change Books

I love this series and ever since i read the first one i knew i had to finish the lot...i actually took into account what Lauren Brookes was writing to and have tried several of the methods mentioned on my own horses only to result in success.. i would reccomend this series to all it is a great storyline!

Great book. My daughter is 10 and she loved the entire series.

Heartland Series #16

I ride horses and i love them i also have horses and abunch of heartland books that i love. This series is about a stable called Heartland and horses that come here are usually afraid of something or they have been abused, so they cure them by using herbal remedies and patience. Amy, who is the main character, does the healing and is also heeling her grief of her mother who died in a car crash when saving an abandoned horse on a stormy night.
In book 16 of the series, Ben, one of the stable hands is leaving so he can concentrate on showing his horse Red more. So Heartland finds a new stable hand named Joni who already knows a lot of the herbal remedies they use and how to use them. Also in this Heartland book right now they are curing a police horse named Venture who was injured in a tornado by falling tires while his rider Sergeant Garcia was trying to rescue kids in a trapped car. Venture is all healed, but starts rearing and bucking at the sight of the saddle, saddle pad, and bridle so any thing to do with tack. Amy gets concerned when he makes no progress at all. So if you want to find out what happens to Venture and all the rest at Heartland you will have to read the book. There are a total of 20 numbered books and a special edition book in the Heartland series.
M.D.C Spokane WA

Heartland Series #16

This series is about a stable called Heartland and horses that come here are usually afraid of something or they have been abused, so they cure them by using herbal remedies and patience. Amy, who is the main character, does the healing and is also heeling her grief of her mother who died in a car crash when saving an abandoned horse on a stormy night.
In book 16 of the series, Ben, one of the stable hands is leaving so he can concentrate on showing his horse Red more. So Heartland finds a new stable hand named Joni who already knows a lot of the herbal remedies they use and how to use them. Also in this Heartland book right now they are curing a police horse named Venture who was injured in a tornado by falling tires while his rider Sergeant Garcia was trying to rescue kids in a trapped car. Venture is all healed, but starts rearing and bucking at the sight of the saddle, saddle pad, and bridle so any thing to do with tack. Amy gets concerned when he makes no progress at all. So if you want to find out what happens to Venture and all the rest at Heartland you will have to read the book. There are a total of 20 numbered books and a special edition book in the Heartland series.
M.D.C Spokane WA

My daugter read this book without putting it down. All the books in this series are a good read and keeps the girls wanting more.

This book is amazing from the point of view of a H.R Professional.As the head of HR for a Global Multi National Corp I have been looking at a concise book which will help me to sell the idea of a Learning Organization to the top management.

I'am planning to distribute a copy of this book to each of the Executive Committe Members in my Company.

The 10 steps outlined in the book are Simple and Clear which will motivate any Top Mgmt to go towards creating a Valuable Organization.

A must read for every H.R Professional.

I've had to read many learning organizational books for my graduate studies -- this was one of my favorites out of maybe 10 I've read. One, it's fun to read! The examples are erudite, taken from other disciplines like science and math, not just business. The 10 steps are easy to follow, logical and well represented. The authors rely on concrete examples that everyone can relate to. If I had to train a group of people or point an organization towards achieving its goals as a learning organization, I would rely on this book as my bible. Great writing style, great examples -- overall one of the most enjoyable I've read!

While there are many books about brain-compatible learning, systems thinking, communication, organizational and culture change, multiple intelligences..., this book has integrated them all into a very practical, wise and interesting manual for organizational growth. Ideally, people in any organization should start with the assessment tool and go sequentially through all the ten steps: 2. promote positive, 3. safe thinking, 4. risk taking, 5. people as resources, 6. learning power, 7. map the vision, 8. model the vision, 9. systems thinking, 10. get show on the road. But there are so many useful guidelines, stories and exercises, you can dip into any page and be enriched and enlightened. Just take "16 principles that promote learning" (pp. 16-19) or the 36 assessment items (pp. 66-67), they are very specific goals for us to aim at. "Why most training doesn't work" (pp. 168-171) should be required reading for all trainers. In fact, the whole book should be required reading by all those in management or interested in fostering growth through participative learning. For follow-up, it helps to read Peter Kline's The Everyday Genius, that gives a more comprehensive background to the Integrative Learning that underlies the present book. People can also go on to Peter Senge and team's books--if they haven't done so. In another revised edition, it might help to include an index and also update the checklist on 7 multiple intelligences to include the natural and existential intelligences.

