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From the author of the acclaimed The Brother Gardeners, a fascinating look at the founding fathers from the unique and intimate perspective of their lives as gardeners, plantsmen, and farmers. For the founding fathers, gardening, agriculture, and botany were elemental passions, as deeply ingrained in their characters as their belief in liberty for the nation they were creating. These stories reveal a guiding but previously overlooked ideology of the American Revolution.
I hate every wave of the ocean', the seasick Charles Darwin wrote to his family during his five-year voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle. It was this world-wide journey, however, that launched the scientists career.
Although mammals and birds are widely regarded as the smartest creatures on earth, it has lately become clear that a very distant branch of the tree of life has also sprouted higher intelligence: the cephalopods, consisting of the squid, the cuttlefish, and above all the octopus. In captivity, octopuses have been known to identify individual human keepers, raid neighboring tanks for food, turn off lightbulbs by spouting jets of water, plug drains, and make daring escapes.
David Roberts, "veteran mountain climber and chronicler of adventures" (Washington Post), has spent his career documenting voyages to the most extreme landscapes on earth. In Limits of the Known, he reflects on humanity's - and his own - relationship to extreme risk. Part memoir and part history, this book tries to make sense of why so many have committed their lives to the desperate pursuit of adventure.
In 1793, William Smith, the orphan son of a village blacksmith, made a startling discovery that was to turn the science of geology on its head. While surveying the route for a canal near Bath, he noticed that the fossils found in one layer of the rocks he was excavating were very different from those found in another. And out of that realization came an epiphany: that by following these fossils one could trace layers of rocks as they dipped, rose and fell, clear across England and clear across the world.
A riveting exploration of how microbes are transforming the way we see nature and ourselves - and could revolutionize agriculture and medicine. Prepare to set aside what you think you know about yourself and microbes. Good health - for people and for plants - depends on Earth's smallest creatures. The Hidden Half of Nature tells the story of our tangled relationship with microbes and their potential to revolutionize agriculture and medicine, from garden to gut.
From the author of the acclaimed The Brother Gardeners, a fascinating look at the founding fathers from the unique and intimate perspective of their lives as gardeners, plantsmen, and farmers. For the founding fathers, gardening, agriculture, and botany were elemental passions, as deeply ingrained in their characters as their belief in liberty for the nation they were creating. These stories reveal a guiding but previously overlooked ideology of the American Revolution.
I hate every wave of the ocean', the seasick Charles Darwin wrote to his family during his five-year voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle. It was this world-wide journey, however, that launched the scientists career.
Although mammals and birds are widely regarded as the smartest creatures on earth, it has lately become clear that a very distant branch of the tree of life has also sprouted higher intelligence: the cephalopods, consisting of the squid, the cuttlefish, and above all the octopus. In captivity, octopuses have been known to identify individual human keepers, raid neighboring tanks for food, turn off lightbulbs by spouting jets of water, plug drains, and make daring escapes.
David Roberts, "veteran mountain climber and chronicler of adventures" (Washington Post), has spent his career documenting voyages to the most extreme landscapes on earth. In Limits of the Known, he reflects on humanity's - and his own - relationship to extreme risk. Part memoir and part history, this book tries to make sense of why so many have committed their lives to the desperate pursuit of adventure.
In 1793, William Smith, the orphan son of a village blacksmith, made a startling discovery that was to turn the science of geology on its head. While surveying the route for a canal near Bath, he noticed that the fossils found in one layer of the rocks he was excavating were very different from those found in another. And out of that realization came an epiphany: that by following these fossils one could trace layers of rocks as they dipped, rose and fell, clear across England and clear across the world.
A riveting exploration of how microbes are transforming the way we see nature and ourselves - and could revolutionize agriculture and medicine. Prepare to set aside what you think you know about yourself and microbes. Good health - for people and for plants - depends on Earth's smallest creatures. The Hidden Half of Nature tells the story of our tangled relationship with microbes and their potential to revolutionize agriculture and medicine, from garden to gut.
