Venus and Virtue are a match made in heaven. While popular culture often tends to think of Christianity as negative about sexuality and sexual pleasure, the fact is that Christians have the best of reasons to joyfully celebrate sex as a gift. Unfortunately, there is as much confusion about sex in Christian circles as there is in the culture at large. The authors of this book believe that this confusion can only be adequately addressed by drawing from the deep wells of biblical truth and traditional theology. The writers, however, are not only experts in biblical scholarship, theology, and philosophy, but also pastoral ministry, counseling, pop culture criticism, and women's issues. This book is not sexy in the typical sense of that word, but by situating sexuality within the cosmic drama of biblical revelation, the true beauty and goodness of sex most clearly emerges. And as that beauty emerges, we can begin to see why Christian morality not only makes profound sense, but also why it positively enriches the meaning of sex in ways that far outstrip the sexy secular alternative.

This book brings together many of John Barrell's essays - some written especially for this volume - on the history and politics of culture in eighteenth-century Britain. It addresses a wide range of cultural practices - painting, sculpture, poetry, the law, the division of labour - discussing them in relation to such issues as sexuality, the body and representation and the distinction between public and private. The Birth of Pandora will interest all those involved with or interested in cultural history and cultural studies.

Responding to the recent revival of interest in herbal medicine, Elisabeth Brooke explores the origins and history of the practice of herbalism and discusses its use in a modern context. This new book will be perfect for anyone interested in the use of herbal medicine, in particular those who have read Brooke's best-selling earlier works including Herbal Therapy for Women . "The thesis of this book is the interconnectedness of all nature, human and plant kingdoms, and the underlying connection of a first principle which unites everything and from which and to which everything returns. We shall go on to discuss the four elements and humours and how the planets weave these differing energies through the vegetable and animal kingdoms which show us how Spirit is expressed in the plant, in the person and in the dis-ease." --from the author

Representing the world is a puzzling thing. How can it be that mundane events such as processing a thought--and from there putting those thoughts into words--acquire this property of 'aboutness'? How can expressions, which depend on anything from the most fundamental regularities in the universe to trivial matters of gossip, be either true or false? In The Metaphysics of Representation, J. Robert G. Williams tells a story about how representational properties arise out of a fundamentally non-representational world. The representational properties of language are reduced, via convention, to the representational properties of thoughts. The representational properties of thoughts are reduced, via principles of rationalization, to the representational properties of perception and intention. And this most fundamental layer of representation is explained in terms of the functions they have to communicate. Williams integrates work from rival traditions to present a combined perspective in the metaphysics of representation, give new predictions and explanations of representational phenomena, and offer new solutions to long-standing problems.

This book is based on the author's PhD thesis which was selected during the 1993 ACM Doctoral Dissertation Competition as one of the three best submissions. The focus of this work is on the issue of availability in distributed file systems. It presents the important new technique called disconnected operation, in which clients mask failures and voluntary network detachments by emulating the functionality of servers where actual server-oriented solutions are inadequate. This permits client operation even under complete isolation from the server; the clean integration of mobile computers into the system is an important side-effect of the new technique. The design and implementation of disconnected file service in a working system, the Coda file system, is described in detail.

This book is not only a fascinating biography of one of the greatest painters of the seventeenth century but also a social history of the colorful extended family to which he belonged and of the town life of the period. It explores a series of distinct worlds: Delft's Small-Cattle Market, where Vermeer's paternal family settled early in the century; the milieu of shady businessmen in Amsterdam that recruited Vermeer's grandfather to counterfeit coins; the artists, military contractors, and Protestant burghers who frequented the inn of Vermeer's father in Delft's Great Market Square; and the quiet, distinguished "Papists Corner" in which Vermeer, after marrying into a high-born Catholic family, retired to practice his art, while retaining ties with wealthy Protestant patrons. The relationship of Vermeer to his principal patron is one of many original discoveries in the book.

Even with the knowledge of needing a miracle to save the woman he loves, Elan Guevara captures world attention over the sacrifice of one of his own lungs. The attention draws the attention of even; Damian the Devil whom extends Elan a deal which comes in the form of Elan having to complete a life-long objective, an objective which could influence masses of people. Ironically, to complete the objective, Damian has to explain how the whole of the universe including its creations were created and why. Recently out of the United States Navy, a humbly naive Elan Guevara settles in early 1990's, Dallas, Texas and re-unites with his street-smart brother Frank whom teaches Elan the, "Big Picture" of American civilian life. Elan Guevara and an older professional woman named Blanca; his Hummingbird, fall in love with one another and it's when Blanca, in need of a double-organ transplant that an unexpected departure from normalcy occurs. In the hospital room where Blanca lays in a coma, the Devil takes Elan Guevara into an incredible journey introducing Elan to the divine seat of a government/university world called, "Ordanturlis" where a hierarchy of Jin Potentas (Angels) and God reside. An elusive framework called the "Orda" is also introduced hence, "Why things are the way they are today. The Devil's Hummingbird: An Interview with the Devil is a fiction 58,000 word count novel that combines elements of divine mystery, political intrigue, spirituality and speculative romance. Here's the opportunity to fancy the Devil's side of the story over how and why all was created. The accompanying pre-quell novel entitled, "Chronicles of the Jin Revolution" is complete. The author is currently working on a third installment of this new divine series.