The Allure of Immortality

The Allure of Immortality PDF

Author: Lyn Millner

Publisher: University Press of Florida

Published: 2015-10-28

Total Pages: 508

ISBN-13: 0813059437

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Wall Street Journal’s Five Best Books About Cults For five days in December 1908 the body of Cyrus Teed lay in a bathtub at a beach house just south of Fort Myers, Florida. His followers, the Koreshans, waited for signs that he was coming back to life. They watched hieroglyphics emerge on his skin and observed what looked like the formation of a third arm. They saw his belly fall and rise with breath, even though his swollen tongue sealed his mouth. As his corpse turned black, they declared that their leader was transforming into the Egyptian god Horus. Teed was a charismatic and controversial guru who at the age of 30 had been "illuminated" by an angel in his electro-alchemical laboratory. At the turn of the twentieth century, surrounded by the marvels of the Second Industrial Revolution, he proclaimed himself a prophet and led 200 people out of Chicago and into a new age. Or so he promised. The Koreshans settled in a mosquito-infested scrubland and set to building a communal utopia inside what they believed was a hollow earth--with humans living on the inside crust and the entire universe contained within. According to Teed’s socialist and millennialist teachings, if his people practiced celibacy and focused their love on him, he would return after death and they would all become immortal. Was Teed a visionary or villain, savior or two-bit charlatan? Why did his promises and his theory of "cellular cosmogony" persuade so many? In The Allure of Immortality, Lyn Millner weaves the many bizarre strands of Teed's life and those of his followers into a riveting story of angels, conmen, angry husbands, yellow journalism, and ultimately, hope.

Invisible

Invisible PDF

Author: Philip Ball

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2015-04-08

Total Pages: 333

ISBN-13: 022623889X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Science is said to be on the verge of achieving the ancient dream of making objects invisible. Invisible is a biography of an idea, tied to the history of science over the "longue duree." Taking in Plato to today s science, Ball shows us that the stories we have told about invisibility are not in fact about technical capability but about power, sex, concealment, morality, and corruption. Precisely because they refer to matters that lie beyond our senses, unseen beings and worlds have long been a repository for hopes, fears, and suppressed desires. Ideas of invisibility are, like all ideas rooted in legend, ultimately parables about our own potential and weaknesses. Invisible presents the first comprehensive survey of the roles that the idea of invisibility has played throughout time and culture. This territory takes us from medieval grimoires to cutting-edge nanotechnology, from fairy tales to telecommunications, from camouflage to early cinematography, and from beliefs about ghosts to the dawn of nuclear physics and the discovery of dark energy. Invisible reveals what our age-old fantasies about what lurks unseen, and whether we can enter that realm ourselves, truly say about us. "

Vampire God

Vampire God PDF

Author: Mary Y. Hallab

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2010-03-30

Total Pages: 181

ISBN-13: 1438428588

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Examines the enormous popular appeal of vampires from early Greek and Slavic folklore to present-day popular culture.

Immortality, Inc

Immortality, Inc PDF

Author: Chip Walter

Publisher:

Published: 2020

Total Pages: 324

ISBN-13: 1426219806

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

"Veteran journalist Chip Walter takes us deep inside Silicon Valley's boardrooms and the world's most advanced biomedical labs to reveal the incredible new science of extending human lifespan. Here are the bold business moves funded by Google and made by Apple chairman and Calico CEO Arthur Levinson; the pioneering stem cell techniques developed by scientist Robert Hariri; the transformative enterprises established by genomics genius Craig Venter; and the mind-bending future envisioned by thought leader Ray Kurzweil--all pointing toward a time not too long from now when we will live without disease or diminished faculties far beyond the age of 100. It's an audacious cast of characters, and through their stories you will come to understand how groundbreaking discoveries in gene therapy, molecular biology, and artificial intelligence are cracking the aging process--and could even lead to immortality. As Walter reveals, the quest to cheat death isn't science fiction anymore. It's real, it's serious, and it will change absolutely everything--including our definition of what it means to be alive."--Dust jacket.

