This introductory chapter, encyclopaedic in nature, covers the main aspects of catastrophe (CAT) risk from a qualitative perspective, offering an overview of what will be explored in quantitative terms in the subsequent chapters. It starts with the definition of the fundamental terms and concepts, such as peril, hazard, risk, uncertainty, probability, and CAT model. It then describes the historical development of catastrophe risk science, which was often influenced by the societal impact of some infamous catastrophes. The main periods are as follows: from ancient myths to medieval texts, mathematization (eighteenth and nineteenth centuries) and computerization (twentieth century). Finally, it provides an exhaustive list of perils categorized by their physical origin, including geophysical, hydrological, meteorological, climatological, biological, extraterrestrial, technological, and socio-economic perils. In total, 42 perils are covered, with historical examples and consequences for people and structures discussed for each one of them.

This chapter provides an introduction to the Cambridge Handbook of Bilingual Phonetics and Phonology, and emphasizes the interdisciplinarity of the scholarship included in the Handbook, which contributes to the diversity of approaches, to theory-building, and to the collaborative connections that are enhancing the field. The abstracts of each of the thirty-five chapters are also included and are followed by concluding remarks providing a roadmap for the future of research on bilingual phonetics and phonology.

In this chapter I lay the foundations of the book and give an overview of the argument. After introducing the importance of studying state capacity and the main puzzle of why certain states are set in divergent state building trajectories, I discuss the state of bellicist theory and criticisms related to its alleged functionalist approach to history, and lack of fit with a world where inter-state war has become less frequent. I then turn to Latin America, a poster child of anti-bellicist scholars. There I review the aforementioned books by Centeno, Kurtz, Mahoney, Mazzuca, Saylor, and Soifer, amongst others. My book is set against this new consensus which dismisses war as an explanation for intra-regional variation in state capacity. In a final section, I propose the need to rethink the theory with a focus on the long-term consequences of war outcomes rather than pre-war conditions. The introduction closes with a discussion of my case selection strategy and chapter layout.

The fundamental practices and principles of network data are presented in this book, and the preface serves as an important starting point for readers to understand the goals and objectives of this text. The preface explains how the practical and fundamental aspects of network data are intertwined, and how they can be used to solve real-world problems. It also gives advice on how to use the book, including the boxes that will be featured throughout the book to highlight key concepts and provide practical examples of working with network data. Readers will find this preface to be a valuable resource as they begin their journey into the world of network science.

The introductory chapter positions the volume in relation to the discussion of historical knowledge building from different perspectives, including the philosophy of history, history education, and knowledge structures from a sociological perspective. The chapter explains the usefulness of studying knowledge building in history from a functional linguistic perspective and provides an overview of the Systemic Functional Linguistics initiatives since the 1980s. It concludes with a preview of the contributory chapters in this collection.

The virus that causes COVID-19 came from outer space. King Charles III of Britain is Count Dracula’s cousin. John Kellogg invented cornflakes to prevent people from having impure sexual thoughts. The US military hides information about UFOs from the public. The average person accidentally swallows about eight spiders per year in their sleep. While each claim may sound absurd, some of these statements are true, and some are false. The prologue to this book introduces the topic of misinformation and some of its complexities, explains the rationale behind why this book was written and who it’s intended for, and lays out the chapter structure.

Chapter 1 provides an introduction to the present book, by outlining its objectives, providing a working definition for ritual, and introducting the concept of the ritual perspective. The chappter also introduces the conventions used in this book and overviews its contents.

Ever since we began to build software systems that interacted with humans, there have ethical concerns about the ways in which we interact with them. In [830], for example, Weizenbaum observes of the world’s first chatterbot that “ELIZA shows, if nothing else, how easy it is to create and maintain the illusion of understanding, hence perhaps of judgment deserving of credibility. A certain danger lurks there.”2 Fast forward more than 60 years, and this observation that a “certain danger lurks there” has emerged as a range of different concerns about the ways in which software (and hardware) systems are developed and deployed, and the range of data that modern data-driven systems rely upon. The space of machine ethics is vast, and a large number of texts, papers, and policy documents now exist on the subject.

This introduction provides an overview of the 1860s and an explanation of the plan of the volume. It also offers brief descriptions of individual chapters.

Although the vast majority of mobile robotic systems involve a single robot operating alone in its environment, a growing number of researchers are considering the challenges and potential advantages of having a group of robots cooperate in order to complete some required task. For some specific robotic tasks, such as exploring an unknown planet [374], search and rescue [812], pushing objects [608], [513], [687], [821], or cleaning up toxic waste [609], it has been suggested that rather than send one very complex robot to perform the task it would more effective to send a number of smaller, simpler robots. Such a collection of robots is sometimes described as a swarm [81], a colony [255], or a collective [436], or the robots may be said to exhibit cooperative behavior [607].

The Introduction outlines the nature of the study and the rationale for undertaking it. It argues that collective self-defence remains under-theorised (and collective self-defence practice under-analysed) despite the increased invocation of it by states in recent years. The Introduction also discusses the book’s methodology, particularly in relation to its focus on state practice and opinio juris as crucial ‘raw materials’ for legal standards in this context. The key facts and findings of the famous 1986 Nicaragua decision of the International Court of Justice are then summarised, because the case is referred to throughout the book. The Introduction concludes with a summary of the structure of the book.

Chapter 1 sets out the aim of the research and identifies the structure of the book and the methodology that is used.

This chapter is an introduction to the research and writing undertaken by those who have researched the reshaping of the education system. It begins by giving a recent history of the country and particularly the disruptive events of 2022. The argument is that Kazakhstan is at a pivotal moment in its culture and development as an independent, post-Soviet state. The introduction also outlines the key aspects of the education system, previous research by this team plus the major themes and structure of the book.

This chapter offers a very brief introduction to the topic addressed in this book and presents a general outline.

This chapter provides an overview of macroeconomics, which is the study of the economy as a whole. We first discuss what macroeconomics is about. Then we describe how different types of economies (market economy, planned economy, and mixed economy) work to solve economic problems in human society. Then we discuss how economic modeling helps to understand economic phenomena. Finally, the chapter provides a brief history of macroeconomic thought.

This introductory essay to the volume sets out the volume’s form and purpose, and then provides advance introduction of each of its component essays in turn. Since the volume comes together as a tightly organised and cumulative introduction to David Tracy, this essay forms its own concerted introduction to Tracy parallel to the performance of the book as a whole.