World History Philosophy

Size explains the regularities—and peculiarities—of the key processes shaping life (from microbes to whales), the Earth (from asteroids to volcanic eruptions), technical advances (from architecture to transportation), and societies and economies (from cities to wages).

Anarchism claims that there's no need for a state and that it would be better to have a society without central government. Anarchists dislike the authority of the state, but the dream of the stateless society is not a simple matter.

Whether you are a scientist or a poet, pro-nuclear energy or staunch opponent, conspiracy theorist or pragmatist, James Mahaffey's books have served to open up the world of nuclear science like never before. With clear explanations of some of the most complex scientific endeavors in history, Mahaffey's new book looks back at the atom's wild, secretive past and then toward its potentially bright future.

Thomas Paine's The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology, published in three parts from 1794, was a best seller in America, where it caused a short-lived deistic revival. Promoting a creator-God while advocating reason in the place of revelation, Paine’s controversial pamphlet caused his native British audience, fearing the results of the French Revolution, to receive it with more hostility than their American counterparts.

Napoléon a trente ans en ce mois de noembre 1799. Il est Premier consul. Dans cinq ans, il sera Empereur des Français. "Joseph, si notre père nous voyait", murmurera-t-il à son frère aîné lors du sacre. Un an encore et il s'écriera : "Soldats, je suis content de vous !" Voilà la course légendaire. À la suivre jour après jour, on mesure la tension, la lucidité, la volonté, l'énergie, le génie, qu'il a fallu à Napoléon pour franchir les obstacles. Cadoudal le royaliste veut le tuer. L'Angleterre, l'Autriche, la Russie veulent l'abattre. Il faut l'emporter, sinon tout s'effondre.

Figuring explores the complexities of love and the human search for truth and meaning through the interconnected lives of several historical figures across four centuries - beginning with the astronomer Johannes Kepler, who discovered the laws of planetary motion, and ending with the marine biologist and author Rachel Carson, who catalyzed the environmental movement.

These early philosophical writings underpinned the Chinese revolutions and their clarion calls to insurrection remain some of the most stirring of all time. Drawing on a dizzying array of references from contemporary culture and politics, Zizek's firecracker commentary reaches unsettling conclusions about the place of Mao's thought in the revolutionary canon.

Can psychedelic drugs help us tackle the biggest problems we face globally? Can they heal the cultural, spiritual, and political wounds we’re wrestling with? Psychedelics have hit the mainstream as powerful new mental health treatments. But as clinicians explore what these molecules can do for our individual minds, The Bigger Picture goes further to illuminate how psychedelics can help us find new ways to make sense of and come through the crises we face around the world.

In our ever-more-polarized society, there's at least one thing we still agree on: The world is overrun with misinformation, faulty logic, and the gullible followers who buy into it all. Of course, we're not among them - are we? Scientist David Robert Grimes is on a mission to expose the logical fallacies and cognitive biases that drive our discourse on a dizzying array of topics - from vaccination to abortion, 9/11 conspiracy theories to dictatorial doublespeak, astrology to alternative medicine, and wrongful convictions to racism.

Since prehistory, humans have braved the business ends of knives, scrapers, and mashers, all in the name of creating something delicious - or at least edible. In Consider the Fork, award-winning food writer and historian Bee Wilson traces the ancient lineage of our modern culinary tools, revealing the startling history of objects we often take for granted. Charting the evolution of technologies from the knife and fork to the gas range and the sous-vide cooker, Wilson offers unprecedented insights.

Beginning with opium, the “joy plant,” which has been used for 10,000 years, Thomas Hager tells a captivating story of medicine. His subjects include the largely forgotten female pioneer who introduced smallpox inoculation to Britain, the infamous knockout drops, the first antibiotic, which saved countless lives, the first antipsychotic, which helped empty public mental hospitals, Viagra, statins, and the new frontier of monoclonal antibodies. This is a deep, wide-ranging, and wildly entertaining book.

Charles Eisenstein explores the history and potential future of civilization, tracing the converging crises of our age to the illusion of the separate self. He argues that our disconnection from one another and the natural world has mislaid the foundations of science, religion, money, technology, economics, medicine, and education as we know them. It has fired our near-pathological pursuit of technological Utopias even as we push ourselves and our planet to the brink of collapse.

Ici se nouent les derniers actes du fabuleux destin de Napoléon. Le 24 juin 1812, il entre en Russie à la tête de la Grande Armée. Alors chaque jour, chaque page de ce livre, et jusqu'à la mort de l'empereur le 5 mai 1821, devient une scène inoubliable. C'est l'océan de feu qui détruit Moscou et c'est le passage de la Bérézina au terme de la retraite de Russie. C'est Leipzig et c'est Montmirail, la campagne d'Allemagne et la campagne de France en 1813 et 1814.

At the dawn of the 20th century, humanity was facing global disaster. Mass starvation, long predicted for the fast-growing population, was about to become a reality. A call went out to the worlds scientists to find a solution. This is the story of the two enormously gifted, fatally flawed men who found it: the brilliant, self-important Fritz Haber and the reclusive, alcoholic Carl Bosch. Together they discovered a way to make bread out of air, built city-sized factories, controlled world markets, and saved millions of lives.

Shining a light on the most profound insights revealed by modern physics, Jim Al-Khalili invites us all to understand what this crucially important science tells us about the universe and the nature of reality itself. Al-Khalili begins by introducing the fundamental concepts of space, time, energy, and matter, and then describes the three pillars of modern physics - quantum theory, relativity, and thermodynamics - showing how all three must come together if we are ever to have a full understanding of reality.

What is archaeology? The word may bring to mind images of golden pharaohs and lost civilizations or Neanderthal skulls and Ice Age cave art. Archaeology is all of these, but also far more: the only science to encompass the entire span of human history - more than three million years! This Little History tells the riveting stories of some of the great archaeologists and their amazing discoveries around the globe.

Part memoir, part guidebook, and part social history, For Small Creatures Such as We is the first book from the daughter of Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan - a luminous exploration of Earth's marvels that require no faith in order to be believed. As Sagan shares these rituals, For Small Creatures Such as We becomes a moving tribute to a father, a newborn daughter, a marriage, and the natural world - a celebration of life itself, and the power of our families and beliefs to bring us together.

Both a history and an examination of human thought and behavior spanning three thousand years, On Politics thrillingly traces the origins of political philosophy from the ancient Greeks to Machiavelli in Book I and from Hobbes to the present age in Book II. Whether examining Lord Acton's dictum that "absolute power corrupts absolutely" or explicating John Stuart Mill's contention that it is "better to be a human dissatisfied than a pig satisfied," Alan Ryan evokes the lives and minds of our greatest thinkers in a way that makes hearing about them a transcendent experience.

Math has a reputation for being inaccessible. People think that it requires a special gift or that comprehension is a matter of genes. Yet, the greatest mathematicians throughout history, from Rene Descartes to Alexander Grothendieck, have insisted that this is not the case.

They were the most famous sisters in China. As the country battled through 100 years of wars, revolutions, and seismic transformations, the three Soong sisters from Shanghai were at the center of power, and each of them left an indelible mark on history. All three sisters enjoyed tremendous privilege and glory, but also endured constant mortal danger. They showed great courage and experienced passionate love, as well as despair and heartbreak.