Cells to Civilizations

Cells to Civilizations

Author: Enrico Coen

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 342

ISBN-13: 0691149674

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A compelling investigation into the relationships between our biological past and cultural progress, "Cells to Civilizations" presents a remarkable story of living change.


Book Synopsis Cells to Civilizations by : Enrico Coen

Download or read book Cells to Civilizations written by Enrico Coen and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A compelling investigation into the relationships between our biological past and cultural progress, "Cells to Civilizations" presents a remarkable story of living change.


Cells to Civilizations

Cells to Civilizations

Author: Enrico Coen

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2012-05-27

Total Pages: 341

ISBN-13: 1400841658

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The science of change from cells to culture Cells to Civilizations is the first unified account of how life transforms itself—from the production of bacteria to the emergence of complex civilizations. What are the connections between evolving microbes, an egg that develops into an infant, and a child who learns to walk and talk? Award-winning scientist Enrico Coen synthesizes the growth of living systems and creative processes, and he reveals that the four great life transformations—evolution, development, learning, and human culture—while typically understood separately, actually all revolve around shared core principles and manifest the same fundamental recipe. Coen blends provocative discussion, the latest scientific research, and colorful examples to demonstrate the links between these critical stages in the history of life. Coen tells a story rich with genes, embryos, neurons, and fascinating discoveries. He examines the development of the zebra, the adaptations of seaweed, the cave paintings of Lascaux, and the formulations of Alan Turing. He explores how dogs make predictions, how weeds tell the time of day, and how our brains distinguish a Modigliani from a Rembrandt. Locating commonalities in important findings, Coen gives readers a deeper understanding of key transformations and provides a bold portrait for how science both frames and is framed by human culture. A compelling investigation into the relationships between our biological past and cultural progress, Cells to Civilizations presents a remarkable story of living change.


Book Synopsis Cells to Civilizations by : Enrico Coen

Download or read book Cells to Civilizations written by Enrico Coen and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012-05-27 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The science of change from cells to culture Cells to Civilizations is the first unified account of how life transforms itself—from the production of bacteria to the emergence of complex civilizations. What are the connections between evolving microbes, an egg that develops into an infant, and a child who learns to walk and talk? Award-winning scientist Enrico Coen synthesizes the growth of living systems and creative processes, and he reveals that the four great life transformations—evolution, development, learning, and human culture—while typically understood separately, actually all revolve around shared core principles and manifest the same fundamental recipe. Coen blends provocative discussion, the latest scientific research, and colorful examples to demonstrate the links between these critical stages in the history of life. Coen tells a story rich with genes, embryos, neurons, and fascinating discoveries. He examines the development of the zebra, the adaptations of seaweed, the cave paintings of Lascaux, and the formulations of Alan Turing. He explores how dogs make predictions, how weeds tell the time of day, and how our brains distinguish a Modigliani from a Rembrandt. Locating commonalities in important findings, Coen gives readers a deeper understanding of key transformations and provides a bold portrait for how science both frames and is framed by human culture. A compelling investigation into the relationships between our biological past and cultural progress, Cells to Civilizations presents a remarkable story of living change.


Cells to Civilizations

Cells to Civilizations

Author: Enrico Coen

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2015-03-22

Total Pages: 332

ISBN-13: 0691165602

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Coen describes the four ways that life, in the broadest term, is transformed: development through patterning, Darwinian selection, modifying neural interactions and connections, and cultural change as a result of human behavior and interaction; and argues that these four means of transformation are better understood not as separate processes, but as one common set of mechanisms for life's transformations.


Book Synopsis Cells to Civilizations by : Enrico Coen

Download or read book Cells to Civilizations written by Enrico Coen and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-03-22 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Coen describes the four ways that life, in the broadest term, is transformed: development through patterning, Darwinian selection, modifying neural interactions and connections, and cultural change as a result of human behavior and interaction; and argues that these four means of transformation are better understood not as separate processes, but as one common set of mechanisms for life's transformations.