After reading Chapter One I felt different. I couldn't put my finger on it but something had clicked. As I began to listen regularly to the self-hypnosis download on a daily basis I felt different again. Then my life began to change. I won't go into detail but some choices I had been pondering became very clear. And taking action was just a natural activity.

Read the book and DO the worksheets. Follow along with his instructions to read a chapter a day, listen to the download, relax and watch what happens. I've recommended this book to more friends than I can count and they say the same thing - the change just seems to happen.

Another reviewer said that it was possible to follow the directions in this book and have nothing change. I've read this book, and I find that claim to be bizarre.

In order for that to happen, for you to do the exercises in this book properly and have nothing change, you need to be so bullheaded as to actually turn your back on everything you learned and just plod on in the same, stupid direction you always took. You could do that, of course; but why bother?

Or you could just lie, and say, "Yeah, teach. Dog ate my homework. I did real good, dunno why I forgot everything." Or even, "Oh, yeah, but I already knew how to do that, prof. Want my money back."

Buy the book, and do the exercises. To paraphrase Richard Bandler: "If it didn't work, you didn't do what he said. You did the other one- the one where you ask, 'What the heck is this guy talking about?'"

This book includes NLP tools for life change that would cost hundreds of dollars to learn elsewhere.

I was led to this book at a time when I needed to makes changes to support the way I was living and to find new options. I had seen some of Paul's recent TV programmes helping people to oiverocme phobias and simialr and as I passed a book stall it `grabbed' me.

While I used to enjoy his much earlier TV shows demonstrating the power of hypnosis, or more accurately the power of the unconscious mind, I did not accredit much value to that beyond entertainment and possibly helping a few. However in the intervening years, and no doubt as a consequence of his own sometimes difficult life experiences, McKenna has matured considerably and added a deeper insight and value to his work and understanding of the nature of mind and being.

This has paved the way to helping many who chose to make profound changes to their experience of Iife. His concept and approach find great resonance with the many `teachers' throughout history with regard to how we create our reality via our beliefs. I can think for one of the famous books written by `Seth' via Jane Roberts in the 70's that describes in such beautiful detail how we create our reality individually and collectively. In short your beliefs are the master filter that lets us choose and create from all sorts of possible realities - we are not just at the mercy of some given experience but truly masters of our own experience. The trouble is most of humanity have no ideas how the process of reality creation occurs and how to impact upon it or change it.

Paul's book is a user friendly approach to this process and reading his book, and listening to the wonderful CD, are very powerful tools to make such self directed changes. If yuo believe it can work then it will, if you have an entrenched belief that this is not possible, then in keeping with the principles it won't - which just goers to show me even more that it does! Writing out ones life goals as part of one of the chapters is another very powerful tool to start to see and experience the changes you want. A 5 year plan is your own statement of focus and intention.

If we can get away for the slight apprehension around the term `hypnosis' as something that will subvert our will in favour of another's, then we can actually do an enormous amount of good to self and others using these techniques. If our intention is pure so will be out outcomes. No one argues on the benefits of electricity but that can harm if missapplied. So be careful what you ask for with these techniques for you will surely be given what you seek! Both `positive' and `negative'.

Well done McKenna for your wonderful, positive, empowering gift to help mankind when perhaps he needs more than ever to figure out how to create a more positive, loving, meaningful and enjoyable existence for himself and the world at large.

I most strongly recommend this book to those who strongly wish to make some significant changes in their life and who dare to!

Julian

I started to read this book as my close parents were divorcing, and I was feeling very disconnected from life.
Paul Mckenna's title '' Change your Life in Sever Days'' seemed at the time unreal to me.... until I read the first few pages. It helps you to discover the inner peace inside yourself with simple step by step guides. Now I am married and moved to LA from France where I was living, and seem to step over those ''bumps in the road'' with a lot more knowledge of my inner helper... my real self. Get this book! It's a wake up call to a better jouney.

This book is like every self-help book. Not in the sense that the material is the same, but it's a case of PUT IT INTO PRACTICE!
It's pretty simple - by following Paul's techniques I have found my confidence lift to great levels, I feel much better about myself, and I worry less about people's actions towards me.
About 6 months after I first read this book, I was having a hard time and found this book on my shelf and decided to read it for a second time. And low and behold!! I started doing the exercises again, and sure enough my confidence levels were raised again. It's all very well to READ these things, but if you don't take ACTION (and I mean CONSTANT action), then it's not going to work for you.
We are a society full of people looking for a quick fix - and there isn't one. MAKE AN EFFORT!! You'll be surprised what will happen!

