Understanding Personal Auto

Customer Reviews:

Good guide for would-be car-insurance salespeople - NOT for consumers.......2007-05-21

This guide had all of the information you need to form a basic-to-moderately advanced understanding of personal auto insurance, but not surprisingly, it was very dry. Other Dearborn guides I've read - on life insurance, for example - have been much easier to read. As is such, this book is good only for the hard facts needed to cram for a test. It is not recommended for individual consumers who want to learn more about car insurance in order to make wise purchasing decisions.

Average customer rating:

Understanding Personal Auto Insurance
Sheryl Lilke
Manufacturer: Dearborn Trade Pub
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Insurance | Automotive | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 079311280X

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Understanding Personal Auto Textbook

Manufacturer: Dearborn a Kaplan Professional Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Insurance | Automotive | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0793178819

Book Description

This comprehensive course provides a thorough review of the ISO Personal Auto Policy. The Declarations Page, four Insuring Agreements and General Provisions are explained in detail.

The course employs a policy analysis approach in which the June 1998 edition of the Personal Auto Policy form is examined section by section. It also contains concrete examples of how insurance coverage applies, is limited or is excluded under the form.

Students will learn how the policy typically responds to various bodily injury, property damage and liability losses and how endorsements may be used to amend the basic policy form. The purpose of No Fault legislation and the three types of No Fault laws are also explained.

If you are taking this course for CE, the CE exam will automatically be added to your basket when selecting CE credit. Certain states require that a proctor/monitor supervise the exam taking process.

Book Description

This book contributes substantively to the current state of the art of macroeconomic modeling by providing a method for modeling large collections of heterogeneous agents subject to nonpairwise externality called field effects, i.e. feedback of aggregate effects on individual agents or agents using state-dependent strategies. Adopting a level of microeconomic description that keeps track of compositions of fractions of agents by "types" or "strategies", time evolution of the microeconomic states is described by (backward) Chapman-Kolmogorov equations.

Customer Reviews:

Content.......2001-02-28

Content: 1 Introduction 2 Simple Illustrative and Motivating Examples 3 Empirical Distributions: Statistical Laws in Macroeconomics 4 Modeling Interactions I: Jump Markov Processes 5 Modeling Interactions II: Master Equations and Field Effects 6 Modeling Interactions III: Pairwise and Multiple-Pair Interactions 7 Sluggish Dynamics and Hierarchical State Spaces 8 Self-organizing and Other Critical Phenomena in Economic Models Elaborations and Future Directions of Research Appendix References Index

A stimulating synthesis -- physics models of social systems.......1999-09-17

Can statistical physics methods be used to help understand and predict the behaviors of groups of people over time? Aoki, a well-known expert in optimal control theory and dynamic models applied to economic models, suggests that they can. This book offers an inspiring medley of technical ideas and probabilistic models -- based on analogies to spin glasses, self-organizing physical systems, and key ideas of statistical mechanics -- to make plausible the idea that behaviors of aggregates of rational actors, too, can be predicted statistically. (Enthusiasts of Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, take note!)

The book is worth studying carefully for its ideas and models, even though its main thesis may not ultimately be convincing. It presents and illustrates modeling techniques that will be useful to marketing scientists and quantitative social scientists as well as to economists. A central idea is that individual behaviors can be represented by transitions among discrete choices or microstates, while the rates at which these transitions take place may depend on the frequency distribution of the whole population (and/or of local subpopulations)among microstates. The result is an adaptive process in which individual choices define the aggregate macrostate (i.e., the frequency distribution of individuals of various distinguished types among microstates), which in turn affects subsequent choices. Whether this adaptive process will reach any equilibrium, and, if so, which one and how and when, are principal concerns addressed through various well-analyzed models.

The techniques introduced and illustrated are primarily, partition function and stochastic process methods, including jump processes, diffusion processes, and martingale methods. Other ideas, from critical process theory, stochastic epidemics, large deviations, and maximum entropy econometrics and physics, are introduced and exploited where appropriate. The practical value of such methods to modelers cannot be denied. Aoki's main theme, that such techniques can be used to predict behaviors of populations of individuals, is not buttressed by any real applications. The models presented may be too simple to capture what many social scientists would consider essential real-world complexities, such as the generation of new player types and roles and the effects of boundaries and spatial distributions of resources and environments on populations over time. Nonetheless, the collection of ideas and methods presented, and the overall vision of a social science in which inter-individual heterogeneities and choices are accounted for by discrete transitions, makes this monograph exciting and valuable.

