中国社会科学院考古研究所陈星灿、《失落的卫星》作者刘子超推荐！
国内首次完整引进，“西域探险之父”斯文·赫定第四次亚洲探险全记录。
完整展现1899~1901斯文·赫定探险生涯中浓墨重彩的三年。
◉ 编辑推荐
斯文·赫定第四次深入亚洲腹地考察的实录，
一百多年前我国新疆 、西藏自然和人文景观的生动写照。
斯文 ·赫定的游记，一如他的素描，真实、朴素而传神。
——中国社会科学院考古研究所 陈星灿
一场非凡的发现之旅，一次动魄的阅读体验。
——《失落的卫星》作者刘子超
这是一部关于探险家的真实日常之作，完整呈现斯文·赫定成果斐然的一次亚洲探险。
全书用类似日记的形式重现在凄凉孤寂的荒野中度过的每一天，记录沿途三年间 6000 多英里路程的波澜壮阔。穿越塔克拉玛干沙漠，发现沉睡的楼兰古城，考察古罗布泊风貌，再次踏足西藏高原，向着神圣的拉萨一路前行。
◉ 内容简介
斯文·赫定的第四次亚洲之旅并不顺利，一路惊险连连，从藏北进入拉萨的尝试宣告失败，他和旅队不得不穿过大片未知的土地，回到罗布荒原，为再次进藏做准备。整夜的大风暴过后，一座消失已久的古城—楼兰出现在他们面前，为这支备受打击的旅队带来了巨大惊喜，也为新疆现代考古添上浓墨重彩的一笔。最终，他们未能抵达拉萨，但发现楼兰古城、重新界定罗布泊的位置等成果让这次亚洲之旅成为传奇。

Captive American Indian Manteo was returned to his homeland as Governor, a gamble that resulted in the first English settlement in the New World. Using first-hand accounts, this book tells the full story and its extraordinary twist.

A Study of the Play-Element in Culture

(excerpts from my proposal for the book)
Anyone who has explored the history, technology, or theory of computers has likely encountered the concept of the Turing Machine. The Turing Machine is an imaginary — not even quite hypothetical — computer invented in 1936 by English mathematician Alan Turing (1912–1954) to help solve a question in mathematical logic. As a byproduct, Turing also founded the field of computability theory — the study of the abilities and limitations of digital computers.
Although the concept of the Turing Machine is well known, Turing’s original 1936 paper is only rarely read. This neglect may have something to do with the paper’s title — “On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem” — and perhaps the paper’s extensive use of a scary German gothic font. That’s too bad, because the paper is not only a fascinating read but a milestone in the history of computing and 20th century intellectual thought in general.
This book presents Turing’s original 36-page paper (and a follow-up 3-page correction) with background chapters and extensive annotations. Mathematical papers like Turing’s are often terse and cryptic. I have elaborated on many of Turing’s statements, clarified his discussions, and provided numerous examples.
Interwoven into the narrative are the highlights of Turing’s own life: his years at Cambridge and Princeton, his secret work in cryptanalysis during World War II, his involvement in seminal computer projects, his speculations about artificial intelligence, his arrest and prosecution for the crime of “gross indecency,” and his early death by apparent suicide at the age of 41.
The book is divided into four parts: Parts I and II together are about 200 pages in length and cover the first 60% of Turing’s paper, encompassing the Turing Machine and computability topics. This part of the book is entirely self-contained and will be of primary interest to most readers.
Part III is a faster paced look at the remainder of Turing’s paper, which involves the implications for mathematical logic. Some readers might want to skip these chapters.
Part IV resumes the more "popular" presentation showing how the Turing Machine has become a vital tool in understanding the workings of human consciousness and the mechanisms of the universe.
Although I expect the primary readers of the book to be programmers, computer science majors, and other “techies,” I have tried my best to make the book accessible to the general reader. There is unavoidably much mathematics in the book, but I have tried to assume that the reader only has knowledge of high-school mathematics, and probably a foggy one at that.

A comprehensive survey of western technology from the Seventeenth Century with Galileo and the Scientific Revolution to the Twentieth Century.

