The growth of population during the past few centuries is no proof that population will continue to grow straight upward toward infinity and doom. On the contrary, demographic history offers evidence that population growth has not been at all constant. According to paleoecologist Edward Deevey, the past million years show three momentous changes. The first, [...]
Few institutions are more important to an urban community than its police, yet there are few subjects historians know so little about. Most of the early academic interests developed among political scientists and sociologists, who usually examined their own contemporary problems with only a nod toward the past. Even the public seemed concerned only during [...]
The Alaska pipeline starts at the frozen edge of the Arctic ocean. It stretches southward across the largest and northernmost state in the United States, ending at a remote ice free seaport village nearly 800 miles from where it begins. It is massive in size and extremely complicated to operate. The steel pipe crosses windswept [...]
The status of women in colonial North America has been well studied and described and can be briefly summarized. Throughout the colonial period there was a marked shortage of women, which varied with the regions and was always greatest in the frontier areas. This favorable ratio enhanced women’s status and position and allowed them to [...]
The military aspect of the United States Civil War has always attracted the most attention from scholars. The roar of gunfire, the massed movements of uniformed men, the shrill o f bugles, and the drama of hand to hand combat have facinated students of warfare for a century. Behind the lines, however, life was less [...]
British Columbia is the third largest Canadian province, both in area and population. It is nearly 1.5 times as large as Texas, and extends 800 miles (1,280km) north from the United States border. It includes Canada’s entire west coast and the islands just off the coast.
Most of British Columbia is mountainous, with long rugged ranges [...]
Cells cannot remain alive outside certain limits of temperature, and much narrower limits mark the boundaries of effective functioning. Enzyme systems of mammals and birds are most efficient only within a narrow range around 37 ℃; a departure of a few degrees from this value seriously impairs their functioning. Even though cells can survive wider [...]
Of the tens of thousands of ships on the ocean bottom, only a handful, less than 1 percent, contain negotiable treasure, such as gold and jewels. Most give us a different priceless treasure — history. A sunken ship lies in trust, preserved in the airless environment of the sea and those in deep water are [...]
The increase in international business and in foreign investment has created a need for executives with knowledge of foreign languages and skills in cross-cultural communication. Americans, however, have not been well trained in either area and, consequently, have not enjoyed the same level of success in negotiation in an international arena as have their foreign [...]
For the last 82 years, Sweden’s Nobel Academy has decided who will receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, thereby determining who will be elevated from the great and the near great to the immortal. But today the Academy is coming under heavy criticism both from the without and from within. Critics contend that the selection [...]
