Cynthia Stokes Brown was an avid reader and researcher. This collection is a digital representation of her personal library with the books categorized as Cynthia had them on the bookshelves in her home.
You can view the collection in it entirety or you can view them by category
American History | Big History| World History | Research | Poetry
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Our Inner Ape: A Leading Primatologist Explains Why We Are Who We Are
Frans De Waal
It’s no secret that humans and apes share a host of traits, from the tribal communities we form to our irrepressible curiosity. We have a common ancestor, scientists tell us, so it’s natural that we act alike. But not all of these parallels are so appealing: the chimpanzee, for example, can be as vicious and manipulative as any human.
Yet there’s more to our shared primate heritage than just our violent streak. In Our Inner Ape, Frans de Waal, one of the world’s great primatologists and a renowned expert on social behavior in apes, presents the provocative idea that our noblest qualities—generosity, kindness, altruism—are as much a part of our nature as are our baser instincts. After all, we share them with another primate: the lesser-known bonobo. As genetically similar to man as the chimpanzee, the bonobo has a temperament and a lifestyle vastly different from those of its genetic cousin. Where chimps are aggressive, territorial, and hierarchical, bonobos are gentle, loving, and erotic (sex for bonobos is as much about pleasure and social bonding as it is about reproduction).
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Primates and Philosophers: How Morality Evolved
Frans De Waal
'It's the animal in us', we often hear when we've been bad, But why not when we're good? 'Primates and Philosophers' tackles this question by exploring the biological foundations of one of humanity's most valued traits: morality.
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Earthwise: A Guide to Hopeful Creation Care
Calvin B. DeWitt
Sadly, our ways of life in today's global economy have led to increasing land and habitat destruction, pollution, species extinction, buildup of "greenhouse gases," and other degradations of the earth. But rather than grovel and wring our hands in despair, lifelong creation care scientist Calvin B. DeWitt suggests we discover a joyful, positive attitude about working together for good in this world. Looking forward in hope, we can make changes and take positive, lasting action that is more in harmony with the way the world works and is meant to be. This book, now in its third edition, helps to provide us and our friends, neighbors, coworkers, and fellow citizens with practical information and ideas to become truly "earthwise."
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Philosophy & Civilization in the Middle Ages
Maurice De Wulf
The purpose of the study as here presented is to approach the Middle Ages from a new point of view, by showing how the thought of the period, metaphysics included, is intimately connected with the whole round of Western civilization to which it belongs.
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Guns, Germs, and Steel
Jared Diamond
In this "artful, informative, and delightful" (William H. McNeill, New York Review of Books) book, Jared Diamond convincingly argues that geographical and environmental factors shaped the modern world. Societies that had had a head start in food production advanced beyond the hunter-gatherer stage, and then developed religion --as well as nasty germs and potent weapons of war --and adventured on sea and land to conquer and decimate preliterate cultures. A major advance in our understanding of human societies, Guns, Germs, and Steel chronicles the way that the modern world came to be and stunningly dismantles racially based theories of human history. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science, the Rhone-Poulenc Prize, and the Commonwealth club of California's Gold Medal.
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The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn From Traditional Societies?
Jared Diamond
Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence. Societies like those of the New Guinea Highlanders remind us that it was only yesterday—in evolutionary time—when everything changed and that we moderns still possess bodies and social practices often better adapted to traditional than to modern conditions.
The World Until Yesterday provides a mesmerizing firsthand picture of the human past as it had been for millions of years—a past that has mostly vanished—and considers what the differences between that past and our present mean for our lives today. -
International Dissent: Six Steps Toward World Peace
William O. Douglas
This 1971 book by an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States details six propositions to prevent war: an end to military alliances; all colonies should be made free and all protectorates abolished; the recognition of China and its admission to the United Nations; an international regulatory body must be established to control the use of the ocean floor; developing nations must be helped to enter the technological world ; "Rules of Law" governing international situations must be agreed upon through sessions of the United Nations.
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Creation: From Nothing Until Now
Willem B. Drees
Presenting a brief and accessible overview of contemporary scientific thought, Creation is an imaginative and poetic exploration of the origins of the universe. WIllem Drees assesses the religious and philosophical impact of scientific theories of evolution and the natural world, and examines the changing relationship between us and our planet.
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Hidden From History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past
Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus, and George Chauncey Jr.