Note: Readers who enjoy this book may also want to read T.C. Schelling's Micromotives and Macrobehavior. Schelling's book is much less technical, but follows some of the same big ideas and applies them to many homely, compelling examples.

Book Description

Curmudgeons have for ages spiked life and literature with barbs and arrows, which are never so sharp as when shot from a woman's sling. From Shakespeare's Shrew to television's Maude, they've added pepper to the often bland stew of human conversation. Organized into 50 broad categories, The Curmudgeon Woman is a collection of 500 quotations from more than 300 razor-witted females. Covering a period from the 1600s to the present, they share their needle-sharp points of view on such engaging topics as aging, happiness, sex, marriage, inequality, fashion, life, and death. Not just funny, not just nasty, The Curmudgeon Woman combines sharp wit with deep truths. With contributions ranging from Minna Antrim ("Experience is a good teacher, but she sends in terrific bills.") to Natalie Wood ("The only time a woman really succeeds in changing a man is when he's a baby."), The Curmudgeon Woman displays a wry sense of humor and more wisdom than ought to be allowed.

Average customer rating:
Time Life Book Digest (A Woman of Our Times, The Cat and The Curmudgeon, Rabbit At Rest, Under Seige)

Manufacturer: Time Warner
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000EPA74A

Average customer rating:
A Woman Of Our Times / The Cat And The Curmudgeon / Rabbit At Rest / Under Siege
Rosie / AMORY, Cleveland / UPDIKE, John / COONTS, Stephen THOMAS
Manufacturer: Time Warner Libraries
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000J0T3CC

Average customer rating:
The Mozart Compendium : A Guide to Mozart's Life and Music
H. C. Robbins Landon
Manufacturer: Borders Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OM86UU

Average customer rating:
The Mozart Compendium. A Guide to Mozart's Life & Music.
H.C. ed. ROBBINS LANDON
Manufacturer: Schirmer, 1990.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000JVWJGI

Average customer rating:
The Mozart Compendium: A Guide to Mozart's Life and Music
H C (Editor) Landon
Manufacturer: Borders Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Similar Items:

The Compleat Mozart: A Guide to the Musical Works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

ASIN: 0681075570

Product Description

Comprehensive guide by all the best Mozart experts. Some biography, but mostly about his music.

The Mozart Compendium: A Guide to Mozart's Life and Music

Average customer rating:

Bravo! THE reference guide to own!

The Mozart Compendium: A Guide to Mozart's Life and Music

Manufacturer: Schirmer Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Music | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0028713214

Customer Reviews:

Bravo! THE reference guide to own!.......2003-08-04

I bought this book, read through it's pages, and learned immeasurable amounts of information concerning Mozart's life and works. I will go to this book, time and again, for any info I may need. If you need info, it's here!

The Mozat Compendium: a Guide to Mozart's Life and Music

Average customer rating:

The Mozat Compendium: a Guide to Mozart's Life and Music

Manufacturer: Schirmer, New York
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000I9OQNK

Amazon.com

Yes We Have No: Adventures in the Other England is a dazzling, brilliant book, brimming with brutal truths--so much so it's amazing it ever saw the ink of American printing presses. In an industry that practically mandates that travel books paint foreign countries in romantically glowing colors and their residents be portrayed at worst as mischievous angels, Cohn emerges with the fresh slap of honesty, capturing on paper a group of sometimes grisly, sometimes mad, and often timeworn characters who push on with dignity and usually at least a dash of hope.

After growing up in Northern Ireland and rollicking a bit in the British music scene, Cohn settles into an English village so perfect and sleepy that for many years it seems untouched by time. When modernity strikes--in the form of a surly new neighbor who composes ad jingles--Cohn cuts his ties to idyllic living. In a miniature car driven by a feisty, if nearly dwarf-sized, female Odinist--the cult revival of the Norse god is but many of the discoveries he makes--Cohn sets out to the far corners of England, from depressed coal towns to New Age campgrounds, seeking modern English truth.

