Showing results by publisher "-emdashery books-" in History

We measure rainfall and radiation, the depths of space and the emptiness of atoms, calories and steps, happiness and fear. If we could not measure then we could not observe the world around us; we could not experiment, learn, and co-operate. But why did this urge to measure flourish? And when did measurement become ubiquitous? It is an incredible story that spans hunter-gatherer societies to ancient Egyptians, the French Revolution to the relentless quantification of the 21st-century self. It is a tale that tracks humanity's search for dependable truths in a chaotic universe.

100 Great Scientists Who Changed the World introduces the giants of scientific discovery and examines their achievements - the men and women who, often in the face of extreme skepticism or worse, have striven and succeeded in pushing back the boundaries of human knowledge. Ranging across the spectrum of scientific endeavor from the cosmology of Copernicus and Galileo through the medical revolutions of Hippocrates and Galen, it includes the fields of physics, biology, chemistry, and genetics.

In 1610, Galileo published the Siderius nuncius, or Starry Messenger, a "hurried little masterpiece" in John Heilbron's words. Presenting to the world his remarkable observations using the recently invented telescope, Galileo dramatically challenged our idea of the perfection of the heavens and the centrality of the Earth in the universe. Indeed, the appearance of the little book is regarded as one of the great moments in the history of science.

From the 18th century vicar who was the first to look up at the night's sky and suggest there was something very dark and extraordinarily heavy that was moving the stars, to the first actual photograph of a black hole, 250 years later, Jonas Enander has travelled the world, visited telescopes and observatories, interviewed world-leading space researchers, and delved deep into the archives to investigate how our relationship with black holes has changed over time.

We are told that modern science was invented in Europe, the product of great minds like Nicolaus Copernicus, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Albert Einstein. But this is wrong. Science is not, and has never been, a uniquely European endeavour. Horizons pushes beyond Europe, exploring the ways in which scientists from Africa, America, Asia and the Pacific fit into the history of science, and arguing that it is best understood as a story of global cultural exchange.

The sun's family of planets become a familiar place in this personal account of the lives of other worlds. Sobel explores the planets' origins and oddities through the lens of popular culture, from astrology, mythology, and science fiction to art, music, poetry, biography, and history. This intimate account is filled with fascination, beauty, and surprise.

In this gripping sequel to Atlantis: The Antediluvian World, 19th-century iconoclast Ignatius Donnelly sets his sights on Earth’s forgotten disasters. Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel argues that a comet struck the Earth thousands of years ago, unleashing firestorms, floods, and a dark age that buried civilizations in myth and rubble.

Mathematics shapes almost everything we do. From building rockets to the handheld technology that governs our day-to-day lives, we are all in debt to the mathematical geniuses of the past. But the history of mathematics is warped; it looks like a sixteenth-century map that enlarges Europe at the expense of Africa, Asia and the Americas. The Secret Lives of Numbers introduces listeners to a new group of mathematical boundary-smashers, those who have been erased by history because of their race, gender or nationality.

From the acclaimed author of The Nobel Prize comes this fascinating portrait of four of the greatest minds in the history of science and the impossible turning point they faced. As World War II wound down, and it became increasingly clear that the Allies would emerge victorious, Albert Einstein invited three close friends - all titans of contemporary science and philosophy - to his home at 112 Mercer Street in Princeton, New Jersey, to discuss what they loved best: science and philosophy.

In a rarified world of scientific research, a revolution has been brewing. Its activists are not anarchists, but rather Nobel Laureates in physics and economics and pony-tailed graduates, mathematicians, and computer scientists from all over the world. They have formed an iconoclastic think-tank and their radical idea is to create a new science: complexity. They want to know how a primordial soup of simple molecules managed to turn itself into the first living cell--and what the origin of life some four billion years ago can tell us about the process of technological innovation today.

The true history of science and religion is a human one. It’s about the role of religion in inspiring, and strangling, science before the scientific revolution. It’s about the sincere but eccentric faith and the quiet, creeping doubts of the most brilliant scientists in history–Galileo, Newton, Faraday, Darwin, Maxwell, Einstein. Above all it’s about the question of what it means to be human and who gets to say–a question that is more urgent in the twenty-first century than ever before.

Every applicable government agency and almost all mainstream media outlets claim that chemtrails are merely a "conspiracy theory". They say that the lines in the sky are harmless condensation trails and that jet aircrafts have always produced emissions that can linger in the sky for hours as they spread out and form a hazy cloud-cover. They say that anybody who asserts that aircraft are routinely spraying us with toxic materials is crazy. If this is so, then why are we consistently seeing anomalously high levels of toxins in rainwater samples as well as in ambient air samples?

The Biology Book is packed with short, pithy explanations of more than 95 momentous ideas in science, from cell theory to evolution by natural selection. Themed chapters explore key areas of the life sciences including ecology, zoology and biotechnology, tracing the history of scientific thought and introducing the scientists who shaped the subject, such as Carl Linnaeus, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel. Coverage of topical issues such as cloning, neuroscience, human evolution and gene-editing brings the story right up to date.

As scientists confidently look forward to average life expectancies hitting 100+ years in some Western societies, it’s easy to forget how precarious our grasp on good health has been. It is a struggle no better demonstrated than by the myriad and extraordinary measures that humans have gone to – as diverse as animal sacrifice to stem cell transplants – in their quest to stave off death and disease. Acclaimed historian Mark Jackson takes a fresh global view of mankind’s great battle, exploring both Western and Eastern traditions.

The periodic table of elements, first encountered by many of us at school, provides an arrangement of the chemical elements, ordered by their atomic number, electron configuration, and recurring chemical properties, and divided into periodic trends. In this Very Short Introduction audiobook, Eric R. Scerri looks at the trends in properties of elements that led to the construction of the table and shows how the deeper meaning of the table's structure gradually became apparent with the development of atomic theory.

Best-selling author Steven Johnson recounts - in dazzling, multidisciplinary fashion - the story of the brilliant man who embodied the relationship between science, religion, and politics for America's Founding Fathers. The Invention of Air is a title of world-changing ideas wrapped around a compelling narrative, a story of genius and violence and friendship in the midst of sweeping historical change that provokes us to recast our understanding of the Founding Fathers.

We may imagine that science is a process of breakthroughs and light bulb moments. But in reality, science goes wrong 99% of the time. Almost every idea a scientist comes up with is quickly disproved by a failed experiment or rival research. Science moves at a rate of inches per decade and we like it that way. But occasionally, just occasionally, a complete fluke happens and changes everything. This is a rip-roaring adventure through science gone wrong, accidentally changing humanity for the better.

In this audiobook, you'll find the maddest, strangest and downright grossest stories from history and science that you don't want to know. (Except secretly you really do you masochistic, beastly person you.) Painfully funny and drop-your-jaw ridiculous, this is trivia from the cesspit of time that you won't be able to stop listening once you start.

In this technology-driven age, it's tempting to believe that science can solve every mystery. After all, science has cured countless diseases and even sent humans into space. But as Jonah Lehrer argues in this sparkling debut, science is not the only path to knowledge. In fact, when it comes to understanding the brain, art got there first.

Science may be known for banishing the demons of superstition from the modern world. Yet just as the demon-haunted world was being exorcized by the enlightening power of reason, a new kind of demon mischievously materialized in the scientific imagination itself. Scientists began to employ hypothetical beings to perform certain roles in thought experiments―experiments that can only be done in the imagination―and these impish assistants helped scientists achieve major breakthroughs that pushed forward the frontiers of science and technology.