Machine Politics

For decades, history has considered Tammany Hall, New York's famous political machine, shorthand for the worst of urban politics: graft, crime, and patronage personified by notoriously corrupt characters. Infamous crooks like William "Boss" Tweed dominate traditional histories of Tammany, distorting our understanding of a critical chapter of American political history. In Machine Made, historian and New York City journalist Terry Golway convincingly dismantles these stereotypes.

In The Win Machine, Ryan McBeth delivers a gripping techno-thriller that explores the terrifying power of technology, the dangers of unchecked ambition, and the razor-thin line between profit and catastrophe. As the countdown to global annihilation ticks away, the ultimate question emerges: How far would you go to win?

The second novel in the wildly popular First Law Trilogy from New York Times bestseller Joe Abercrombie. Superior Glokta has a problem. How do you defend a city surrounded by enemies and riddled with traitors, when your allies can by no means be trusted, and your predecessor vanished without a...

The New York Times bestselling first book in Joe Abercrombie's The Age of Madness Trilogy where the age of the machine dawns, but the age of magic refuses to die. The chimneys of industry rise over Adua and the world seethes with new opportunities. But old scores run deep as ever. On the...

Superintelligence asks the questions: What happens when machines surpass humans in general intelligence? Will artificial agents save or destroy us? Nick Bostrom lays the foundation for understanding the future of humanity and intelligent life. The human brain has some capabilities that the brains of other animals lack. It is to these distinctive capabilities that our species owes its dominant position. If machine brains surpassed human brains in general intelligence, then this new superintelligence could become extremely powerful - possibly beyond our control.

A galaxy on the brink of collapse. An order hunted from all sides. Ancient powers awakening in the Astral deep. And one mission that could doom — or save — everything. Now available in audiobook format — featuring Amazon’s Virtual Voice edition. The Dominion War Complete Series (Books 1–4) An epic, multi-faction space opera where Astral powers, political betrayal, and ancient enemies ignite a war that could consume the galaxy. Across a fractured galaxy, the balance of power is failing. The Edo — an elite order of Astral-sensitive warriors sworn to uphold peace — stand isolated...

AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES AND USA TODAY BESTSELLER A vital exploration as we head into the 2026 midterm elections of how right-wing extremism, media manipulation, and ideological echo chambers have eroded critical thinking and deepened political divisions—and how we can fight back to save our...

The Doomsday Machine is Ellsberg's hair-raising insider's account of the most dangerous arms buildup in the history of civilization, whose legacy - and renewal under the Obama administration - threatens the very survival of humanity. It is scarcely possible to estimate the true dangers of our present nuclear policies without penetrating the secret realities of the nuclear strategy of the late Eisenhower and early Kennedy years, when Ellsberg had high-level access to them.

Addiction by Design takes listeners into the intriguing world of machine gambling, an increasingly popular and absorbing form of play that blurs the line between human and machine, compulsion and control, risk and reward.

From the New York Times bestselling author of A Little Hatred comes a stunning fantasy novel that finds the world in an unstoppable revolution where heroes have nothing left to lose as darkness and destruction overtake everything. Chaos. Fury. Destruction. The Great Change is upon us . . . Some...

From the Industrial Revolution to the age of artificial intelligence, The Technology Trap takes a sweeping look at the history of technological progress and how it has radically shifted the distribution of economic and political power among society’s members.

“Lively. . . . Rousing. . . . Prophecy—roving, intelligent, irreducibly idiosyncratic—can expand our sense of possibility, starting now.” —The New York Times Book Review Tech empires are the prophets of the modern day, and like the ancient oracles and medieval astrologers that preceded...

Soul Machine takes us back to the origins of modernity, a time when a crisis in religious authority and the scientific revolution led to searching questions about the nature of human inner life. This is the story of how a new concept - the mind - emerged as a potential solution, one that was part soul and part machine but fully neither.

A fragile peace gives way to conspiracy, betrayal, and rebellion in this sequel to the New York Times bestselling A Little Hatred from epic fantasy master Joe Abercrombie. Peace is just another kind of battlefield . . . Savine dan Glokta, once Adua's most powerful investor, finds her judgement...

The cells in our bodies consist of molecules, made up of the same carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen atoms found in air and rocks. But molecules, such as water and sugar, are not alive. So how do our cells - assemblies of otherwise "dead" molecules - come to life, and together constitute a living being? In Life’s Ratchet, physicist Peter M. Hoffmann locates the answer to this age-old question at the nanoscale.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY WIRED In this brilliant smart-thinking book about the power and influence of social media, Professor Sinan Aral shows how ‘hyper-socialization’ has profoundly changed us. Why does fake news spread faster than the truth? Do products and ideas become...

What does it actually mean to be rational? Not Hollywood-style "rational", where you forsake all human feeling to embrace Cold Hard Logic, but where you make good decisions, even when it's hard; where you reason well, even in the face of massive uncertainty; where you recognize and make full use of your fuzzy intuitions and emotions, rather than trying to discard them. In Rationality: From AI to Zombies, Eliezer Yudkowsky explains the science underlying human irrationality with a mix of fables, argumentative essays, and personal vignettes.

An invaluable guide to understanding how the internet has broken our brains—and what we can do to fix it. "Vivid and unforgettable.” ―Jonathan Haidt, New York Times bestselling author of The Righteous Mind The original internet was not designed to make us upset, distracted, confused, and...

A magisterial intellectual history of the last century of American conservatism. "A superb work of scholarship and a delight to read." —Wall Street Journal When most people think of the history of modern conservatism, they think of Ronald Reagan. Yet this narrow view leaves many to question...

A landmark insider’s tour of how social media affects our decision-making and shapes our world in ways both useful and dangerous, with critical ideas on how to protect ourselves in the 2020 election and beyond MIT professor Sinan Aral isn’t only one of the world’s leading experts on...