This Is Your Brain on Music : The Science of a Human Obsession

Daniel J. Levitin
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Music, Science, and the Brain are more closely related than you think. Daniel J. Levitin, James McGill Professor of Psychology and Music at McGill University, shows you why this is.

In this groundbreaking union of art and science, rocker-turned-neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin (The World in Six Songs) explores the connection between music, its performance, its composition, how we listen to it, why we enjoy it, and the human brain. Drawing on the latest research and on musical examples ranging from Mozart to Duke Ellington to Van Halen, Levitin reveals:

• How composers produce some of the most pleasurable effects of listening to music by exploiting the way our brains make sense of the world

• Why we are so emotionally attached to the music we listened to as teenagers, whether it was Fleetwood Mac, U2, or Dr. Dre

• That practice, rather than talent, is the driving force behind musical expertise

• How those insidious little jingles (called earworms) get stuck in our head

Taking on prominent thinkers who argue that music is nothing more than an evolutionary accident, Levitin poses that music is fundamental to our species, perhaps even more so than language. A Los Angeles Times Book Award finalist, This Is Your Brain on Music will attract readers of Oliver Sacks, as it is an unprecedented, eye-opening investigation into an obsession at the heart of human nature.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

天體的音樂 : 音樂, 科學和宇宙自然秩序 (The Music of the Spheres )

詹姆斯 (Jamie James) 著
online access from SuperStar Digital Library
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《天體的音樂》是一部華美的哲學著作。它具有哲學性，給我們展示了一個我們從未想到的那麼美好的世界--音樂構成的世界。

宇宙是一個龐大的交響樂隊，天體構成音樂的音符。如果可能，你可以為自己畫一個世界，在這個世界中，每一個事物都有意義。一個寧靜的秩序主宰著你周圍的世界，而你頭上的天穹在崇高的和諧中迴旋。你可以看到、聽到和知道的一切都是終極真理的一個方面：一個幾何法則的高貴的簡捷、天體運動的預言的可能、一個結構極其均衡的賦格曲的和諧的美麗--所有這一切都是宇宙最為盡善盡美的表現。

《天體的音樂》又是一部追根探源的歷史著作。從古希臘畢達哥拉斯談起，經中世紀而到文藝復興，直到近現代。使用的是音樂的素材，敘述的是人間的音樂，闡釋的卻是天上的道理--音樂構成的世界。在這部書中將古今勾連在一塊兒的一個關鍵概念是“和諧”，它是音樂的生命，也是世界的生命。

(摘錄自www.amazon.cn)

LANGGAARD: Music of the Spheres / 4 Tone Pictures  

Nobel Prize Women in Science: Their Lives, Struggles, and Momentous Discoveries

Sharon Bertsch McGrayne
online access from ProQuest Ebook Central
online access from EBSCOhost
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Examines the lives of 15 women who have won Nobel prizes or contributed to a Nobel prize-winning project, exploring the reasons for the disparity in the number of women being awarded the coveted and honored award. Takes a fresh perspective on the history of science through the lives of gifted female scientists.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

透明的紅蘿蔔

莫言 著
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作者莫言，獲得二○一二年諾貝爾文學獎，是首位獲此殊榮的中國籍作家。

《透明的紅蘿蔔》主要內容：他看到了一幅奇特美麗的圖畫：光滑的鐵砧子。泛著青幽幽藍幽幽的光。泛著青藍幽幽光的鐵砧子上，有一個金色的紅蘿蔔。紅蘿蔔的形狀和大小都像一個大個陽梨，還拖著一條長尾巴，尾巴上的根根鬚鬚像金色的羊毛。紅蘿蔔晶瑩透明，玲瓏剔透。透明的、金色的外殼裡苞孕着活潑的銀色液體。紅蘿蔔的線條流暢優美，從美麗的弧線上泛出一圈金色的光芒。光芒有長有短，長的如麥芒，短的如睫毛，全是金色，……

(摘錄自書中內文)

The Death and Life of Great American Cities

Jane Jacobs
online access from ProQuest Ebook Central
online access from SuperStar Digital Library (Chinese)
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Published to coincide with the 50th anniversary of its initial publication, this special edition of Jane Jacobs’s masterpiece, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, features a new Introduction by Jason Epstein, the book’s original editor, who provides an intimate perspective on Jacobs herself and unique insights into the creation and lasting influence of this classic.

The Death and Life of Great American Cities was described by The New York Times as “perhaps the most influential single work in the history of town planning . . . [It] can also be seen in a much larger context. It is first of all a work of literature; the descriptions of street life as a kind of ballet and the bitingly satiric account of traditional planning theory can still be read for pleasure even by those who long ago absorbed and appropriated the book’s arguments.” Jane Jacobs, an editor and writer on architecture in New York City in the early sixties, argued that urban diversity and vitality were being destroyed by powerful architects and city planners. Rigorous, sane, and delightfully epigrammatic, Jane Jacobs’s tour de force is a blueprint for the humanistic management of cities. It remains sensible, knowledgeable, readable, and indispensable.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

從歷史與國際法看釣魚台主權歸屬

鄭海麟 著
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目前雖然釣魚台列嶼已隨琉球經由美國交給日本管轄，但美國所交還者，僅為琉球之行政權，而非其地之主權；關於此點，美國政府已曾一再聲明。至於釣魚台主權問題，美國則無權置啄，而由中日外交談判或經由聯合國及國際法庭加以解決。而鄭海麟博士的此一皇皇巨著《從歷史與國際法看釣魚台主權歸屬》，正可提供我國外交當局未來對日交涉時一個堅強有力的法理依據……

(摘錄自博客來網路書店)