History Science Life

Socrates: A Life Worth Living traces the life and ideas of one of Western civilization’s founding philosophers, whose influence is still felt more than two thousand years later. Socrates is famous for how he died, executed by the Athenian government for corrupting the youth of Athens, but his most important contribution was to challenge the people around him to test their ideas and beliefs in conversation with each other, in the belief that in this way we could become a society that knows the difference between truth and falsehood, and find what makes a life worthwhile.

"They’re running wild. Feral! If I had a shilling for every time a Scott Street boy said he was doing something when he was doing something else entirely I’d be living in Cardiff in a house made of Lardy cake. What did I say? Bad things will happen!" The idea of the war coming to their small, impoverished Welsh mining village always seemed remote, but with one explosive event and the arrival of the Americans preparing for the invasion of France, the people of Treherbert find their world turned upside down.

More than two thousand years ago Stoicism revealed a way of living with less suffering and more happiness. Even though the Ancient Stoics lived a long time ago they had startling insights into the human condition which have lasted until this day. Stoicism sought answers to questions such as "how can I be more happy?" or "what is the purpose of life?" and much more. Stoicism can help us put things into perspective, let go of worry, overcome adversity, and improve our overall experience of life.

Medieval history is often written as a series of battles and territorial shifts. But the essential contributions of women during this period have been too often relegated to the dustbin of history. In Women in the Middle Ages, Frances and Joseph Gies reclaim this lost history, in a lively historical survey that charts the evolution of women’s roles throughout the period and profiles eight individual women in depth.

Discover the secret to a meaningful and fulfilled life through the ancient wisdom of King Solomon.

More than 10,000 years ago spectacularly large mammals roamed the pampas and jungles of South America. This book tells the story of these great beasts during and just after the Pleistocene, the geological epoch marked by the great ice ages. Megafauna describes the history and way of life of these animals, their comings and goings, and what befell them at the beginning of the modern era and the arrival of humans.

We all make mistakes. Nobody’s perfect. Not even some of the greatest geniuses in history, as Mario Livio tells us in this marvelous story of scientific error and breakthrough. Charles Darwin, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Linus Pauling, Fred Hoyle, and Albert Einstein were all brilliant scientists. Each made groundbreaking contributions to his field - but each also stumbled badly. These five scientists expanded our knowledge of life on Earth, the evolution of the Earth itself, and the evolution of the universe, despite and because of their errors. As Mario Livio luminously explains, the scientific process advances through error.

As he prepares to recite the Declaration of Independence before his eighth grade social studies class in California, the thing Francisco has feared for 10 years finally happens. La migra, the immigration police, come to his classroom and pick him up for deportation to Mexico. Soon back in the United States with a "green card", Francisco struggles through adolescence, working two or three jobs a day and striving to excel at school.

Sharks have been fighting for their lives for 500 million years and are under dire threat today. They are the longest surviving vertebrate on Earth, outlasting multiple mass extinction events that decimated life on the planet. How did they thrive so long? By developing superpower-like abilities that allowed them to ascend to the top of the oceanic food chain. John Long, who has been on the cutting edge of shark research for decades, weaves a thrilling story of sharks’ unparalleled reign.

Along the southern coast of England, atop the White Cliffs of Dover, stands a castle. And at that castle's old keep is an orphanage. Delphi Keep has seen many youngsters come and go through its gates, and Ian Wigby and his sister, Theodosia, are happy to call it home. Life has always been simple at the Keep, and the orphanage safe, until one day, Ian and Theo find a silver treasure box. And within the box, a prophesy. Three thousand years ago a great Greek oracle wrote of a quest.

This entertaining examination of everyday science from the fanciful to the factual covers topics ranging from pesticides and environmental estrogens to lipsticks and garlic. Readers are alerted to the shenanigans of quacks and are offered glimpses into the fascinating history of science. The science of aphrodisiacs, DDT, bottled waters, vitamins, barbiturates, plastic wraps, and smoked meat is investigated. Worries about acrylamide, preservatives, and waxed fruits are put into perspective, and the mysteries of bulletproof vests, weight-loss diets, green-haired Swedes, laughing gas, and "mad honey" are unraveled.

Mari N. Crabtree traces the long afterlife of lynching in the South through the traumatic memories it left in its wake. African American victims and survivors had to find a way to live through and beyond the horrors of lynching. Crabtree offers a theory of African American collective trauma and memory rooted in a strategy for “working through” trauma that has long existed within the African American cultural tradition: the ironic spirit of the blues sensibility—a spirit of misdirection and cunning that blends joy and pain.

When twenty-two-year-old aspiring geologist Charles Darwin boarded HMS Beagle in 1831 with his microscopes and specimen bottles—invited by ship’s captain Robert FitzRoy who wanted a travel companion at least as much as a ship’s naturalist—he hardly thought he was embarking on what would become perhaps the most important and epoch-changing voyage in scientific history.

But the quest to unravel life's genesis is not just a story of big ideas. It is also a compelling human story, rich in personalities, conflicts, and surprising twists and turns. Along the way the journey takes in some of the greatest discoveries in modern biology, from evolution and cells to DNA and life's family tree. It is also a search whose end may finally be in sight. In The Genesis Quest, Michael Marshall shows how the quest to understand life's beginning is also a journey to discover the true nature of life, and by extension our place in the universe.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel: one of the most famous engineers the United Kingdom has ever produced. A man who put his stamp on his own country in the most visible way possible: through the construction of bridges and tunnels that stand to this day and by transforming both the landscape and the nature of society. This audiobook will tell the story of the man known affectionately as “The little giant,” through telling the stories of the incredible achievements that made him a household name in his own lifetime and to the present day.

In this "immersive, densely reported, and altogether remarkable first book [with] the texture and color of a first-rate novel" (New York Times), journalist Doug Bock Clark tells the epic story of the world's last subsistence whalers and the threats posed to a tribe on the brink. Deeply empathetic and richly reported, The Last Whalers is a riveting, powerful chronicle of the collision between one of the planet's dwindling indigenous peoples and the irresistible enticements and upheavals of a rapidly transforming world.

The story of the twentieth century is largely the story of the power of science and technology. Within that story is the incredible tale of the human conflict between Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence, and Edward Teller—the scientists most responsible for the advent of weapons of mass destruction. How did science—and its practitioners—enlisted in the service of the state during the Second World War, become a slave to its patron during the Cold War?

New Yorker staff writer Michael Specter has twice won the Global Health Council’s Excellence in Media Award, as well as the Science Journalism Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In Denialism, he fervently argues that people are turning away from new technologies and engaging in a kind of magical thinking that is hindering scientific progress.

Technology is our new life partner. No longer confined to the sidelines, new interactive technologies like AI therapists, avatar friends, and robot assistants are ready to transform technology's role from basic tools of convenience to intimate elements of our social and emotional lives.

He swore to take a bullet for the President and left it all behind to take a bullet for the American people. Why would a successful, twelve-year Secret Service agent resign his position in the prime of his career to run for political office against all the odds? New York Times bestseller, Life Inside the Bubble is an intimate look at life inside the presidential "bubble," a haze of staffers, consultants, cronies, acolytes, bureaucrats and lobbyists that creates the "alternate reality" in which monumental policy decisions are made.