Existence Origin And Weird Technology Exploring Humanity S Ultimate Questions

Author : Pentti O Haikonen
Publisher : World Scientific
Page : 250 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2022-10-21
Category : Science
ISBN : 9789811260742

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Existence, Origin And Weird Technology: Exploring Humanity's Ultimate Questions by Pentti O Haikonen Pdf

What are we humans, and how did we become the high technology species? What would be our legacy? What is the ultimate meaning of life? Many of these questions are still waiting for full and complete answers and explanations.For thousands of years humans have pondered the fundamental questions about origin, existence and reality, and also about mind, consciousness, communication and social issues. In this day and age when advancing technology is quickly transforming our societies and our ways of life, these questions are more important than ever, not only in the theoretical sense, but also in practice. We have to understand what has happened, and what is happening.For the first time in the history, technology has given us powerful means to investigate the phenomena behind the ultimate questions. However, technology is only a tool; the thinking human is still required for the understanding of the world.This book explores these curious topics, beginning from the origin of the Universe to the emergence of life; the evolution from cells to brains; the development of cognitive ability from perception and attention to reasoning and thinking; how we interact with other humans by means of love and emotion; to the creation of thinking machines by weird technology.THIS BOOK presents novel views on these questions and provides explanations and possible answers in an easy-to-read style.

Author : Nick Lane
Publisher : Profile Books
Page : 569 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2015-04-23
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781847658807

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The Vital Question by Nick Lane Pdf

Why is life the way it is? Bacteria evolved into complex life just once in four billion years of life on earth-and all complex life shares many strange properties, from sex to ageing and death. If life evolved on other planets, would it be the same or completely different? In The Vital Question, Nick Lane radically reframes evolutionary history, putting forward a cogent solution to conundrums that have troubled scientists for decades. The answer, he argues, lies in energy: how all life on Earth lives off a voltage with the strength of a bolt of lightning. In unravelling these scientific enigmas, making sense of life's quirks, Lane's explanation provides a solution to life's vital questions: why are we as we are, and why are we here at all? This is ground-breaking science in an accessible form, in the tradition of Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species, Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene, and Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel.

Author : David Graeber,David Wengrow
Publisher : Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 2021-11-09
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9780374721107

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The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber,David Wengrow Pdf

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A dramatically new understanding of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution—from the development of agriculture and cities to the origins of the state, democracy, and inequality—and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation. For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike—either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself. Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume. The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action. Includes Black-and-White Illustrations

Author : Hanya Yanagihara
Publisher : Anchor
Page : 834 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2016-01-26
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9780804172707

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A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara Pdf

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A stunning “portrait of the enduring grace of friendship” (NPR) about the families we are born into, and those that we make for ourselves. A masterful depiction of love in the twenty-first century. NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST • MAN BOOKER PRIZE FINALIST • WINNER OF THE KIRKUS PRIZE A Little Life follows four college classmates—broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition—as they move to New York in search of fame and fortune. While their relationships, which are tinged by addiction, success, and pride, deepen over the decades, the men are held together by their devotion to the brilliant, enigmatic Jude, a man scarred by an unspeakable childhood trauma. A hymn to brotherly bonds and a masterful depiction of love in the twenty-first century, Hanya Yanagihara’s stunning novel is about the families we are born into, and those that we make for ourselves. Look for Hanya Yanagihara’s latest bestselling novel, To Paradise.

Author : Max Tegmark
Publisher : Vintage
Page : 385 pages
File Size : 53,9 Mb
Release : 2017-08-29
Category : Technology & Engineering
ISBN : 9781101946602

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Life 3.0 by Max Tegmark Pdf

New York Times Best Seller How will Artificial Intelligence affect crime, war, justice, jobs, society and our very sense of being human? The rise of AI has the potential to transform our future more than any other technology—and there’s nobody better qualified or situated to explore that future than Max Tegmark, an MIT professor who’s helped mainstream research on how to keep AI beneficial. How can we grow our prosperity through automation without leaving people lacking income or purpose? What career advice should we give today’s kids? How can we make future AI systems more robust, so that they do what we want without crashing, malfunctioning or getting hacked? Should we fear an arms race in lethal autonomous weapons? Will machines eventually outsmart us at all tasks, replacing humans on the job market and perhaps altogether? Will AI help life flourish like never before or give us more power than we can handle? What sort of future do you want? This book empowers you to join what may be the most important conversation of our time. It doesn’t shy away from the full range of viewpoints or from the most controversial issues—from superintelligence to meaning, consciousness and the ultimate physical limits on life in the cosmos.

