Product Description
Girolamo Cardano was a doctor, astrologer, mathematician, and natural philosopher who helped create modern algebra and invented the universal joint. He wrote this colorful autobiography while under house arrest by the Inquisition. A lively mix of picaresque adventure and campus comedy, Cardano’s story gives a fascinating glimpse into the early modern period, when notions of science and the self now taken for granted were very much unresolved. The book of My Life is a vivid portrait of the life of a free-thinking intellectual and the 16th-century world in which he lived. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Double Cross Review
As an award-winner American author, James Patterson went from designing the "Toys R Us Kids" slogan, to writing internationally award-winning thriller novels.Well-known for many of his detective series, Patterson brings suspense and thrill to the extreme.Double Cross, one of James's non-fiction novels, is the 13th of the Cross series and continues the story of a former- FBI profiler who returns to the force to track and deal with a couple of malevolent criminals.

The main character is Alex Cross, a former police profiler who retired and became a psychologist.He lives with three kids and has a police-detective girlfriend named Brianna Stone.Just when Alex feels good about being away from the crimes and excitement, he finds himself being lured back into it.An urgent case of an "audience killer" who started a chain of brutal public murders, as well as Kyle Craig, prisoner, former-murderer, and Cross' former FBI coworker, escaped from a maximum-security prison in order to seek vengeance on Cross for putting him in jail. Throughout the story, Alex rejoins the Washington DC police force and cracks down on the criminals. After investigation, clues left behind by both killers leave the inquiring questioning on the possible connection between the two.Could the murderers have a connection?

The audience killer is quite a scene.Imagine, disguised foreign mechanic knocks on your door about a leaky pipe you never even knew about.As soon as you let them in they attack you, torture you, and throw you off the balcony of a building.Unfortunately, this was the case for one of the poor victims.Many more gruesome, cruel schemes occur with Alex Cross and his crew there to investigate and scope out the killers.

Back and forth the chapters switch from the different characters perspectives.Alex narrates one, then Kyle Craig in another.This book was fascinating.In almost every paragraph, I could picture the scenes and the characters expressions.The author uses such great imagery that paints detailed pictures in my mind, making me feel as if I was almost there.

"Double Cross is a strong, addictive page turner.It is definitely worth the trip to the book store."
([...] )
I agree with this quote completely and must say that once I started this book, it was hard to put it down.Double Cross being my first James Patterson and Cross Series book, I enjoyed it very much.At first, I thought the book would be too long for me, but surprisingly enough, I read through it faster than I expected.Reading this definitely encourages me to go out and read more of the Cross series.

There weren't really any disappointments with the book.I enjoyed every part of it.At first I was a little lost, since this is the 13th book in a series, and the first of the series I have read... However, I quickly picked it up and figured things our and really couldn't put the book down.James Patterson's use of extreme thrilling edges and nerve-tingling anticipation is what makes it such a wanting more book.I would recommend this book to anyone, and would probably just suggest reading a little background or reading the earlier books in the series first before reading this book.

Perhaps best for rarefied tastes
Girolamo Cardano's THE BOOK OF MY LIFE is a very typical entry into the lists of the New York Review of Books Classics: fairly obscure except to Renaissance historians, Cardano was an enormously important Italian mathemetician, scientist, and astrologer who also wrote an account of himself, his nature, and his life. Cardano's experiences in 16th-century Italy are extremely complex and colorful, and he recounts not only his problems with his children and his many enemies, but also his birthsign, his experiments, and his encounters with supernatural beings. The book isn't quite as enthralling as you hope it might be, and in the foreword Anthony Grafton comments on the limitations of this translation (which hearkens back to the 1920s)--given this, you wonder why NYRB didn't commission a new and more faithful translation. The book is intriguing enough but doesn't exactly pass the time quite in the enjoyable way the NYRB Classics seem to be intended to do. ... Read more

Product Description
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Product Description
In Two Volumes. In English Cardano Was Known As Jerome Cardan. ... Read more