I have used the Motivation to Move hypnosis CD for a few weeks now, and am not noticing a change in my behavior. I will admit that I generally fall asleep before it's over, but my understanding is that the message should still get through. I have not been using it at other times of the day (for fear of falling asleep!), so I don't know if it would have a greater effect. At this point I would say it's great if you need to fall asleep, but for me, it doesn't seem to be helping me become more active.

I got this for both myself and my spouse. While I found it somewhat helpful my spouse said the voice was not soothing enough to work on them. My spouse has been under before so it maybe that I had no expectations or past experience to draw from. I found that I did sleep better and while I usually don't have a problem exercising anyway, I would say it helped to listen to it to prepare for the next day's routine.

First, this is sold by Amazon NOT by a private reseller so I take issue with the handmade product. NO plastic seal on the case. The insert and label on the cd were printed with an injet printer... you can tell when the ink smears if slightly dampened. This is to be expected if I make my own cd but NOT from Amazon. Sad.
Content: Less than stellar. I loathe the repeated countdown ending with a snap of the fingers. I HATE THAT! Not relaxing. The speaker's voice is masculine with a slight affect like Sean Connery. Distracting.
NOT worth the extraordinarily high price.
Suggestion: Try Glenn Harrold's cd's instead.

Surfing, viewing and clicking away at new products on Amazon one day, I'm not quite sure what led me to the 'Motivation to Move! Hypnosis Exercise Motivation' CD, but I will say this . . . I'm totally and completely glad I did and I'm sold on this product! No kidding!

I've listened to many a subliminal/hypnosis tape/CD's in my day and for the most part they all turned out to be full of more 'new age-ish' type music than anything else. Perhaps the 'subliminal message' was indeed there but it never seemed to sink in for me . . . that is until I purchased Trevor Scot's 'Motivation to Move! Hypnosis Exercise Motivation' CD.

I'm starting my third week today and it is absolutely amazing how my mindset has totally and completely changed regarding exercising! It wasn't a fact of 'not' wanting to exercise, it was a lack of motivation to initially start and more importantly stick with it once I started. However, it appears I honestly have not experienced that problem once since I started to listen to the 'Motivation to Move! Hypnosis Exercise Motivation' CD.

By the end of the first week of listening to the CD every night before I went to bed and following Trevor's instructions to the 'T', the following week I found myself rising on queue at 5am every morning. No forcing myself to get up, no grumbling when I did or convincing myself I could sneak in another hour of sleep, I truly wanted to get up and exercise!

Each day afterward was as if on queue I'd wakeup at 5am, jump out of bed and literally jump on the exercise equipment in my home and put in a good one to two hour workout before heading out the door to work later that morning.

It has been an amazing two-weeks so far and although Mr. Scot suggests that you listen to this CD for 21 days straight, preferably before you go to bed at night and as needed afterward, I plan to continually listen to the CD every night well past the 21 day suggestion because not only does it help me sleep better, but in the morning I'm raring to go and exercise and that's the exact results I was looking for when I purchased this CD.

In my opinion, for those who are honestly open-minded, accept and realize the truth that `no quick weight loss' diet is ever going to do the trick and sincerely are looking for something that will truly work and get you once and for all off the dreaded yo-yo rollercoaster diet dilemma and on to the only true proven weight loss method that actually works, i.e., exercising, the 'Motivation to Move! Hypnosis Exercise Motivation' CD would be a perfect place to start. I highly recommend following the instructions precisely and I honestly believe you'll experience the same results I am currently experiencing. By this CD and see for yourself!

If there is a traditional hypnosis, I was very relaxed I think I fell a sleep. In order for it to work you have to listen everyday, which I have not,but i feel that if i did listen it would work.
The Procrastenator

This book is a wonderfully engaging, well-written autobiography; it also brings vividly to life a crucially-important part of recent US social history. Charles Halpern worked at the heart of an era of progressive change in law and society that started in the 1960s, and he stayed creatively active even throughout the subsequent period of reaction--which arguably has lasted down to the present day.

