New Releases by Paul Taylor

The 4th book in the Wapsi Square series finds everyone walking down a darker path on the road to dealing with an ancient machine that seems to have a temperament all its own and has been deemed "un-fixable".

Text-to-Speech Synthesis provides a complete, end-to-end account of the process of generating speech by computer. Giving an in-depth explanation of all aspects of current speech synthesis technology, it assumes no specialised prior knowledge. Introductory chapters on linguistics, phonetics, signal processing and speech signals lay the foundation, with subsequent material explaining how this knowledge is put to use in building practical systems that generate speech. Including coverage of the very latest techniques such as unit selection, hidden Markov model synthesis, and statistical text analysis, explanations of the more traditional techniques such as format synthesis and synthesis by rule are also provided. Weaving together the various strands of this multidisciplinary field, the book is designed for graduate students in electrical engineering, computer science, and linguistics. It is also an ideal reference for practitioners in the fields of human communication interaction and telephony.

The offices for the sick and dying are the forgotten child of the Book of Common Prayer. The rubric has not been updated since 1549, but much has changed since then. People go to hospitals and nursing homes instead of taking to their bed. With longer life spans and modern medicine, people are living longer and often experience more and longer hospitalizations. Visitation of the Sick has been shortened to reflect use in a hospital or nursing home instead of at home. The Reserved Sacrament is usually preferable when ministering to the sick. The Communion Service is intended for use by chaplains and parish clergy during visits to hospitals, nursing homes, and assisted living facilities. It could also be used outside of chaplaincy. Chaplains have found that many of those who are dying like to have the Psalms read to them, so the Psalter has been included from the 1928 BCP (except for Psalm 23, which is KJV).

The first biography of Sherman''s chief engineer and the man whose post-Civil War engineering work changed Great Lakes navigation forever Orlando M. Poe chronicles the life of one of the most influential yet underrated and overlooked soldiers during the Civil War. After joining the Union Army in 1861, Poe commanded the 2nd Michigan Infantry in the Peninsula Campaign and led brigades at Second Bull Run and Fredericksburg. He was then sent west and became one of the Union heroes in the defense of Knoxville. Poe served under several of the war''s greatest generals, including George McClellan and William T. Sherman, who appointed him chief engineer to oversee the burning of Atlanta and Sherman''s March to the Sea. Though technically only a captain in the regular army at the war''s end, Poe was one of Sherman''s most valued subordinates, and he was ultimately appointed brevet brigadier general for his bravery and service. After the war, Poe supervised the design and construction of numerous Great Lakes lighthouses, all of which are still in service. He rejoined Sherman''s staff in 1873 as engineer aide-de-camp and continued his role as trusted advisor until the general''s retirement in 1884. Poe then returned to his adopted home in Detroit where he began planning his ultimate post-Civil War engineering achievement: the design and construction of what would become the largest shipping lock in the world at Sault St. Marie, Michigan. Mining an extensive collection of Poe''s unpublished personal papers that span his entire civil and military career, and illustrating the narrative with many previously unpublished photographs, Paul Taylor brings to life for the first time the story of one of the nineteenth century''s most overlooked war heroes.

Here comes the third graphic novel in the Wapsi square series. And just as Monica thinks she has a handle on all that that''s happening around her, things go into a tighter turn with the help of her pocket demons. And while keeping her demons close to her, are they really all accounted for and are there more she doesn''t know about?

How can you make the best use of patient data to improve health outcomes? More and more information about patients'' health is stored on increasingly interconnected computer systems. But is it shared in ways that help clinicians care for patients? Could it be better used as a resource for researchers? This book is aimed at all those who want to learn about how IT is transforming the way we think about medicine and medical research. The ideas explored here are taken from research carried out around the world, and are presented by a leading authority in Health Informatics based at University College London. This comprehensive guide to the field is split into three sections: What is health informatics? – an introduction Techniques for representing and analysing patient data and medical knowledge Implementation in the clinical setting: changing practice to improve health care outcomes Whether you are a health professional, NHS manager or IT specialist, this book will help you understand how data can be managed to provide the information you and your colleagues want in the most helpful and accessible way for both you and your patients.

