Nieuwe aanwinsten Geesteswetenschappen: juli - sep 2024

Pleidooi voor deconstructie van opgelegde koloniale identiteiten, waarbij de situatie van gekoloniseerde volkeren en de rol van geweld binnen de context van dekolonisatie worden belicht.

On the Edge of Eternity overturns the paradigm of the eighteenth-century discovery of geological time, showing that the antiquity of our planet was a widespread and culturally acceptable notion in pre-1800 Europe. In this groundbreaking study, Ivano Dal Prete brings to life a long-forgotten world, in which the biblical story of the Creation and of the Flood was only one among many doctrines that could be freely taught and discussed. University scholars and students, artists like Leonardo da Vinci, and the readers of easily accessible vernacular books, envisaged, painted, and debated an ageless Earth scarred by innumerable deluges, raised and submerged continents, annihilated and resurgent humanities. Rather than discover deep time, the eighteenth century erased its rich and complex history, replacing it with a simplistic account that suited its political agendas and still informs our culture. On the Edge of Eternity invites the reader to revisit engrained beliefs on the relationship of science and religion, the history of the Earth sciences, and the cultural assumptions that have underpinned the modern controversy on Young Earth creationism.

Some ideas seem to possess a disproportionate ability to lead to new insights, new discoveries, new ideas, & even entirely new ways of thinking. Such ideas are said to be fruitful. Looking across the history of science & mathematics, we see creative minds preoccupied with the search for ideas of this kind. More precious than truth, but far less plentiful, fruitful ideas provide those in pursuit of knowledge with a bottomless well of innovation from which to draw as they attempt to solve new problems & to refine solutions to old ones. Seasoned researchers have a nose for these ideas. They often know in an instant that some way of approaching a problem will eventually result in a solution to it & to a whole host of other problems, all of which suddenly seem related. In this book, Chris Haufe explains how these ideas are detected & developed into large-scale frameworks for research.

For centuries, Europeans believed in a parallel world of the 'social supernatural'. The social supernatural realm mirrored and interacted with our own, causing disasters and providing fertility. Bringing together eighteen experts, this book explores how diverse cultures across Europe envisioned their social supernatural neighbours.

From Egypt to Guantanamo, we open the doors to the experiences of incarcerated Muslims.

Timothy Morton's aim in Hell is to up the game of ecological theory and praxis, moving away from their data-dumping guilt mode and into the planetary-scale inspirational feel that is the spiritual ecstasy of life itself. Nothing less than such a transformation can convince religious climate-change deniers to give up their passionate beliefs that the comforting support of Jesus can assuage all ills. On Earth hell is marked by the binary of subject/object in all its varieties--gendered, racialized, colonized--all master/slave relationships, the hallmark of capitalism and the Anthropocene--and is evidenced by the twinned theological forms of evangelical religion and scientism. Morton proposes instead that the sacred is the phenomenology of biology--how life from its earliest evolutionary beginnings feels--not subjective inner experience but a way of being in symbiotic relationship, a mood permeating existence. They find resources in visionaries William Blake and Friedrich Nietzsche but also, counterintuitively, in Immanuel Kant, all of whom refused to ontologize science. In hell, by contrast, we are entrapped in the measurable, purposive physical world. Blake above all understood that ideology structures our worlds and that we have to fight hard to change it. The biosphere is driven by unconditioned desire--without a telos--thus queerness, pleasure, beauty, art happen in all conscious (sentient) beings. That surge of life is holy, our birthright, and if not a reason to "save Earth," what could be?

Kunstmatige of artificiële intelligentie (AI) is de capaciteit van computers om menselijke vaardigheden te vertonen, zoals wiskundig denken, creativiteit en communicatie. In dit boeiende AI-landschap neemt natuurlijketaalverwerking een centrale plaats in op het kruispunt van taal en technologie. Met behulp van geavanceerde methoden als machinaal leren kunnen we computers teksten laten analyseren, begrijpen en produceren. Computermodellen kunnen getraind worden om geschreven en gesproken teksten te doorzoeken, verbeteren, samen te vatten en zoveel meer.00Vertaalsystemen, automatische zoeksystemen en chatbots zijn slechts een handvol voorbeelden van toepassingen die steunen op taaltechnologie. Maar wat schuilt er nu precies onder de motorkap van die tools die we dagelijks gebruiken? In dit boek gaan we dieper in op de werking van taaltechnologie. We stellen vragen als: Wat speelt er zich af achter de schermen van ChatGPT? Hoe kan taaltechnologie taal begrijpen, produceren en zelfs ons gedrag sturen? Daarnaast bespreken we enkele praktische toepassingen als sentimentanalyse en automatische vertaling. Het laatste deel van dit boek werpt een kritische blik op een aantal ethische vraagstukken. Dit is het eerste Nederlandstalige boek over taaltechnologie, gericht aan iedereen met een passie voor talen. Het is toegankelijk, maar met de nodige diepgang voor wie er zelf mee aan de slag wil.