How do trees live? Do they feel pain or have awareness of their surroundings? Research is now suggesting trees are capable of much more than we have ever known. In The Hidden Life of Trees, forester Peter Wohlleben puts groundbreaking scientific discoveries into a language everyone can relate to.
Acclaimed scientist Hope Jahren has built three laboratories in which she's studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. Her first book might have been a revelatory treatise on plant life. Lab Girl is that, but it is also so much more. Because in it, Jahren also shares with us her inspiring life story, in prose that takes your breath away.
There are redwoods in California that were ancient by the time Columbus first landed and pines still alive that germinated around the time humans invented writing. There are Douglas firs as tall as skyscrapers and a banyan tree in Calcutta as big as a football field. From the tallest to the smallest, trees inspire wonder in all of us, and in The Tree, Colin Tudge travels around the world - throughout the United States, the Costa Rican rain forest, Panama and Brazil, India, New Zealand, China, and most of Europe - bringing to life stories and facts about the trees around us.
Leonardo da Vinci created the two most famous paintings in history, The Last Supper and the Mona Lisa. But in his own mind, he was just as much a man of science and engineering. With a passion that sometimes became obsessive, he pursued innovative studies of anatomy, fossils, birds, the heart, flying machines, botany, geology, and weaponry.
A major audiobook about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes. Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on Earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs.
Joining the ranks of popular science classics like The Botany of Desire and The Selfish Gene, a groundbreaking, wondrously informative, and vastly entertaining examination of the most significant revolution in biology since Darwin - a "microbe's-eye view" of the world that reveals a marvelous, radically reconceived picture of life on Earth.
Our world has ended five times: It has been broiled, frozen, poison gassed, smothered, and pelted by asteroids. In The Ends of the World, Peter Brannen dives into deep time, exploring Earth's past dead ends, and in the process offers us a glimpse of our possible future. Many scientists now believe that the climate shifts of the 21st century have analogs in these five extinctions.
First published in 1949 and praised in the New York Times Book Review as "full of beauty and vigor and bite", A Sand County Almanac combines some of the finest nature writing since Thoreau with an outspoken and highly ethical regard for America's relationship to the land. This classic work remains as relevant today as it was nearly 70 years ago.
Darwin developed the theory of sexual selection to explain why the animal world abounds in stunning beauty, from the brilliant colors of butterflies and fishes to the songs of birds and frogs. He argued that animals have "a taste for the beautiful" that drives their potential mates to evolve features that make them more sexually attractive and reproductively successful. But if Darwin explained why sexual beauty evolved in animals, he struggled to understand how.
Most books about the history of humanity pursue either a historical or a biological approach, but Dr. Yuval Noah Harari breaks the mold with this highly original book. From examining the role evolving humans have played in the global ecosystem to charting the rise of empires, Sapiens integrates history and science to reconsider accepted narratives, connect past developments with contemporary concerns, and examine specific events within the context of larger ideas.
Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution. Losos' insights into natural selection and evolutionary change have far-reaching applications for protecting ecosystems, securing our food supply, and fighting off harmful viruses and bacteria. This compelling narrative offers a new understanding of ourselves and our role in the natural world and the cosmos.
Paper is one of the simplest and most essential pieces of human technology. For the past two millennia, the ability to produce it in ever more efficient ways has supported the proliferation of literacy, media, religion, education, commerce, and art; it has formed the foundation of civilizations, promoting revolutions and restoring stability.
Winner of the Costa Biography Award 2015. Winner of the LA Times Book Prize 2015 (Science and Technology). Shortlisted for the Independent Book Week Award 2016.
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) is the great lost scientist: more things are named after him than anyone else. There are towns, rivers, mountain ranges, the ocean current that runs along the South American coast; there's a penguin, a giant squid - even the Mare Humboldtianum on the moon.
His colourful adventures read like something out of a Boy's Own story: Humboldt explored deep into the rainforest, climbed the world's highest volcanoes and inspired princes and presidents, scientists and poets alike. Napoleon was jealous of him; Simon Bolívar's revolution was fuelled by his ideas; Darwin set sail on the Beagle because of Humboldt; and Jules Verne's Captain Nemo owned all his many books. He simply was, as one contemporary put it, 'the greatest man since the Deluge'.