Climate of Ecopolitics is a vital Citizen''s Guide that sorts out the millions of bits of information on global climate change. Global warming has been described as both the world''s biggest crisis, and the biggest hoax-neither is true. This book explores the history, histrionics, psychology, false prophets and marketers of the environmental movement. A provocative view of global ecopolitics is presented; where governments demand radical and costly action on climate change and global warming. And sadly, where the due diligence of climate science cause-and-effect findings are an inconvenience- ". green group propaganda have distorted climate change far beyond rational scientific discovery or discourse."-LOS ANGELES TIMES ". we spend as much on environmental protection as on national defense and homeland security combined."-THE WALL STREET JOURNAL This book also examines the key government policies for dealing with the issues of global climate change and climate science.

"This is a welcome critical corrective to complacent mainstream accounts of the media''s cultural impact". Prof. Slavoj Zizek, International Director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities at Birkbeck, University of London "A powerful and highly engaging re-assessment of past critical thinkers (including those not normally thought of as critical) in the light of today''s mediascape". Jorge Reina Schement, Distinguished Professor of Communications, Penn State University With the exception of occasional moral panics about the coarsening of public discourse, and the impact of advertising and television violence upon children, mass media tend to be viewed as a largely neutral or benign part of contemporary life. Even when criticisms are voiced, the media chooses how and when to discuss its own inadequacies. More radical external critiques are often excluded and media theorists are frequently more optimistic than realistic about the negative aspects of mass culture. This book reassesses this situation in the light of both early and contemporary critical scholarship and explores the intimate relationship between the mass media and the dis-empowering nature of commodity culture. The authors cast a fresh perspective on contemporary mass culture by comparing past and present critiques. They: Outline the key criticisms of mass culture from past critical thinkers Reassess past critical thought in the changed circumstances of today Evaluate the significance of new critical thinkers for today''s mass culture The book begins by introducing the critical insights from major theorists from the past - Walter Benjamin, Siegfried Kracauer, Theodor Adorno, Marshall McLuhan and Guy Debord. Paul Taylor and Jan Harris then apply these insights to recent provocative writers such as Jean Baudrillard and Slavoj Žižek, and discuss the links between such otherwise apparently unrelated contemporary events as the Iraqi Abu Ghraib controversy and the rise of reality television. Critical Theories of Mass Media is a key text for students of cultural studies, communications and media studies, and sociology.

This book provides an innovative examination of the European Union as it departs from its path of integration. Indeed, so far has it departed that it could be described as having entered a new reality. The original reality was that captured in the evocative phrase in its founding agreement, the Treaty of Rome, that it should be an ever-closer union of peoples. Largely that was the path followed until the 1990s, but by the early twenty-first century there have been signs that it is turning into an ordinary international organization in which there is little overriding sense of purpose. This book discusses the indications of this development and explains why it happened only a decade or so after a peak of popular enthusiasm in the early 1990s. The question was whether the EU would become less important for the member states, as seemed to be the case for the British, or whether the German pattern, in which the EU remained important, would prevail. This book concludes that the former is more likely in part because of problems with the policies of the European Union and its conduct, but more specifically because of the current prevailing political culture in Western Europe. Paul Taylor warns that the current problems are underestimated and that there is the risk of casually throwing away the considerable achievements of the integration process. The End of European Integration will be of interest to all those with an interest in European integration, whether for or against. It will also interest students of European studies, European politics, and politics and international relations in general.

Analyzing the complex interaction between the material and immaterial aspects of new digital technologies, this book draws upon a mix of theoretical approaches (including sociology, media theory, cultural studies and technological philosophy), to suggest that the ‘Matrix’ of science fiction and Hollywood is simply an extreme example of how contemporary technological society enframes and conditions its citizens. Arranged in two parts, the book covers: theorizing the Im/Material Matrix living in the Digital Matrix. Providing a novel perspective on on-going digital developments by using both the work of current thinkers and that of past theorists not normally associated with digital issues, it gives a fresh insight into the roots and causes of the social matrix behind the digital one of popular imagination. The authors highlight the way we should be concerned by the power of the digital to undermine physical reality, but also explore the potential the digital has for alternative, empowering social uses. The book’s central point is to impress upon the reader that the digital does indeed matter. It includes a pessimistic interpretation of technological change, and adds a substantial historical perspective to the often excessively topical focus of much existing cyberstudies literature making it an important volume for students and researchers in this field.

