Cool Stuff on the Net
Google The Swiss Email Directory Microsoft On Line Typography
Webster on Line
bibliotheca augustana Gay History and Literature D. L. Ashliman's Home Page Read Literature: Lale's list of must read books My Reviews on Amazon
Encyclopedia of the Rulers of Egypt Rome: Literary Resources The Tertullian Home Page Roman Emperors to the Fall of the Western Empire Roman Emperors to the fall of Constantinople Roman emperors in marble The Ecole Chronology Project The Costumer's Manifesto
The Proceedings of the Friesian School A Cartography of the Ecstatic and Meditative States
Why the Big Bang is Wrong Space Missions and Launches Eric Weisstein's Treasure Trove of Scientific Biography
Bountiful Books Paul A. Whyles - Second Hand Books
Google is certainly the best no nonsense search engine on the net; no mucking about. BigFoot is the inevitable choice to find an email address. This page uses "Trebuchet" as default font. It works with Windows and Mac. If your computer doesn't have it already in its font folder, you can download it for free from Microsoft on line typography. And Webster, of course, needs no introduction.
The bibliotheca augustana gives in one place the best collection of classical texts in several languages; it also is the coolest design on the web - simple and effective. Gay history and literature is an excellent literature page, edited and designed from a certain perspective, but who cares? It is a good place to go for biographical information on writers and poets. D. L. Ashliman's home page offers a number of resources for the fairy-tale buff and researcher in mythologies from every climate and culture. Read literature: Lale's list of must read books offers suggestions and discusses literature from various points of view. My own reviews on Amazon did receive the attention they deserve, but Amazon attempted some absolutely innane "editing" and thus ended a beautiful friendship on a sour note, especially considering the princely salary a reviewer receives from that firm. It initiated the making of this page. Should you dislike my reviews at Amazon, then you may still use the link to place an order there. (You can even place an order if you actually like my reviews.)
Rome: literary resources gives you access to most of the major resource and text pages for Greek and Roman literature. Not just for the aficionados the Tertullian home page has developed into a primary ressource page which even academics are not ashamed of to use as reference. Roman emperors to the fall of the Western Empire give a complete rundown from 27 BC to 491 AD; Roman emperors to the fall of Constantinople in 1453 list the rest of the lot from the Byzantine empire. And should the names not mean a whole lot to you, then come face to face with Roman emperors in marble. The The Ecole Chronology Project is a good source for quick orientation; nothing too deep, but it helps finding your bearings. So does Encyclopedia of the Rulers of Egypt. And the Costumer's Manifesto is a wonderful page to explore how people in all periods of history used to dress up!
One doesn't need to be a philosopher or being savvy in the philosophy of Jacob Friedrich Fries (1773-1843) to appreciate the Proceedings of the Friesian School. It is the best and most informative no-nonsense philosophy page on the net. People who have read my review of Plotinus' "Enneads" will know what a Cartography of the Ecstatic and Meditative States is all about. (See also the archive.) As a student I had earned a little extra-money by assisting as guinea-pig to the research program.
Not being a professional physicist myself, I take the liberty to form my own opinions and "why the Big Bang is wrong" partly explains why I remain sceptical about the professional cosmologist's favorite myth. It really is barely more than that! So far, observational data and Granny Nature remain ambiguous on the issue, whatever Professor Hawking and the PR people of the COBE project like us to think. Besides - if we take on surface value the current descriptions of the initial condition preceeding the bang, then we are made to understand that the entire universe once had been compressed to one infinitely small point. Well, in my book that looks pretty much like a black hole. And black holes do not all of a sudden expand, right? Of course the whole idea is based on the assumption that the initial bang rose from a so called "singularity," of whose physics there would be no way of knowing. How convenient! I call this an act of faith. It has nothing to do with science. But I am not a crusader. Big Bang has one thing to speak for it: this universe, like the coffee in my cup, and everything else is ruled by the second law of thermodynamics, which means events have an irreversible direction in time and therefore a history. Common sense tells us that every history must have a beginning. It may, but then, it may not. Heisenberg's uncertainty principle seems at least to exclude the possibility of a definite ending at zero degree Kelvin. And Schopenhauer's dictum, that causality is not a hired cab one can dismiss at one's convenience, still stands. No matter how far back we follow the chain of events, there is always one more cause preceding the first one - at infinitum. And even for a finite universe, as in Everett's and Hawking's scenarios, an infinite proliferation of simultaneous and parallel events, seems to be a serious proposition. (Hawking's baby-universes. Question to Everett - where is the energy coming from for his symmetrical quantum events?) We shall see. Space missions and launches keep us posted on - well, space missions and launches. Eric Weisstein's treasure trove of scientific biography is what it says in the name.
The best place to search for out
of print books is Bountiful Books, it is convenient to use,
and it has the largest virtual store for books on the net. I must
confess, I haven't purchased a new book fresh from the press for
ages. Paul A. Whyles
- Second Hand Books has a lot to offer, and his line of the
'Folio Society' editions is very attractive and inexpensive, especially if compared to
the prices for a shoddy paperback.
S.