Civilization

Civilization

Author: Niall Ferguson

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2011-11-01

Total Pages: 432

ISBN-13: 1101548029

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From the bestselling author of The Ascent of Money and The Square and the Tower “A dazzling history of Western ideas.” —The Economist “Mr. Ferguson tells his story with characteristic verve and an eye for the felicitous phrase.” —Wall Street Journal “[W]ritten with vitality and verve . . . a tour de force.” —Boston Globe Western civilization’s rise to global dominance is the single most important historical phenomenon of the past five centuries. How did the West overtake its Eastern rivals? And has the zenith of Western power now passed? Acclaimed historian Niall Ferguson argues that beginning in the fifteenth century, the West developed six powerful new concepts, or “killer applications”—competition, science, the rule of law, modern medicine, consumerism, and the work ethic—that the Rest lacked, allowing it to surge past all other competitors. Yet now, Ferguson shows how the Rest have downloaded the killer apps the West once monopolized, while the West has literally lost faith in itself. Chronicling the rise and fall of empires alongside clashes (and fusions) of civilizations, Civilization: The West and the Rest recasts world history with force and wit. Boldly argued and teeming with memorable characters, this is Ferguson at his very best.


Book Synopsis Civilization by : Niall Ferguson

Download or read book Civilization written by Niall Ferguson and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2011-11-01 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the bestselling author of The Ascent of Money and The Square and the Tower “A dazzling history of Western ideas.” —The Economist “Mr. Ferguson tells his story with characteristic verve and an eye for the felicitous phrase.” —Wall Street Journal “[W]ritten with vitality and verve . . . a tour de force.” —Boston Globe Western civilization’s rise to global dominance is the single most important historical phenomenon of the past five centuries. How did the West overtake its Eastern rivals? And has the zenith of Western power now passed? Acclaimed historian Niall Ferguson argues that beginning in the fifteenth century, the West developed six powerful new concepts, or “killer applications”—competition, science, the rule of law, modern medicine, consumerism, and the work ethic—that the Rest lacked, allowing it to surge past all other competitors. Yet now, Ferguson shows how the Rest have downloaded the killer apps the West once monopolized, while the West has literally lost faith in itself. Chronicling the rise and fall of empires alongside clashes (and fusions) of civilizations, Civilization: The West and the Rest recasts world history with force and wit. Boldly argued and teeming with memorable characters, this is Ferguson at his very best.


Growth

Growth

Author: Vaclav Smil

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2019-09-24

Total Pages: 665

ISBN-13: 0262042835

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A systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, from tiny organisms to the trajectories of empires and civilizations. Growth has been both an unspoken and an explicit aim of our individual and collective striving. It governs the lives of microorganisms and galaxies; it shapes the capabilities of our extraordinarily large brains and the fortunes of our economies. Growth is manifested in annual increments of continental crust, a rising gross domestic product, a child's growth chart, the spread of cancerous cells. In this magisterial book, Vaclav Smil offers systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, from tiny organisms to the trajectories of empires and civilizations. Smil takes readers from bacterial invasions through animal metabolisms to megacities and the global economy. He begins with organisms whose mature sizes range from microscopic to enormous, looking at disease-causing microbes, the cultivation of staple crops, and human growth from infancy to adulthood. He examines the growth of energy conversions and man-made objects that enable economic activities—developments that have been essential to civilization. Finally, he looks at growth in complex systems, beginning with the growth of human populations and proceeding to the growth of cities. He considers the challenges of tracing the growth of empires and civilizations, explaining that we can chart the growth of organisms across individual and evolutionary time, but that the progress of societies and economies, not so linear, encompasses both decline and renewal. The trajectory of modern civilization, driven by competing imperatives of material growth and biospheric limits, Smil tells us, remains uncertain.


Book Synopsis Growth by : Vaclav Smil

Download or read book Growth written by Vaclav Smil and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2019-09-24 with total page 665 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, from tiny organisms to the trajectories of empires and civilizations. Growth has been both an unspoken and an explicit aim of our individual and collective striving. It governs the lives of microorganisms and galaxies; it shapes the capabilities of our extraordinarily large brains and the fortunes of our economies. Growth is manifested in annual increments of continental crust, a rising gross domestic product, a child's growth chart, the spread of cancerous cells. In this magisterial book, Vaclav Smil offers systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, from tiny organisms to the trajectories of empires and civilizations. Smil takes readers from bacterial invasions through animal metabolisms to megacities and the global economy. He begins with organisms whose mature sizes range from microscopic to enormous, looking at disease-causing microbes, the cultivation of staple crops, and human growth from infancy to adulthood. He examines the growth of energy conversions and man-made objects that enable economic activities—developments that have been essential to civilization. Finally, he looks at growth in complex systems, beginning with the growth of human populations and proceeding to the growth of cities. He considers the challenges of tracing the growth of empires and civilizations, explaining that we can chart the growth of organisms across individual and evolutionary time, but that the progress of societies and economies, not so linear, encompasses both decline and renewal. The trajectory of modern civilization, driven by competing imperatives of material growth and biospheric limits, Smil tells us, remains uncertain.


