BOOKS AND E-BOOKS
ARIEL
Another View of Our Solar System
Can we change how we see the solar system? The most common picture of our solar system consists of the sun and its eight (formerly nine) well-known planets, ranging from Mercury out to Neptune. But as Peter Zelinski argues, the very term “planet” poses problems; this category limits our view. Rather than containing a small number of planets, our solar system actually hosts a rich quantity of worlds. This brief e-book looks to those worlds, rethinking and reordering the bodies of the solar system in a tour that welcomes Haumea, Makemake, Eris and many other bodies into a view that is more expansive than the view of the solar system we have been given. The result is a new and fuller picture of something we thought we understood. It is also an illustration of the power of categories, and how looking past them can expand what we see. Forget the familiar ordering of eight planets and take this rapid tour of your solar system and its fifty (or so) worlds.
THIS IS NOT A BOOK
Why Printed Books Matter and
E-Books Can’t Take Their Place
Books matter! And books and e-books are not the same. During the lockdown period of 2020, libraries closed their buildings to stop lending physical books, but kept open digital portals for downloading e-books. This e-book was written in response, and in response to the false idea that books and e-books are interchangeable. Peter Zelinski's argument for why physical books are irreplaceable touches on the personal experience of books and the historical adoption of the codex format we think of as a book today. Drawing the distinction that physical books and e-books are different media serving readers and serving authors’ works in different ways, this e-book argues for recognizing physical books as the greatest resource we have for experiencing worthy ideas and for conveying ideas across cultures and centuries.
YOU DID NOT CHOOSE ME, BUT I CHOSE YOU
Do we choose God or does God choose us? Passages throughout the New Testament either assume or directly state the point that the believers were chosen to believe. Yet that idea is foreign within the modern context that sees belief in God as a victory of personal choice. This book looks to scripture to explore the premise that the knowledge of God we experience as belief is something God has awakened within us. That premise reorients our understanding of our lives in this world and the life to come. As the book explains, God is transforming believers by renewing their minds. In doing so, he is realizing an objective pursued without variation through both the Old Testament and the New.
HOW DO WE KNOW GOD IS REAL?
“What may be known of God is manifest,” wrote Paul in his letter to the Romans. In other words, the evidence is plain. Yet believers get lost. They wrestle with doubt, and can be overcome by the fear that what they believe is foolish. This short book provides a trail out of these woods, offering an argument by which we know that God certainly exists. As Paul’s words suggest, we can infer the reality of God from our experience of the world. We don’t even have to look far, because our very experience of selfhood makes the case that God is with us. This book is a letter of reassurance to every Christian who struggles with doubt, which quite possibly means it is written to every Christian.
THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
Do the biblical Ten Commandments consist of something more than a list of rules? This book unpacks one of the most familiar parts of the Bible to find the richness of meaning that waits within the ancient text. Topics the book explores include the distinction between an idol and a false god; the continuity between the commandments and Jesus Christ; and the significance of the fact that the commandments were split between two tablets of stone. As the book explains, the text written on tablets can be seen as a map. That map outlines spiritual principles basic to our lives, and it charts the steps in a progression aimed at drawing the heart nearer to God.