In this original work of psychoanalytic theory, John Muller explores the formative power of signs and their impact on the mind, the body and subjectivity, giving special attention to work of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan and the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce. Muller explores how Lacan's way of understanding experience through three dimensions--the real, the imaginary and the symbolic--can be useful both for thinking about cultural phenomena and for understanding the ...

The most human-friendly book on machine learningSomewhere buried in all the systems that drive artificial intelligence, you'll find machine learning―the process that allows technology to build knowledge based on data and patterns. Machine Learning For Dummies is an excellent starting point for anyone who wants deeper insight into how all this learning actually happens. This book offers an overview of machine learning and its most important practical applic...

This volume addresses itself to the ways in which the so-called 'new sciences of complexity' can deepen and broaden neurobiological and psychological theories of mind. Complexity theory has gained increasing attention over the past 20 years across diverse areas of inquiry, including mathematics, physics, economics, biology, and the social sciences. Complexity theory concerns itself with how nonlinear dynamical systems evolve and change over time and draws on research arising from chaos the...

This volume addresses the topic of embodiment in psychoanalysis from both theoretical and clinical points of view. Freud's development of a psychoanalytic theory and treatment originated from his consideration of neurology, aphasia, and the great range of embodied signs constituting the hysterical neuroses. Symptoms and signs, Freud noted in 1895, "join in the conversation" by taking bodily form. The body and the mind form a nexus, which is the proper area of study for psychoanalysis....

Since 2001, the United States has created or reorganized more than two counterterrorism organizations for every apprehension it has made of Islamists apparently planning to commit terrorism within the country. Central to this massive enterprise is what the FBI frequently calls "ghost-chasing"-the efforts by police and intelligence agencies to follow up on over ten million tips. Less than one alarm in 10,000 fails to be false-the rest all point to ghosts. And the vast majority of the leads ...

Democracy is overrated. Capitalism, on the other hand, doesn't get enough credit. In this provocative and engaging book, John Mueller argues that these mismatches between image and reality create significant political and economic problems--inspiring instability, inefficiency, and widespread cynicism. We would be far better off, he writes, if we recognized that neither system is ideal or disastrous and accepted instead the humdrum truth that both are "pretty good." And, to Mueller, that me...

Design and assemble an inexpensive yet fast and reliable PCConstruct the PC of your dreams using the practical information contained in this hands-on guide. Build Your Own PC on a Budget explains, step-by-step, how to put together a customized computer that is affordable, stable, and powerful. Discover how to choose the parts that fit your needs, safely connect and test components, add video and peripherals, install an operating system, connect to the Inte...

In seeking to evaluate the efficacy of post-9/11 homeland security expenses--which have risen by more than a trillion dollars, not including war costs--the common query has been, "Are we safer?" This, however, is the wrong question. Of course we are "safer"--the posting of a single security guard at one building's entrance enhances safety. The correct question is, "Are any gains in security worth the funds expended?" In this engaging, readable book, John Mueller and Mark Stewart apply risk...

"War... is merely an idea, an institution, like dueling or slavery, that has been grafted onto human existence. It is not a trick of fate, a thunderbolt from hell, a natural calamity, or a desperate plot contrivance dreamed up by some sadistic puppeteer on high. And it seems to me that the institution is in pronounced decline, abandoned as attitudes toward it have changed, roughly following the pattern by which the ancient and formidable institution of slavery became discredited and then m...

It could be said that American foreign policy since 1945 has been one long miscue; most international threats - including during the Cold War - have been substantially exaggerated. The result has been agony and bloviation, unnecessary and costly military interventions that have mostly failed. A policy of complacency and appeasement likely would have worked better. In this highly readable book, John Mueller argues with wisdom and wit rather than ideology and hyperbole that aversion to inter...

This book collects the key essays, together with updating notes and commentary, of Professor John Mueller on war and the role of ideas and opinions.Mueller has maintained that war (and peace) are, in essence, merely ideas, and that war has waned as the notion that 'peace' is a decidedly good idea has gained currency. The first part of the book extends this argument, noting that as ideas have spread, war is losing out not only in the developed world, but now in the developing one, a...

This book deals with a variety of issues of history, of national security, and of political economy, and focuses on the need for a dynamic perspective. It emphasizes the development of ideas as the motor forces behind the economic policies.