John Schaeffer

This book introduces the thought of Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) into the discussion about natural law. For many critics, natural law is not natural but a façade behind which lurks the supernatural – that is, revealed religion. While current notions of natural law are based on either Aristotelian/Thomistic principles or on Enlightenment rationalism, the book shows how Vico was the only natural law thinker to draw on the Roman legal tradition, rather than on Greek or Enlightenment philosophy. Specifically, the book addresses how Vico, drawing his inspiration from Roman history, incorporated both rhetoric and religion into a dynamic concept of natural law grounded in what he called the sensus communis: the entire repertoire of values, images, institutions, and even prejudices that a community takes for granted. Vico denied that natural law could ever furnish a definitive answer to moral problems in the social/public sphere. Rather he maintained that such problems had to be debated in the wider arena of the sensus communis. For Vico, as this book argues, natural law principles emerged from these debates; they did not resolve them.

This book introduces the thought of Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) into the discussion about natural law. For many critics, natural law is not natural but a façade behind which lurks the supernatural – that is, revealed religion. While current notions of natural law are based on either Aristotelian/Thomistic principles or on Enlightenment rationalism, the book shows how Vico was the only natural law thinker to draw on the Roman legal tradition, rather than on Greek or Enlightenment philosophy. Specifically, the book addresses how Vico, drawing his inspiration from Roman history, incorporated both rhetoric and religion into a dynamic concept of natural law grounded in what he called the sensus communis: the entire repertoire of values, images, institutions, and even prejudices that a community takes for granted. Vico denied that natural law could ever furnish a definitive answer to moral problems in the social/public sphere. Rather he maintained that such problems had to be debated in the wider arena of the sensus communis. For Vico, as this book argues, natural law principles emerged from these debates; they did not resolve them.

What book would you want if you were stranded on a desert island? Widely regarded as the "bible" of off-grid living, Real Goods Solar Living Source Book might be your best choice. With over six hundred thousand copies in print worldwide, it is the most comprehensive resource available for anyone interested in lessening their environmental footprint or increasing their energy independence. The Solar Living Sourcebook, Fourteenth Edition is the ultimate guide to renewable energy, sustainable living, natural and green building, off-grid living, and alternative transportation, written by experts with decades of experience and a passion for sharing their knowledge. This fully revised and updated edition includes brand new sections on permaculture and urban homesteading and completely rewritten chapters on solar technology, sustainable transportation, and relocalization. It also boasts greatly expanded material on: * Natural building * Permaculture and biodynamics * Electric and biofuel-powered vehicles * Passive solar * Solar water heating * Grid-tie photovoltaic systems -plus maps, wiring diagrams, formulae, charts, electrical code, solar sizing worksheets, and much more. Whether you're a layperson or a professional, novice or longtime aficionado, the Sourcebook puts the latest research and information at your fingertips-everything you need to know to make sustainable living a reality. John Schaeffer is the president and founder of Real Goods-the foremost global source for tools and information on renewable energy, energy efficiency, and sustainable living. Since 1978, through Real Goods, he has pioneered solar technology in North America, providing over one hundred and fifty megawatts of solar power and helping to solarize over eighteen thousand homes.

In 1998, Frank Schaeffer was a bohemian novelist living in "Volvo driving, higher-education worshipping" Massachusetts with two children graduated from top universities. Then his youngest child, straight out of high school, joined the United States Marine Corps. Written in alternating voices by eighteen-year-old John and his father, Frank, Keeping Faith takes readers in riveting fashion through a family's experience of the Marine Corps: from being broken down and built back up on Parris Island (and being the parent of a child undergoing that experience), to the growth of both father and son and their separate reevaluations of what it means to serve. From Frank's realization that among his fellow soccer dads "the very words'boot camp' were pejorative, conjuring up'troubled youths at risk'" ("'But aren't they all terribly southern?' asked one parent") to John's learning that "the Marine next to you is more important than you are," Keeping Faith , a New York Times bestseller , is a fascinating and personal examination of issues of class, duty, and patriotism. The fact that John is currently serving in the Middle East only adds to the impact of this wonderfully written, timely, and moving human interest story.