This richly revealing anthology brings together for the first time the vital new scholarly studies now lifting the veil from the gay and lesbian past. Such notable researchers as John Boswell, Shari Benstock, Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, Jeffrey Weeks and John D’Emilio illuminate gay and lesbian life as it evolved in places as diverse as the Athens of Plato, Renaissance Italy, Victorian London, jazz Age Harlem, Revolutionary Russia, Nazi Germany, Castro’s Cuba, post-World War II San Francisco—and peoples as varied as South African black miners, American Indians, Chinese courtiers, Japanese samurai, English schoolboys and girls, and urban working women. Gender and sexuality, repression and resistance, deviance and acceptance, identity and community—all are given a context in this fascinating work.
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Bang! The Universe Verse: Book 1
James Lu Dunbar
This rhyming comic book explains the scientific concepts surrounding the origin of the universe, life on Earth and the human race, from the Big Bang to the scientific method.
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Great Apes: The Universe Verse: Book 3
James Lu Dunbar
The third and final book in The Universe Verse series, "Great Apes!" is a scientifically accurate rhyming comic book that explains the origin of the human race and the dawn of civilization.
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It's Alive! The Universe Verse: Book 2
James Lu Dunbar
This rhyming comic book explains the scientific concepts surrounding the origin of the universe, life on Earth with captivating illustrations and whimsical rhymes.
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The Universe Verse
James Lu Dunbar
The Universe Verse is a scientifically-accurate rhyming comic book about the origins of the universe, life on Earth and the human race. It introduces and illuminates the most fundamental features of our existence in a way that is engaging and accessible to a wide audience, including young children. This book contains most major scientific milestones known to humanity, all in one rhyming comic book. Including, but not limited to: energy, space, time, the four fundamental forces, matter, particles, atoms, elements, fusion, stars, E=MC2, supernovae, galaxies, planets, solar systems, Earth, planetary crust, atmosphere, water, life, variation, reproduction, survival, evolution, cells, DNA, genes, sex, biodiversity, the food web, bacteria, photosynthesis, extinctions, respiration, eukaryotes, endosymbiosis, chloroplasts, mitochondria, multicellular organisms, tissues, organs, perception, nerves, brains, aquatic, terrestrial, flying creatures, fossils, dinosaurs, mammals, primates, humans, consciousness, language, agriculture, civilization, math, writing, books and science!
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The Human Story: A New History of Mankind's Evolution
Robin Dunbar
For scientists studying evolution, the past decade has seen astonishing advances across many disciplines - discoveries which have revolutionised scientific thinking and turned upside down our understanding of who we are. The Human Story brings together these threads of research in genetics, behaviour and psychology to provide an understanding of just what it is that makes us human. Robin Dunbar looks in particular at how the human mind has evolved, and draws on his own research during the last five years into the deep psychological and biological bases of music and religion.
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Your Cosmic Context: An Introduction to Modern Cosmology
Todd Duncan and Craig Tyler
Your Cosmic Context provides a framework for exploring the nature and history of our universe. Equally well suited for independent reading and study or for a one-term general education course in cosmology, this book is a guide to the key insights of scientific cosmology, including the big bang theory and exotic entities like dark matter and dark energy. It also explains how we discovered the surprising things we now know about the distant reaches of space and time, and thereby serves as one of the best available illustrations of the scientific method in action.
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The Adventures of Ibn Battuta: A Muslim Traveler of the 14th Century
Ross E. Dunn
Ross Dunn here recounts the great traveler's remarkable career, interpreting it within the cultural and social context of Islamic society and giving the reader both a biography of an extraordinary personality and a study of the hemispheric dimensions of human interchange in medieval times.
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Religion Without God
Ronald Dworkin
Looks at the nature of religion, God's place in it, and the possibility of humanist religion without God.
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The Sun, The Genome and the Internet: Tools of Scientific Revolutions
Freeman J. Dyson
"In this visionary look into the future, Freeman Dyson argues that technological changes fundamentally alter our ethical and social arrangements and that three rapidly advancing new technologies - solar energy, genetic engineering, and worldwide communication - together have the potential to create a more equal distribution of the world's wealth." "Written with passionate conviction about the ethical uses of science, The Sun, the Genome, and the Internet is both a brilliant reinterpretation of the scientific process and a challenge to use new technologies to close, rather than widen, the gap between rich and poor."--Jacket.
