basic books okt 2025 (11 Ergebnisse)

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - The?epic?story of the planet's oldest trees and the making of the modern world "Rich.fascinating."The Wall Street Journal Humans have always revered long-lived trees.?But?as historian Jared Farmer reveals in?Elderflora, our veneration took a modern turn in the eighteenth century, when?naturalists embarked on?a quest?to?locate and precisely date the oldest?living things on earth. The new science of tree time prompted travelers to visit ancient specimens and conservationists to protect sacred groves. Exploitation accompanied sanctification, as old-growth forests succumbed to imperial expansion and the industrial revolution. Taking us from Lebanon to New Zealand to California, Farmer surveys the complex history of the world's oldest trees, including voices of Indigenous peoples, religious figures, and contemporary scientists who study elderflora in crisis. In a changing climate, a long future is still possible, Farmer shows, but only if we give care to young things that might grow old.Winner of the 2023 Jacques Barzun Prize in Cultural History.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - From snake-oil salesmen to crypto grifters, the gripping story of charlatans-and why we fall for themFor centuries charlatans have been bamboozling victims. But today, charlatanry is more lucrative and global than ever. Using the power of digital technology, our age's charlatans have spun a worldwide web of exploitation on an unprecedented scale. In Charlatans, global affairs experts Moisés Naím and Quico Toro investigate how charlatans fool us and why they've become so influential today. They argue that modern charlatans exploit the same weak points in human cognition as the snake-oil salesmen of the old West. They earn our trust, trick us into believing they have some special skill or knowledge, then exploit us. In some ways, nothing has changed. But, today, charlatans are digital, viral, and global. Whether they're health gurus pushing pseudoscience or crypto bros orchestrating Ponzi schemes, modern charlatans rapidly amass worldwide audiences on the internet and social media using a common set of strategies. These hucksters swiftly swindle unsuspecting victims, as our slow-moving institutions struggle to respond. Packed with insights on how to avoid being duped by charlatans, this is an eye-opening journey through the brazen deception and brutal victimization at the heart of this new global scourge.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - "If you've ever wondered why our education system feels stuck in the past, this book delivers both a powerful critique and a bold vision for the future." Daniel H. Pink, #1New York Timesbestselling author ofDrive How much information is forgotten almost immediately after it is taught How many students graduate from high school unprepared for careers where lifelong learning is essential to succeed These problems stem from an educational system that uses time spent in a classroom and the results of standardized, multiple-choice tests as proxies for actual understanding. Educators Tony Wagner and Ulrik Juul Christensen call for a radical new system of learning, where students progress individually when they demonstrate that they can use what they have learnedno matter how long it takes to get there. This is called mastery learning, and it is the future of education. This book shows how mastery learning is already being put to use in the United States and around the world, from kindergarten to college and in the workplace. Through conversations with teachers, students, parents, policymakers, and employers, Wagner and Christensen show how mastery improves motivation and prepares students for productive work, an engaged civic life, and personal growth and well-being. They also outline the challenges of adopting mastery learning and how to overcome them. Mastery is an urgent call to action to transform education for all.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A preeminent Harvard professor and poetry expert explains the artistryand the celebrityof Taylor Swift "This is an outstanding look at one of the world's most beloved entertainers."?Kirkus (starred) Taylor Swift has become a peerless superstar, ceaselessly productive and internationally beloved. From her teen country debut to her Eras tour and beyond, Swift's career and her creations have captivated and bewitched us, opening up new ways to see both her life and our own. In Taylor's Version, the poet and literary scholar Stephanie Burt offers an insightful and heartfelt critical appreciation of Taylor Swift, her body of work, and the community that her art has fostered. Drawing from her 2024 Harvard course, Taylor Swift and Her World, as well as from her years as a Swiftie, Burt examines Swift's particular form of genius not the destructive genius of tortured poets, but the collaborative and joyful genius of an artist who has mastered her craft. She highlights the ways Swift's work remains at once intimate and relatable, portraying people we feel that we know and people we wish we could be, from the first loves and girlhoods on Fearless through the public and private angst of Midnights. How does she do it (with a broken heart) Tracing a path through the Eras, Taylor's Version shows what Swift has created, how it works, and why her songs will endure.