But Halpern's autobiography goes further even than providing a vivid, personal chronicle of our recent past. It also gives readers a present-day model of and incitement to progressive change-making. It models change-making as an intensely creative and imaginative activity, as it charts Halpern's succession of activities as an architect and leader of Center for Law and Social Policy, the nation's first public interest law firm; then as the designer and first dean of the CUNY Law School, an educationally and socially innovative institution that focused on public interest law; and ultimately as head of the progressive Nathan Cummings foundation. The scope and sheer variety of Halpern's constant, ongoing innovation and institutional invention is fascinating and even breathtaking.

At the same time, Halpern writes of what informs and grounds this unusual creativity. His book is also an account of intellectual and spiritual growth, as Halpern experiments with and incorporates contemplative practice in his life--drawing on it to sustain and empower him in his public career. Halpern then feeds back personal discovery back into institutional creativity, as he sets up a series of programs devoted to transforming intellectual and professional practice in a wide variety of fields--in law schools, colleges, universities, and social movements.

Making Waves and Riding the Currents takes a life well-lived and transforms it into a book that will interest, involve, inform and inspire generations of readers.

I highly recommend this engaging memoir, which is an inspiration and fast read. Charles Halpern graduated from Harvard and Yale, and parlayed a legal career into the first public interest law firm and law school. Upon discovering meditation, Mr. Halpern, incorporated his practice into his life's work. As a result of Halpern's efforts, oil pipelines were put in Alaskan soil sustainably, DDT was banned, public interest lawyers found their needed education, and graduates started influential environmental groups such as EarthJustice. The ripple of Halpern's positive wave continues, and you can catch it by reading Making Waves and Riding the Currents.

No matter what your political persuasion or your profession, this book is a great source of wisdom and insight. Beyond a fascinating history of the birth of public interest law, Charlie Halpern provides a deeply personal and affirming account of how to pursue one's ideals in a way that is nurturing of our deeper selves and respectful of others. A key lesson of this book is that it is not just what you stand or fight for, but who you are and how you act as you do it. By cultivating an awareness that allows a deeper wisdom to emerge, Charlie points to ways we all can contribute to the world in a way that contributes to far greater tolerance and balance, without compromising our effectiveness. And in the process, we also become healthier and more loving and also create a world that reflects this.

Making Waves and Riding Currents is a book that everyone should read. No soft tale here but a journey not unlike rafting white waters. Charles sees the real and the ideal, the what "could be and is not yet", takes time to grasp the whole, sees the way and then takes it. He combines courage, a genuine interest in life and a willingness to "live and learn" both on a professional and personal level. This is a story of major entrepreneurial ventures that impact our own lives, created and co-created, experienced and shared in ways allowing every one involved to learn, use their experience, as well as to question and relinquish old patterns, recognize blocks and crack open into wider realms of understanding and living that center on Wisdom. This book documents changes in thinking that have make our society more humane and just. This is not your usual "lawyer" story. This is speaks to everyone's potential to develop wisdom, played out large, and saying: Come on, you can do it! I can't stop thinking about what one life can do.

From the beginning of this tale of Charles Halpern's remarkable accomplishments, it was obvious that he was an intelligent, effective individual with many skills. But competent doesn't necessarily mean wise. Fortunately for us readers, interwoven with the story of his doing is the story of his psychological/spiritual development -- the story of his growth in wisdom and the integration of that wisdom into his many activities.

Halpern had the courage to place himself in a wide variety of challenging, often uncomfortable, growth-fostering situations. Too many to recount here, they included a winter camping adventure in the Adirondacks, a week-long vision quest based on Native American traditions that included many hours in a sweat lodge, and a five-day mindfulness meditation retreat led by Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. This last was a watershed event, about which Halpern wrote: "The experience of extended meditation practice...awakened my interest in exploring the connection between meditation and wisdom. Could I undertake to practice wisdom, living the wise life that would generate wise actions and decisions? Could this be a new way to approach activism, to start from the place of wisdom and compassion rather than the place of anger and insistence on legal rights?"

Meditation became a central focus in his life, and numerous retreats followed. To some extent facilitated by the Nathan Cummings Foundation of which he was now President, he met and got to know many of America and the world's foremost spiritual teachers. "Longtime meditators and respected teachers," he wrote, "gave me a new model for a way to be in the world--committed to serving others, cultivating wisdom, being open to changing themselves, and exposing their own vulnerability." Currently, Charles Halpern is Chair of The Center for Contemplative Mind and Society.

MAKING WAVES AND RIDING THE CURRENTS is a truly inspiring and uplifting book. It is the tale of a life marked by great accomplishment and developing wisdom, told with an engaging frankness about his own vulnerabilities by the man who has lived it.

