Richard A. Muller

Richard A. Muller demonstrated in his recent bestseller, Physics for Future Presidents, that he has a unique talent for delivering the “aha” moment—making difficult topics accessible. In The Instant Physicist he shows his ability to entertain, too, by presenting the best of the scientific curiosities he has assembled over his distinguished career. Assisted by award-winning cartoonist Joey Manfre, who has created an original color cartoon for each “physics bite,” Muller will have readers chuckling while they’re absorbing more science than they ever thought possible. From the surprising (chocolate has more energy in it than TNT) to the scary (even kids can make a bomb), this book contains a revelation on every page. Once finished with this page-turner, readers will be the stars of their next cocktail party. The book consists of a color cartoon on each right-hand page and explanatory text on the left.

Physics and Technology for Future Presidents contains the essential physics that students need in order to understand today's core science and technology issues, and to become the next generation of world leaders. From the physics of energy to climate change, and from spy technology to quantum computers, this is the only textbook to focus on the modern physics affecting the decisions of political leaders and CEOs and, consequently, the lives of every citizen. How practical are alternative energy sources? Can satellites really read license plates from space? What is the quantum physics behind iPods and supermarket scanners? And how much should we fear a terrorist nuke? This lively book empowers students possessing any level of scientific background with the tools they need to make informed decisions and to argue their views persuasively with anyone--expert or otherwise. Based on Richard Muller's renowned course at Berkeley, the book explores critical physics topics: energy and power, atoms and heat, gravity and space, nuclei and radioactivity, chain reactions and atomic bombs, electricity and magnetism, waves, light, invisible light, climate change, quantum physics, and relativity. Muller engages readers through many intriguing examples, helpful facts to remember, a fun-to-read text, and an emphasis on real-world problems rather than mathematical computation. He includes chapter summaries, essay and discussion questions, Internet research topics, and handy tips for instructors to make the classroom experience more rewarding. Accessible and entertaining, Physics and Technology for Future Presidents gives students the scientific fluency they need to become well-rounded leaders in a world driven by science and technology. Professors: A supplementary Instructor's Manual is available for this book. It is restricted to teachers using the text in courses. For information on how to obtain a copy, refer to: http://press.princeton.edu/class_use/solutions.html Leading universities that have adopted this book include: * Harvard * Purdue * Rice University * University of Chicago * Sarah Lawrence College * Notre Dame * Wellesley * Wesleyan * University of Colorado * Northwestern * Washington University in St. Louis * University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign * Fordham * University of Miami * George Washington University

We live in complicated, dangerous times. Present and future presidents need to know if North Korea's nascent nuclear capability is a genuine threat to the West, if biochemical weapons are likely to be developed by terrorists, if there are viable alternatives to fossil fuels that should be nurtured and supported by the government, if private companies should be allowed to lead the way on space exploration, and what the actual facts are about the worsening threats from climate change. This is "must-have" information for all presidents—and citizens—of the twenty-first century. Winner of the 2009 Northern California Book Award for General Nonfiction.

In Christ and the Decree, one of the foremost scholars of Calvinism today expounds the doctrines of Christ and predestination as they were developed by Calvin, Bullinger, Musculus, Vermigli, Beza, Ursinus, Zanchi, Polanus, and Perkins. Muller analyzes the relationship of these two doctrines to each other and to the soteriological structure of the system. Back by demand, this seminal work on the relationship between Calvin and the Calvinists is once again available with a new contextualizing preface by the author. It offers a succinct introduction to the early development of Calvinism/Reformation thought.

This is a sequel to Richard Muller's The Unaccommodated Calvin (OUP 2000). In the previous book, Muller attempted to situate Calvin's theological work in its historical context and to strip away various twentieth-century theological grids that have clouded our perceptions of the work of the Reformer. In the present book, Muller carries this approach forward, with the goal of overcoming a series of nineteenth- and twentieth-century theological frameworks characteristic of much of the scholarship on Reformed orthodoxy, or what might be called 'Calvinism after Calvin'.

It is not possible to understand the present or future climate unless scientists can account for the enormous and rapid cycles of glaciation that have taken place over the last million years, and which are expected to continue into the future. A great deal has happened in the theory of the ice ages over the last decade, and it is now widley accepted that ice ages are driven by changes in the Earth's orbit. The study of ice ages is very inter-disciplinary, covering geology, physics, glaciology, oceanography, atmospheric science, planetary orbit calculations astrophysics and statistics.

This book attempts to understand Calvin in his sixteenth-century context, with attention to continuities and discontinuities between his thought and that of his predecessors, contemporaries, and successors. Richard Muller is particularly interested in the interplay between theological and philosophical themes common to Calvin and the medieval doctors, and in developments in rhetoric and method associated with humanism. He shows that Calvin's theology evidences the impact of humanist philology and rhetoric, of patristics, and also - both positively and negatively - of the categories of medieval scholastic thought. Calvin's conclusions, together with those of a group of contemporary Reformed and Lutheran thinkers, famously became the basis of much later Protestant theology. But understood in its sixteenth-century context, Muller argues, Calvin's theology proves both intriguing and intractable to twentieth-century concerns. This intractable and unaccomodated Calvin, he says, is important to our historical understanding in direct proportion to the level of distortion found in several generations of modern dogmatic analysis of Calvin's thought.

This book attempts to understand Calvin in his sixteenth-century context, with attention to continuities and discontinuities between his thought and that of his predecessors, contemporaries, and successors. Richard Muller is particularly interested in the interplay between theological and philosophical themes common to Calvin and the medieval doctors, and developments in the rhetoric and argument associated with humanism.