If we send a message into space, will extraterrestrial beings receive it? Will they understand? The endlessly fascinating question of whether we are alone in the universe has always been accompanied by another, more complicated one- if there is extraterrestrial life, how would we communicate with it? In this book, Daniel Oberhaus leads readers on a quest for extraterrestrial communication. Exploring Earthlings' various attempts to reach out to non-Earthlings over the centuries, he poses some not entirely answerable questions- If we send a message into space, will extraterrestrial beings receive it? Will they understand? What languages will they (and we) speak? Is there not only a universal grammar (as Noam Chomsky has posited), but also a grammar of the universe? Oberhaus describes, among other things, a late-nineteenth-century idea to communicate with Martians via Morse code and mirrors; the emergence in the twentieth century of SETI (the search for extraterrestrial intelligence), CETI (communication with extraterrestrial intelligence), and finally METI (messaging extraterrestrial intelligence); the one-way space voyage of Ella, an artificial intelligence agent that can play cards, tell fortunes, and recite poetry; and the launching of a theremin concert for aliens. He considers media used in attempts at extraterrestrial communication, from microwave systems to plaques on spacecrafts to formal logic, and discusses attempts to formulate a language for our message, including the Astraglossa and two generations of Lincos (lingua cosmica). The chosen medium for interstellar communication reveals much about the technological sophistication of the civilization that sends it, Oberhaus observes, but even more interesting is the information embedded in the message itself. In Extraterrestrial Languages, he considers how philosophy, linguistics, mathematics, science, and art have informed the design or limited the effectiveness of our interstellar messaging.

Drawing on varied examples from poetry, literature and film, including Virginia Woolf, Jack Gilbert and the films of Terrence Malick, Melancholic Joy offers an honest assessment of the human condition. It unflinchingly acknowledges the everyday frustrations and extraordinary horrors that generate despair and argues that the appropriate response to this darkness is to take up joy again, not in an attempt to ignore or dismiss evil, but rather as part of a "melancholic joy" that accepts the mystery of a world that is both beautiful and brutal.

New directions in queer theory continue to trouble the boundaries of both queerness and the classical, leading to an explosion of new work in the vast - and increasingly uncharted - intersection between these disciplines, which this interdisciplinary volume seeks to explore. This handbook convenes an international group of experts who work on the classical world and queer theory. The discipline of Classics has been involved with, and implicated in, queer theory from the start. By placing front and center the rejection of heteronormativity, queer theory has provided Classics with a powerful tool for analyzing non-normative sexual and gender relations in the ancient West, while Classics offers queer theory ancient material (such as literature, visual arts, and social practices) that challenges a wide range of modern normative categories. The collection demonstrates the vitality of this particular moment in queer classical studies, featuring an expansive array of methodologies applied to the interdisciplinary field of Classics. Embracing the indeterminacy that lies at the core of queer studies, the essays in this volume are organized not by chronology or genre, but rather by overlapping categories under the following rubrics: queer subjectivities, queer times and places, queer kinships, queer receptions, and ancient pasts / queer futures. The Routledge Handbook of Classics and Queer Theory offers an invaluable collection for anyone working on queer theory, especially as it applies to premodern periods; it will also be of interest to scholars engaging with the history of sexuality, both in the ancient world and more broadly.

Rest occupies a space outside of sleep and alertness: it is a form of recuperation but also of preparation for what is to come, and is a need felt by human and animal alike. Through the centuries, different and conflicting definitions and forms of rest have blossomed, ranging from heavenly repose to what is prescribed for the modern affliction of burn-out. What has remained constant is its importance: long the subject of art and literature, everyone understands the need not to disturb the aimless, languishing, daydreaming Lotus-eater. Not viewed simply as an antidote for fatigue, for a long time rest was seen as the prelude to eternal life, until everything changed in the nineteenth century and society entered the great 'age of rest'. At this point, the renowned French historian Alain Corbin explains, rest took on new therapeutic and leisurely qualities, embodied by the new types of human that emerged. The modern epicurean frolicked on beaches and soaked up the rays, while melancholics were rejuvenated in pristine sanatoria, the new temples of rest. Paid holidays and a widespread acceptance of the need to build up the strength sapped during work followed, while the 1950s became the decade of 'sea, sex and sun'. This new book, as original as Corbin's other histories of neglected aspects of human life, pans the long evolution of rest in a highly readable and engaging style.

The Disabled Body in Contemporary Art. Featuring updated chapters and case studies, this second edition will not only expand on the first edition but will bring a new focus to contemporary disabled artists and their embodied, multimedia work.