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Islamic History as Global History
Richard M. Eaton
This essay explores the rise of Islam and its continuing influential role in Africa, Asia, and Europe, making it the source of a truly global civilization. Such concepts as the nature of Islamic civilization and the sources of its cultural diffusion, Islamic socioreligious institutions, and Islam as a world system are also discussed. >
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The Dominant Animal: Human Evolution and the Environment
Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich
"Over millions of years and through countless genetic twists and turns, humanity has evolved into the dominant animal. We have populated the globe, reshaped most landscapes, eradicated myriad populations and species of other organisms, and even transformed the oceans and climate." "The vast environmental changes we have produced and the intricate cultures we have created are now shaping evolution. From the complex workings of our genes to what we eat and how we govern ourselves, we are changing our world and our world is changing us. We are creating our future. But what kind of future will it be?" "Renowned scientists and thinkers Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich tackle that fundamental question in this exploration of evolution, environment, and culture. The Dominant Animal is a scientific field trip across time and space, from the microscopic to the global. The Ehrlichs weave together the theories of Darwin, empirical studies of fruit flies, lizards, and disease, the fossil record, the psychology of perception and belief systems, the nature of the human genome, and the power of culture and environment into a single illuminating thread."--Jacket.
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The Chalice and The Blade: Our History, Our Future
Riane Eisler
The phenomenal bestseller, with more than 500,000 copies sold worldwide, now with a new epilogue from the author-The Chalice and the Blade has inspired a generation of women and men to envision a truly egalitarian society by exploring the legacy of the peaceful, goddess-worshipping cultures from our prehistoric past.
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Good Without God: What a Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe
Greg M. Epstein
Author Greg Epstein, the Humanist chaplain at Harvard, offers a world view for nonbelievers that dispenses with the hostility and intolerance of religion prevalent in national bestsellers like God is Not Great and The God Delusion. Epstein's Good Without God provides a constructive, challenging response to these manifestos by getting to the heart of Humanism and its positive belief in tolerance, community, morality, and good without having to rely on the guidance of a higher being.--From publisher description.
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The Search for Ancient Greece
Roland Etienne and Francoise Etienne
Chronicles the history of archeological discovery in Greece beginning with the writings of Pausanias in the 2nd century, continuing through and focusing on the expeditions of the 19th and 20th centuries.
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People of the Earth: An Introduction to World Prehistory
Brian M. Fagan
People of the Earth is a narrative account of the prehistory of humankind from our origins over 3 million years ago to the first pre-industrial civilizations, beginning about 5,000 years ago. This is a global prehistory, which covers prehistoric times in every corner of the world, in a jargon-free style for newcomers to archaeology. Many world histories begin with the first civilizations. This book starts at the beginning of human history and summarizes the latest research into such major topics as human origins, the emergence and spread of modern humans, the first farming, and the origins of civilization.
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Planets, Stars and Galaxies: Descriptive Astronomy for Beginners
A. E. Fanning
Comprehensive introductory survey: the sun, solar system, stars, galaxies, universe, cosmology; quasars, radio stars, etc. 24pp. of photographs.
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Women in the Classical World
Elaine Fantham, Helene Peet Foley, Natalie Boymel Kampen, Sarah B. Pomeroy, and H. Alan Shapiro
Women in the Classical World lifts the curtain on the women of ancient Greece and Rome, exploring the lives of slaves and prostitutes, Athenian housewives, and Rome's imperial family. The first book on classical women to give equal weight to written texts and artistic representations, it brings together a great wealth of materials--poetry, vase painting, legislation, medical treatises, architecture, religious and funerary art, women's ornaments, historical epics, political speeches, even ancient coins--to present women in the historical and cultural context of their time.
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What Darwin Really Said: An Introduction to His Life and Theory of Evolution
Benjamin Farrington
First published in 1859, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution inalterably transformed our view of the history of life on the planet—and along with it, how we understand ourselves, our origins, and our place in the world. As we stand before the dawn of a new century, this theory is still the source of heated debate. In medicine, psychology, sociology, and politics, controversial new ideas are being espoused to claim Darwin for their legitimacy, while religious opponents continue to press for their alternative theory of “creationism” to be taught in the public schools. To being light where there has been much heat, What Darwin Really Said offers an excellent introduction to this great thinker’s discoveries, his view of human development, and the endurance of his theories against the test of time.