A very enjoyable read about a fastinating man who's life was well lived and who has had far reaching influence during his lifetime and to present day. A vital part of anyone's reading collection who is interested in science writing and the environment. Michael Hall -Environmental photographer
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) - how much do we in Britain know about him? He was a 'visionary and thinker far ahead of his time who revolutionised the way we see the natural world' and this, his biography, is truly, truly, tremendous, brilliantly researched and intellectually rich. It won well-deserved huge acclaim and awards in 2015, including the Costa Biography prize.
In his long and staggeringly energetic life, Humboldt's achievements were enormous. The son of a wealthy Prussian aristocrat, he was able to finance his first mind-blowing 5-year expedition to Latin America in 1799 where he broke the mould of other adventurers by striving to communicate with the indigenous tribes and to understand their relationship with Nature. Nature was the key to Humboldt's life work. 'Nature is a living whole,' he said. 'not a dead aggregate.' Many years before anyone else he established that every living thing on earth is connected to another as though by a thread, and that human beings cause climate change through deforestation and excessive irrigation. He foresaw the catastrophic effects of cutting timber for the building of Europe's navies and reported even the destruction wrought by gases released into the atmosphere from centres of industry.
The whole story of Humboldt's enthralling and exciting life is densely packed with detail and there are equally stimulating side chapters on those whom Humboldt influenced including Goethe (who you would never have guessed had a collection of 18,000 rocks!), Bolivar, Darwin, Jefferson, Waldo Emerson, Thoreau, Haeckel and Marsh (whose wife who suffered from a painful back complaint accompanied her husband on expeditions carried on a board).
The narration is American with the American pronunciation of many words very different from the English. An American narration is appropriate however since Humboldt visited England only briefly, whilst in America his stature is huge with hundreds of places and geographical features named after him. I must admit that I found the narration monotonous because the tone was unvaried. But the content is so brilliant, I was happy to listen.
10 of 12 people found this review helpful
This is an incredible book and beautifully written. However the narration by someone who sounds like they should be doing movie trailers was really jarring. Check the sample to see if you can handle it.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful
I rarely read biographies & I normally find C18 European history very dull. But this book has awakened my interest. Most amazing fact about Humbolt (in my opinion): the huge number of gigantic ally famous people he met, indeed was acquainted with. A real science adventure story. But then ... Humbolt himself gets into a slightly shambling old age, & so does this book. There's a long tail, with mini-biographies of some of the main people influenced by Humbolt. That's still interesting but ... Well, less so.
6 of 8 people found this review helpful
and to him they revealed a global force behind nature, the movements of civilizations as well as of landmass. No one had ever approached botany in this way.”
Andrea Wulf, The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World
This is a fascinating book that rekindles the love of knowledge and nature, that explains some of the ideas and concepts thru which we see nature in this present time. A rediscovery of a man that pollinated the world with ideas that are still battling with religion's dogma that sees nature as subservient to man's needs to one where we are part of nature and indivisible from its processes and that we need to save nature before it's too late for humanity.
“The effects of the human species’ intervention were already ‘incalculable’, Humboldt insisted, and could become catastrophic if they continued to disturb the world so ‘brutally’. Humboldt would see again and again how humankind unsettled the balance of nature.”
― Andrea Wulf, The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World
Unlike most biographies this book presents how the work Alexander von Humboldt reverberated thru the thinkers of his time and how those waves are still lapping on our world and expanding beyond his name. Without an army or power he has influenced more of our world outlook than most figures from his time. He stood firm on his beliefs and and defended them even when inconvenient or financially imprudent (can you say that of many other human beings?). He opposed slavery and argued for equality for all and stood his ground with kings and dictators alike. He helped young scientist financially when he had no finances, he believed in a holistic approach to learning, appreciating the world for all it's beauty; art and sciences were one and the same to him .