He finds, among others, a karaoke king, a psychic social worker, a gay transvestite-turned-straight family man, a lunatic wandering on foot town to town searching for the boyfriend who dumped her, a businessman-turned-politician who is running as the anti-Christ in the upcoming election, and a lonely widower whose only remaining valuable is shredded by a punk. In these deftly drawn sketches there is often one day that changes a life--for good or for evil--with the remaining days and years following like cars pulled by a train, fueled by blind hope or dashed dreams. Together, these portraits of those who've been brushed aside or have fallen into the cracks reflect an untold England, not one of cricket and foxhunts, but a society molded by or thrashing against the onward marching of change. --Melissa Rossi

Book Description

Forget about cricket, tea with the vicar and the changing of the guard (and about the much-hyped Cool Britannia as well), and encounter a hidden nation -- the many millions who've fallen out of the mainstream, or chosen to jump. Nik Cohn's kaleidoscopic England is made up of techno-freaks and soccer-obsessives, faith healers and fetishists, graffiti artists, Odinists, Rastas, Elvis impersonators, even the Antichrist. Armed with insatiable curiosity and guided by Mary Carson, an unstoppable Irish firebrand, Cohn whirls from the changing countryside of Cornwall and East Anglia to the ravaged postindustrial North, from riotous seaside towns to London netherworlds. Whether rampaging native or second-generation immigrant, each member of this remarkable chorus has a distinct story and a voice to match, and their lives define a world cut loose from tradition and all certainty. Gone bananas, in fact.

Humane and exuberant -- a surprising guide to a country we thought we knew, and writing of the highest order.

Customer Reviews:

Fast-paced read.......2006-06-17

I enjoyed this book, the whimsical characters Cohn meets are a fascinating subsection of the British underground types.

Fun but unreliable view of England.......2002-07-31

I'm not sure how successful Cohn is at describing the 'real' England. The motley cast of characters he 'happens' upon are just as unrepresentative of England as Dick Van Dyke's chimney sweep. But I guess a series of interviews with the real population of England - like anywhere else in the west: a collection of fairly nice but dull suburbanites - would not have made for a gripping read. And this is a gripping read - one of those books I couldn't put down.

But I am suspicious of the provenance of much of the text. I get the feeling that much of what people say in the book seem to be things Cohn would have liked them to say rather than the actual verbatium 'truth'. Fair enough I supose.

(By way of example, I come from Derry and I know for a fact no one but an imaginative journalist like Cohn could describe it in romantic terms!!)

Little New or Startling Here.......2000-02-16

Gotta say that my high hopes for this book sank further and further with every chapter I read. Rather than present the "Adventures in the Other England" that the subtitle promises, Cohn instead gives the reader transcriptions of conversation after conversation. Yes, he does have a knack for finding interesting people to talk to, but once he's done that, he seems content to record what they say and leave it at that. One thing he does try to stress is what a melting pot England has become since WWII and what a diverse array of lifestyles it now hosts. But unless you're completely unaware and still think Britain is nothing more than a country of cozy tea rooms and ye olde tradition, none of this is news. A far more enlightening (and depressing) book on the state of modern Britain is Nick Danziger's travelogue "Danziger's Britain."

If you want to know the state of England today -this is it........2000-01-28

A very great book indeed- and you would expect nothing else from such a sharp and gifted observer and writer as Nik Cohn. I know England very well ( lived there all my 50 years) and I have lived in most of the places he describes -London,Blackpool,Manchester,Liverpool. He is spot on. He is a great writer ; sympathetic, funny,understated,pithy and not fooled for a minute by Blair and his ilk. England has been in decline for a long time - it is now closer to being a fascist state than many Continental countries that the English like to look down on..

You have to read between the lines........1999-11-17

Not only have I read this book - I'm in it! In fact, the whole book's about me (read between the lines). I'm on the last four pages of the next to last chapter. It's obvious (to me) that the rest of the book exists merely as a contrast and backdrop to... er... well... ME! Some parts of it are wrong. I don't have a pentagram on my wall, I don't look like Yogi Bear... etc. But I suppose Nik Cohn couldn't be seen to be in any way supporting me. It would hardly boost his reputation! If he'd better suggested what the book was really about - I'd have given it five stars.

