Nothing That Is

In the tradition of "Longitude, " a small and engagingly written book on the history and meaning of zero--a "tour de force" of science history that takes us through the hollow circle that leads to infinity. 32 illustrations.

"Infused with cosmic, culinary dread and seasoned with dark humor, The Nothing That Is reads like Anthony Bourdain riffing on Lovecraft. Winkler's engaging style and hypnotic prose will consume you whole, and if that doesn't whet your appetite, there's an exploding graveyard. Eat this one up, my friends, before it eats you!" -- Kealan Patrick Burke, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Kin and Sour Candy"Wild, fast-moving, and disorientingly hilarious... down to earth and completely unhinged. It also gave me a jolt of sickening, infinite horror I hadn't felt since the Vermicious Knids jumped out of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator."-- Ben Loory, author of Tales of Falling and FlyingIt's 1986. Cade McCall is an assistant manager for a catering business. Driving to work one morning, part of the local graveyard explodes. Later the same day, Cade gets an odd message from a client who needs catering for an Extreme Food Club. He calls himself Mr. Dinosaur. And he's paying $11,000. Despite Cade's reservations, he takes the gig. Although, who's feeding whom is another question entirely...Involving female biker gangs, cults, possessed furniture, and a full dose of cosmic horror, The Nothing That Is serves up the weird.

Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez's The Blair Witch Project seemingly appeared from nowhere to become one of 1999's highest grossing films. While generating revenue as a low budget movie backed by a media blitz, The Blair Witch Project also generated controversy and made a mockery of the Hollywood industry, billing itself as "real" footage of a supernatural event. Critics were divided over some of the most basic questions: whether the film was an artistic success or the product of its hype, for example, and whether it challenged Hollywood conventions or succumbed to them in the end. Nothing That Is: The Blair Witch Controversies examines these and other debates, and initiates some of its own about American taste for horror, hoax, independent films, the Internet, and the direction of cinema in the twenty-first century. The book explores the modest origins and rapid demise of this independent film- while also analyzing the sensational results of its broad media discourses--a Web site developing the back story of The Blair Witch Project was one of the most-accessed sites on the entire Internet at the time of the movie's release. These essays, from many diverse perspectives, also look at The Blair Witch Project's manipulation of cinematic codes, its view on technology and the occult, its film progenitors, and even its effects on the film's setting of Burkittsville, Maryland. Nothing That Is will interest both film scholars and fans of this unexpected blockbuster that emerged from, if not "nothing," a complex brew of culture, technology, and ingenuity.

What conceptual blind spot kept the ancient Greeks (unlike the Indians and Maya) from developing a concept of zero? Why did St. Augustine equate nothingness with the Devil? What tortuous means did 17th-century scientists employ in their attempts to create a vacuum? And why do contemporary quantum physicists believe that the void is actually seething with subatomic activity? You’ll find the answers in this dizzyingly erudite and elegantly explained book by the English cosmologist John D. Barrow. Ranging through mathematics, theology, philosophy, literature, particle physics, and cosmology, The Book of Nothing explores the enduring hold that vacuity has exercised on the human imagination. Combining high-wire speculation with a wealth of reference that takes in Freddy Mercury and Shakespeare alongside Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and Stephen Hawking, the result is a fascinating excursion to the vanishing point of our knowledge.

The Nothing That Is and the Nothing That Is Not is the final volume in a trilogy on interpretations of otherness in the postmodern era. The first two volumes are A Do-It-Yourself Dystopia: The Americanization of Big Brother (University Press of America, 2002) and Leopards in the Temple: Selected Essays 1990-2000 (University Press of America, 2001).

"Written over a period of more than a decade, The Nothing That Is is a collection about the very concept of "nothing," approached from a variety of angles and in a variety of ways. Addressing a broad range of topics and works by contemporary writers and artists, these essays seek to decentre our relationship to both the "givenness" of history and to a predictive or probable model of the future. They do so by drawing attention to the ways that poetic language activates the multiple, and as yet undesignated, possibilities replete within our every moment, and within every encounter between a speaking "I" and what exceeds subjectivity--a listening "Other," be it community or the objective world."--

Is nothing everything? As strange as that question looks at first sight, it will definitely make sense after reading NOTHING MATTERS. Provocative and accessible, free of jargon, NOTHING MATTERS shows that there is more to nothing than meets the eye. History, the arts, philosophy, politics, religion, cosmology - all are touched by nothing. Who, for example, could have believed that nothing held back progress for 600 years, all because of mistaken translation, or that nothing is a way to tackle (and answer) the perennial question 'what is art?

“A welcome antidote to our toxic hustle culture of burnout.”—Arianna Huffington “This book is so important and could truly save lives.”—Elizabeth Gilbert “A clarion call to work smarter [and] accomplish more by doing less.”—Adam Grant We work feverishly to make ourselves happy. So why are we so miserable? Despite our constant search for new ways to optimize our bodies and minds for peak performance, human beings are working more instead of less, living harder not smarter, and becoming more lonely and anxious. We strive for the absolute best in every aspect of our lives, ignoring what we do well naturally and reaching for a bar that keeps rising higher and higher. Why do we measure our time in terms of efficiency instead of meaning? Why can’t we just take a break? In Do Nothing, award-winning journalist Celeste Headlee illuminates a new path ahead, seeking to institute a global shift in our thinking so we can stop sabotaging our well-being, put work aside, and start living instead of doing. As it turns out, we’re searching for external solutions to an internal problem. We won’t find what we’re searching for in punishing diets, productivity apps, or the latest self-improvement schemes. Yet all is not lost—we just need to learn how to take time for ourselves, without agenda or profit, and redefine what is truly worthwhile. Pulling together threads from history, neuroscience, social science, and even paleontology, Headlee examines long-held assumptions about time use, idleness, hard work, and even our ultimate goals. Her research reveals that the habits we cling to are doing us harm; they developed recently in human history, which means they are habits that can, and must, be broken. It’s time to reverse the trend that’s making us all sadder, sicker, and less productive, and return to a way of life that allows us to thrive.