In the twenty-rst century piracy has regained a central place in Western culture, thanks to a surprising combination of Johnny Depp and the Pirates of the Caribbeanfranchise as well as the dramatic rise of modern-day piracy around Somalia and the Horn of Africa.
In this global history of the phenomenon, maritime terrorism and piracy expert Peter Lehr casts fresh light on pirates. Ranging from the Vikings and Wako pirates in the Middle Ages to modern day Somali pirates, Lehr delves deep into what motivates pirates and how they operate. He also illuminates the state’s role in the development of piracy throughout history: from privateers sanctioned by Queen Elizabeth to pirates operating off the coast of Africa taking the law into their own hands. After exploring the structural failures which create fertile ground for pirate activities, Lehr evaluates the success of counter-piracy efforts—and the reasons behind its failures.

Shows the value of the Bayesian methodology for the addressing the core issues in the field
Provides clear, comprehensive, and accessible explanations
Discusses a wide range of questions, from philosophical foundations to practical applications in science
Combines mathematical modeling with conceptual analysis, simulations, case studies, and empirical results
How should we reason in science? Jan Sprenger and Stephan Hartmann offer a refreshing take on classical topics in philosophy of science, using a single key concept to explain and to elucidate manifold aspects of scientific reasoning. They present good arguments and good inferences as being characterized by their effect on our rational degrees of belief. Refuting the view that there is no place for subjective attitudes in 'objective science', Sprenger and Hartmann explain the value of convincing evidence in terms of a cycle of variations on the theme of representing rational degrees of belief by means of subjective probabilities (and changing them by Bayesian conditionalization). In doing so, they integrate Bayesian inference—the leading theory of rationality in social science—with the practice of 21st century science. Bayesian Philosophy of Science thereby shows how modeling such attitudes improves our understanding of causes, explanations, confirming evidence, and scientific models in general. It combines a scientifically minded and mathematically sophisticated approach with conceptual analysis and attention to methodological problems of modern science, especially in statistical inference, and is therefore a valuable resource for philosophers and scientific practitioners.

Ever since the dawn of linguistics as a scientific discipline, there have been numerous attempts to find links between various languages of the world. Nowadays, it is common knowledge that most modern languages originate from several ancient languages, most notably languages of the Indo-European language family, which all derive from the Proto-Indo-European language. But could these languages possibly have links with other, entirely different ones? After all, modern China is not far away from where this Proto-Indo-European language originates. This book deals with such links, with a specific focus on German-Chinese cognates. It is based on the assumption, that literally all languages of the world are connected in some way. Our goal is to demonstrate how closely related German and Chinese really are. The author spent the last five years conducting this research and achieved remarkable results through unceasing endeavour. His comparison of words is relatively strict and carefully chosen. Cognates contained in this book are required to have the same consonant endings, as these are the most important part of the comparison. Since modern Mandarin Chinese has lost nearly all endings of Classical Chinese (preserving only -n and -ng), the author makes use of Cantonese (a Chinese dialect spoken in southern China, as well as in Hong Kong and Macao), as it retains all endings found in Classical Chinese (-n, -ng, -m, -k, -p, -t) and is therefore suitable for illustrating the astonishing similarities between the Germanic languages (most notably German, but also English) and Chinese (represented mainly by Cantonese in this book). These cognates can also be used to develop a Chinese-character-based transliteration for German and other European languages. If virtually every language can be written using a script based on Roman letters, why would the same not be possible with Chinese characters? Better yet, as opposed to the Latin script, Chinese characters not only represent a sound, but contain a meaning and show the etymology of the word as well. Cognates are expressed with the same character and words of a word group mostly share the same phonetic parts (glyphs). The meaning is contained in the radicals of Chinese characters. Creating a script based on Sinographs (characters consisting of Chinese radicals and phonetic parts) for Western languages will make language learning considerably easier. Cognates will simply be recognized instead of being searched for in etymological dictionaries. It may well promote the learning and understanding of other languages at first sight. The author, himself a passionate language learner, thereby attempts to promote and deepen cross-cultural understanding and demonstrate, that supposedly entirely different cultures (or languages) actually have much more in common than we might think.