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - An Oxford physicist 'seeks to shatter complacency' (David Deutsch) in modern physics and show why five revolutionary experiments in quantum physics promise to open the gates separating us from a true understanding of the universe For the last century, physics has been treading along the paths set by the same two theoriesquantum theory and general relativityand, let's face it, it's getting pretty boring. Most scientists are simply chasing decimal points in laboratories, unable to explore the theories at large scales, where serious discrepancies could emerge. The situation is a lot like the one physics was in in 1890, right before Planck, Einstein, and Bohr blew the roof off Newtonian physics. As Vlatko Vedral argues in Portals to a New Reality, that means we are on the brink of a revolution. Vedral shows how quantum information theory has opened radically new avenues for experiments that could upend physics. They can sound very strangeone essentially involves entangling a human with Schrödinger's catbut they lay bare elements of our theories that are particularly problematic, such as the widespread belief that nothing truly exists unless it is observed. At present these experiments are thought experiments, albeit fascinating ones. But nothing, save inertia and a lack of ambition, stands in our way. Now is the time to rewrite the understanding of the universe.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A leading astrobiologist argues that space travel is an evolutionary event at least as important as life's first journey from sea to land'The Giant Leap is a detailed and provocative exploration of what it means for life as we know it to escape the bounds of the only planet where it has ever been.' Sean Carroll, author of The Biggest Ideas in the Universe The story of life has always been one of great transitions, of crossing new frontiers. The dawn of life itself is one; so, too, is the first time two cells stuck together rather than drifting apart. And perhaps most dramatic were the moves from the sea to land, land to air. Each transition has witnessed wild storms of innovation, opportunity, and hazard. It might seem that there are no more realms for life to venture. But there is one: space. In The Giant Leap, astrobiologist Caleb Scharf argues that our journey into space isn't simply a giant leap for humankindit's life's next great transition, an evolution of evolution itself. Humans and our technology are catalysts for an interplanetary transformation, marking a disruption in the story of life as fundamental as life's movement from sea to land, and land to sky. Inspired by Darwin's account of his journey on the Beagle,and packed with stories from the past, present, and future of space travel, The Giant Leapthrills at both life's creativity and the marvels of technology that have propelled us into the cosmos. And it offers an awesome glimpse of the grander vistas that wait in the great beyond.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - The 'remarkable' (Dr. Jane Goodall)story of a beagle's past, and the future of animal research When journalist Melanie D.G. Kaplan adopted her beagle Hammy, all she knew was that he had spent nearly four years in a research lab. Curious to know more about this gentle creature's past, as well as the broader world of animal research, Kaplanwith Hammy in towembarks on a quest for answers. How did Hammy end up in a research facility Why are we still using millions of animals a year in experiments What have we learned from them Is there another way.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A compellingjourney into the inner workings of human and artificial minds "Deeply stimulating and disarmingly accessible" Robert Sapolsky, author of Determined Named a Best Book of the Year byNew ScientistNext Big Idea Club When we are trying to solve a problem, what happens We find ourselves weighing arguments, or relying on intuition, then reaching a conscious decision about what to do. What is going on behind the scenes In The Emergent Mind, Gaurav Suri and Jay McClelland show that our experience is the tip of an iceberg of brain activity that can be captured in an artificial neural network. Such networksinitially developed as models of ourselveshave become the engines of artificial neural intelligence. Suri and McClelland aren't reducing mankind to mere machines. Rather, they are showing how a data-driven neural network can create thoughts, emotions, and ideasa mindwhether in humans or computers. The Emergent Mind provides a fascinating account of how we reach decisions, why we change our minds, and how we are affected by context and experience. Ultimately, the book gives a new answer to one of our oldest questions: Not just how do minds work, but what does it mean to be a mind at all.