“Knowledge, Humboldt believed, had to be shared, exchanged and made available to everybody.”
― Andrea Wulf, The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World
I need to read this book several more times to truly appreciate all the information in it. It reminded me how much I loved going out and observing nature as a child, walking in the Andes, looking for fossils seeing every rock as a message from the past a proof of life printed on a stone, looking at beetles and spiders without time, full of curiosity, sleeping on top of a hill face up floating on the world my chest almost touching the stars. Drinking cool water from springs and tasting the difference, loving it all, being part of it.
Any book that makes you feel that again is worth reading and sharing and perhaps that repercussion will spread a new love and respect for Nature, or a way to save it from ourselves.
10 of 14 people found this review helpful
If Charles Darwin was Luke Skywalker then Alexander Von Humboldt would be Obi Wan Kenobi.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
The performance is ideal for those who enjoy typical American documentaries. It is not conducive to active listening which a subject such as this requires. It blends into the background in a soporific way.
The book doesn't really know what it wants to be. Admittedly I didn't get to the end but it switched between a life story of Humboldt, lots of Goethe incidentals and an attempt to explain world events all coming together around Humboldt's life. The last of these is a mixture of subjects that occurred centuries apart to false statements (e.g. crop rotation discovered around the early industrial revolution? Tell that to the farmers using it for millennia around the globe).
Overall what seemed like a fascinating topic drove me to distraction - and to sleep.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
If you could sum up The Invention of Nature in three words, what would they be?
Pertinent ecological history
What other book might you compare The Invention of Nature to, and why?
None
What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?
Oh dear - this is where the criticism comes in, on what is otherwise an excellent book.
Firstly the positive - the narrator is very clear in his diction, which is good.
I don't like American accents generally, but they are not a problem for me normally. But the narrator has some really strange pronunciations, which I am sure are not "standard" American English. "Himalya" for the Himalaya is bad enough, but with a common word like "Parisian" I was driven to distraction.
Also there was not really sufficient feeling in the narrator's work - he was just narrating.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
The early chapters, when Humbolt was carrying out his explorations of South America, were by far the most interesting - it was fascinating to hear that issues such as climate change were being considered two hundred years ago, when many of today's politicians remain unconvinced.
Any additional comments?
I would certainly recommend this. I am not of a scientific bent, but I have thoroughly enjoyed this book, and would have enjoyed it more with a better chosen narrator.
3 of 4 people found this review helpful
A man for our season because he predicted the problems our planet would be in if our stewardship of the earth's resources were not wisely and scientifically managed.
5 of 7 people found this review helpful
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
I would recommend the book, but I would warn the listener that the voice of the reader is unexpressive. Worth sticking with it for the content.
What did you like best about this story?
I didn't now how important Humboldt was to the development of theories about the natural world - brilliant!
Who might you have cast as narrator instead of David Drummond?
Almost anyone.
Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
No laughing or crying, but I was fascinated.
5 of 7 people found this review helpful
An interesting story about one of the most influential people on the environmental movement and understanding nature.
I was perhaps expecting more as it won the Royal Society book prize, but I felt the book neither fulfilled in creating a compelling personal story of Humboldts story or of his seminal thoughts in reconstructing a whole scientific field. Arguably the best written bits are the influence on other scientists and authors. Worth it for those who have never heard of Humboldt.
Narration was clear, but too monotone for me.
3 of 4 people found this review helpful
What did you like most about The Invention of Nature?
A great read, I learned so much about this great man and his legacy.
What did you like best about this story?
A good easy to read story tying together various scientists as they learn from nature.
What about David Drummond’s performance did you like?
Easy to listen to.
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
Not for me, I needed to put it down, just to think about its message and how it affects us now.
Any additional comments?
Highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to understand more of nature.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful
struggled to finish quickly despite being well written. Definitely worth sticking with even if you have to chip away at it. Would have been nice with a different narrator, but was sufficient.
Timely read with Mankinds' reach into Space Living imminent. How can imagination save Nature from Economic Development?