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When the World Was Whole: Three Centuries of Memories
Charles Fenyvesi
In this family memoir, Charles Fenyvesi brings back to life his ancestors who loved and improved the poor soil they tilled in northeastern Hungary, kept the countless rules of their Jewish faith, and trusted Providence. Unlike their co-religionists who wandered about, always on the lookout for better opportunities elsewhere, they stayed in the same small village far from cities and main highways — and bound for the family cemetery whose hoary age remains a secret known only to family members. They lived at peace with their neighbors — Greek Catholic, Roman Catholic, and Calvinist — and joined their passionate struggle for independence from the Austrian Empire, then a great power on the European continent. Fenyvesi collected their stories, part verified history and part misty legend, about their travels searching for beautiful brides and running into wise rabbis who dispensed blessings. Nothing is accidental in their world of secret symmetries and unexpected re-enactments.
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The Whole Shebang: A State-of-the-Universe(s) Report
Timothy Ferris
From the prizewinning author who has been called "the greatest science writer in the world" comes this delightfully comprehensive and comprehensible report on how science today envisions the universe as a whole. Timothy Ferris provides a clear, elegantly written overview of current research and a forecast of where cosmological theory is likely to go in the twenty-first century. He explores the questions that have occurred to even casual readers - who are curious about nature on the largest scales: What does it mean to say that the universe is "expanding", or that space is "curved" - and sheds light on the possibility that our universe is only one among many universes, each with its own physical laws and prospects for the emergence of life.
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Cosmic Evolution: An Introduction to Astronomy
George B. Field, Gerrit L. Verschuur, and Cyril Ponnamperua
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The World of Odysseus
M. I. Finley
The World of Odysseus is a concise and penetrating account of the society that gave birth to the Iliad and the Odyssey--a book that provides a vivid picture of the Greek Dark Ages, its men and women, works and days, morals and values. Long celebrated as a pathbreaking achievement in the social history of the ancient world, M.I. Finley's brilliant study remains, as classicist Bernard Knox notes in his introduction to this new edition, "as indispensable to the professional as it is accessible to the general reader"--a fundamental companion for students of Homer and Homeric Greece.
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The Eternal Frontier: An Ecological History of North America and Its Peoples
Tim Flannery
n The Eternal Frontier, world-renowned scientist and historian Tim Flannery tells the unforgettable story of the geological and biological evolution of the North American continent, from the time of the asteroid strike that ended the age of dinosaurs 65 million years ago, to the present day. Flannery describes the development of North America's deciduous forests and other flora, and tracks the immigration and emigration of various animals to and from Europe, Asia, and South America, showing how plant and animal species have either adapted or become extinct. The story takes in the massive changes wrought by the ice ages and the coming of the Indians, and continues right up to the present, covering the deforestation of the Northeast, the decimation of the buffalo, and other facets of the enormous impact of frontier settlement and the development of the industrial might of the United States. Natural history on a monumental scale, The Eternal Frontier contains an enormous wealth of fascinating scientific details, and Flannery's accessible and dynamic writing makes the book a delight to read.
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Eyes Wide Open: Going Behind the Environmental Headlines
Paul Fleischman
"We're living in an aha moment. Take 250 years of human ingenuity. Add abundant fossil fuels. The result: a population and lifestyle never seen before. The downsides weren't visible for centuries, but now they are. Suddenly everything needs rethinking -- suburbs, cars, fast food, cheap prices. It's a changed world. This book explains it. Using politics, psychology, and history for altitude, Eyes Wide Open shows how to see the principles driving events and attitudes, from vested interests to denial to big-country syndrome. Here's the briefing you need to comprehend the twenty-first century."--Back cover.
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Timewalkers: The Prehistory of Global Colonization
Clive Gamble
Human evolution tends to be understood in terms of a development from inferior to superior, primitive to advanced, the simple to the complex. In this book Gamble attempts to dispel some of the myths and distortions that this way of perceiving the human past has produced. He looks at human prehistory and behaviour through a detailed study of global colonization and adaptation to climate and environment, and seeks to introduce a fresh approach to the causes behind this dispersal of humans. In the course of his study he presents the latest findings of prehistoric archaeology, and a critique of the attitudes of early European explorers and twentieth-century scholars to the question of human origins.
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The Bonds of Berdichev: The Life and Fate of Vasily Grossman
John Garrard and Carol Garrard
Chronicles the life Vasily Grossman, a Russian Jew and World War II correspondent for the Soviet Army, who evolved from a Marxist supporter into a passionate critic of the new regime and whose voice can finally be heard without the threat of Soviet retaliation.
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The Nine Nations of North America
Joel Garreau
Divides North America into nine powers, and explains the cultural, ethnic, and geographic identities of each