Bitten & Smitten

Bitten & Smitten PDF

Author: Michelle Rowen

Publisher: Forever

Published: 2008-11-15

Total Pages: 230

ISBN-13: 0446550434

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

In Rowen's death-defyingly funny debut--a cross between "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Sex in the City"--Sarah Dearly goes on a blind date . . . with a vampire. Original.

Immortal

Immortal PDF

Author: P. C. Cast

Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com

Published: 2011-01-22

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 1458721574

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

In Immortal; Love Stories With Bite' edited by New York Times bestselling author of the House of Night series P.C. Cast' seven of todays most popular YA vampire and contemporary fantasy authors offer new short stories that prove when youre immortal' true love really is forever.

Teachings of the Immortals

Teachings of the Immortals PDF

Author: Mikal Nyght

Publisher:

Published: 2013-02-27

Total Pages: 226

ISBN-13: 9780976689775

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

So... you want to live forever? This book can show you how! It was 1994 when we went to see Interview With the Vampire, which turned out to be a major catalyst in my life, awakening the awareness that I was a mortal who was going to die if I didn't do something. But what to do? While I would love to say I went looking for Lestat & found him, that would be a pleasant fantasy. What I did was to open to the realm of all possibility, asking questions which are crucial to any spiritual journey. It begins with "Who are you?" It's impossible to describe the spiritual longing I experienced as the deeper insights from Interview With the Vampire began to haunt me. It wasn't an obsession with the movie. It was an inescapable fascination with the darker truths which forced me to question the very reality in which I lived, until I eventually came to see that the world is nothing like we've been taught to believe. Believe what you will. Tell yourself this is all only a writer's fantasy if it will make you sleep better. The simple truth is that we began to receive letters on the computer in my home. Letters from an immortal. The letters were not just beautiful seductions. They were teachings, outlining a systematic undoing of the belief systems which hold us prisoner to the consensual mortal world - the dayshine world. Over a period of years, we were instructed via these letters as well as through gnosis-channelings. What we were being taught was the process of evolution from mortal to immortal, the transmogrification of human to other-than-human. Our own mind creates reality, but the hardest part is undoing the programming that tells us we are impotent children in meat suits at the whim of some cloud-bound deity.The hardest part is giving ourselves permission to explore outside of the matrix, past the confines of Plato's cave. What we were being taught, ultimately, was how to nurture, create, & manifest our immortal twin, the eternal other, the shaman's double. There are dozens of names for it, but it all comes down to this: we have within ourselves the ability to be anything we choose - including immortal, eternal & infinite. This revised second edition includes excerpts from The Darker Teachings, which pick up where The Matrix leaves off. Intense instruction from the author assists the seeker in transcending the limitations which are really only obstacles in the mind. You are becoming YOURSELF! You are taking upon yourself the power to Be the immortal spirit which has been whispering in your ear for longer than you can remember. TWO REVIEWS FROM THE FIRST EDITION 5.0 out of 5 stars Where the night never ends., April 15, 2012 By Donald Anderson (SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, US) This book can be very informative to some and nothing but babble to the closed minded. To venture outside of the box is always full of new situations to look at. To keep one's self open is to explore where the "program" won't affect you. Have you ever felt as if you did not belong? Read this book and open to it's message. * 5.0 out of 5 stars My book of life., October 15, 2011 By Sam Bleuel (Rio Rancho, New Mexico) This is the best book I've EVER read! I'm not much of a reader, but I bought the kindle edition of this and couldn't be happier. Though some of what it says I've thought myself, it contains a lot of interesting, new, and useful information. It's scary how true this book is, most people could not fathom it. Basically, I live by this book. It explains my thinking in every way possible and more. I've suggested this book to SO many people! I also love that on the actual site of this book, you can talk to the author and ask questions. He is very intelligent and knowledgeable. Anything is possible, we hold ourselves back from living/evolving to our true potential. That's something to remember! This book is the best of its kind and the most realistic.