International Organization in the Age of Globalization examines how the relentless process of globalization has affected the world''s international organizations. Taylor primarily focuses on the United Nations and the wider UN system, but he also examines the involvement of the WTO, the World Bank and regional organizations such as the EU, ASEAN, ASEM, NAFTA, and MERCOSUR in these processes. This wide ranging study concentrates on three key areas--the maintenance of peace and security, the management of economic and social activity, and the protection of individual welfare--which provide illustrations of the changing relationship between international organizations and individual states, a central interaction in global organization.Clearly and provocatively written, this book will be essential for anyone interested in processes of globalization. Students and researchers in international relations, politics, economics and sociology will benefit from the author''s insights into the changing nature of international organization in the twenty-first century.

As global society becomes more and more dependent, politically and economically, on the flow of information, the power of those who can disrupt and manipulate that flow also increases. In Hacktivism and Cyberwars Tim Jordan and Paul Taylor provide a detailed history of hacktivism''s evolution from early hacking culture to its present day status as the radical face of online politics. They describe the ways in which hacktivism has re-appropriated hacking techniques to create an innovative new form of political protest. A full explanation is given of the different strands of hacktivism and the ''cyberwars'' it has created, ranging from such avant garde groups as the Electronic Disturbance Theatre to more virtually focused groups labelled ''The Digitally Correct''. The full social and historical context of hacktivism is portrayed to take into account its position in terms of new social movements, direct action and its contribution to the globalization debate. This book provides an important corrective flip-side to mainstream accounts of E-commerce and broadens the conceptualization of the internet to take into full account the other side of the digital divide.

Celebrating the unusually rich collection of stories that make up the history of the Jews at the Olympic Games, this work shows how many of the athletes fought battles both on and off the running track and how the personal drama and enduring humanity of their stories goes beyond sport and embraces politics, heroism, and resilience. From the first Olympics in Athens in 1896 through to the disasters and triumphs of Munich 1972 and beyond, Jews and the Olympic Games, which features a list of the more than 250 Jewish medalists, is a powerful account of the conflict between sport and politics.

The environmental movement is the most densely organized movement in human history. Green Gone Wrong is a sweeping view of the environmental movement that began and reached its full legitimate expression in the United States in the 20th Century, yet, as the book argues, has lost its way in the 21st Century. The book critically examines the environmental movement; its environmentalist believers, its motivating philosophers, philosophies and psychology. The book explores the concepts of ecopolitics and fear mongering that have infected environmentalism and its government bureaucratic legacy. The book also calls for a re-introduction of good science into environmental policy decisions. Green Gone Wrong takes a candid and contemporary look at the negative impacts of ecopolitics on your life, property and constitutional rights. The book presents cases of ecopolitical abuses in public debates and legal conflicts, and portrays the condition of today''s environment in surprisingly positive terms. This fact-filled and fully-referenced work is from the provocative perspective of an environmental scientist who has solved real environmental problems for 25 years. Through this insightful account, your understanding of our environment will change from one of endless problems to one of amazing solutions.

Chronicles both land and sea maneuvers in Florida during the Civil War.

An entertaining travelogue follows the legendary highway over more than two thousand miles of road leading from Chicago to Los Angeles, describes the many landmarks along the way, and discusses the significance of Route 66 in terms of American history and culture. Original.

Practical Foundations collects the methods of construction of the objects of twentieth-century mathematics. Although it is mainly concerned with a framework essentially equivalent to intuitionistic Zermelo-Fraenkel logic, the book looks forward to more subtle bases in categorical type theory and the machine representation of mathematics. Each idea is illustrated by wide-ranging examples, and followed critically along its natural path, transcending disciplinary boundaries between universal algebra, type theory, category theory, set theory, sheaf theory, topology and programming. Students and teachers of computing, mathematics and philosophy will find this book both readable and of lasting value as a reference work.

If system administration is giving you the blues, this is the book you

This book introduces and examines what is currently the most central and controversial area in financial reporting. It is designed so that readers with particular interests can easily find their way through clearly marked sections.

An examination of the impact of international organisation at regional and global levels

Survey design and data collection. Company strategies and decision making. Technological performance. Company performance.

Specifically designed for the 250,000 students enrolled in Introduction to Music courses each year, this helpful outline gives background information on topics such as: sound and tone, the notation of pitch, harmony and tonality, and more.