Reviews for Opportunities in Computer Aided Design and Computer Aided Manufacturing Careers (CAD-Cam) - ...

The average rating for Opportunities in Computer Aided Design and Computer Aided Manufacturing Careers (CAD-Cam) - ... based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-05-17 00:00:00 Carl Huddleston Let's be very clear about one thing: if you write English prose, and if you read a lot and care about English prose, you should read Gibbon. His sentences are perfect. Each is carefully weighted, pulling the reader through like a kind of perpetual motion machine; the syntax and the content are perfectly matched. Certainly some constructions seem a little dated, but generally that makes me think that contemporary prose is impoverished, rather than that Gibbon's is overly difficult. Just as all Western intellectual life feeds into Dante, so all Western prose feeds into Gibbon: Tacitus' compression, Swift's clarity, Voltaire's irony, and doubtless plenty of people I've never read, too. Here's a sentence more or less chosen at random: "The general respect with which these deputies were received, and the zeal of Italy and the provinces in favour of the senate, sufficiently prove that the subjects of Maximin were reduced to that uncommon distress in which the body of the people has more to fear from oppression than from resistance." This single thought--that the conditions of the early clauses prove that the people were so oppressed that revolution became inevitable--would take a paragraph of clauseless, muddy Hemingwayed nouns. Add to this Gibbon's possession of most seventeenth century virtues--clarity, unwillingness to hide his contradictory thoughts, judgments made according to morality rather than form--and his work becomes all the more remarkable. Of course, he also has the greatest seventeenth century vices, which he has to have if he's going to display his contradictory thoughts. He's a supreme enlightenment thinker, obsessed with natural laws (hence, he should be universalist) who's also strangely bigoted. The barbarians are uncultured, the Romans effeminate, the Byzantines weak and so on. The Jews, who bizarrely insist on worshiping only their own national God, are villains, as are the Christians who take over this insistence on the unity of the deity. David Womersley's introduction is excellent, too; it makes very clear the contradictions between Gibbon's overarching argument (supposedly, that Christianity is the 'cause' of the D&F) and what he actually writes. He's fascinated by the accidents of history ("Cleopatra's nose"), and he lays out in great detail the many, many social trends that would eventually lead to the fall of the West. Although the book is organized as if Christianity is the primary cause (the first volume ends with two chapters on the new religion; the second begins with Constantine), Gibbon himself must have recognized that his book had become something much more than another philosophe-like attack on early modern religion. Of course, he also gets in some great jabs at ancient Christianity. Also tied to his general plan: every section ends with a lament for the continuing decline of the empire, even as the empire stubbornly continues to exist. This has surely shaped Western attitudes to Rome for the worse. Constantinople stood into the fifteenth century; Constantinople was Roman. But too many writers, particularly conservatives, like to say that Rome fell due to x, which is exactly what Obama is giving us. That's fatuous. Rome lasted for two thousand years: would you say the United States fell because the capital was moved from D. C. to Portland, and then D.C. was taken by Mexico? No, you would not. But if there's a real flaw to the work, it's simply that Gibbon couldn't help attacking ancient historians, particularly ecclesiastical historians. They deserve attack, and if I'd spent dozens of years reading about so and so's miracles and the genius of such and such, I'd be on the offensive as well. But only rarely does this make for good reading. He also tends towards moralizing generalities: outside of the major figures (Julian, Constantine etc...), he too often writes that this usurper was bad, without explaining how or why. That might be a problem with his sources, of course, but again, a little boring. I don't imagine many people will get through the six volumes of this work. There's too much of everything, so whatever you dislike, you'll find it here. Personally, I was rarely riveted by his explanations of battles and wars. So and so set up by the mountains; so and so in the valley... I'm asleep. Others will be tortured by his discussions of early Christian heresies. On the other hand, if you can get into Game of Thrones, you can get into this. It's the original fantasy novel. So, in sum, it's not perfect. What a damning indictment.

Review # 2 was written on 2021-03-04 00:00:00 Juan Mendiola The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon (Volume One) is a classic, definitive, heavy, credible account of this period of antiquity. Initially, I was wary of embarking on this six-volume epic as Gibbon was strutting his stuff all the way back in the 1700’s. For this reason, I expected his writing to be inaccessible, stuffy even. But what a mistake on my part – his writing is so very understandable, and in fact, adds plenty to this wonderful subject matter. It really does – I found myself even reading some passages and then sitting there thinking – Wow, that was beautifully explained. Really!! ”The caprice of Hadrian influenced his choice of a successor. After revolving in his mind several men of distinguished merit, whom he esteemed and hated, he adopted Verus, a gay and voluptuous nobleman, recommended by uncommon beauty to the lover of Antinous” That is so delicately, and perfectly put. Also, this, regarding my favourite Emperor, Trajan: ”……above two hundred and fifty years after the death of Trajan, the senate, in pouring out customary acclamations on the accession of a new emperor, wished that he might surpass the felicity of Augustus, and the virtue of Trajan” How brilliant is that? Couldn’t you read that all night long? Interestingly, this first volume commences with a fifty-page summary of the life of Gibbon. This is a great way to start this book, understanding the man himself lends the reader an insight into why he chose Roman History as an important subject for him, his work on other periods of history and his personal life. It helps us understand the way this book is written. Following the introduction Gibbon describes how the military is structured and how it functions, he also identifies the provinces (there’s a great map at the back of the book) and he spends some time describing certain aspects of the empire, such as the roads, trade, slaves, agriculture and much more – to provide the reader with a very, very brief snapshot of the place. Then we get stuck into the interesting bits – starting from the first emperor, Augustus in 27 BCE, we systematically go through each emperor all the way to the death of emperor Licinius in 324 CE, that’s almost SIXTY EMPERORS!! A veritable feast of fun. But the way Gibbon presents this isn’t by way of 57 neatly titled chapters – it just rolls on like one continuous story. Yes, there are sections/chapters, but they’re not divided by rulers, more so by topics of interest – which also flows in chronological order. Gibbon completes this first volume with a wonderful introduction of the Progress of the Christian Religion, this sets us up nicely for the commencement of Volume Two – where we go to The conduct of the Roman Government towards the Christians, from Nero to Constantine. So, everything flows wonderfully. It is difficult to knock off a hundred pages in a sitting because there is so much information. I chose to read ten to fifteen pages just before I slept, after spending a few hours on my other (main) read – and it sets me off for a good night’s sleep, reflecting on the dramas of around eighteen hundred years ago. One other thing, there are no diagrams – perhaps his wonderful way of words means they’re not necessary, and each page contains numerous footnotes – detailing more information and the references used. All of the references are what you’d expect including Dio, Tacitus, Livy, Suetonius, Historia Augusta (for what that is worth), Herodian and many, many more – these footnotes are there for the serious historian. The fundamentalist, the extremist – not for us hobby enthusiasts. I must stop this review now as I’ll bang on merrily for five hundred pages – this is so, so, so GOOD! 5 Stars