Scientific Cosmology And International Orders

A history of how scientific ideas have transformed international politics since 1550.

This book explores how states, scholars and other actors have justified war from early modernity to the present. Looking at narratives of the justification of war in theory and practice, this book offers a comprehensive investigation of the emergence of the modern international order and its normative foundation.

Examining the legacy of Alberico Gentili, this book questions conventional narratives about how states monopolized the right to wage war.

'Making Identity Count' presents a new constructivist method for the recovery of national identity, applies the method in nine country cases, and draws conclusions from the empirical evidence for hegemonic transitions and a variety of quantitative theories of identity.

Thoroughly revised and updated introduction to past and present cosmological theory.

This book newly articulates the international and interdisciplinary reach of Whitehead’s organic process cosmology for a variety of topics across science and philosophy, and in dialogue with a variety historical and contemporary voices. Integrating Whitehead’s thought with the insights of Bergson, James, Pierce, Merleau-Ponty, Descola, Fuchs, Hofmann, Grof and many others, contributors from around the world reveal the relevance of process philosophy to physics, cosmology, astrobiology, ecology, metaphysics, aesthetics, psychedelics, and religion. A global collection, this book expresses multivocal possibilities for the development of process cosmology after Whitehead.

Rule-based global order remains a central object of study in International Relations. Constructivists have identified a number of mechanisms by which actors accomplish both the continuous reproduction and transformation of the rules, institutions, and regimes that constitute their worlds. However, it is less clear how these mechanisms relate to each other--that is, the rules for changing the rules. This book seeks to explain how political actors know which procedural rules to engage in a particular context, and how they know when to utilize one mechanism over another. It argues that actors in world politics are simultaneously engaged in an ongoing social practice of rule-making, interpretation, and application. By identifying and explaining the social practice of rule-making in the international system, this book clarifies why global norms change at particular moments and why particular attempts to change norms might succeed or fail at any given time. Mark Raymond looks at four cases: the social construction of great power management in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars; the creation of a rule against the use of force, except in cases of self-defense and collective security; contestation of the international system by al Qaeda in the period immediately following the 9/11 attacks; and United Nations efforts to establish norms for state conduct in the cyber domain. The book also shows that practices of global governance are centrally concerned with making, interpreting, and applying rules, and argues for placing global governance at the heart of the study of the international system and its dynamics. Finally, it demonstrates the utility of the book's approach for the study of global governance, the international system, and for emerging efforts to identify forms and sites of authority and hierarchy in world politics.

Modern cosmology has changed significantly over the years, from the discovery to the precision measurement era. The data now available provide a wealth of information, mostly consistent with a model where dark matter and dark energy are in a rough proportion of 3:7. The time is right for a fresh new textbook which captures the state-of-the art in cosmology. Written by one of the world's leading cosmologists, this brand new, thoroughly class-tested textbook provides graduate and undergraduate students with coverage of the very latest developments and experimental results in the field. Prof. Nicola Vittorio shows what is meant by precision cosmology, from both theoretical and observational perspectives. This book is divided into three main parts: Part I provides a pedagogical, but rigorous, general relativity-based discussion of cosmological models, showing the evidence for dark energy, the constraints from primordial nucleosynthesis and the need for inflation Part II introduces density fluctuations and their statistical description, discussing different theoretical scenarios, such as CDM, as well as observations Part III introduces the general relativity approach to structure formation and discusses the physics behind the CMB temperature and polarization pattern of the microwave sky Carefully adapted from the course taught by Prof. Vittorio at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, this book will be an ideal companion for advanced students undertaking a course in cosmology. Features: Incorporates the latest experimental results, at a time of rapid change in this field, with balanced coverage of both theoretical and experimental perspectives Each chapter is accompanied by problems, with detailed solutions The basics of tensor calculus and GR are given in the appendices