Altri libri che potrebbero interessarti

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  Science and the Modern World

  Alfred North Whitehead

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  The famed mathematician and philosopher takes readers on a journey into a new scientific age, exploring topics from relativity to religion.   Alfred North Whitehead, one of the great figures in the philosophy of science, wrote this prescient work nearly a century ago. Yet, in an era that has us reckoning with science and technology’s place and meaning in our lives, it remains as relevant as ever. Science and the Modern World puts scientific discovery into historical and cultural context—exploring the effects of science and people on each other.   “It is a work not only of the first importance but also of great beauty. . . . Vivid writing.” —Nature

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  Mapping the Nation - History and...

  Susan Schulten

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  “A compelling read” that reveals how maps became informational tools charting everything from epidemics to slavery (Journal of American History).   In the nineteenth century, Americans began to use maps in radically new ways. For the first time, medical men mapped diseases to understand and prevent epidemics, natural scientists mapped climate and rainfall to uncover weather patterns, educators mapped the past to foster national loyalty among students, and Northerners mapped slavery to assess the power of the South. After the Civil War, federal agencies embraced statistical and thematic mapping in order to profile the ethnic, racial, economic, moral, and physical attributes of a reunified nation.   By the end of the century, Congress had authorized a national archive of maps, an explicit recognition that old maps were not relics to be discarded but unique records of the nation’s past. All of these experiments involved the realization that maps were not just illustrations of data, but visual tools that were uniquely equipped to convey complex ideas and information. In Mapping the Nation, Susan Schulten charts how maps of epidemic disease, slavery, census statistics, the environment, and the past demonstrated the analytical potential of cartography, and in the process transformed the very meaning of a map.   Today, statistical and thematic maps are so ubiquitous that we take for granted that data will be arranged cartographically. Whether for urban planning, public health, marketing, or political strategy, maps have become everyday tools of social organization, governance, and economics. The world we inhabit—saturated with maps and graphic information—grew out of this sea change in spatial thought and representation in the nineteenth century, when Americans learned to see themselves and their nation in new dimensions.

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  Mycology - Fungi and Their World

  Mike Crawford

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  Fungi occupy a unique and essential place in the natural world, forming a biological kingdom distinct from plants, animals, and bacteria. Unlike plants, fungi do not rely on photosynthesis to produce energy, and unlike animals, they do not consume food through ingestion. Instead, they absorb nutrients externally by secreting powerful enzymes that break down organic material. This ability allows fungi to play a crucial role in ecosystems, particularly as decomposers that recycle nutrients back into the environment. 
  The evolutionary origins of fungi date back over a billion years, with evidence suggesting they share a distant common ancestor with animals. As they evolved, fungi developed an incredible range of adaptations, enabling them to survive in nearly every habitat on Earth. From the depths of the ocean to arid deserts, fungi have found ways to thrive in extreme conditions. Some species form vast underground networks, facilitating communication between plants, while others exist as microscopic spores floating invisibly through the air. 
  Classifying fungi has been a longstanding challenge due to their vast diversity and complex life cycles. Scientists traditionally grouped fungi based on physical traits and reproductive strategies, but advances in molecular biology have refined their classification. The major phyla of the fungal kingdom include Basidiomycota, which encompasses familiar mushrooms, Ascomycota, which includes yeasts and molds, Zygomycota, known for fast-growing molds, and Glomeromycota, which form essential symbiotic relationships with plant roots. These diverse groups showcase the wide-ranging forms and functions of fungi in nature.

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  Telling Our Way to the Sea - A...

  Aaron Hirsh

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  A luminous and revelatory journey into the science of life and the depths of the human experienceBy turns epic and intimate, Telling Our Way to the Sea is both a staggering revelation of unraveling ecosystems and a profound meditation on our changing relationships with nature—and with one another.When the biologists Aaron Hirsh and Veronica Volny, along with their friend Graham Burnett, a historian of science, lead twelve college students to a remote fishing village on the Sea of Cortez, they come upon a bay of dazzling beauty and richness. But as the group pursues various threads of investigation—ecological and evolutionary studies of the sea, the desert, and their various species of animals and plants; the stories of local villagers; the journals of conquistadors and explorers—they recognize that the bay, spectacular and pristine though it seems, is but a ghost of what it once was. Life in the Sea of Cortez, they realize, has been reshaped by complex human ideas and decisions—the laws and economics of fishing, property, and water; the dreams of developers and the fantasies of tourists seeking the wild; even efforts to retrieve species from the brink of extinction—all of which have caused dramatic upheavals in the ecosystem. It is a painful realization, but the students discover a way forward. After weathering a hurricane and encountering a rare whale in its wake, they come to see that the bay's best chance of recovery may in fact reside in our own human stories, which can weave a compelling memory of the place. Glimpsing the intricate and ever-shifting web of human connections with the Sea of Cortez, the students comprehend anew their own place in the natural world—suspended between past and future, teetering between abundance and loss. The redemption in their difficult realization is that as they find their places in a profoundly altered environment, they also recognize their roles in the path ahead, and ultimately come to see one another, and themselves, in a new light.In Telling Our Way to the Sea, Hirsh's voice resounds with compassionate humanity, capturing the complex beauty of both the marine world he explores and the people he explores it with. Vibrantly alive with sensitivity and nuance, Telling Our Way to the Sea transcends its genre to become literature.

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  Averting Catastrophe - Decision...

  Cass R. Sunstein

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  The world is increasingly confronted with new challenges related to climate change, globalization, disease, and technology. Governments are faced with having to decide how much risk is worth taking, how much destruction and death can be tolerated, and how much money should be invested in the hopes of avoiding catastrophe. Lacking full information, should decision-makers focus on avoiding the most catastrophic outcomes? When should extreme measures be taken to prevent as much destruction as possible? 
   
   
   
  Averting Catastrophe explores how governments ought to make decisions in times of imminent disaster. Cass R. Sunstein argues that using the "maximin rule," which calls for choosing the approach that eliminates the worst of the worst-case scenarios, may be necessary when public officials lack important information, and when the worst-case scenario is too disastrous to contemplate. He underscores this argument by emphasizing the reality of "Knightian uncertainty," found in circumstances in which it is not possible to assign probabilities to various outcomes. At once an approachable introduction to decision-theory and a provocative argument for how governments ought to handle risk, Averting Catastrophe offers a definitive path forward in a world rife with uncertainty.

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  Sextant - A Young Man's Daring...

  David Barrie

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  Award–winning author David Barrie explores the history of the Sextant and the daring mariners who used it to explore, conquer, and map the world. 
   
  Since its invention in 1759, a mariner’s most prized possession has been the sextant. A navigation tool that measures the angle between a celestial object and the horizon, the sextant allowed sailors to pinpoint their exact location at sea. 
   
  David Barrie chronicles the sextant’s development and shows how it not only saved the lives of navigators in wild and dangerous seas, but played a pivotal role in their ability to map the globe. He synthesizes centuries of seafaring history and the brave sailors who have become legend, including James Cook, Matthew Flinders, Robert FitzRoy, Frank Worsley of the Endurance, and Joshua Slocum, the redoubtable old “lunarian” and first single-handed-round-the-world yachtsman. He also recounts his own maiden voyage, and insights gleaned from his experiences as a practiced seaman and navigator. 
   
  In the tradition of Dava Sobel’s Longitude, David Barrie’s compelling and dramatic tale of invention and discovery is an eloquent elegy to one of the most important navigational instruments ever created. Full of heroism, danger, and excitement, told with an infectious sense of wonder, Sextant examines a masterful achievement that changed the course of history.

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