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A search for the meaning of one of nature's greatest riddles: why do so many creatures transform "Beautiful.Entertaining.Inspiring."Nature "A meditation on transformation . . . Warm [and] empathetic . . . wonderful."Science "Startling . . .astounding . . .Animated by wonder."MIT's Undark "Steeped in wonderment. . . hauntingly timely."Washington Independent Review of Books "How many creatures walking on this earth / Have their first being in another form " the Roman poet Ovid asked two thousand years ago. He could not have known the full extent of the truth: today, biologists estimate a stunning three-quarters of all animal species on Earth undergo some form of metamorphosis. But why do tadpoles transform into frogs, caterpillars into butterflies, elvers into eels, immortal jellyfish from sea sprigs to medusae and back again, growing younger and younger in frigid ocean depths Why must creatures go through massive destruction and remodeling to become who they are Tracing a path from Aristotle to Darwin to cutting-edge science today, Harman explores that central mystery. Metamorphosis, however, isn't just a biological puzzle: it takes us to the very heart of questions of being and identity, whatever kind of change we humans may undergo. Metamorphosis is a new classic of natural history: a book that, by unveiling a mystery of nature, causes us to relearn ourselves.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A prize-winning scholar's new and expansive telling of the HundredYears'War,revealing howthe lines drawn on medievalbattlefields forged themodern world? "A riveting page-turner that brilliantly revises centuries of history" (Bernard Cornwell, New York Timesbestselling author of The Last Kingdom) Henry V at Agincourt. Edward III at Crécy. The Black Prince at Poitiers. Joan of Arc at Orléans. The period we call "the Hundred Years War" was a cascade of violence bursting with some of the most famous figures and fascinating fights in history. The central combatants, England and France, bore witness to uncountable deaths, unbelievable tragedy, and uncompromising glory. But there was much more to this period than a struggle between two nations for dominance.Bloody Crowns tells a new story of how medieval Europe was consumed, not by a hundred years' war, but by two full centuries of war from 1292 to 1492. During those years, blood was spilled far beyond the borders of England and France. The Low Countries became war zones. Italy was swept up. So, too, the Holy Roman Empire, the Iberian Peninsula, Scotland, and Wales. The conflict drove enormous leaps forward in military technology and organization, political systems and national identities, laying the groundwork for the modern world. With a keen eye for military intrigue and drama, Bloody Crowns critically revises our understanding of how modern Europe arose from medieval battlefields.

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - An acclaimed scholar tells the full, breathtaking history of Rome, from its emergence in the Iron Age to the capture of Constantinople in the thirteenth century "A sweeping historical survey that spans two millenniaThose intrigued by the ebb and flow of political powerwill find in this book a cornucopia.'Wall Street Journal When we think of "ancient Romans" today, many picture the toga-clad figures of Cicero and Caesar, presiding over a republic, and then an empire, before seeing their world collapse at the hands of barbarians in the fifth century AD. The Romans does away with this narrow vision by offering the first comprehensive account of ancient Rome over the course of two millennia. Prize-winning historian Edward J. Watts recounts the full sweep of Rome's epic past: the Punic Wars, the fall of the republic, the coming of Christianity, Alaric's sack of Rome, the rise of Islam, the Battle of Manzikert, and the onslaught of the Crusaders who would bring about the empire's end. Watts shows that the source of Rome's enduring strength was the diverse range of people who all called themselves Romans. This is the Rome of Augustus, Marcus Aurelius, and Constantine, but also Charlemagne, Justinian, and Manuel Comnenusand countless other men and women who together made it the most resilient state the world has ever seen. An expansive, eye-opening portrait, The Romans is the definitive history of Rome and its citizens.