Monday, January 29, 2024

Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides

Geoffrey L. Cohen
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Finalist for The Next Big Idea Bookclub • Book of the Year Selection Behavioral Scientist and Greater Good Society

“This is perhaps the richest book on belonging you’ll ever read.… The inspiration one draws from every page of this book is an enhanced sense of what is possible. It revives the very thing we need most in these times: hope.” ―Claude M. Steele, author of Whistling Vivaldi


Discover the secret to flourishing in an age of division: belonging. In a world filled with discord and loneliness, finding harmony and happiness can be difficult. But what if the key to unlocking our potential lies in this deceptively simple concept? Belonging is the feeling of being a part of a group that values, respects, and cares for us―a feeling that we can all cultivate in even the smallest corners of social life. In Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides, Stanford University professor Geoffrey L. Cohen draws on his own and others’ groundbreaking scientific research to offer simple, concrete solutions for fostering a sense of belonging. These solutions can generate surprisingly significant and long-lasting benefits.

Small but powerful actions can bolster belonging―actions such as encouraging people to reflect on their core values before they face a challenge or expressing belief in someone’s capacity to reach a higher standard. A wide range of innovative approaches have been found to boost achievement at work and at school, bridge political divides, reduce prejudice, and even contribute to overall health. Rigorously tested in diverse arenas―from classrooms to disadvantaged neighborhoods to iconic Silicon Valley companies―these methods offer a path forward in these demanding times. Belonging is a compelling read for all who yearn for a more connected world, whether you’re a manager or employee, an educator or student, a parent or caregiver, or simply someone seeking to make the most out of every moment you spend with others. Packed with actionable insights and specific strategies, this book offers hope and practical guidance, serving as both an inspiration and a roadmap to creating a world of inclusion, understanding, and empathy.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

世界大局地圖全解讀. 5, 最視覺化的地緣政治圖輯, 攤開129張主題地圖, 帶你看懂全球政治劇變! = Mapping the world.

亞歷克西斯.鮑茲曼 (Alexis Bautzmann), 蘿拉.瑪格麗特 (Laura Margueritte)
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深入國際重大議題
129張全彩焦點地圖 ╳ 106張精彩圖表
全球脈動一目瞭然!


★用地圖看懂國際局勢,從脈絡了解地緣政治
全球地緣政治正在快速重組,面對俄烏戰爭、反全球化浪潮、科技和能源技術快速變革等趨勢變化和地緣衝突,本書直擊國際要角,用一張地圖就能展現政治、人口、經貿、文化等不同尺度的資訊,並清楚梳理事件的「歷史脈絡→當前現況→演變趨勢→未來展望」,為所有關注世界局勢的讀者提供兼具地理廣度與歷史縱深、最多元全面的地緣政治分析。

◎【糧食價格飆漲】疫情危機、環境惡化與區域衝突交互作用,導致全球7億人面臨糧食短缺  、2022年食品價格指數創新高,其中又以亞洲受害人數最多?
  →搭配精彩地圖:〔糧食危機熱點地圖〕+〔各類食品價格上漲幅度比較〕

◎【太空戰爭最前線】2050年,小行星稀有金屬市場價值將超越千億美元,哪些國家已經布局太空軍隊、聯合私人企業加速探勘稀有燃料?
  →搭配精彩地圖:〔重要衛星系統覆蓋圖〕+〔各國太空預算統計圖〕

◎【網路犯罪肆虐全球】5G技術加速全球數位化,也讓網路犯罪更加猖狂,勒索軟體受害者支付贖金突破4億美元,美國最大燃油供應業者也成為攻擊對象?
  →搭配精彩地圖:〔全球網路攻擊&資安地圖〕

(摘錄自博客來網路書店)

Monday, January 22, 2024

The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI

Fei-Fei Li
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ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S RECOMMENDED BOOKS ON AI * FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOKS OF 2023

From Dr. Fei-Fei Li, one of TIME's 100 MOST INFLUENTIAL in AI, comes "a powerful plea for keeping humanity at the centre of our latest technological transformation" (Financial Times).

Wired called Dr. Fei-Fei Li “one of a tiny group of scientists—a group perhaps small enough to fit around a kitchen table—who are responsible for AI’s recent remarkable advances.”

Known to the world as the creator of ImageNet, a key catalyst of modern artificial intelligence, Dr. Li has spent more than two decades at the forefront of the field. But her career in science was improbable from the start. As immigrants, her family faced a difficult transition from China’s middle class to American poverty. And their lives were made all the harder as they struggled to care for her ailing mother, who was working tirelessly to help them all gain a foothold in their new land.

Fei-Fei’s adolescent knack for physics endured, however, and positioned her to make a crucial contribution to the breakthrough we now call AI, placing her at the center of a global transformation. Over the last decades, her work has brought her face-to-face with the extraordinary possibilities—and the extraordinary dangers—of the technology she loves.

The Worlds I See is a story of science in the first person, documenting one of the century’s defining moments from the inside. It provides a riveting story of a scientist at work and a thrillingly clear explanation of what artificial intelligence actually is—and how it came to be. Emotionally raw and intellectually uncompromising, this book is a testament not only to the passion required for even the most technical scholarship but also to the curiosity forever at its heart.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

文化地圖 :八個面向的文化量表,讓你精確掌握文化交鋒的真相,避免淪為「國際文盲」(The Culture Map)

艾琳.梅爾 (Erin Meyer)
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跨國、跨地域、跨文化的合作指南

⇨對你而言的「遲到」,可能不是「遲到」?
⇨對你而言的「讚美」,可能不是「讚美」?
⇨「講話比較直」的問題,外國人也有?
⇨「隨和」,可能也是「缺乏領導力」?

