Book picks similar to
Moral Principles in Education by John Dewey
education
philosophy
non-fiction
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The Second Intelligent Species: How Humans Will Become as Irrelevant as Cockroaches
Marshall Brain - 2015
We currently see no evidence of any kind indicating that extraterrestrials exist outside of our solar system. But at this moment, millions of engineers, scientists, corporations, universities and entrepreneurs are racing to create the second intelligent species right here on planet earth. And we can see the second intelligent species coming from all directions in the form of self-driving cars, automated call centers, chess-playing and Jeopardy-playing computers that beat all human players, airport kiosks, restaurant tablet systems, etc. The frightening thing is that these robots will soon be eliminating human jobs in startling numbers. The first wave of unemployed workers is likely to be a million truck drivers who are replaced by self-driving trucks. Pilots will be eliminated soon as well. Then, as new computer vision systems come online, we will see tens of millions of workers in retail stores, fast food restaurants and construction sites replaced by robots. Unless we take steps now to change the economy, we will soon have tens of millions of workers who are unemployed and seeking welfare because they will have no other choice. Marshall Brain's new book "The Second Intelligent Species: How Humans Will Become as Irrelevant as Cockroaches" explores how the future will unfold as the second intelligent species emerges. The book answers questions like: - How will new computer vision systems affect the job market? - How many people will become unemployed by the second intelligent species? - What will happen to millions of newly unemployed workers? - How can modern society and modern economies cope with run-away unemployment caused by robots? - What will happen when the first sentient, conscious computer appears? - What moral and ethical principles will guide the second intelligent species? - Why do we see no extraterrestrials in our universe? "The Second Intelligent Species" offers a unique and fascinating look at the future of the human race, and the choices we will need to make to avoid massive unemployment and poverty worldwide as intelligent machines start eliminating millions of jobs.
Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies
Nick Bostrom - 2014
The human brain has some capabilities that the brains of other animals lack. It is to these distinctive capabilities that our species owes its dominant position. If machine brains surpassed human brains in general intelligence, then this new superintelligence could become extremely powerful--possibly beyond our control. As the fate of the gorillas now depends more on humans than on the species itself, so would the fate of humankind depend on the actions of the machine superintelligence.But we have one advantage: we get to make the first move. Will it be possible to construct a seed Artificial Intelligence, to engineer initial conditions so as to make an intelligence explosion survivable? How could one achieve a controlled detonation?
Anarchy, State, and Utopia
Robert Nozick - 1974
National Book Award in category Philosophy and Religion, has been translated into 11 languages, and was named one of the "100 most influential books since the war" (1945–1995) by the U.K. Times Literary Supplement.
A Layman's Guide to Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis
Eric Berne - 1968
Excerpt from rear cover: Eric Berne "...is a psychiatrist...born in Montreal...is chairman of the board...swims regularly in the cold and...He has a mustache"
Faster: The Acceleration of Just About Everything
James Gleick - 1999
Yet for all the hours, minutes, and even seconds being saved, we're still filling our days to the point that we have no time for such basic human activities as eating, sex, and relating to our families. Written with fresh insight and thorough research, Faster is a wise and witty look at a harried world not likely to slow down anytime soon.
The Culture of Fear: Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things
Barry Glassner - 1999
He exposes the people and organizations that manipulate our perceptions and profit from our anxieties: politicians who win elections by heightening concerns about crime and drug use even as both are declining; advocacy groups that raise money by exaggerating the prevalence of particular diseases; TV news-magazines that monger a new scare every week to garner ratings.