Customer Reviews:

Thought-provoking and thorough.......2003-07-01

This book is rich with ideas and provides a thought-provoking analysis of television and its impact on culture. It would no doubt be interesting to anthropologists of modern culture, sociologists, and the general public. We often forget about the powerful influence of this pervasive medium, but its impact is undeniable. By making this implicit impact explicit, Consuming Environments helps us become more reflective consumers of television content.

Customer Reviews:

worth to read.......2007-05-13

The book covered 90% of the content on the middleware architecture.
spent lots of time and effect to explain the core component
of the middleware with the consideration of the security, scalability,
management, redundancy,integration. Also it cover the Web service.
Maybe it is a little bit hard for author to put everything within 300 pages. And maybe the author should put more business case with how the Middleware architecture develop from legacy platform towards SOA.
One pitty thing inside the book is the author try to overweight MS's .NET solution. It try to trade off the key strength of J2EE with .NET.
Don't forget the whole ideal of .NET was stolen from open organization.
most of the MS product are lighted from the Open source.

Excellent overview of IT Architecture.......2004-09-06

I have been reading a lot of books about architecture recently, so when I spotted this I bought it without looking too closely at it. If I had paid more attention then I would have noticed that even its title hints that it isn't a standard book about n-tier architecture and/or UML modelling. First, the book is about IT architecture not software architecture, and second middleware is a major driver for the book.

In fact I have to say this is one of the most refreshing books I have read recently. It has the subtitle "Strategies for Building Large, Integrated Systems"; though this is undoubtedly true, I would be more inclined to call it "Everything you wanted to know about architecture but daren't ask"! Certainly for me it filled in some gaps in my knowledge and in general drew together a number of topics that aren't always treated in architecture books, and gave them a nice coherent thread.

See my blog for a more detailed review.

Focuses on the conceptual foundations.......2004-07-01

Excellent book that focuses on the conceptual underpinnings rather than on the specifics of products. If you want to sample a specific section of this book while you are at the bookstore to decide if this is the book for you, I would recommend Section 4.3, "The issue of state." A couple of pages of reading here will clearly reveal the character of this book and help you decide if this is the type of discussion that would make your adrenalin flow.
I withheld one star because the writing style was a bit jagged -almost as if written by someone as the author was speaking impromptu.

Yesterday, today and tomorrow of middleware - a must read!!.......2004-03-24

An excellent coverage of what's, why's and how's of middleware technologies.

The book gives an interesting perspective into the growth of middleware solutions with special focus on enterprise systems architecture and distributed technologies. The long journey that begins with TP monitors and primitive "transaction machines" covers a great deal of ground outlining the need-driven evolution of various middleware alternatives and ends with the discussion of latest - the EJB, .NET and CORBA. There is a special emphasis on the changing landscape brought about by the rise of eCommerce and the need to manage large-scale enterprise systems.

I love the way author drives home some very complex concepts. This book can serve as an indispensable resource both for beginners and experienced professionals. While the novice can easily comprehend intricacies of IT architecture, experienced architects will find a lot of food for throughout and new insights into many issues. I personally had many "ah, what a brilliant idea" moments. You will find many useful and perhaps unconventional solutions to practical problems. It can even help an IT manager to understand the real middleware and IT architecture issues and to make intelligent decisions without having to get deep into technical waters.

Overall, this book is a must have and deserves 10 horseshoes. [...]

An out and out excellent book.......2003-06-03

Rarely these days do you come across a technical book that gets to the bottom of the issues in a non-marketing manner and without using excessive technical jargon.

At the bottom of it all, the complexities of building large applications are based on some practical issues as well as some theoretical computing issues. How these architectural issues can be addressed in a product independent manner is at the heart of this book.

It was a pleasure to read again a non-verbose book showing the clarity of thought, and I strongly recommend it to any one interested in architectural issues of building large systems.

Average customer rating:
IT Architectures and Middleware: Strategies for Building Large, Integrated Systems
Chris / Bye, Peter Britton
Manufacturer: Addison-Wesley Professional
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OUEIMM

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