Author : Loyal D. Rue
Publisher : Rutgers University Press
Page : 409 pages
File Size : 50,6 Mb
Release : 2005
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780813535111

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Religion is Not about God by Loyal D. Rue Pdf

Annotation If religion is not about God, then what on earth is it about? Loyal Rue contends that religion is a series of strategies that aims to influence human nature so that we might think, feel, and act in ways that are good for us, both individually and collectively.

Author : Timothy Taylor
Publisher : St. Martin's Press
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2010-07-20
Category : Science
ISBN : 023010973X

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The Artificial Ape by Timothy Taylor Pdf

A breakthrough theory that tools and technology are the real drivers of human evolution Although humans are one of the great apes, along with chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans, we are remarkably different from them. Unlike our cousins who subsist on raw food, spend their days and nights outdoors, and wear a thick coat of hair, humans are entirely dependent on artificial things, such as clothing, shelter, and the use of tools, and would die in nature without them. Yet, despite our status as the weakest ape, we are the masters of this planet. Given these inherent deficits, how did humans come out on top? In this fascinating new account of our origins, leading archaeologist Timothy Taylor proposes a new way of thinking about human evolution through our relationship with objects. Drawing on the latest fossil evidence, Taylor argues that at each step of our species' development, humans made choices that caused us to assume greater control of our evolution. Our appropriation of objects allowed us to walk upright, lose our body hair, and grow significantly larger brains. As we push the frontiers of scientific technology, creating prosthetics, intelligent implants, and artificially modified genes, we continue a process that started in the prehistoric past, when we first began to extend our powers through objects. Weaving together lively discussions of major discoveries of human skeletons and artifacts with a reexamination of Darwin's theory of evolution, Taylor takes us on an exciting and challenging journey that begins to answer the fundamental question about our existence: what makes humans unique, and what does that mean for our future?

Author : David Toomey
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Page : 246 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2013-02-26
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780393089943

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Weird Life: The Search for Life That Is Very, Very Different from Our Own by David Toomey Pdf

“Weird indeed, and not a little wonderful.”—Nature In the 1980s and 1990s, in places where no one thought it possible, scientists found organisms they called extremophiles: lovers of extremes. There were bacteria in volcanic hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor, single-celled algae in Antarctic ice floes, and fungi in the cooling pools of nuclear reactors. But might there be life stranger than the most extreme extremophile? Might there be, somewhere, another kind of life entirely? In fact, scientists have hypothesized life that uses ammonia instead of water, life based not in carbon but in silicon, life driven by nuclear chemistry, and life whose very atoms are unlike those in life we know. In recent years some scientists have begun to look for the tamer versions of such life on rock surfaces in the American Southwest, in a “shadow biosphere” that might impinge on the known biosphere, and even deep within human tissue. They have also hypothesized more radical versions that might survive in Martian permafrost, in the cold ethylene lakes on Saturn’s moon Titan, and in the hydrogen-rich atmospheres of giant planets in other solar systems. And they have imagined it in places off those worlds: the exotic ices in comets, the vast spaces between the stars, and—strangest of all—parallel universes. Distilling complex science in clear and lively prose, David Toomey illuminates the research of the biological avant-garde and describes the workings of weird organisms in riveting detail. His chapters feature an unforgettable cast of brilliant scientists and cover everything from problems with our definitions of life to the possibility of intelligent weird life. With wit and understanding that will delight scientists and lay readers alike, Toomey reveals how our current knowledge of life forms may account for only a tiny fraction of what’s really out there.

Author : Stephen Wolfram
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 1197 pages
File Size : 45,6 Mb
Release : 2002
Category : Cellular automata
ISBN : 071399116X

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A New Kind of Science by Stephen Wolfram Pdf

This work presents a series of dramatic discoveries never before made public. Starting from a collection of simple computer experiments---illustrated in the book by striking computer graphics---Wolfram shows how their unexpected results force a whole new way of looking at the operation of our universe. Wolfram uses his approach to tackle a remarkable array of fundamental problems in science: from the origin of the Second Law of thermodynamics, to the development of complexity in biology, the computational limitations of mathematics, the possibility of a truly fundamental theory of physics, and the interplay between free will and determinism.