Product Description
Girolamo Cardano was an Italian doctor, natural philosopher, and mathematician who became a best-selling author in Renaissance Europe. He was also a leading astrologer of his day, whose predictions won him access to some of the most powerful people in sixteenth-century Europe. In Cardano's Cosmos, Anthony Grafton invites readers to follow this astrologer's extraordinary career and explore the art and discipline of astrology in the hands of a brilliant practitioner. Renaissance astrologers predicted everything from the course of the future of humankind to the risks of a single investment, or even the weather. They analyzed the bodies and characters of countless clients, from rulers to criminals, and enjoyed widespread respect and patronage. This book traces Cardano's contentious career from his first astrological pamphlet through his rise to high-level consulting and his remarkable autobiographical works. Delving into astrological principles and practices, Grafton shows how Cardano and his contemporaries adapted the ancient art for publication and marketing in a new era of print media and changing science. He maps the context of market and human forces that shaped Cardano's practices--and the maneuvering that kept him at the top of a world rife with patronage, politics, and vengeful rivals.Cardano's astrology, argues Grafton, was a profoundly empirical and highly influential art, one that was integral to the attempts of sixteenth-century scholars to understand their universe and themselves.Amazon.com Review
It's sometimes hard to remember that once upon a time,astrology was state-of-the-art science. It was inextricably wound upwith astronomical observation, after all, and good Renaissance menoften pursued both avocations. Preeminent among astrologers andnatural philosophers of the 16th century was Girolamo Cardano, thesubject of Anthony Grafton's scrutiny in Cardano'sCosmos. Cardano is a prime biographical subject, having lived alife of extraordinary proportions. He pursued careers in medicine,mathematics, palmistry, and writing in addition to astrology, andeventually ended up on the wrong side of the Inquisition.Forbiddento teach publicly, Cardano nevertheless continued his investigations,played politics, and wrote a wicked, tell-all autobiography.

Cardano considered himself a "master of time," and this theme windsthrough Grafton's narrative as it must have wound through theastrologer's life.Astrology was a tool for both predicting thefuture and for explaining the past.

As anastrologer--and as an autobiographer--he struggled with time, tryingto uncover the hidden logic of his past and to show how accuratepredictions could yield valuable therapies for his own and others'futures.... More than once, however, Cardano tried to replace thisperspective with a radically different one: one in which time past andfuture mattered little or not at all.

Unlike many a modern astrologer, Cardano's scientific bent allowed himto acknowledge that other factors were often at work in matters offate. To keep up with these influences, he became an expert in occultmatters as well as a keen observer of the natural world.

Grafton's biography artfully exposes the everyday life of anextraordinary man. Cardano comes alive as a brilliant, egotisticaleccentric whose desire for order and truth was satisfied by thecomplex systems of astrology.--Therese Littleton ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Excellent if partial
partial in the sense that it leaves stuff out that is maybe interesting.

It was only after finishing this that I realised that Girolamo Cardano was the same Cardan who crops up in any one volume history of mathematics in the discussion about calculating the roots of polynomials and the development of complex numbers. Cardan was not really a major mathematician, but he did more than carry a spear in an important episode (note added in proof: in fact I've just learned from the current NYRB that Richard Feynman regarded it as catalytically important for western science) - and in the end it was that role, not an entertaining memoir, that makes him important; it's a strange lapse on Grafton's part - especially since he does manage to get in that Cardan invented a neat mechanical coupling.

Still, for all that, this is a splendid exercise in historical empathy, and well worth a read.

The Durability of Astrology
When examining the practice of astrology from a contemporary scientific viewpoint, the entire enterprise initially strikes one as anachronistic. Figures such as Nostradamus lend the impression that aspiring fortune-tellers played upon the public's hopes, expectations and fears in order to further their own personal and monetary gain. Given this impression, it becomes important to ask how astrology as a scientific discipline fits into the overall history of science, particularly in relation to the disciplines of optics and medicine. In his book "Cardano's Cosmos: The Worlds and Works of a Renaissance Astrologer" (1999), Anthony Grafton extensively describes the social and political milieu within which the practice of astrology took place during the sixteenth century as experienced by the Italian astrologer Giorlamo Cardano (1501-1576).

As Grafton makes clear, astrology is an ancient yet durable discipline. Irrespective of time or place, astrologers "worked from the same cosmological premises, projected the same beneficent and threatening images into the heavens, and used for the most part the same mathematical techniques" (p. 5). Consequently, the"continuity of the astrological tradition is, perhaps, unmatched in the intellectual history of the West" (p. 6). The origins of European astrology drew from Mesopotamian celestial interpretation as well as ancient Greek cosmology. To the extent which astrology permeated sixteenth century society, Grafton describes an "omnipresence of astrology" that does not distinguish between "high and low, [or] elite and popular culture" (p. 10). In this deeply pervasive picture, we find that "as in the Hellenistic and Roman world, no one escaped the celestial economy" (p. 11). It was in the new social context of the Renaissance, coupled with the advent of the new media of widespread publishing, that allowed astrology to permeate all aspects of society.

