Michael Cole

In his raw and unflinching memoir, Michael Cole, co-star of ABCs iconic show, THE MOD SQUAD writes about his role as Pete Cochran in the groundbreaking program that dealt with issues never before seen on television - racism, drug abuse, child abuse, the Vietnam War.Michael gives an often humorous and always brutally honest account of his life, his career, his meteoric highs and suicidal lows. For the first time, he reveals what it was like to be famous, idolized by millions, and recognized all over the world, while at the same time struggling with internal demons - insecurities fostered by abandonment and rejection, and fueled by alcohol. Readers will find his Hollywood stories entertaining, but it is the authors hope that others will be inspired by his story of redemption as he continues to cherish his life one day at a time.

While The Star Walkers is a trilogy, each book stands alone with a satisfying conclusion.Most people stay clear of the uncharted regions of Amazon and its perils, yet much like a nail is to a magnet, Dr. Eric Shade is attracted to the lure of ancient lost cities, Inca gold, and the age-old legend of the Star Walkers, a mysterious group of pale-skinned people the Indians claim are gods. Having served a stint with the Special Forces, Shade has learned to survive in the maleficent environment of the jungle, but even his skills as a tracker and guide are tested when he agrees to go into the depths of the Amazon to retrieve a hoard of silver.On his quest for the silver, Shade and a beautiful woman companion enter a labyrinth of tunnels that leads them to a fabulous ancient city, a city that has eluded archeologists for centuries. There they meet two Indians who take them through a hidden passageway to a utopian village where a tribe of mysterious people live. During their stay, they convince Shade that the Star Walkers are more than just a myth. According to the natives, the Star Walkers had befriended their ancestors thousands of years ago. Although these Indians dont know where the Star Walkers had come from, they claim a group of pale-skinned men descended upon their ancestors in shimmering ships that supposedly had come from the sky. Shade is hard pressed to believe that part of the story, but one thing becomes abundantly clear. Someone had to have taught these natives how to travel through tunnels in total darkness and how to concoct potions and elixirs that contain superhuman powers.

While the Star Walkers is a trilogy, each book stands alone with a satisfying conclusion.Eric Shade, a seasoned Amazon guide, purchases a 16th-century letter written by a Spanish conquistador. It reveals a set of directions an old Indian gave him as to how to reach the elusive Star Walkers.Before Shade can ever hope to find the Star Walkers, he must overcome the hazards of an impenetrable jungle, dispose of the mercenaries who are trying to kill him, and avoid a group of cannibals whose compound is close to the tunnel, a tunnel Shade must enter in order to reach the Star Walkers.The farther Shade travels the tunnels inside Muela Del Diablo, a dangerous volcanic mountain, the more he realizes that neither the mercenaries nor the cannibals are his worst threat, for he enters a megalithic bizarre world, a world of which the Sphinx and the pyramids are merely the surface markers. What Shade discovers in a chamber inside the bowels of the mountain goes far beyond the scope of anything he had ever imagined.

Subprime provides the reader with a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the highly charged and unscrupulous world of mortgage lending, the very instrument that precipitated the economic meltdown.Set against the backdrop of greedy investors who bilk credit-blemished borrowers, the book delves into a toxic mix of character traits portrayed by an uncle and his nephew. One is elderly, rich, inflexible and jaded while the other is young, poor, pliable, and naive.The conflict between the two manifests itself as the nephew struggles with a sense of morality while his uncle weaves a cancerous web of extortion and deceit. Once the nephew extricates himself from his uncles grasp, he falls into an abyss of his own making as power, lust and ambition continue to cloud his vision.

Alexis Brooke, an expert at identifying Mesoamerican structures, is called upon to head up an expedition to the Yucatan Peninsula to investigate a half-buried Mayan ruin and a metallic anomaly that purportedly lies beneath it.With the help of three other scientists, she soon discovers that not only is the ruin hollow, but that it also emits strange sounds, sounds that can only be heard at night. When a member of her team discovers a way to open it, she lowers herself into the ancient structure.But its not the ruin that puzzles her--its what lies directly beneath it. Her archeological training doesnt begin to prepare her and her team for what they will find. . . .

