash with one another, and eventually collapse.Professor Dise immerses you in the political, administrative, and military details of these thrilling civilizations, analyzing three basic questions: How did this particular empire emerge? How was it governed and defended? How and why did it ultimately fall? These questions raise a host of profound issues on the growth, development, and failures of vast imperial systems.Grounded in a chronological approach, you'll find no better guide through the palatial halls, administrative offices, and war-torn battlefields of these empires than Professor Dise. Each lecture is packed with a range of rich sources on which our current understanding of the ancient Near East rests, including cuneiform tablets, colorful narratives, and archaeological remains.As you comb through these intriguing records, you quickly become more informed about how the past is recorded and passed down to subsequent generations. Spanning thousands of years of human history and encompassing regions both familiar and forgotten, this course is a remarkable tour through the farthest reaches of the ancient world - in all its marvelous diversity.