John Berger's latest indignation,'Hold Everything Dear' alerted me to Solnit's volume. The books compliment eachother. Given the magnitude of negative world news promulgated by popular media, Solnit's short polemical tract about the inroads made to erode culpable global capitalism is , itself a grain of sand. Indeed, introduced to Solnit via,'River of Shadows' her excellent recap of pioneer photographer, Edweard Muyerbridge, I was less surprised to discover that she embodied environmental concerns than that she was a prominent activist in West Coast political undertakings. Smatterings of her achievements count amongst the movements she puts on record. I suspect the book is unlikely to capture the neo-libs, fundamentalists and subscribers to well-mannered mindlessness whose passivity she rails against. Her rally call is for renewed hope over despair, action to outflank the American Paradise, that suburban 'gulag' ennui that has been lulled by cable TV, two car garages and cul de-sacs of despair. A book for the converted.

Solnit reflects on a life of great hopes for the world, in an age of tragedies for humanity. She contemplates the experience of hope as it ranges from self-deception to simple honesty. Her stories expose small openings to unexpected possibilities, like making friends in a Eureka, Nevada bar with supporters of WRANGLERS (Western Ranchers Against No Good Leftist Environmentalist Radical S---heads), who share her hope for restoring the land. Her hope in final answers, correct ideologies or great leaders fades, but other possibilites arise moment by moment. She grows whimsically alert, noticing oddball blessings:

"It turns out, for example, the Viagra is good for endangered species. Animal parts that traditional Chinese medicine prescribed as aphrodisiacs and for treating impotence -- including green turtles, seahorses, geckos, hooded and harp seals, and the velvet from the half-grown antlers of caribou -- are, thanks to the new drug, no longer in such demand. What more comic form of the mysterious unfolding of the world is there than this, which suggests that Viagra's ultimate purpose may be the survival of animals at the edges of the planet?" (p.77-78)

Occasionally her activist life, her community, and all of world history come together in panoramas of bard-like awareness:

"Take a third Pacific species, though -- the brown pelican, which also nearly disappeared then came back -- and imagine one pelican's trajectory from Ocean Beach, the western edge of my city and my own continent.

Imagine it soaring with the heavy prehistoric grace of a pterodactyl down Fulton Street, the long street that starts at the beach, parallels the north side of Golden Gate Park, and carries on after the park ends to run east through the old African-American neighborhood, past surviving gospel churches and extict barbershops to the little formal garden between the War Memorial Building and the Opera House, then straight into City Hall, whose great guilded dome straddles the street. Let that pelican soar through the echoing central atrium where in 1961 students who protested the anticommunist purges were washed down the marble stairs with fire hoses, let the bird float out the other side, going on east, to United Nations Plaza, where Fulton dead-ends into Market Street, the city's main artery. This is the place where I stand in the present to face past and future, the place where stories come together, one of the countless centers of the world." (p.139-140)

I bought this book for a discussion group at my church. It really has a lot of good ideas in it and maybe gives me a little hope for the future.

I've tried to read Solnit over the years but her disjointed view of the ecological and other problems facing the US-- and past critiques of how to solve them-- just hang there, like a phantom in the dark, as I read.
In past works she's vehemently against WALMART, but for the 'latinoization' of the US' as a way of reinjecting political serum into the body politic. Rebecca, where do you think a lot of latinos--legal land illegal--work and shop to help break U.S. consumer consumption records?
She's against the 'racists' in the Sierra Club who want stricter immigration control, yet she's silent on the 'no-longer a white elephant' population issue that's helping to destroy her beloved West.
If you can get over the twice-chewed romantic stories of 'hope' in this one, you may find possibilities in this book. I found a yawner.

This book came to my attention via a Sonoma State colleague who uses it for her ecopsychology class. It is not intended to lay out a particular activist approach or set of practices, but to recommend an attitude change from despair or nausea to hope. Elegantly written, it questions the extremes of optimistic denial and existential nausea by offering a collection of behind-the-scenes stories about how people who refused to give up brought a better future into being one brave action at a time. Great book for teachers wanting to encourage activism or social awareness in a time of unprecedented political and environmental crisis.

I borrowed this book from my local library and am very glad I didn't spend money on it. Unless you have absolutely no knowledge of heathly eating, you are beyond the level of this book. The "vices" being busted consist of 3 - yes, only 3, that are pure common sense when it comes to weight loss. Also, the few recipes offered had no nutritional information or serving size suggestions. So, check it out from the library if you are curious, but otherwise, don't bother.