While The Star Walkers is a trilogy, each book stands alone with a satisfying conclusion.Eric Shade, a former South American history professor, is hired by Catalina Rivera, a beautiful archeologist, to help her and her fiance locate a fabulous treasure once belonging to an Inca queen that has been hidden for centuries in the deep jungles of Brazil. In order to locate the treasure, they must first scale a formidable mountain, a mountain the native Indians wont go near because they claim its occupied by a group of strange pale-skinned men, which they refer to as the Star Walkers.The farther the group travels into the rain forest, the more Shade begins to suspect that the Star Walkers are more than just a myth. As they traverse jungle-choked canyons and steep gorges, facing danger at every turn, hatred, treachery and betrayal enter into play. Not only must Shade brave the cloying dangers of an inhospitable terrain, but he must also ward off an insanely jealous man who is hell-bent on killing him.

The pope is dying, and Cardinal Giuseppe Mercati is promoted to the coveted position of Prefect of the Secret Archives. While searching for an ancient manuscript amidst clerics scandals, he uncovers a horrific conspiracy, a secret so vile that if it ever got out, it would unlease a chain of events that would rock the very foundation of the Roman Catholic Church.Frank Santino, a Las Vegas illusionist extraordinaire, is warned he must create an entirely new spectacular act. If he cannot do so, he will not only lose his job, but also his lavish lifestyle. A reliable source tells him that a certain rare book, the same one Cardinal Mercati is searching for, contains information that will enable him to perform unheard of feats. Frank sets out in search of the manuscript. He soon finds that the powers enabling him to perform those feats could very well hurl his mind to the brink of insanity.

An eccentric billionaire with a penchant for antiquities asks an unsuspecting university professor who lectures on Central Asian history to convince a group of Mongolian shamans to sanction a search for Genghis Khans tomb. The professor agrees, but soon discovers the medicine men are not her only obstacle.Not only must she circumvent a maze of deadly traps in a subterranean tunnel, but she must also confront a renegade group of Buddhists who are hell-bent on killing her.Things become even more complicated once she discovers a connection exists between an ancient gold medallion and a slain Mongolian archeologist. Little does she realize that once she decodes the medallions inscriptions, she will unleash an unprecedented chain of events: the FBI becomes involved in an unsolved murder investigation, the CIA and the KGB enter the picture, and once a horrific conspiracy becomes exposed it causes an international incident.

An ancient tablet scribed with inexplicable hieroglyphic-type writing found in the Grand Canyon prompts four scientists with different backgrounds and ideologies to search for a secret passage leading to the Sphinx. Their aim? To discover a ten-thousand-year-old link between Egypt and Arizona.But once the cryptologist gleans the full import of the tablets message, they realize that before the mystery can be solved, they must first find a cave in El Tovar Canyon.A murder by an unscrupulous dealer in antiquities ends up complicating matters. When the U.S. government threatens to seal off the cave for reasons of national security, the scientists decide to take matters into their own hands.What they uncover forces them to make a choice. If they reveal the secret, it could compromise the security of the United States. And if they dont, they could relegate future generations to an inhospitable world.

Due to a freakish anomaly that takes place in the far reaches ofspace, astronaut Rory Colt ends up back on Earth five hundred yearsinto the future.But the world as he knew it no longer exists. In itsplace are two dissimilar civilizations. In one society a cyber worldof self-gratification provides its occupants with electromechanicalenhancements, while the other is comprised of people who emulate lifeas it was lived in the nineteenth century.When a beautiful woman hybrid lures Rory into her futuristic world, he soon discovers theyare being manipulated by an omniscient, electronic immortal who hasensnared them into a terrifying web of betrayal and deceit. To freethe new world from the monsters clutches, he must destroy him.But how does one destroy a creature who lives in cyberspace?

Against the backdrop of the polluted Salton Sea, Investigative Reporter Jonathan Bruckheimer is challenged to prove the existence of an old, land-locked Spanish galleon that many believe is the ghost ship of the desert. It is rumored to contain a large treasure trove of rare black pearls.Things become complicated when Looney, a Native American Indian, who is instrumental to this quest, is murdered. Although the desert town of Brawley is small, the hunger for riches is great. This makes practically everyone in the community a suspect.Risking the wrath of his editor, not to mention personal danger, Bruckheimer is determined to uncover the truth. Does the ghost ship of the desert actually exist? Who murdered Looney and why?

When Pakistani archeologist, Amman Lal Ded, is murdered, a series of cataclysmic events is unleashed, affecting not only his son, Mushtaq, and Natalie Rowe, a forensic pathologist, but the entire Christian and Muslim world.Before his death, Amman left Natalie the key to a safe-deposit box containing an ancient document, which he said would shed light on a major Christian premise. Not knowing its location, Natalie and Mushtaq embark on a harrowing journey to find it.Their path leads them deep within a sacred Muslim shrine in Kashmir. A startling discovery provides evidence that Jesus remains are interred in the shrine. Had Jesus, in fact, survived the Crucifixion?With Pakistani terrorists in hot pursuit, Natalie and Mushtaq fear there may be no escape. If they survive long enough to uncover the document, will it authenticate their discovery in the shrine?

