Most Popular Books by John Foster

A World For Us aims to show that the physical world does not exist independently of the human mind, but draws its existence from the way in which, under God''s ordinance, things appear to us in experience.

New in Paperback! In much the way that the CD replaced the album, the poster has waned as a messaging vehicle. The poster has now become a postcard and e-mail blast, leaving many to long for the lost age when posters were not only major promotional vehicles, but also artwork worthy of framing. Some of the world''s best designers just could not stand idle while the poster fell by the wayside. They turned to the poster for personal expression and as an outlet from more restrictive mediums. This book showcases their breathtaking artwork, which has proven that the poster can still serve as a worthy communications tool. In doing so, they''ve brought the poster back to prominence. In this book, John Foster has compiled the world''s finest new work at the height of this rebirth. There is currently no book on the market that can claim it features a "definitive" poster collection.

The famous bone beds of the Morrison Formation, formed one hundred and fifty million years ago and running from Wyoming down through the red rock region of the American Southwest, have yielded one of the most complete pictures of any ancient vertebrate ecosystem in the world. Jurassic West, Second Edition tells the story of the life of this ancient world as scientists have so far been able to reconstruct it. Aimed at the general reader, Jurassic West, Second Edition recounts the discovery of many important Late Jurassic dinosaurs such as Apatosaurus, Allosaurus, and Stegosaurus. But dinosaurs compose barely a third of the more than 90 types of vertebrates known from the formation, which include crocodiles and turtles, frogs and salamanders, dinosaurs and mammals, clams and snails, and ginkgoes, ferns, and conifers. Featuring nearly all new illustrations, the second edition of this classic work includes new taxa named since 2007, updates to the naming and classifications of some old taxa, and expanded sections on numerous aspects of Morrison Formation paleontology and geology.

John Foster presents a penetrating investigation of the question: what is it to perceive a physical object? Is perceptual contact with a physical object, he asks, something fundamental, or does it break down into further factors? If the latter, what are these factors, and how do they combine to secure the contact? For most of the book, Foster addresses these questions in the framework of a realist view of the physical world. But the arguments which thereby unfold - arguments which undermine direct realism and establish a version of the sense-datum theory - lead to the conclusion that we do not perceive physical objects at all. The only way to avoid this conclusion is by abandoning physical realism for a form of idealism, and this is the option which Foster finally embraces. The Nature of Perception makes a valuable contribution to the ongoing debate: it sheds light on the traditional issues, and breathes new life into positions which most current philosophers assume to be dead.

A comprehensive guide to the evolution of life during the Cambrian Period, and a story of one man’s search for the world’s oldest animal fossils. “Told with a wry humor, the odd pop cultural/sci-fi reference, and personal anecdotes, Foster does a great job in making this an enjoyable read and bringing the Cambrian to us. An alien world is transformed before our eyes into one that is increasingly more familiar.” —Quarterly Review of Biology This volume, aimed at the general reader, presents the life and times of the amazing animals that inhabited Earth more than five hundred million years ago. The Cambrian Period was a critical time in Earth’s history. During this immense span of time nearly every modern group of animals appeared. Although life had been around for more than two million millennia, Cambrian rocks preserve the record of the first appearance of complex animals with eyes, protective skeletons, antennae, and complex ecologies. Grazing, predation, and multi-tiered ecosystems with animals living in, on, or above the sea floor became common. The cascade of interaction led to an ever-increasing diversification of animal body types. By the end of the period, the ancestors of sponges, corals, jellyfish, worms, mollusks, brachiopods, arthropods, echinoderms, and vertebrates were all in place. The evidence of this Cambrian “explosion” is preserved in rocks all over the world, including North America, where the seemingly strange animals of the period are preserved in exquisite detail in deposits such as the Burgess Shale in British Columbia. Cambrian Ocean World tells the story of what is, for us, the most important period in our planet’s long history. “Definitely the best introductory textbook within its field. It is clearly worth reading.” —Deposits Magazine

365 daily design mantras from four leading industry experts, providing you with valuable design dos and don''ts for every day of year. Packed with practical advice presented in a fun, lighthearted fashion, this is the perfect book for the ever-growing group of non-designers who want some graphic design guidance. And for more experienced designers, individual entries will either bring forth knowing nods of agreement or hoots of derision, depending on whether or not the reader loves or hates hyphenation, has a pathological fear of beige, or thinks that baseline grids are boring. In the style of a classical almanac, 365 entries combine a specific rule with a commentary from a variety of experienced designers from all fields of the graphic design industry. Covering topics such as typography, colour, layout, imagery, production, and creative thinking, you can either dip in at random or use the book as the source of a daily lesson in how to produce great graphic design.