Vice Busting is the no diet way to get slim. Julia helps you to identify the things that are keeping you from losing and helps you keep them off with Vice Busting. A must for everyone who really wants to lose weight and keep it off.

A very sensible approach to change your way of eating.I like how it teaches you to slowly change bad habits while incorporating new ones.Taking your time to change and not try to do it all overnight,if the change is too drastic you won't stick with it.I would recommend this book to anyone who has tried and failed at other diets.

Great book, full of interesting information proved very helpful. After reading what feels like every "diet" book out there, this one was very insightful.

I picked up this book from the public library after reading all the glowing reviews here at Amazon and I have to say that I'm disappointed with the content! It's just another diet book saying the same things over and over. There's nothing new here, and there's the familiar emphasis on eating correctly and exercising which every fat person knows by heart! And, the "vices" listed are nothing new either as again, every fat person knows that eating cookies, chips, pizza, ice cream, and drinking sodas will put weight on you IF you don't eat these things in moderation and exercise consistently! It disturbed me that foods are labled "vices" as we all know that if you eliminate foods while trying to lose weight, these are the very foods you'll pick up once you're finished dieting! The recipies at the end of the book are the same ones you'll find in any low fat, low carb book...blah, blah! Most overweight people are not fat because we don't know how or what to cook! Believe me, we know what to cook and how to cook it!

The exercise regimens are the same as you'll find anywhere and most people know to start with small steps then build up as you go along. The thing that I hated about this book is that it just promotes walking and weight lifting. These activities are great, but I think anything that gets you moving will do in the beginning! Some people will want to do other things like dance, aerobics, swimming, tennis, bowling, surfing, etc...!! The real secret is to do activities that you love! No new tips on how to really motivate yourself were given, and the reasons listed for dieting and exercising were the same old, tired reasons that people have used over and over, but never seem to stick! If you want motivation for eating and moving well try the book, The Zen of Eating!

What was really missing from this book (for me) was some insight into the reasons why fat people stuff and stuff themselves with high caloric foods and the steps you and I can take to stop. I don't think the author is aware that food is really not the issue, but it's what's irritating or aggravating the person to eat comforting junk foods! I finally figured out the the reason I put on over 100lbs was because of the loss of a much wanted relationship and the stress of teaching disabled students in an educational system that can not meet even a few of their needs! OK, so now I need/wanted a book that would give practical tips on how to deal with eating when I'm frustrated with my job and self, angry at situations/people/students I can't change or influence and when I'm wanting sexual touch, intimacy and comforting!! And, I need some good info on how to stay motivated when I'm dead tired from telling a 17 year old student that 7x8 is not 40 over and over, when I've written 50 educational plans in 4 months and attended so many unnecessary school/faculty/parent meetings that I'm blue in the face!

Again, if food were the main issue, then fat people would eat carrots, cabbage and string beans by the bushels! Fat people are overeating to comfort themselves from situations that make them feel powerless, irritated, aggravated and stressed! Hello!! From this book, I also would have liked some information on the diffent types of overeating that exist. Yep, we don't all eat the same way! Some of us gorge on sweets, some of us like salty foods, some like a combination of both and some of us just love huge amounts of non-sugar foods! Additionally, some of us are compulsive/obsessive eaters, emotional eaters, stress eaters, and binge eaters just to name a few of the terms. And, I'm sure there are even more types out there. Ok, there can't be a "one shoe fits all sizes" approach to these different eaters/issues, right????

Overall, I think this book is great for people who suddenly find themselves fat and don't have a clue as to what to do, but if you've been fat for a while and you've tried dieting, exercising, pills, surgery, liquids, potions and angel dust...this book really won't give you anymore insight into how to deal with what's eating you and how to stop! For me, eliminating foods is just not a long-term solution! So, save your money and give diet authors Geneen Roth or Victoria Moran a try...at least they've come close to figuring out how to deal with the non-food issues that drive people to eat to excess and how to find the motivation to correct the problem while learning how to live a more fulfilled life at any size!

