Editorial Product Review: :Anthropology, psychology, cultural history, and biology provide key filters in this breezy but substantial exploration of the focal impact of the face. Produced by the BBC as a four-hour series and broadcast in the U.S. on the Learning Channel, The Human Face benefits from host, narrator, and cowriter John Cleese's signature blend of erudition, enthusiasm, and wit. Along the way, Cleese presents information on the evolution of human facial features, the face's role in sexuality (including the biological significance of ...
Editorial Product Review:Description:In evolutionary terms, sex is more important than life itself--without progeny, we are evolutionary losers. Sex fuels evolutionary change, by adding variation to the gene pool and eliminating unsatisfactory traits. We look at the endless variety of sexual expression and the powerful hold sex exerts over all living things. And we explore how the need to pass on our genes has shaped our own bodies, minds, and lives. Some scientists believe that art, literature, music--in fact all of human culture--may ...
Editorial Product Review:Description:Survival of the fittest. Raw competition? Or, a level of cooperation indispensable to life? Evolution tells us that both are important. We explore our own spiraling arms race with microorganisms, the only entities that can pose a threat to our existence. We follow the struggles of medical detectives uncovering the roots of epidemics and trace the alarming spread of resistance among pathogens that cause disease, like the new virulent tuberculosis--nicknamed 'Ebola with wings.' Interactions between species are among the most ...
Editorial Product Review: :When Cosmos was first broadcast in 1980, our world--and the context of Carl Sagan's eloquent 'personal journey'--was a different place. The late Dr. Sagan would be pleased to witness the cooling of the cold war, the continued exploration of space, and ongoing efforts to curb our destructive dependence on fossil fuels. For Sagan's series is far more than a guided tour through 'billions and billions' of stars and galaxies. It remains a profound plea for the unity of humankind, for ...
Editorial Product Review:Description:For 21 years, Charles Darwin kept his theory of evolution secret from all but a few friends. He confided to one: 'It is like confessing to a murder.' His torment resonates in society today--in the challenge his incredibly powerful idea poses to our understanding of our world and ourselves. We interweave the drama in key moments of Darwin's life with documentary sequences of current research, linking past to present and introducing major concepts of evolutionary theory. We also explore why ...
Editorial Product Review: :Where did it all begin? How did the universe give birth to the sun and its family of planets that form our solar system? How is a bubbling atomic reactor in space the source of warmth and light for life as we know it? Why will Mars be the first planet we colonize? What is the long-term fate of the planets in our solar system? Are we alone? The Planets is an entertaining, comprehensive, and informative A&E documentary series that ...
Editorial Product Review:Description:Of all the species on earth, we alone attempt to explain who we are and how we came to be, through the prisms of both science and religion. How has the tension between the two played out? Today, the theory of evolution still is dogged by controversy. This program explores the creationist movement and its arguments by drawing on real human stories of people struggling to find a balance between faith and reason. Through the perceptions of theistic scientists and ...
Editorial Product Review: essential video:Considered by many to be Federico Fellini's most beautiful and powerful film, La Strada was the first film to reveal the range of Guilietta Masina, whose poignant performance as the childlike Gelsomina recalls Chaplin's Little Tramp. The bubbly, waiflike Gelsomina is a simpleton sold to the gruff, bullying circus strongman Zampanò (Anthony Quinn) as a servant and assistant. Treated no better than an animal, Gelsomina nonetheless falls in love with the brute Zampanò. When they join a small ...
This raw work-flow application isn't the Holy Grail many hoped it would be, but Apple Aperture 1.5 could make life easier for photographers who need to cull, retouch, and output large numbers of photographs quickly and efficiently.
This raw work-flow application isn't the Holy Grail many hoped it would be, but Apple Aperture 1.5 could make life easier for photographers who need to cull, retouch, and output large numbers of photographs quickly and efficiently.