Isaac Newton's "Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended", published in 1728, one year after the great man's death, unleashed a storm of controversy. And for good reason. The book presents a drastically revised timeline for ancient civilizations, contracting Greek history by five hundred years and Egypt's by a millennium. "Newton and the Origin of Civilization" tells the story of how one of the most celebrated figures in the history of mathematics, optics, and mechanics came to apply his unique ways of thinking to problems of history, theology, and mythology, and of how his radical ideas produced an uproar that reverberated in Europe's learned circles throughout the eighteenth century and beyond. Jed Buchwald and Mordechai Feingold reveal the manner in which Newton strove for nearly half a century to rectify universal history by reading ancient texts through the lens of astronomy, and to create a tight theoretical system for interpreting the evolution of civilization on the basis of population dynamics. It was during Newton's earliest years at Cambridge that he developed the core of his singular method for generating and working with trustworthy knowledge, which he applied to his study of the past with the same rigor he brought to his work in physics and mathematics. Drawing extensively on Newton's unpublished papers and a host of other primary sources, Buchwald and Feingold reconcile Isaac Newton the rational scientist with Newton the natural philosopher, alchemist, theologian, and chronologist of ancient history.

In 1799, a French Army officer was rebuilding the defenses of a fort on the banks of the Nile when he discovered an ancient stele fragment bearing a decree inscribed in three different scripts. So begins one of the most familiar tales in Egyptology—that of the Rosetta Stone and the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs. This book draws on fresh archival evidence to provide a major new account of how the English polymath Thomas Young and the French philologist Jean-François Champollion vied to be the first to solve the riddle of the Rosetta.
Jed Buchwald and Diane Greco Josefowicz bring to life a bygone age of intellectual adventure. Much more than a decoding exercise centered on a single artifact, the race to decipher the Rosetta Stone reflected broader disputes about language, historical evidence, biblical truth, and the value of classical learning. Buchwald and Josefowicz paint compelling portraits of Young and Champollion, two gifted intellects with altogether different motivations. Young disdained Egyptian culture and saw Egyptian writing as a means to greater knowledge about Greco-Roman antiquity. Champollion, swept up in the political chaos of Restoration France and fiercely opposed to the scholars aligned with throne and altar, admired ancient Egypt and was prepared to upend conventional wisdom to solve the mystery of the hieroglyphs.
Taking readers from the hushed lecture rooms of the Institut de France to the windswept monuments of the Valley of the Kings, The Riddle of the Rosetta reveals the untold story behind one of the nineteenth century’s most thrilling discoveries.

A thrilling history of the West’s scramble for the riches of ancient Egypt by the foremost Egyptologist of our time.

Newton studies have undergone radical changes in the last half-century as more of his work has been uncovered and more details of his life and intellectual context have come to light. This volume singles out two strands in recent Newton studies: the intellectual background to Newton's scientific thought and both specific and general aspects of his technical science. The essays make new claims concerning Newton's mathematical methods, experimental investigations, and motivations, as well as the effect that his long presence had on science in England.The book is divided into two parts. The essays in part I shed new light on Newton's motivations and the sources of his method. The essays in part II explore Newton's mathematical philosophy and his development of rational mechanics and celestial dynamics. An appendix includes the last paper by Newton biographer Richard W. Westfall, examining some of the ways that mathematics came to be used in the age of Newton in pursuits and domains other than theoretical or rational mechanics.

This volume is an attempt to reconstitute the tacit knowledge - the shared, unwritten assumptions, values and understandings - that shapes the work of science. Jed Z. Buchwald uses as his focus the social and intellectual world of 19th-century German physics. Drawing on the lab notes, published papers and unpublished manuscripts of Heinrich Hertz, Buchwald recreates Hertz's 1887 invention of a device that produced electromagnetic waves in wires. The invention itself was serendipitous and the device was quickly transformed, but Hertz's early experiments led to major innovations in electrodynamics. Buchwald explores the difficulty Hertz had in reconciling the theories of other physicists, including Hermann von Helmholtz and James Clerk Maxwell, and he considers the complex and often problematic connections between theory and experiment. In this first detailed scientific biography of Hertz and his scientific community, Buchwald demonstrates that tacit knowledge can be recovered so that we can begin to identify the unspoken rules that govern scientific practice.