溝通──是最難的事


八個面向的文化量表(the eight-scale model)
  ‧溝通:低情境,或高情境?
  ‧評估:直接否定回應,或是間接否定回應?
  ‧說服:原理優先,或應用優先?
  ‧領導:平權式,或更看重階級?
  ‧決策:重視共識,或是由上而下?
  ‧信任:任務導向,或是關係導向?
  ‧歧異:不怕對峙,或是避免對峙?
  ‧時程:線性時間,或是彈性時間?
  讓你精確掌握文化交鋒的真相,避免淪為「國際文盲」!

我們看不懂的,很可能不只是外國人的文化,對於自己的文化,也一樣毫無自覺。於是戴著自己的文化有色眼鏡來看待其他人,依此作出錯誤判斷或誤判,無意間為自己製造了許多困難和挫敗。企業想要成功,你必須具有與全世界的人順利合作的能力,那麼你就要能夠和知道如何欣賞文化差異,同時也要能尊重個別差異。

行為的文化模式與信仰,經常影響我們的覺察(我們所看見的)、認知(我們的想法),以及行動(我們的行為)。這本書的目標即在協助你,改善你解讀文化這三個面向的能力,以及提升你的處理效益。

(摘錄自博客來網路書店)

Monday, January 15, 2024

An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us

Ed Yong
online access from EBSCOhost Ebooks
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ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2022: The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Time, People, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Slate, Reader’s Digest, Chicago Public Library, Outside, Publishers Weekly, BookPage

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2022: Oprah Daily, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Economist, Smithsonian Magazine, Prospect (UK), Globe & Mail, Esquire, Mental Floss, Marginalian, She Reads, Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal


The Earth teems with sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields. But every kind of animal, including humans, is enclosed within its own unique sensory bubble, perceiving but a tiny sliver of our immense world.

In An Immense World, Ed Yong coaxes us beyond the confines of our own senses, allowing us to perceive the skeins of scent, waves of electromagnetism, and pulses of pressure that surround us. We encounter beetles that are drawn to fires, turtles that can track the Earth’s magnetic fields, fish that fill rivers with electrical messages, and even humans who wield sonar like bats. We discover that a crocodile’s scaly face is as sensitive as a lover’s fingertips, that the eyes of a giant squid evolved to see sparkling whales, that plants thrum with the inaudible songs of courting bugs, and that even simple scallops have complex vision. We learn what bees see in flowers, what songbirds hear in their tunes, and what dogs smell on the street. We listen to stories of pivotal discoveries in the field, while looking ahead at the many mysteries that remain unsolved.

Funny, rigorous, and suffused with the joy of discovery, An Immense World takes us on what Marcel Proust called “the only true voyage . . . not to visit strange lands, but to possess other eyes.”

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

人類使用說明書 : 關於生活與人際難題,科學教我們的事 (Explaining Humans)

卡蜜拉‧彭 (Camilla Pang)
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榮獲科普書最高榮譽
2020「英國皇家學會科學圖書大獎」
史上最年輕得主!

作者於八歲時被診斷患有自閉症(ASD),二十六歲時診斷出注意力不足過動症(ADHD),這種獨異狀態,意味著她不太可能過一般社群生活、與「人類這種生物」和諧共處,因而四處碰壁,動輒掀翻周身親友同儕的常人世界,於是她天真地詢問母親是否有一本「人類使用說明書」可按圖索驥,導出解方。答案是沒有。成人之後,她有幸獲得生化博士學位,終於尋得開啟自我封閉天地的專業之鑰,以她最熟悉的科學語言,拆解繁複晦澀的身心機制與社會儀俗,回歸並肯定自身的特異性,釐清了「如何當一個人」的最終意義。本書以作者的第一人稱、「半回憶錄式」敘事鋪陳,探索人類生活中可能引燃衝突、牽動交流的日常現象或決策機制,例如:

  - 決定,以及我們如何做出決定
  - 衝突,以及我們如何避免衝突
  - 關係,以及我們如何建立關係
  - 禮儀,以及我們如何遵守禮儀

本書以罕見、原創的「心理回憶錄/圖解分析/科學入門知識介紹」多合一形式,追問身心地帶令人費解的常軌脫逸或糾結景象,搭配作者親繪、深入淺出的二十餘幅「手寫風」圖表,溫暖包容的心靈精神觀與廣納物理、化學、生物、心理學的基礎科學世界觀和諧共振,交織出這本幽默有餘、嚴謹有度的「人類心智現象解說指南」——原來生活決策有分「箱型思維」與「樹狀思維」?人人個性有別,都是「蛋白質」搞的鬼?宇宙萬物注定失序,清掃房間只是違逆「熱力學」的徒然之舉?「一見如故」或「平行時空」,都是「波長」不同步的問題,振幅各異,絕不可能搖擺共舞;人與人憑靠「化學鍵」牽連相依,自然界「四大作用力」也在其間吸斥生剋。「人我」化成,其來有自,這本新世代天才學者的得獎大作,將領你踏上「與人同相」之路⋯⋯

(摘錄自博客來網路書店)