Randall Collins has provided a comprehensive overview of the major philosophical ideas that interested non philosophers can use as an introduction without fear of missing anything important. As a physician grappling daily with the issues of knowledge assessment, the extensive overview was well worth the few weeks it took to read the book. Many descriptions are nevertheless brutally summarized so that I often used on line encyclopedias to provide necessary background. Bertrand Russell's " A History of Western Philosophy" is more accessible, but is now out of date, and not nearly as comprehensive. By dividing philosophers into schools by century and location, providing easily understandable charts of the interconnections of various schools, and brief summaries of their positions, one builds a very humanized, inclusive picture. The description of science as rapid discovery based primarily on technological innovation certainly resonated strongly and came as a new insight in spite of spending the last 40 years in such an endeavor. The same arguments about knowledge growth are repeatedly emphasized, but at least there is a slight difference in perspective. Summarizing the big problems of ontology and epistemology by how and when they appeared in Western, Islamic, Chinese, Japanese, and Indian cultures gives an excellent overview. The final chapter on sociological realism based on the previous discussion provided a sound foundation for building the arguments, and placing the ideas in perspective. I came away with a better idea of where to go next and that even though the search for enlightenment is unending, a few successes, no matter how minor, can be very satisfying.

For all interested in global history of philosophy, this is the book to get.

First, each section on a particular philosophical tradition (e.g. ancient Greece, Indian, Medieval Islamic, Chinese, Modern) is an interesting high-level history of tradition in its own rights. This alone makes the price tag worthwhile.

More importantly, Collins included very interesting insights about individual period that is not covered by other general histories:
1) How some schools of thoughts become popular not because they are correct but because they are extreme
2) Parallelisms that occur in different periods of the same tradition (e.g. Post-Shankara positions in India has its parallel during the hey-day of Buddhist philosophy)
3) Parallelisms that occur across traditions (e.g. compelling coverage of how medieval Christian & Islamic philospophy shares a similar structure)

With these characteristics, I think this book clearly satisfies the need us interested in global history of philosophy, for which Collins is clearly very passionate about.

On the sociology theoretical piece, I think the theory is fine: it articulates a lot of aspects of which most students of philosophy has a vague sense. The theory is almost 'common sense'-- just that it doesn't seem to have been clearly articulated that way in academic circles. As such, the theory piece is less interesting, but it is not intruding and it provides a sound umbrella thesis for Collins' insights on individual traditions.

Lastly, one point about the 'data' that Collins use-- the 'maps' that link the different philosophers in networks. I think it is interesting to read (because it includes a lot of interesting names-- familiar or otherwise), but they don't really provide the 'data' on which the sociological theory can be based. I think Collins himself recognized this-- and thus his appendix about the important 'isolates' like Ibn Sina.

I have a Ph.D. in history of philosophy, but I now follow it as an interested layman rather than a professional. In short, this review is written from the viewpoint of someone whose background and interests lie in philosophy rather than sociology.

For me, this was an interesting and useful book for a couple of reasons:

1. It discusses philosophers in the context of social networks, where the thinkers are linked by relationships such as: was the student of, reacted against, was married to the sister of, etc.

Often, philosophy is taught (or studied) by looking only at the works of philosophers, in isolation from the philosophers' relationships with others around them. Placing a philosopher in the context of a network of relationships helps considerably in understanding what the philosopher is trying to do, and why. In short, it can help you better to understand any particular philosopher that you are studying.

2. I found the author's notion of an "attention space" very interesting. The notion of an "attention space" in the history of philosophy seems to me similar to Thomas Kuhn's notion of a "paradigm" in the history of science. Philosophers' roles in the history of philosophy are described as moving the attention space, or elaborating within the attention space, and so on, where moving the attention space is comparable to Kuhn's "paradigm shift" and elaborating within the attention space is comparable to Kuhn's "normal science". This approach to the history of philosophy is, I think helpful. It gives you genuine insight into the history of philosophy.

I recommend this book. You may not wish to read it all -- I didn't -- but if you dip into it here and there, at spots that look interesting to you, you will encounter ideas and concepts that are useful, stimulating and thought-provoking.

'I am thinking' is irrefutable because 'I am not thinking' nevertheless displays oneself thinking.
-- p. 858

The book 'The Sociology of Philosophies' purports to be 'The first comprehensive history of world philosophy,' as well as 'a social history of global intellectual life.' Collins in this book takes as his subject the whole of human intellectual endeavour, exploring the strands and developments of philosophical thought in all the major cultures of the world.

Collins begins this weighty and, at times, hyper-intellectual tome by building a theory of intellectualism, ritual, education, and philosophical reflection. He identifies two of the longest and most dominant philosophical strands as being those arising in Greece and China.

