The authors present their findings and theories about the history and practice of headbinding, including its possible origin as a way to emulate an elite, advanced race of beings.

Our big brains, our language ability, and our intelligence make us uniquely human. But barely 10,000 years ago (a mere blip in evolutionary time) human-like creatures called "Boskops" flourished in South Africa. They possessed extraordinary features: forebrains roughly 50% larger than ours, and estimated IQs to match--far surpassing our own. Many of these huge fossil skulls have been discovered over the last century, but most of us have never heard of this scientific marvel. Prominent neuroscientists Gary Lynch and Richard Granger compare the contents of the Boskop brain and our own brains today, and arrive at startling conclusions about our intelligence and creativity. Connecting cutting-edge theories of genetics, evolution, language, memory, learning, and intelligence, Lynch and Granger show the implications of large brains for a broad array of fields, from the current state of the art in Alzheimer's and other brain disorders, to new advances in brain-based robots that see and converse with us, and the means by which neural prosthetics-- replacement parts for the brain--are being designed and tested. The authors demystify the complexities of our brains in this fascinating and accessible book, and give us tantalizing insights into our humanity--its past, and its future.

"Elongated human skulls have been found in the archaeological record on every inhabited continent, and most commonly these people existed about 2000 years ago. The vast majority were elite members of various societies and artificial cranial deformation was performed on them as infants in order to achieve a specific look so as to differentiate them from the general public. Nowhere was this more commonplace than in Peru and Bolivia, and this book sets out to figure out where these societies lived, when, and how they may have been related. The most mysterious aspect is that some of the ancient people of Peru and Bolivia may have in fact been born with elongated skulls. Should this turn out through medical examination to be true, the history of humanity many have to be re-written."--Supplied by publisher

The alien influences behind the rise and fall of Egypt’s Golden Age • Explains how Akhenaten was the last pharaoh entrusted with the sacred and ancient alien knowledge of stargates, free energy, and antigravity technologies • Reveals how the Brotherhood of the Snake, a secret society of reptilian aliens, sought to destroy Akhenaten and suppress the sacred knowledge of the pharaohs • Explores the original purpose of the pyramids--to transmit energy to expand consciousness--and how they were decommissioned after the Great Flood The sophisticated civilization of ancient Egypt arose seemingly overnight, complete with advanced levels of art, agriculture, astronomy, and physics. Then, with the death of Pharaoh Akhenaten, much of this higher knowledge was lost--or suppressed. But evidence of this former Golden Age, the alien visitors behind its rise, and those behind its decline still exists--some of it in plain sight. Examining the purposefully obscured reign of Akhenaten and Nefertiti, Xaviant Haze explains how they represent the last dynasty with access to the sacred knowledge of stargates, free energy, and antigravity technologies, knowledge handed down from an advanced interstellar race in the remote past. He reveals how the reptilian race known as the Shemsu Hor infiltrated the Egyptian priesthood and banking systems and formed the Brotherhood of the Snake--a secret society set on destroying Akhenaten’s flourishing kingdom and suppressing the sacred knowledge of the pharaohs. Haze examines the evidence of aliens in ancient Egypt, such as the reptilian beings depicted in the Temple of Hathor and Thutmose III’s alien encounter. He shows how Akhenaten and his family are always portrayed with elongated skulls and explores the connection between ancient aliens and Mars, including the Martian materials used in Egyptian monuments. He explains the original purpose of the pyramids--to transmit uplifting energy throughout the planet to help expand consciousness--and explores how they were decommissioned after the Great Flood of prehistory. He reveals how the original builders of the pyramids foresaw humanity’s fall from the Golden Age and strategically encoded these magnificent structures to wake humanity from the depths of the Dark Ages.

Technology of the Gods lays out the mind-bending evidence that long-lost civilizations had attained and even exceeded our "modern" level of advancement. Westerners have been taught that humankind has progressed along a straight-line path from the primitive past to the proficient present, but the hard, fast evidence (literally written in stone!) proves that the ancients had technologies we cannot even replicate today.