The Lives of a Cell

The Lives of a Cell

Author: Lewis Thomas

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 1978-02-23

Total Pages: 160

ISBN-13: 1101667052

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Elegant, suggestive, and clarifying, Lewis Thomas's profoundly humane vision explores the world around us and examines the complex interdependence of all things. Extending beyond the usual limitations of biological science and into a vast and wondrous world of hidden relationships, this provocative book explores in personal, poetic essays to topics such as computers, germs, language, music, death, insects, and medicine. Lewis Thomas writes, "Once you have become permanently startled, as I am, by the realization that we are a social species, you tend to keep an eye out for the pieces of evidence that this is, by and large, good for us."


Book Synopsis The Lives of a Cell by : Lewis Thomas

Download or read book The Lives of a Cell written by Lewis Thomas and published by Penguin. This book was released on 1978-02-23 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Elegant, suggestive, and clarifying, Lewis Thomas's profoundly humane vision explores the world around us and examines the complex interdependence of all things. Extending beyond the usual limitations of biological science and into a vast and wondrous world of hidden relationships, this provocative book explores in personal, poetic essays to topics such as computers, germs, language, music, death, insects, and medicine. Lewis Thomas writes, "Once you have become permanently startled, as I am, by the realization that we are a social species, you tend to keep an eye out for the pieces of evidence that this is, by and large, good for us."


America Before

America Before

Author: Graham Hancock

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Published: 2019-04-23

Total Pages: 486

ISBN-13: 1250153743

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The Instant New York Times Bestseller! Was an advanced civilization lost to history in the global cataclysm that ended the last Ice Age? Graham Hancock, the internationally bestselling author, has made it his life's work to find out--and in America Before, he draws on the latest archaeological and DNA evidence to bring his quest to a stunning conclusion. We’ve been taught that North and South America were empty of humans until around 13,000 years ago – amongst the last great landmasses on earth to have been settled by our ancestors. But new discoveries have radically reshaped this long-established picture and we know now that the Americas were first peopled more than 130,000 years ago – many tens of thousands of years before human settlements became established elsewhere. Hancock's research takes us on a series of journeys and encounters with the scientists responsible for the recent extraordinary breakthroughs. In the process, from the Mississippi Valley to the Amazon rainforest, he reveals that ancient "New World" cultures share a legacy of advanced scientific knowledge and sophisticated spiritual beliefs with supposedly unconnected "Old World" cultures. Have archaeologists focused for too long only on the "Old World" in their search for the origins of civilization while failing to consider the revolutionary possibility that those origins might in fact be found in the "New World"? America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization is the culmination of everything that millions of readers have loved in Hancock's body of work over the past decades, namely a mind-dilating exploration of the mysteries of the past, amazing archaeological discoveries and profound implications for how we lead our lives today.


Book Synopsis America Before by : Graham Hancock

Download or read book America Before written by Graham Hancock and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2019-04-23 with total page 486 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Instant New York Times Bestseller! Was an advanced civilization lost to history in the global cataclysm that ended the last Ice Age? Graham Hancock, the internationally bestselling author, has made it his life's work to find out--and in America Before, he draws on the latest archaeological and DNA evidence to bring his quest to a stunning conclusion. We’ve been taught that North and South America were empty of humans until around 13,000 years ago – amongst the last great landmasses on earth to have been settled by our ancestors. But new discoveries have radically reshaped this long-established picture and we know now that the Americas were first peopled more than 130,000 years ago – many tens of thousands of years before human settlements became established elsewhere. Hancock's research takes us on a series of journeys and encounters with the scientists responsible for the recent extraordinary breakthroughs. In the process, from the Mississippi Valley to the Amazon rainforest, he reveals that ancient "New World" cultures share a legacy of advanced scientific knowledge and sophisticated spiritual beliefs with supposedly unconnected "Old World" cultures. Have archaeologists focused for too long only on the "Old World" in their search for the origins of civilization while failing to consider the revolutionary possibility that those origins might in fact be found in the "New World"? America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization is the culmination of everything that millions of readers have loved in Hancock's body of work over the past decades, namely a mind-dilating exploration of the mysteries of the past, amazing archaeological discoveries and profound implications for how we lead our lives today.


