Böcker av Paul Georgiou

Man is a meaning-seeking creature. We have an undeniable need to ask how and why. We look for answers to ';how?' in science and mathematics. For answers to ';why?' questions, we have to search in our experience of life and to explore the world of ideas, those of others and our own.That's when words and ideas, suitably arranged, come together in a happy confluence of sound and meaning, signifying something worthwhile. The poems in this book are written in various forms and styles. Some rhyme; some don't. The meaning of some is perfectly straightforward; others are multi-layered. In some of the poems, the poet is seeking to meet one of poetry's familiar objectives, of conveying ';what oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed'. But he clearly hopes that some of his readers will be interested in poems that explore ideas that are less commonly thought. Some of the poems deal with contentious issues; some contain sexually explicit lines and provocative thoughts. As he says in his Introduction: If I offend anyone, I apologise. But everyone should have the right to say what they think, just as everyone has the right to disagree or criticise. The collection is divided into eleven sections: Love; Anger, Madness & Despair; Conflict & War; Danger & Fear; God; Hope; Life; Occasional Poems; Stories; Lyrics; Stuff & Nonsense.

Adventures in Numberland is a fairy story about numbers in life and in business. The target audience is adult but will work for older children as an introduction to business and the importance of numeracyThe hero is Piff, the wood-cutters daughter, a beautiful , strong-minded young girl who is thrown out of her home by her fat and lazy step-mother. Alone in the forest, Piff meets the fairy, Numberlina, who decides to help Piff by showing her how useful numbers are and how powerful they can be. In return Numberlina wants a share of the profits and help in dealing with the Anathemath, an evil and confusing spirit, shrouded in a noxious green cloud.Piff develops the wood-cutting business successfully, moving into furniture manufacturing and finally ship building. In the process, she leans how useful all the numbers (including pi, phi and e) can be. She attracts the unwelcome attention of Prince Baltigral who owns almost everything in Numberland. Baltigral is a greedy prince who has enlisted the help of the Anathemath, to mislead, suppress and exploit the population of Numberland.In the course of her commercial career, Piff learns that mathematics has many practical uses - e.g. for making perfect right angles in the design of furniture, for measuring distances, for designing buildings and for calculating interest.In the end, there is a final cataclysmic political and numerical struggle between Piff supported by Numberlina on one side and Prince Baltigral aided by the Anathemath on the other.

The author takes on the toughest questions about the nature of existence:: Why is there something rather than nothing? Why is there this particular something? What exactly is this something? Why is this something governed by rules? What are we to make of the human experience? How can the human experience help to answer other existential questions ? Does God exist? and, on the basis of fact and through the application of reason, he ruthlessly dissects each issue to provide the best available answers. He invites the reader to join him on a journey. What do you need? An open mind. A willingness to accept conclusions if they are clearly based on facts and reason, even if the conclusions are counter-intuitive.He promises there will be nothing complicated as you move forward. Its a journey anyone can take. Only those whose minds are closed will fall by the wayside.Anyone who is hoping they will find absolute truth, whatever that means, will be disappointed. As you progress, the author concedes, you will have to make compromises at every stage. But the journey is still worthwhile because, at the end, although you wont have absolute truth, you will have come as close to it as is possible. And you will have avoided the irrational excesses of the extremists on either side of the existential debate.The author gives this warning. You will be asked to rethink many of the certainties which you take for granted and believe are true because they are not true. The material world is not what you think it is. Space and time are not what you think they are. Simplistic answers to existential questions do not survive even cursory scrutiny of the facts. With our current state of scientific knowledge, he sets out to give an accurate description of reality which he summarises in the following terms: We live in a largely immaterial universe of powerful and invisible forces, governed by intellectually comprehensible rules. He then goes on to consider the nature of the rules and how man, half angel and half beast, fits into this world and deals with what he describes as our appalling and ridiculous predicament..After all the analysis, the author identifies a series of existential questions which monotheists tend to fudge or ignore: If there is a God, why does he hide himself? Why is faith in an invisible, unprovable deity the key to salvation? If God wished to create man, why did it take so long for life (10 billion years) and human consciousness (13.5 billion years) to evolve? Why is there evil in the world if God is all-powerful and wholly good? Why do prophets promote different versions of the one God?and then, breaking his rules about confining himself to fact and reason, he offers a simple but paradoxical solution to all these questions. At the end, as promised, he offers God for the curious unbeliever.This book is very likely to change the way you see the world and your place in it.

Adventures in Grammarland is set in a fantasy world, where words are people and where, because of bitter conflict and disunity in the past, the land is now oppressed by the tyrant Ignorance. A young lad, Josh, embarks on a quest in Grammarland that requires him to grasp the rules of grammar, to understand why the rules are so important and to face Ignorance, and his two sons Bigotry and Prejudice, in a final, cataclysmic battle that will seal the fate of Grammarland once and for all. On the way, he must cross the Bog of Disuse (where old words sink without trace) and deal with the foul-mouthed Giant Oath, the well-meaning but incoherent Misuse, and the Tautology family including Tautology's wife Verbiage, and their children Digression and Drivel. On the journey, Josh is accompanied by Syntax, who is a stickler for the rules of Grammarland, and Melisa, who understands the rules but also knows how to play with them constructively. Adventures in Grammarland turns what many see as a dry and obscure subject into an exciting adventure. The reader meets all the parts of speech and is shown how, when the words work together, they become more powerful than any enemy. This is a book for anyone, from the age of 9 to 90, who enjoys an exciting story, especially if they have an interest in language.