Guardian Angel: My Journey from Leftism to Sanity
Melanie Phillips - 2013
Beginning with her solitary childhood in London, it took years for Melanie Phillips to understand her parents’ emotional frailties and even longer to escape from them. But Phillips inherited her family’s strong Jewish values and a passionate commitment to freedom from oppression. It was this moral foundation that ultimately turned her against the warped and tyrannical attitudes of the Left, requiring her to break away not only from her parents—but also from the people she had seen as her wider political family. Through her poignant story of transformation and separation, we gain insight into the political uproar that has engulfed the West. Britain’s vote to leave the EU, the rise of far-Right political parties in Europe, and the stunning election of US president Donald Trump all involve a revolt against the elites by millions. It is these disdained masses who have been championed by Melanie Phillips in a career as prescient as it has been provocative. Guardian Angel is not only an affecting personal story, but it provides a vital explanation why the West is at a critical crossroads today. “Melanie Phillips has been one of the brave and necessary voices of our time, unafraid to speak the language of moral responsibility in an age of obfuscation and denial. This searing account of her personal journey is compelling testimony to her courage in speaking truth to power.”—Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks
All Minus One: John Stuart Mill's Ideas on Free Speech Illustrated
John Stuart Mill - 2018
Reeves (a biographer of Mill) and Haidt (a social psychologist) summarize Mill's three timeless arguments for free speech and the value of viewpoint diversity. They then reduce the text to half its original length, allowing Mill's best arguments and metaphors to shine. Artist Dave Cicirelli illustrates those metaphors to amplify their intuitive power. Ideal for use in college courses, or in any organization in which people would benefit from productive disagreement.
Little Soldiers: An American Boy, a Chinese School, and the Global Race to Achieve
Lenora Chu - 2017
China produced some of the world’s top academic achievers, and just down the street from her home in Shanghai was THE school, as far as elite Chinese were concerned. Should Lenora entrust her rambunctious young son to the system?So began Rainey’s immersion in one of the most extreme school systems on the planet. Almost immediately, the three-year-old began to develop surprising powers of concentration, became proficient in early math, and learned to obey his teachers’ every command. Yet Lenora also noticed disturbing new behaviors: Where he used to scribble and explore, Rainey grew obsessed with staying inside the lines. He became fearful of authority figures, and also developed a habit of obeisance outside of school. “If you want me to do it, I’ll do it,” he told a stranger who’d asked whether he liked to sing. What was happening behind closed classroom doors? Driven by parental anxiety, Lenora embarked on a journalistic mission to discover: What price do the Chinese pay to produce their “smart” kids? How hard should the rest of us work to stay ahead of the global curve? And, ultimately, is China’s school system one the West should emulate? She pulls the curtain back on a military-like education system, in which even the youngest kids submit to high-stakes tests, and parents are crippled by the pressure to compete (and sometimes to pay bribes). Yet, as mother-and-son reach new milestones, Lenora uncovers surprising nuggets of wisdom, such as the upside of student shame, how competition can motivate achievement, and why a cultural belief in hard work over innate talent gives the Chinese an advantage.Lively and intimate, beautifully written and reported, Little Soldiers challenges our assumptions and asks us to reconsider the true value and purpose of education.
Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis
Robert D. Putnam - 2015
This is the America we believe in a nation of opportunity, constrained only by ability and effort. But during the last twenty-five years we have seen a disturbing opportunity gap emerge. Americans have always believed in equality of opportunity, the idea that all kids, regardless of their family background, should have a decent chance to improve their lot in life. Now, this central tenet of the American dream seems no longer true or at the least, much less true than it was. Robert Putnam about whom The Economist said, "His scholarship is wide-ranging, his intelligence luminous, his tone modest, his prose unpretentious and frequently funny," offers a personal but also authoritative look at this new American crisis. Putnam begins with his high school class of 1959 in Port Clinton, Ohio. By and large the vast majority of those students "our kids" went on to lives better than those of their parents. But their children and grandchildren have had harder lives amid diminishing prospects. Putnam tells the tale of lessening opportunity through poignant life stories of rich and poor kids from cities and suburbs across the country, drawing on a formidable body of research done especially for this book. Our Kids is a rare combination of individual testimony and rigorous evidence. Putnam provides a disturbing account of the American dream that should initiate a deep examination of the future of our country.