The Source Field Investigations

The Source Field Investigations

Author: David Wilcock

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2012-07-31

Total Pages: 562

ISBN-13: 0452297974

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Prepare yourself for a revealing tour through the most incredible scientific mysteries of the world with your guide David Wilcock, the New York Times bestselling author of Awakening in the Dream. More than two million people have seen David Wilcock’s incredible tour of the 2012 prophecies in his Internet documentary, The 2012 Enigma. Now, he expands his vision with a cutting-edge investigation into alternative sciences with deep insights into what is coming in our immediate future. A stunning synthesis of hidden science and lost prophecies, The Source Field Investigations exposes DNA transformation, wormholes, ancient conspiracies, the Maya calendar, and a new model of galactic energy fields triggering mental, biological, and spiritual evolution. Unlike the apocalyptic viewpoints depicted in big-budget disaster films, Wilcock believes that 2012 will be a watermark for widespread acceptance of a greater reality—and here, he lays out the blueprints for such a Golden Age.


Book Synopsis The Source Field Investigations by : David Wilcock

Download or read book The Source Field Investigations written by David Wilcock and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2012-07-31 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prepare yourself for a revealing tour through the most incredible scientific mysteries of the world with your guide David Wilcock, the New York Times bestselling author of Awakening in the Dream. More than two million people have seen David Wilcock’s incredible tour of the 2012 prophecies in his Internet documentary, The 2012 Enigma. Now, he expands his vision with a cutting-edge investigation into alternative sciences with deep insights into what is coming in our immediate future. A stunning synthesis of hidden science and lost prophecies, The Source Field Investigations exposes DNA transformation, wormholes, ancient conspiracies, the Maya calendar, and a new model of galactic energy fields triggering mental, biological, and spiritual evolution. Unlike the apocalyptic viewpoints depicted in big-budget disaster films, Wilcock believes that 2012 will be a watermark for widespread acceptance of a greater reality—and here, he lays out the blueprints for such a Golden Age.


Technics and Civilization

Technics and Civilization

Author: Lewis Mumford

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2010-10-30

Total Pages: 524

ISBN-13: 0226550273

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Technics and Civilization first presented its compelling history of the machine and critical study of its effects on civilization in 1934—before television, the personal computer, and the Internet even appeared on our periphery. Drawing upon art, science, philosophy, and the history of culture, Lewis Mumford explained the origin of the machine age and traced its social results, asserting that the development of modern technology had its roots in the Middle Ages rather than the Industrial Revolution. Mumford sagely argued that it was the moral, economic, and political choices we made, not the machines that we used, that determined our then industrially driven economy. Equal parts powerful history and polemic criticism, Technics and Civilization was the first comprehensive attempt in English to portray the development of the machine age over the last thousand years—and to predict the pull the technological still holds over us today. “The questions posed in the first paragraph of Technics and Civilization still deserve our attention, nearly three quarters of a century after they were written.”—Journal of Technology and Culture


Book Synopsis Technics and Civilization by : Lewis Mumford

Download or read book Technics and Civilization written by Lewis Mumford and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-10-30 with total page 524 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Technics and Civilization first presented its compelling history of the machine and critical study of its effects on civilization in 1934—before television, the personal computer, and the Internet even appeared on our periphery. Drawing upon art, science, philosophy, and the history of culture, Lewis Mumford explained the origin of the machine age and traced its social results, asserting that the development of modern technology had its roots in the Middle Ages rather than the Industrial Revolution. Mumford sagely argued that it was the moral, economic, and political choices we made, not the machines that we used, that determined our then industrially driven economy. Equal parts powerful history and polemic criticism, Technics and Civilization was the first comprehensive attempt in English to portray the development of the machine age over the last thousand years—and to predict the pull the technological still holds over us today. “The questions posed in the first paragraph of Technics and Civilization still deserve our attention, nearly three quarters of a century after they were written.”—Journal of Technology and Culture


The Life of Super-Earths

The Life of Super-Earths

Author: Dimitar Sasselov

Publisher: Basic Books (AZ)

Published: 2012-01-24

Total Pages: 226

ISBN-13: 046502193X

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An astronomy professor at Harvard University discusses the possibilities of finding other worlds that sustain alien life forms, citing recent breakthroughs in biology and exoplanetary astronomy, including the recent discovery of arsenic-based bacteria in a California lake.


Book Synopsis The Life of Super-Earths by : Dimitar Sasselov

Download or read book The Life of Super-Earths written by Dimitar Sasselov and published by Basic Books (AZ). This book was released on 2012-01-24 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An astronomy professor at Harvard University discusses the possibilities of finding other worlds that sustain alien life forms, citing recent breakthroughs in biology and exoplanetary astronomy, including the recent discovery of arsenic-based bacteria in a California lake.