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
These are the books she had in her Big History collection
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America the Possible: Manifesto for a New Economy
James Gustave Speth
"The "New Economy Movement," as Gar Alperovitz described it in The Nation, is an effort to unite the various wings of progressive politics into a coherent set of ideas and programs that will be radically different from the current free-market paradigm. The movement arises out of environmentalism: the era of climate change, it asserts, demands a much deeper rethinking of American institutions than much of the political establishment is willing to contemplate. This book, as its title suggests, is the New Economy Movement's manifesto. Gus Speth argues that America faces four problems of such magnitude that any one of them could seriously undermine the nation. All four together will almost certainly lead to a crisis, especially since the problems interact with each other. The four problems are: 1. the growth of inequality in our country, which is not only an economic burden but a social one, as it is creating classes of people who have little knowledge of or sympathy for each others' lives, and little commitment to addressing the problems of others; 2. the increasingly onerous burden of foreign military commitments; 3. climate change; 4. our increasingly polarized and dysfunctional politics. It's the interactions that are the most frightening: how, for instance, will the U.S. respond to sea-level rise in Bangladesh that forces tens of millions of people to flee the coast for higher ground? This would not only create a humanitarian crisis but a diplomatic and military one as well. America, politically paralyzed and economically almost bankrupt, would be called upon to act or cede its strategic supremacy"--Provided by publisher.
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Big History and the Future of Humanity
Fred Spier
Big History and the Future of Humanity presents an original theoretical approach that makes “big history” – the placing of the human past within the history of life, the Earth, and the Universe -- accessible to general readers while revealing insights into what the future may hold for humanity.
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The Structures of Big History: From the Big Bang Until Today
Fred Spier
"The social and natural sciences have more in common than most people would perhaps suspect. This thought-provoking study, the first of its kind ever attempted, presents a single straightforward structure which unites the latest scientific views on the history of the Universe, the Solar System, Earth, life and humankind. It contributes to a better understanding of some long-standing academic controversies, such as the root causes for the origins of humankind, the rise of agriculture and the emergence of early states."--Jacket.
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Earth Abides
George R. Stewart
A disease of unparalleled destructive force has sprung up almost simultaneously in every corner of the globe, all but destroying the human race. One survivor, strangely immune to the effects of the epidemic, ventures forward to experience a world without man. What he ultimately discovers will prove far more astonishing than anything he'd either dreaded or hoped for.
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The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era
Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry
"Grounded in contemporary scientific understanding and inspired by the world's great wisdom traditions, cosmologist Brian Swimme and cultural historian Thomas Berry meld the findings of contemporary science - cosmology, geology, biology, and sociology - with the human search for meaning. The resulting account articulates fifteen billion years of existence with awe, delight, and vision." "Swimme and Berry remind us of the importance of story - "story is the only way of providing, in our times, what the mythic stories of the universe provided for tribal peoples and for the earlier classical civilizations in their times." In a richly detailed narrative of epic sweep, they recount the unfolding of the universe, from the "primordial flaring forth" and the formation of galaxies and supernovas to the "human emergence," classical civilizations, and imminent Ecozoic era." "The Universe Story compellingly explores humanity's place in the evolving cosmos and our ecological imperative. Crippling the Earth's biodiversity, "we are deciding what species will live or perish, we are determining the chemical structure of the soil and the air and the water, we are mapping out the areas of wilderness that will be allowed to function in their own natural modalities." This, Swimme and Berry remind us, "is filled with risk and presumption," for "the story of the Earth is also the story of the human."" "Honoring "the special capacity of the human to enable the universe and the planet Earth to reflect on and to celebrate ... in our music and our art, our dance and our poetry, and in our religious rituals," Swimme and Berry urge that we honor the knowledge gained by centuries of scientific inquiry with reverence, entrancement, and a commitment to renewal. Such joyous commitment is essential, for "there is eventually only one story, the story of the universe. Every form of being is integral with this comprehensive story. Nothing is itself without everything else.""--Jacket.
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Journey of the Universe
Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker
In Journey of the Universe Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker tell the epic story of the universe from an inspired new perspective, weaving the findings of modern science together with enduring wisdom found in the humanistic traditions of the West, China, India, and indigenous peoples. The authors explore cosmic evolution as a profoundly wondrous process based on creativity, connection, and interdependence, and they envision an unprecedented opportunity for the world's people to address the daunting ecological and social challenges of our times.
Journey of the Universe transforms how we understand our origins and envision our future. Though a little book, it tells a big story—one that inspires hope for a way in which Earth and its human civilizations could flourish together.
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State of the World 2013: Is Sustainability Still Possible?
The Worldwatch Institute
"In 'State of the World 2013: Is Sustainability Still Possible?', experts define clear sustainability metrics and examine various policies and perspectives, including geoengineering, corporate transformation, and changes in agricultural policy, that could put us on the path to prosperity without diminishing the well-being of future generations. If these approaches fall short, the final chapters explore ways to prepare for drastic environmental change and resource depletion, such as strengthening democracy and societal resilience, protecting cultural heritage, and dealing with increased conflict and migration flows"--Provided by publisher.