Renowned philosopher and cultural theorist Kristeva (Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection) offers an extended consideration of artistic figurations of the severed head, the organizing theme to an exhibition she coordinated at the Louvre in 1998. Though she follows a single historical trajectory, moving from Paleolithic skull cults to antique Greek sculpture to the Surrealist drawings, Kristeva eschews the disciplinary constraints of art history, instead employing psychoanalysis to explore the intertwined problems of representation and mortality posed by the severed head. For Kristeva, the capacity to figure the life of the mind first requires a confrontation with this horrific object that stands at the boundary between life and death, registering not only the loss of corporeal form but also subjective interiority. Though this book does not engage with recent images of decapitation, it is not without contemporary political-cultural import; for Kristeva, these cruel artistic figurations offer us the capacity to contemplate the sacred within a technology-driven contemporary visual culture. Verdict While a challenging text, this beautifully written and richly layered meditation on mortality and representation will undoubtedly appeal to those readers interested in semiotic and psychoanalytically informed readings of art.-Jonathan Patkowski, CUNY Graduate Ctr.(c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Cowin (New York Center for Biomedical Engineering) and Humphrey (biomedical engineering, Texas A&M U.) present seven papers that discuss current research and future directions. Topics concern tissues within the cardiovascular system (arteries, the heart, and biaxial testing of planar tissues such as heart valves). Themes include an emphasis on data on the underlying microstructure, especially collagen; the consideration of the fact that both arteries and the heart contain muscle and that there is, therefore, a need to quantify both the active and passive response; constitutive relations for active behavior; and the growth and remodeling of cardiovascular tissues. Of interest to cardiovascular and biomechanics soft tissue researchers, and bioengineers. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

An enigmatic people lived on the coast of Peru between 2700 and 2000 years ago that academia spends little time studying. In the driest part of the country which receives less than half an inch of rain per year they were enormously successful at agriculture and fishing and were very advanced as regards textile production, had the potters wheel and constructed ships of totora reed with cotton cloth sails.The most intriguing characteristic of these Paracas people was that they had elongated heads, and through my research I can state that the earliest of them, especially their nobility were born with elongated skulls; cranial deformation of their infants being performed later due to genetic mixing with normal local Homo sapiens sapiens.They also had genetically red hair, and thus were most likely light skinned and may have had green or blue eyes; thus, they were not Native Americans. Recent and extensive DNA testing shows us that they very well could have migrated from the Black Sea area as much as 3000 years ago, and sought refuge from invasion and oppression.Academia has either ignored or suppressed this information, and that is why I present it to you here.

This is the first volume in an interdisciplinary three-book series covering the full range of biological, clinical, and surgical aspects in the evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of patients with craniofacial malformations. This volume opens by considering general topics such as developmental biology and disease classification and then examines in depth the biological basis of the various malformations, including craniosynostoses, cleft-lip and palate with complex orofacial clefts, branchio-oculo-facial syndromes, rare syndromes, soft tissue malformations, and dysgnathia. Psychological aspects, including psychological evaluation methods and therapies and quality of life issues, are then addressed. Finally, all relevant clinical, radiological, and genetic investigations are described and important diagnostic issues are explored. Featuring numerous high-quality illustrations, the book will be of high value for all clinicians, researchers, and postgraduate students who deal with these malformations. The accompanying two volumes describe treatment principles and present in an atlas manner all relevant surgical techniques in detail. The content of this multivolume set, written by the world’s leading research and clinical specialists in their discipline, represents therefore the recent intellect, experience, and state of this medical field.

The New York Times–bestselling graphic memoir about Alison Bechdel, author of Fun Home, becoming the artist her mother wanted to be. Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home was a pop culture and literary phenomenon. Now, a second thrilling tale of filial sleuthery, this time about her mother: voracious reader, music lover, passionate amateur actor. Also a woman, unhappily married to a closeted gay man, whose artistic aspirations simmered under the surface of Bechdel's childhood…and who stopped touching or kissing her daughter good night, forever, when she was seven. Poignantly, hilariously, Bechdel embarks on a quest for answers concerning the mother-daughter gulf. It's a richly layered search that leads readers from the fascinating life and work of the iconic twentieth-century psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, to one explosively illuminating Dr. Seuss illustration, to Bechdel’s own (serially monogamous) adult love life. And, finally, back to Mother—to a truce, fragile and real-time, that will move and astonish all adult children of gifted mothers. A New York Times, USA Today, Time, Slate, and Barnes & Noble Best Book of the Year “As complicated, brainy, inventive and satisfying as the finest prose memoirs.”—New York Times Book Review “A work of the most humane kind of genius, bravely going right to the heart of things: why we are who we are. It's also incredibly funny. And visually stunning. And page-turningly addictive. And heartbreaking.”—Jonathan Safran Foer “Many of us are living out the unlived lives of our mothers. Alison Bechdel has written a graphic novel about this; sort of like a comic book by Virginia Woolf. You won't believe it until you read it—and you must!”—Gloria Steinem