Philosophy Technology

A true scientific pause-resister that traces a remarkable scientific breakthrough (the isolation of endorphins in the brain) as dedicated scientists race - not only with their fellow scientists - but against time and the profit hungry giant pharmaceutical companies. This audiobook chronicles the fascinating discovery of endorphins, the body's natural painkiller.

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.

Socrates is on trial for his life. He is charged with impiety and corrupting young people. He presents his own defense, explaining why he has devoted his life to challenging the most powerful and important people in the Greek world. The reason is that rich and famous politicians, priests, poets, and a host of others pretend to know what is good, true, holy, and beautiful, but when Socrates questions them, they are shown to be foolish rather than wise.

This book presents a timely and significant addition to the ongoing discourse around the ethical implications of AI in general, as well as the new and disruptive AI technologies, such as generative AI platforms like ChatGPT.

Werner Heisenberg's "uncertainty principle" challenged centuries of scientific understanding, placed him in direct opposition to Albert Einstein, and put Niels Bohr in the middle of one of the most heated debates in scientific history. Heisenberg's theorem stated that there were physical limits to what we could know about sub-atomic particles; this "uncertainty" would have shocking implications.

What if the problem is not government—but politics itself? Modern political systems reward charisma, outrage, party loyalty, and short-term promises. Elections change the people in power, yet corruption, polarization, bureaucracy, and failed policies remain. But for the first time in history, humanity may have another option. Could artificial intelligence make decisions based on evidence rather than ideology? Could it administer public services without ambition, favoritism, or campaign donors?

The Tragedy of American Science explores how the US economy’s addiction to military spending distorts and deforms science by making it overwhelmingly subservient to military interests. The primary motive driving American science and technology has become the search for new and more efficient ways to kill people. This transforms science from the classic ideal of a creative force for the advancement of humankind into its destructive and antihuman opposite.

Is your organization relying on the passive illusion of "assurance" when it desperately requires the rigorous discipline of "engineering"? In Philosophy of Software Quality Engineering, IT/IS architect and veteran engineer Martin J. Lammer delivers a groundbreaking philosophical treatise that dismantles traditional Software Quality Assurance (SQA) paradigms. Rebuilt from the ground up, this text establishes a new foundation based on rigorous engineering, ontology, and pragmatism. The software industry is currently in an epistemological crisis.

Kant published this work in 1795, during the aftermath of the American Revolution and the French Revolution. The high hopes of the European Enlightenment had been dampened by the Reign of Terror in which tens of thousands of people died, and the perpetual cycle of war and temporary armistice seemed to be inescapable. Kant's essay is best known as an early articulation of the idea of a league of nations that could bring an end to all hostilities. Today, the United Nations continues to pursue that dream, but lasting peace still seems to be wishful thinking.

In Simply Hegel, Robert L. Wicks presents Hegel’s revolutionary philosophy in clear and simple language, illuminating not only his basic ideas, but also the deeper meanings hidden within the book. Wicks’s analysis also contextualizes Hegel’s thought by providing a vivid chronology of his times, which included such earth-shaking events as the French Revolution and Napoleon’s invasion of Prussia.

Whitehead presented these three lectures at Princeton University in 1929. Although 85 years have passed, his central thesis and his analysis remain remarkably current. The scientific materialism that Whitehead opposed with such vigor continues to dominate in academic circles, and even now those who question that worldview are often accused of being antiscientific. This is especially true in discussions of the nature of the human mind and its relation to the body (particularly the brain).

The bell rings, and a twenty-four-year-old professional fighter rushes toward me like a rocket. I am fifty-eight years old. And I am a computer geek. What kind of man ends up in a Thai boxing ring at fifty-eight? A Marine. A car repossessor from South Central LA. A skydiver, pilot, and technical cave diving instructor. A cybersecurity professional with a wall full of certifications who works with artificial intelligence every day—and who spent five years asking the one question that outlasts every job title: what is the meaning of life? The answer in this book was not found in a library.

From Oxford's leading AI researcher comes a fun and accessible tour through the history and future of one of the most cutting edge and misunderstood field in science: Artificial Intelligence The somewhat ill-defined long-term aim of AI is to build machines that are conscious, self-aware, and...

This book restores the name of Felix Le Dantec—a scientist, philosopher, and heretic of his age—to the living current of thought. At the dawn of the twentieth century, he dared to proclaim that life is not a riddle imposed by spirit upon matter, but that matter itself is spirit—learning, feeling, and recognizing itself through the processes of biology. He saw the organism not as a mechanism steered by circumstance, but as a meaning-making machine: life as an act of self-comprehension, matter awakening to its own awareness.

Artificial intelligence is no longer just technology; it is a profound shift in political power and algorithmic justice. Perfect for an engaging commute, this thought-provoking deep dive explores who holds authority in our increasingly automated world. Whether you are navigating algorithmic...

In this critical time between worlds, technology is shaping the future of our lives, both as individual human beings and collectively as a species. Technology has brought great blessings in multiple vectors, and those benefits are regularly sung in the public sphere. However, the notion that technology is value-neutral is simply not true. All technology is encoded with value, pseudo-value—or tragically, with anti-value. So technology also threatens us with risks to our very existence on this planet.

In the evolution of science and technology, laws governing exceptional creativity and innovation have yet to be discovered. The historian Thomas Kuhn, in his influential study The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, noted that the final stage in a scientific breakthrough such as Albert Einstein's theory of relativity - that is, the most crucial stage - was "inscrutable". The same is still true half a century later.

The war instinct is part of human nature, but the means to fight war depend on technology. Alex Roland traces the co-evolution of technology and warfare from the Stone Age to the age of cyberwar, describing the inventions that changed the direction of warfare throughout history: from fortified...

From the first flicker of gesture around the prehistoric fire to the endless hum of machine speech in the digital age, this book traces the evolution of communication — and with it, the evolution of thought, culture, and consciousness itself. Language is the foundation of civilization: the matrix from which society, morality, and meaning arise. Yet it is also our most dangerous creation — capable of liberation or control, truth or deception, empathy or manipulation. Through language, we built worlds; through language, we can also destroy them.

Artificial intelligence is no longer a distant dream or speculative fiction--it's here, shaping how we work, learn, love, and even understand ourselves. But as machines become more capable, what becomes of the humans who built them? In this book, Dr. Joe Chapa explores one of the most urgent and fascinating questions of our time: How can AI help us to understand our humanity?