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Great Tide Rising: Towards Clarity and Moarl Courage in a Time of Planetary Change
Mary Evelyn Tucker
"Even as seas rise against the shores, another great tide is beginning to rise - a tide of outrage against the pillage of the planet, a tide of commitment to justice and human rights, a swelling affirmation of moral responsibility to the future and to Earth's fullness of life. Philosopher and nature essayist Kathleen Dean Moore takes on the essential questions: Why is it wrong to wreck the world? What is our obligation to the future? What is the transformative power of moral resolve? How can clear thinking stand against the lies and illogic that batter the chances for positive change? What are useful answers to the recurring questions of a storm-threatened time - What can anyone do? Is there any hope? And always this: What stories and ideas will lift people who deeply care, inspiring them to move forward with clarity and moral courage? "-- Provided by publisher.
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The Flooded Earth: Our Future in a World Without Ice Caps
Peter D. Ward
"By 2050: the sea will rise by 2 to 3 feet. Wealthy coastal cities will fight the rising water with dykes and levees; others will lose their underground infrastructure (including electric and fiber optic systems), and face building collapses." "By 2300: the sea will rise by 65 feet. As Antarctica melts, massive floating icebergs will interfere with shipping in the southern hemisphere. The world's geography will change drastically, featuring new rivers and lakes where they never before existed." "By 2500-5000: the sea will achieve its maximum height. Most formerly coastal cities will no longer exist at all. Massive migrations will take place, all deltas and low-lying agricultural areas will have been wiped from the map, and the newly de-iced Greenland and Antarctica will be important farmlands. Humans will have to cope with the spread of tropical diseases like Malaria and Dengue Fever, and the possibility of runaway mass extinctions." "Sea Level Rise Will be an Unavoidable Part of our Future, no matter what we do. Even if we stopped all carbon dioxide emissions today, the seas will rise three feet by 2050 and nine feet by 2100. This---not drought, species extinction, or excessive heat waves---will be the most dramatic effect of global warming. The effects of three feet of sea-level rise will be massive. Nine feet will be catastrophic. Incursions of salt into the water table will destroy most of our best agricultural land---for instance, the Central Valley of California---and corrosion will devour the electrical and fiber-optic systems of coastal cities, as well as our roads and bridges. Amsterdam, Miami, Venice, and other cities, might have to be abandoned. The melting of the ice caps will not be a slow trickle of water into the sea; it will release armadas of icebergs that will make shipping in the Southern Ocean hazardous or impossible. As icebound regions melt, new sources of oil, gas, minerals, and arable land will also be revealed---as will fierce geopolitical battles over who owns the rights to them." "In The Flooded Earth, species extinction expert Peter D. Ward describes in intricate detail what our world will look like in 2050, 2100, 2300, and beyond. In this blueprint for a foreseeable future, Ward also explains what politicians and policy makers around the world should be doing now to head off the worst consequences of an inevitable transformation, including the complete melting of the ice sheets, stagnant oceans, and greenhouse extinction. --Jacket.
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The Future of Life
Edward O. Wilson
Examines the richness of the natural world, how it is currently being threatened, and what can be done to safeguard it.
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The Meaning of Human Existence
Edward O. Wilson
In The Meaning of Human Existence, his most philosophical work to date, Pulitzer Prize-winning biologist Edward O. Wilson examines what makes human beings supremely different from all other species and posits that we, as a species, now know enough about the universe and ourselves that we can begin to approach questions about our place in the cosmos and the meaning of intelligent life in a systematic, indeed, in a testable way.
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The Social Conquest of Earth
Edward O. Wilson
Based on a lifetime of pioneering research, preeminent naturalist Edward O. Wilson gives us a new history of human evolution, presented in an elegant and provocative narrative that promises to have reverberations in fields as diverse as anthropology and social psychology, neuroscience and 21st-century intellectual and religious history. Wilson begins by addressing three "fundamental questions" of religion and philosophy that have fascinated thinkers for centuries: Where did we come from? What are we? Where are we going? Writing that "the origin of modern humanity was a stroke of luck, good for our species for a while, bad for most of the rest of life forever," Wilson traces the rise of Homo sapiens from its infancy, drawing on his remarkable knowledge of biology and social behavior to present us with the clearest explanation ever produced as to the origin of the human condition. Wilson also reveals how "group selection" can be the only model for explaining man's origins and domination, and warns that it has now accelerated--through unregulated and untrammeled growth--to such a point that the planet as we know it is being threatened.--From publisher description.
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Shrinking the Earth: The Rise and Decline of American Abundance
Donald Worster
"The discovery of the Americas around 1500 AD was an extraordinary watershed in human experience. It gave rise to the modern period of human ecology, a phenomenon global in scope that set in motion profound changes in almost every society on earth. This new period, which saw the depletion of the lands of the New World, proved tragic for some, triumphant for others, and powerfully affecting for all."--Provided by publisher.
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The Moral Animal: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology
Robert Wright
An accessible introduction to the science of evolutionary psychology and how it explains many aspects of human nature. Unlike many books on the topic, which focus on abstractions like kin selection, this book focuses on Darwinian explanations of why we are the way we are--emotionally and morally--and interweaves episodes from Darwin's own life as illuminating examples. Wright deals particularly well with explaining the reasons for the stereotypical dynamics of the three big "S's:" sex, siblings, and society.
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The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power
Daniel Yergin
Chronicles the history of the oil industry and the forces that have shaped the modern world.