Author : Michael Shermer
Publisher : Holt Paperbacks
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 43,5 Mb
Release : 2002-09-01
Category : Science
ISBN : 1429996765

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Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer Pdf

Revised and Expanded Edition. In this age of supposed scientific enlightenment, many people still believe in mind reading, past-life regression theory, New Age hokum, and alien abduction. A no-holds-barred assault on popular superstitions and prejudices, with more than 80,000 copies in print, Why People Believe Weird Things debunks these nonsensical claims and explores the very human reasons people find otherworldly phenomena, conspiracy theories, and cults so appealing. In an entirely new chapter, "Why Smart People Believe in Weird Things," Michael Shermer takes on science luminaries like physicist Frank Tippler and others, who hide their spiritual beliefs behind the trappings of science. Shermer, science historian and true crusader, also reveals the more dangerous side of such illogical thinking, including Holocaust denial, the recovered-memory movement, the satanic ritual abuse scare, and other modern crazes. Why People Believe Strange Things is an eye-opening resource for the most gullible among us and those who want to protect them.

Author : Max Tegmark
Publisher : Vintage
Page : 434 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 2015-02-03
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780307744258

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Our Mathematical Universe by Max Tegmark Pdf

Max Tegmark leads us on an astonishing journey through past, present and future, and through the physics, astronomy and mathematics that are the foundation of his work, most particularly his hypothesis that our physical reality is a mathematical structure and his theory of the ultimate multiverse. In a dazzling combination of both popular and groundbreaking science, he not only helps us grasp his often mind-boggling theories, but he also shares with us some of the often surprising triumphs and disappointments that have shaped his life as a scientist. Fascinating from first to last—this is a book that has already prompted the attention and admiration of some of the most prominent scientists and mathematicians.

Author : Adam Rutherford
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2013-06-13
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781101622629

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Creation by Adam Rutherford Pdf

What is life? Humans have been asking this question for thou­sands of years. But as technology has advanced and our understanding of biology has deepened, the answer has evolved. For decades, scientists have been exploring the limits of nature by modifying and manipulating DNA, cells and whole organisms to create new ones that could never have existed on their own. In Creation, science writer Adam Rutherford explains how we are now radically exceeding the boundaries of evolution and engineering entirely novel creatures—from goats that produce spider silk in their milk to bacteria that excrete diesel to genetic circuits that identify and destroy cancer cells. As strange as some of these creations may sound, this new, synthetic biology is helping scientists develop radical solutions to some of the world’s most pressing crises—from food shortages to pandemic disease to climate change—and is paving the way for inventions once relegated to science fiction. Meanwhile, these advances are shedding new light on the biggest mystery of all—how did life begin? We know that every creature on Earth came from a single cell, sparked into existence four billion years ago. And as we come closer and closer to understanding the ancient root that connects all living things, we may finally be able to achieve a second genesis—the creation of new life where none existed before. Creation takes us on a journey four billion years in the making—from the very first cell to the ground-breaking biological inventions that will shape the future of our planet.

Author : Tim Kreider
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2013-04-09
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9781439198711

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We Learn Nothing by Tim Kreider Pdf

A New York Times political cartoonist and writer presents a collection of his most popular essays and drawings about life and government hypocrisy, exploring the darkly comic aspects of such topics as falling in love with unlikeable people, managing a friend with outspoken political views and reacting to a long acquaintance's sex-change operation. By the creator of The Pain--When Will It End?

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 740 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2004
Category : Sydney (N.S.W.)
ISBN : UCSC:32106017069268

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The Bulletin by Anonim Pdf

Author : Rosalind J. Marsh
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 203 pages
File Size : 49,5 Mb
Release : 2022-03-14
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 9781000562309

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Soviet Fiction since Stalin by Rosalind J. Marsh Pdf

First published in 1986, Soviet Fiction since Stalin presents a comprehensive overview of the literature of the post Stalin period in the Soviet Union. The rapid advances in science and technology in these years are reflected in the themes of many of the major novelists – Pasternak, Solzhenitsyn, Sinyavsky, Daniel and Grossman- and scientific subjects frequently offer a vehicle for the exploration of the wider socio-political, moral, and philosophical ideas. As the period advances, however, literature becomes the first medium in which to express mistrust of scientific advance, and hence, indirectly, of Soviet policy as a whole. Rosalind J. Marsh uses a broad definition of ‘science’ which enables her to cover topics ranging from de-Stalinization, nationalism, and anti- Semitism in science, to Lysenko and scientific charlatanism, the Soviet rejection of relativity theory and quantum mechanics, the atom bomb, and also such general problems as secrecy, careerism, and bureaucracy. The bulk of the book concentrates on the Khrushchev years but there is also plentiful discussion of more recent writing such as that of Zinoviev and Voinovich. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of Soviet literature, Russian Literature and literature in general.