Collins posits the theory that intellectual pursuits do not arise in a vacuum, and are more of a societal and communal development than an individual pursuit or achievement.

'That ideas are not rooted in individuals is hard to accept because it seems to offend against a key epistemological point. Here the question is analytically distinct from the propensity to worship intellectual heroes.'

However, when one looks at the history of ideas, they usually arise in groups. While there are certainly key individuals who arose at different times in history, it is also true that there are patterns -- the age of philosophy in Greece, the Renaissance in Italy, etc. There is a particular atmosphere and sociological aspect to the culture that encourages and develops intellectual development that is unique to each, and leads to differing developments.

After exploring this history and the rituals of intellectuals and intellectualism (which is little acknowledged among scholars in the West), Collins explores who the major individuals are, who the minor individuals are, and what places they occupy in the chain of intellectual history. These chains are most pronounced in developments from Greece and developments from China; the Chinese strands continue through almost all subsequent Eastern thought, which is always responding to or reacting against key ideas formed there; in Western thought, almost all philosophical and intellectual development does the same with regard to the Greek development.

Collins proceeds from this to a theoretical framework (in which he develops more closely the Greek philosophical reflective framework, being the one from which Collins was educated, and thus the dominant underpinning of his writing) that explores the importance and rarity of true creativity. From this, he continues, doing a comparative analysis of intellectual communities, drawing in, in addition to Ancient Greece and Ancient China, India, Japan, Neo-Confucian China, Medieval Christendom, Islamic philosophies, Jewish philosophical development, then surveying modern western philosophies, French, German, and British.

Strong historical themes, political and other intellectual developments (such as the shift from faith-based to experimental-based knowledge and the rise of scientific method and mathematical objectivism) are included in his analysis. Collins concludes this work with Meta-Reflections, in which he explores the sequence and branches in the production of ideas socially (exploring the future of philosophy, which Collins states is 'a partisan theme which announces that the era of foundational questions is over. The call for the end of philosophy is recurrent, a standard ploy in intergenerational rearrangements, usually a prelude to a new round of deep troubles and new creativity.'

Collins' meta-reflections also include an epilogue on sociological realism. The quote that starts this review comes from this section. Self-evident truths are explored here.

'Virtually no one actually doubts the reality of the world of ordinary experience. It is only within specialised intellectual networks that the question has arisen whether this banal reality can be proven to a high standard of argument; and even intellectuals, when they are 'off duty', go back to assuming the reality of the ordinary time-space world.'

Sociological realism accepts the world as it is, which is not always the case with philosophy, even though philosophy purports to explain the world. This is a disconnect that occurs frequently in history. Collins further looks to mathematics and 'rapid-discovery science' for complications and developmental pieces in the intellectual history of the world.

Collins includes an extensive bibliography (worth the value of the book in itself), indexes of persons and of ideas, keys and timelines to figures, and a very interesting appendix entitled 'The Clustering of Contemporaneous Creativity', in which the ebb and flow of intellectual development on a global scale is examined and shows interesting results. He charts here the 'cultural production' of intellectuals, and their influence on their respective cultures. He traces such developments across hundreds of major and minor figures, determining fewer than 20 'isolates' in any cultural strand, and those being only among the minor figures.

I received this welcome book free in the mail years ago with the suggestion that it be a text book for a philosophy course. While it certainly is an important, interesting book on philosophy, it offers little as a philosophy text book. But over the years I have found lots of opportunities to refer to it in class as a resource.
Some specific things I find come up frequently:
1. The concept of the sociological cogito -- this strikes me as a wonderful way of applying Augustine, via Descartes' cogito via Leibniz, Hegel, Wittgenstein (private language argument) to interest the class on what we know for certain. It was the first I saw the argument presented this lucidly.
2. Applying the template of social networks to the development of ideas - and this I connect to current complex systems work such as Kennedy's Swarm Intelligence. I love passing the book around so everyone can see the network charts.
3. The relationship between points of view moving through intellectual space following standard patterns, much as Hegelian dialectic describes, but in easier terms.
4. Since I also routinely discuss sociologizing sociology, it certainly is fair that I discuss sociologizing philosophy as well.

There is a disappointment: the book stops. Understood, the effort would have been a tremendous one as the information explosion changes the patterns. But this is precisely the concern. What changes with the information explosion? We did not have to touch Quine to be strongly influenced though meeting him was certainly an event to be remembered. This is an approach I would like to see explored further.

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