For Grafton, providing an account of this society by way of a figure like Cardano is a potentially problematic enterprise. The very field of the history of astrology is what renders the project difficult. Some historians will take an internalist approach, while others will attempt to explain the cultural impact of early modern astrology. Grafton wants to combine both of these approaches, so as to allow the reader to gain a wholistic picture of the history of astrology. Ultimately, Cardano becomes for Grafton the ideal subject with whom to explore this history, as his work "forms a great, constantly changing screen, on which the reader can watch an expert in several ancient divinatory arts blending their surviving texts in order to recreate what the textual record did not reveal" (p. 20).

A potential sequel to Grafton's book might easily explore the legacy of sixteenth century astrology on subsequent generations. Writing in 1933, the psychoanalyst C.G. Jung argued that the psychological void produced by the spiritual loss experienced by the modern European individual was filled in part by a "return" to astrological beliefs.Prior to the twentieth century, the advent of Enlightenment thinking had presumably reduced the need for political leaders and other educated individuals to seek out astrologers for advice. Yet we are aware that former First Lady Nancy Reagan regularly consulted an astrologer for advice with regard to White House affairs during the 1980's. Grafton records that a "papal bull" of 1586 forbade the practice of astrology and denied the influence of the stars. Clearly this act did not succeed in eliminating belief in astrological interpretation from the public consciousness. ... Read more

Product Description
Volume: 2Publisher: London, Chapman and HallPublication date: 1854Subjects: Cardano, Girolamo, 1501-1576Notes: This is an OCR reprint. There may be numerous typos or missing text. There are no illustrations or indexes.When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. You can also preview the book there. ... Read more

Product Description
In Two Volumes. In English Cardano Was Known As Jerome Cardan. ... Read more

Product Description
In Two Volumes. This scarce antiquarian book is included in our special Legacy Reprint Series. In the interest of creating a more extensive selection of rare historical book reprints, we have chosen to reproduce this title even though it may possibly have occasional imperfections such as missing and blurred pages, missing text, poor pictures, markings, dark backgrounds and other reproduction issues beyond our control. Because this work is culturally important, we have made it available as a part of our commitment to protecting, preserving and promoting the world's literature. ... Read more

Product Description
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process.We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Product Description
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Product Description
Girolamo Cardano (1501-1576), renowned as a mathematician, encyclopedist, astrologer, and autobiographer, was by profession a medical practitioner. His copious writings on medicine reflect both the complexity and diversity of the Renaissance medical world and the breadth of his own interests. In this book, Nancy Siraisi draws on selected themes in Cardano's medical writings to explore in detail the relation between medicine and wider areas of Renaissance culture.

Cardano's medical advice included the suggestion that "the studious man should always have at hand a clock and a mirror"--a clock to keep track of the passage of time and a mirror to observe the changing condition of his body. The remark, which recalls his astrological and autobiographical interests, is emblematic of the many connections between his medicine and his other pursuits. Cardano's philosophical eclecticism, beliefs about occult forces in nature, theories about dreams, and free transitions between academic and popularizing scientific writing also contributed to his medicine. As a physician, he greeted two different types of medical innovation in his lifetime with equal enthusiasm: improved access to the Hippocratic corpus and Vesalian anatomy. Cardano presented himself as a practitioner with special gifts. Yet his medical learning remained rooted in the Galenic tradition that he often criticized. Mean-while, he negotiated a career in a medical community characterized by personal and social rivalries, a competitive medical marketplace, and strong institutional and religious pressures. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Why???
Why is this book worth $500? What from this book can not be gained from purchasing a book from the 17th century and beyond that hasn't been covered in the 16th century. Don't get me wrong... I love reading about the history of mathematics... but to charge $500 for a book, I need a pretty good reason to buy it.

Please let me know if there is such a reason I should read this book??

A must-read for every serious mathematician!
The "Ars Magna" by Girolamo Cardano is one of the most important books of the 16th century, a milestone for algebra and mathematics. With its new way of treating scientific problems, it's also a typicalrepresentant of the Italian Renaissance. This is a long overdue re-issue,translated from Latin into English and adapted to modern mathematicalsyntax. Mathematicians and historians both will enjoy it! ... Read more