Showing results by narrator "Jonathan Yen" in All Categories

Advances in Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) have created a new class of computer systems that exhibit astonishing proficiency on a wide variety of tasks with superhuman performance, producing novel text, images, music, and software by analyzing enormous collections of digitized information. Soon, these systems will provide expert medical care; offer legal advice; draft documents; write computer programs; tutor our children; and generate music and art. These advances will accelerate progress in science, art, and human knowledge, but they will also bring new dangers.

On a cold January morning in 1986, NASA launched the Space Shuttle Challenger, despite warnings against doing so by many individuals including Allan McDonald. The fiery destruction of Challenger on live television moments after launch remains an indelible image in the nation's collective memory. In Truth, Lies, and O-Rings, McDonald, a skilled engineer and executive, relives the tragedy from where he stood at Launch Control Center.

It began with plutonium, the first element ever manufactured in quantity by humans. Fearing that the Germans would be the first to weaponize the atom, the United States marshaled brilliant minds and seemingly inexhaustible bodies to find a way to create a nuclear chain reaction of inconceivable explosive power. In a matter of months, the Hanford nuclear facility was built to produce and weaponize the enigmatic and deadly new material that would fuel atomic bombs.

Everybody wants someone to love and spend time with, and searching for your ideal partner is a natural and healthy human tendency. Just about everyone dates at some point in their life, yet few really understand what they're doing or how to get the best results. In Wired for Dating, psychologist and relationship expert Stan Tatkin - author of Wired for Love - offers powerful tips based in neuroscience and attachment theory to help you find a compatible mate and go on to create a fabulous relationship.

Claude Shannon was a tinkerer, a playful wunderkind, a groundbreaking polymath, and a digital pioneer whose insights made the Information Age possible. He constructed fire-breathing trumpets and customized unicycles, outfoxed Vegas casinos, and built juggling robots, but he also wrote the seminal text of the Digital Revolution. That work allowed scientists to measure and manipulate information as objectively as any physical object. His work gave mathematicians and engineers the tools to bring that world to pass.

In this groundbreaking biography of the Japanese emperor Hirohito, Herbert P. Bix offers the first complete, unvarnished look at the enigmatic leader whose 63-year reign ushered Japan into the modern world. Never before has the full life of this controversial figure been revealed with such clarity and vividness. Bix describes what it was like to be trained from birth for a lone position at the apex of the nation's political hierarchy and as a revered symbol of divine status.

On June 13, 1966, men of the 1st Recon Battalion, 1st Marine Division were stationed on Hill 488. Before the week was over, they would fight the battle that would make them the most highly decorated small unit in the entire history of the US military, winning a Congressional Medal of Honor, four Navy Crosses, 13 Silver Stars, and 18 Purple Hearts - some of them posthumously.

Cherry Walker was a devoted, trusting, uncommonly innocent young woman who loved caring for a neighbor's little boy. But when she was asked to testify in court against his abusive mother, Cherry never got the chance. She couldn't lie if her life depended on it - and it did. Cherry's body was found on the side of a Texas road, after being doused with lighter fluid and set aflame. Attractive, manipulative, and violent, mother of four Kim Cargill had a wealth of dirty secrets she'd do anything to keep hidden.

They called him Mickey Free. His kidnapping started the longest war in American history, and both sides - the Apaches and the white invaders - blamed him for it. A mixed-blood warrior who moved uneasily between the worlds of the Apaches and the American soldiers, he was never trusted by either but desperately needed by both. He was the only man Geronimo ever feared. He played a pivotal role in this long war for the desert Southwest from its beginning in 1861 until its end in 1890 with his pursuit of the renegade scout Apache Kid.

This book explains how wielding power affects your emotions and decision making and helps you avoid the traps that lead to negative consequences. With the latest psychological research and practical advice from leading experts, you'll learn how to use soft power to persuade others, fix unhealthy power dynamics in your team, use compassion to connect better with others, and remain ethical in your choices and actions.

Whether you're looking for a way to enhance your appreciation of the events that took place or just want to refresh your memory without digging through countless volumes of World War II history, this book is right for you. Accurate and accessible, World War II for Dummies will help you explore a war that defined and shaped the world we live in today. You'll discover all the players who participated in the war and the politics that drove them. Battle by battle, you'll find out how the Axis powers initially took control of the war and how the Allies fought back to win the day.

Many people take math in high school and promptly forget much of it. But math plays a part in all of our lives all of the time, whether we know it or not. In The Joy of x, Steven Strogatz expands on his hit New York Times series to explain the big ideas of math gently and clearly, with wit, and insight.

If you've ever thought about becoming a backyard beekeeper - or have already tried a hand at it and want to be better one - then this is the book for you! In Beekeeping for Dummies, 4th Edition, you'll find everything you need to know in order to start your own colony, including how to assemble and maintain beehives, handle every phase of honey production, purchase and use all the latest tools, and what to do beyond your first season.

In Plant Teachers, Narby and Pizuri hold a cross-cultural dialogue that explores the similarities between ayahuasca and tobacco, the role of these plants in indigenous cultures, and the hidden truths they reveal about nature. Juxtaposing two distinct worldviews, Plant Teachers invites listeners on a wide-ranging journey through anthropology, botany, and biochemistry, while raising tantalizing questions about the relationship between science and other ways of knowing.

On December 15, 1944, Maj. Alton Glenn Miller, commanding officer of the Army Air Force Band (Special), boarded a plane in England bound for France with Lt. Col. Norman Francis Baessell. Somewhere over the English Channel the plane vanished. No trace of the aircraft or its occupants has ever been found. To this day Miller, Baessell, and the pilot, John Robert Stuart Morgan, are classified as missing in action. Weaving together cultural and military history, Glenn Miller Declassified tells the story of the musical legend Miller and his military career.

Your vagus nerve is the largest and most important nerve in your body. It carries messages to and from your brain, gut, heart, and other major muscles and organs. However, common issues like inflammation, stress, or physical trauma can interfere with the nerve's ability to function. Luckily, there are tons of quick-and-easy ways to activate and exercise the nerve, strengthening its function and restoring your body to good health.

The Supreme Court's rulings have shaped American life and justice and allowed Americans to retain basic freedoms such as privacy, free speech, and the right to a fair trial. This revised and updated edition of Michael G. Trachtman's riveting work includes 10 important cases from 2010 to 2015.

In The Sum of Our Dreams, Louis P. Masur offers a sweeping yet compact history of America from its beginnings to the current moment. Evoking Barack Obama's belief that America remains the "sum of its dreams", Masur locates the origin of those dreams - of freedom, equality, and opportunity - and traces their progress chronologically, illuminating the nation's struggle over time to articulate and fulfill their promise.

Freedom’s Detective reveals the untold story of the Reconstruction-era US Secret Service and their battle against the Ku Klux Klan, through the career of its controversial chief, Hiram C. Whitle.

Gunflint Burning is a comprehensive account of the dramatic events around the Ham Lake fire of 2007, one of the largest wildfires in Minnesota history. In sharp detail, Cary J. Griffith describes the key events of the fire as they unfold, transporting listeners to the front lines of an epic struggle that was at times heroic, tragic, and sublime.