The Secret Life of Puppets

The Secret Life of Puppets PDF

Author: Victoria Nelson

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2003-11-01

Total Pages: 368

ISBN-13: 0674041410

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

In one of those rare books that allows us to see the world not as we've never seen it before, but as we see it daily without knowing, Victoria Nelson illuminates the deep but hidden attraction the supernatural still holds for a secular mainstream culture that forced the transcendental underground and firmly displaced wonder and awe with the forces of reason, materialism, and science. In a backward look at an era now drawing to a close, The Secret Life of Puppets describes a curious reversal in the roles of art and religion: where art and literature once took their content from religion, we came increasingly to seek religion, covertly, through art and entertainment. In a tour of Western culture that is at once exhilarating and alarming, Nelson shows us the distorted forms in which the spiritual resurfaced in high art but also, strikingly, in the mass culture of puppets, horror-fantasy literature, and cyborgs: from the works of Kleist, Poe, Musil, and Lovecraft to Philip K. Dick and virtual reality simulations. At the end of the millennium, discarding a convention of the demonized grotesque that endured three hundred years, a Demiurgic consciousness shaped in Late Antiquity is emerging anew to re-divinize the human as artists like Lars von Trier and Will Self reinvent Expressionism in forms familiar to our pre-Reformation ancestors. Here as never before, we see how pervasively but unwittingly, consuming art forms of the fantastic, we allow ourselves to believe.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue PDF

Author: V. E. Schwab

Publisher: Tor Books

Published: 2020-10-06

Total Pages: 484

ISBN-13: 0765387581

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER USA TODAY BESTSELLER NATIONAL INDIE BESTSELLER THE WASHINGTON POST BESTSELLER Recommended by Entertainment Weekly, Real Simple, NPR, Slate, and Oprah Magazine #1 Library Reads Pick—October 2020 #1 Indie Next Pick—October 2020 BOOK OF THE YEAR (2020) FINALIST—Book of The Month Club A “Best Of” Book From: Oprah Mag * CNN * Amazon * Amazon Editors * NPR * Goodreads * Bustle * PopSugar * BuzzFeed * Barnes & Noble * Kirkus Reviews * Lambda Literary * Nerdette * The Nerd Daily * Polygon * Library Reads * io9 * Smart Bitches Trashy Books * LiteraryHub * Medium * BookBub * The Mary Sue * Chicago Tribune * NY Daily News * SyFy Wire * Powells.com * Bookish * Book Riot * Library Reads Voter Favorite * In the vein of The Time Traveler’s Wife and Life After Life, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is New York Times bestselling author V. E. Schwab’s genre-defying tour de force. A Life No One Will Remember. A Story You Will Never Forget. France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever—and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name. Also by V. E. Schwab Shades of Magic A Darker Shade of Magic A Gathering of Shadows A Conjuring of Light Villains Vicious Vengeful At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

The Allure of Toxic Leaders

The Allure of Toxic Leaders PDF

Author: Jean Lipman-Blumen

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 433

ISBN-13: 0195312007

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Toxic leaders, both political, like Slobodan Milosevic, and corporate, like Enron's Ken Lay, have always been with us, and many books have been written to explain what makes them tick. Here leadership scholar Jean Lipman-Blumen explains what makes the followers tick, exploring why people will tolerate--and remain loyal to--leaders who are destructive to their organizations, their employees, or their nations. Why do we knowingly follow, seldom unseat, frequently prefer, and sometimes even create toxic leaders? Lipman-Blumen argues that these leaders appeal to our deepest needs, playing on our anxieties and fears, on our yearnings for security, high self-esteem, and significance, and on our desire for noble enterprises and immortality. She also explores how followers inadvertently keep themselves in line by a set of insidious control myths that they internalize. For example, the belief that the leader must necessarily be in a position to "know more" than the followers often stills their objections. In addition, outside forces--such as economic depressions, political upheavals, or a crisis in a company--can increase our anxiety and our longing for charismatic leaders. Lipman-Blumen shows how followers can learn critical lessons for the future and survive in the meantime. She discusses how to confront, reform, undermine, blow the whistle on, or oust a toxic leader. And she suggests how we can diminish our need for strong leaders, identify "reluctant leaders" among competent followers, and even nurture the leader within ourselves. Toxic leaders charm, manipulate, mistreat, weaken, and ultimately devastate their followers. The Allure of Toxic Leaders tells us how to recognize these leaders before it's too late.