The Invisible Force: 365 Ways to Apply the Power of Intention to Your Life
Wayne W. Dyer - 2007
Wayne W. Dyer has put together this little book in order to convey the fact that intention is a field of energy that flows invisibly beyond the reach of our normal, everyday habitual patterns. It’s a force that we all have within us, and we have the power to draw it into our lives by being the energy we want to attract. Use the uplifting material within these pages to bring the power of intention into your life for many years to come, and experience the world in a new and exciting way!
Power over People: Classical and Modern Political Theory
Dennis Dalton - 1991
The issues Professor Dalton addresses in these lectures - and in Western political theory generally - fall into three sets of fundamental questions you'll get to unpack. The first set involves the essential characteristics of human nature and the good society. The second focuses on the intricate relationship between the individual and society. And the final set of questions involves theories about change.Through these lectures and their historical case studies, you'll be able to identify the fundamental questions and concerns that shape classical and modern political theory:Describe the influence of one's understanding of human nature upon one's vision of the good society.Compare and contrast the views of theorists regarding the purpose of the state, the relationship between politics and ethics, and the qualifications for exercising political power.Discuss views of leading political theorists regarding the meaning of freedom, the sources of legitimate political authority, and the obligations of individuals to the state or society, and more.
The Thing You Think You Cannot Do: Thirty Truths You Need to Know Now About Fear and Courage
Gordon Livingston - 2012
You must do the thing which you think you cannot do.”—Eleanor Roosevelt. What are we afraid of and what can we do about it? Fear—of change, of intimacy, of loss, of the unknown—has become a corrosive influence in modern life, eroding our ability to think clearly. Exploited for power by politicians and for money by the media, it has become embedded in the way we think about our lives. Overcoming our fear, says Gordon Livingston, constitutes the most difficult struggle we face. Dr. Livingston, a psychiatrist, has increasingly found himself prescribing virtues like courage to his patients instead of tranquilizers or antidepressants. Here, he presents us with thirty truths that tell us all what we need to do to develop personal virtues in the face of societal and our own individual fears. And he does this with the crystalline prose and leavening wit that have made him an internationally bestselling author. As the celebrated novelist Mark Helprin has said of Dr. Livingston: “To read him is to trust him and to learn, for his life has been touched by fire, and his motives are absolutely pure.”
The Cornerstone
Angela Watson - 2008
It will guide you through each step of communicating and reinforcing your expectations. Learn how to create a vision for your classroom and TEACH for it!
Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them
Joshua D. Greene - 2013
But modern times have forced the world’s tribes into a shared space, resulting in epic clashes of values along with unprecedented opportunities. As the world shrinks, the moral lines that divide us become more salient and more puzzling. We fight over everything from tax codes to gay marriage to global warming, and we wonder where, if at all, we can find our common ground. A grand synthesis of neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy, Moral Tribes reveals the underlying causes of modern conflict and lights the way forward. Greene compares the human brain to a dual-mode camera, with point-and-shoot automatic settings (“portrait,” “landscape”) as well as a manual mode. Our point-and-shoot settings are our emotions—efficient, automated programs honed by evolution, culture, and personal experience. The brain’s manual mode is its capacity for deliberate reasoning, which makes our thinking flexible. Point-and-shoot emotions make us social animals, turning Me into Us. But they also make us tribal animals, turning Us against Them. Our tribal emotions make us fight—sometimes with bombs, sometimes with words—often with life-and-death stakes. An award-winning teacher and scientist, Greene directs Harvard University’s Moral Cognition Lab, which uses cutting-edge neuroscience and cognitive techniques to understand how people really make moral decisions. Combining insights from the lab with lessons from decades of social science and centuries of philosophy, the great question of Moral Tribes is this: How can we get along with Them when what they want feels so wrong to Us? Ultimately, Greene offers a set of maxims for navigating the modern moral terrain, a practical road map for solving problems and living better lives. Moral Tribes shows us when to trust our instincts, when to reason, and how the right kind of reasoning can move us forward. A major achievement from a rising star in a new scientific field, Moral Tribes will refashion your deepest beliefs about how moral thinking works and how it can work better.