Dr. Rick Donovan, an astrophysicist, leads a group of American scientists on a secret mission to Antarctica after a roving spy satellite spots a monolithic gray mass five miles long and one mile wide in a glaciers bowels.Upon their arrival, Donovan soon discovers this anomaly entrenched in the glacier is capable of creating enormous amounts of energy--power strong enough to form a vortex that picks up their three-ton vehicle in its maws. Shaken to the core, but determined to find out whats inside the glacier, he and his team board a nuclear submarine to burrow through the ice. Donovan discovers that a life form of superior intelligence inhabits the gray mass.To complicate their mission, a Russian nuclear submarine with the same goal in mind enters the area; unfortunately, the captain has an itchy trigger finger. In order to complete their objective, not only must they confront the Russians, but they must also figure out a way to make contact with the alien life form whos made it perfectly clear it wants to be left alone. Donovan and his team soon realize theyll have to pay a steep price both personally and professionally.

An alien and his wife, whose distant ancestors were originally from Earth, decide to pay humanity a visit. Prior to their departure, they place a copy of their psyches inside a couple of spheres. The spheres are used on their planet to prolong life by having their neural network inserted into a clone. They hope that if something happens to them on Earth, and a human makes bodily contact with the spheres, they will be able to continue their lives inside a human host. When they land their spacecraft in Cambodia, a massive earthquake occurs.Centuries later, his sphere is found. It ends up being sold to a wealthy businessman who wears it as an accoutrement to a masquerade party. Once the alien strain enters his body, the process goes awry, and a battle for survival begins. Its one thing for an alien to enter a clone and quite another for it to enter a living entity, particularly one thats human. The alien attempts to take over, but the humans immune system resists his advances. Eventually there can only be one victor. The question is, who will it be?

En este volumen se reúnen artículos aparecidos en el Quarterly Newsletter del Laboratorio de Cognición Humana Comparada y son importantes puntos de referencia en la historia reciente de la investigación y las teorías acerca de los fundamentos culturales

Si admitimos que la cultura es un aspecto fundamental en la vida y pensamiento de las personas, en buena lógica también debe ser crucial a la hora del estudio de la vida mental. Michael COLE, conocido por su trabajo pionero en cognicion y psicologia del desarrollo, ofrece un multifacetico estudio de lo que es, ha sido y puede llegar a ser la psicologia cultural.Un ambito teorico y empirico que ya esta considerandose como una nueva disciplina; algo que el propio autor deja patente en el subtitulo del libro: Una disciplina del pasado y del futuro. Primero nos traslada al momento historico en el que se concedia a la cultura un lugar de honor en la psicologia. Describe lo que sucedio cuando esta disciplina fue englobada dentro de las ciencias naturales a finales del siglo pasado y la cultura llego a ser una variable causal mas. Una concepcion que distorsionaba tanto la relacion cultura - mente como los metodos necesarios para su estudio. La alternativa que el autor nos presenta trata a la cultura como el medio idiosincrasico de la vida humana, un medio saturado con artefactos, residuo de la experiencia de generaciones anteriores. El autor sostiene que la mediacion a traves de la cultura es la principal caracteristica del pensamiento humano. Michael COLE, uno de los lideres de este movimiento, demuestra la utilidad de esta nueva concepcion aplicandola a diversas cuestiones teoricas, metodologicas y practicas en el estudio del desarrollo humano. Entre estas destacan las relaciones entre naturaleza y educacion, los procesos a traves de los que la cultura posibilita o constriñe el desarrollo, el rol de la alfabetizacion y de la educacion en el desarrollo cognitivo, y los procedimientos para diseñar nuevas formas de accion con capacidad para promover el desarrollo infantil. Estamos ante una extraordinaria sintesis.

Through four editions, The Development of Children has provided students and instructors with a rigorous textbook that encompasses both scientific research and the authors years of practical experience. For the Fifth Edition, Michael and Shelia Cole are joined by Cynthia Lightfoot, whose expertise and engaging style further enhances this well-respected book. Throughout the text, all three authors encourage students to better understand their own lives, as well as the process of development.