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Pathogenesis: How germs made history: A Sunday Times Science Book of the Year - Softcover

Kennedy, Jonathan

 
9781804991893: Pathogenesis: How germs made history: A Sunday Times Science Book of the Year
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1804991899 ISBN 13: 9781804991893
Verlag: Penguin, 2024

Inhaltsangabe

A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK

'Powerfully argued... Fascinating and pacy' Sunday Times, Book of the Week
'Superbly written... sure to please readers of Yuval Noah Harari or Rutger Bregman' The Times
'Full of amazing facts' Observer

In this revelatory book, Dr Jonathan Kennedy argues that germs have shaped humanity at every stage, from the first success of Homo sapiens over the equally intelligent Neanderthals to the fall of Rome and the rise of Islam.

How did an Indonesian volcano help cause the Black Death, setting Europe on the road to capitalism? How could 168 men extract the largest ransom in history from an opposing army of eighty thousand? And why did the Industrial Revolution lead to the birth of the modern welfare state?

The latest science reveals that infectious diseases are not just something that happens to us, but a fundamental part of who we are. Indeed, the only reason humans don't lay eggs is that a virus long ago inserted itself into our DNA, and there are as many bacteria in your body as there are human cells. We have been thinking about the survival of the fittest all wrong: evolution is not simply about human strength and intelligence, but about how we live and thrive in a world dominated by microbes.

By exploring the startling intimacy of our relationship with infectious diseases, Kennedy shows how they have been responsible for some of the seismic revolutions of the past 50,000 years. Provocative and brimming with insight, Pathogenesis transforms our understanding of the human story.

Challenges some of the greatest cliches about colonialism... A revelation' SATHNAM SANGHERA
'Thrilling and eye-opening' LEWIS DARTNELL
'Science and history at its best' MARK HONIGSBAUM
'Unpicks everything we thought we knew... Mind blowing' CAL FLYN

A TIMES SCIENCE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023
A SUNDAY TIMES SCIENCE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Jonathan Kennedy teaches global public health at Queen Mary University of London. He has a PhD in sociology from the University of Cambridge. His interdisciplinary research has been published in leading medical, public health, sociology and history journals, and he has written for newspapers including the Guardian and El Pais. Pathogenesis is his first book.

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A sweeping look at how the major transformations in history--from the rise of Homo sapiens to the birth of capitalism--have been shaped not by humans but by germs

According to the accepted narrative of progress, humans have thrived thanks to their brains and brawn, to actions undertaken individually and collectively that have bent the arc of history. In this revelatory book, sociologist and public health professor Jonathan Kennedy argues that the peddlers of this myth of human exceptionalism massively overestimate the role that we play in social and political change. Instead, it is the humble microbe that wins wars and topples empires.

Drawing on the latest research in fields ranging from genetics and anthropology to archaeology and economics, Pathogenesis takes us through the 60,000 years of our human history, exploring eight major outbreaks of infectious disease that made the modern world. Bacteria and viruses were the protagonists in the demise of the Neanderthals, the growth of Islam, the transition from feudalism to capitalism, the devastation wrought by European colonialism, and the growth of the United States from an imperial backwater to a global superpower. Even Christianity rose to prominence on the back of a wave of deadly pandemics that swept through the Roman Empire in the second and third centuries. The members of this small group tended both their own sick and those abandoned by the Romans, saving many lives and helping turn this tiny, obscure sect into one of the world's major religions.

By centering disease in his wide-ranging history of humankind, Kennedy challenges some of our most fundamental assumptions about our collective past--and urges us to view our current moment as another disease-driven inflection point that will change the course of history. Provocative and brimming with insight, Pathogenesis transforms our understanding of the human story.

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Verlag
Penguin
Erscheinungsdatum
2024
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
1804991899
ISBN 13 
9781804991893
Einband
Taschenbuch
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
384
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Penguin Random House Ireland
penguinpublicity@penguinrandomhouse.com

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