Download or read book Stories Dice and Rocks That Think written by Byron Reese and published by BenBella Books. This book was released on 2022-08-23 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Byron Reese gets to the heart of what makes humans different from all others." —Midwest Book Review What makes the human mind so unique? And how did we get this way? This fascinating tale explores the three leaps in our history that made us what we are—and will change how you think about our future. Look around. Clearly, we humans are radically different from the other creatures on this planet. But why? Where are the Bronze Age beavers? The Iron Age iguanas? In Stories, Dice, and Rocks That Think, Byron Reese argues that we owe our special status to our ability to imagine the future and recall the past, escaping the perpetual present that all other living creatures are trapped in. Envisioning human history as the development of a societal superorganism he names Agora, Reese shows us how this escape enabled us to share knowledge on an unprecedented scale, and predict—and eventually master—the future. Thoughtful, witty, and compulsively readable, Reese unravels our history as an intelligent species in three acts: Act I: Ancient humans undergo “the awakening,” developing the cognitive ability to mentally time-travel using language Act II: In 17th century France, the mathematical framework known as 'probability theory' is born—a science for seeing into the future that we used to build the modern world Act III: Beginning with the invention of the computer chip, humanity creates machines to gaze into the future with even more precision, overcoming the limits of our brains A fresh new look at the history and destiny of humanity, readers will come away from Stories, Dice, and Rocks that Think with a new understanding of what they are—not just another animal, but a creature with a mastery of time itself.
Download or read book Infinite Progress written by Byron Reese and published by Greenleaf Book Group. This book was released on 2013 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Social Forecasting, Futurology.
Download or read book The Fourth Age written by Byron Reese and published by Atria Books. This book was released on 2020-03-17 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As we approach a great turning point in history when technology is poised to redefine what it means to be human, The Fourth Age offers fascinating insight into AI, robotics, and their extraordinary implications for our species. “If you only read just one book about the AI revolution, make it this one” (John Mackey, cofounder and CEO, Whole Foods Market). In The Fourth Age, Byron Reese makes the case that technology has reshaped humanity just three times in history: 100,000 years ago, we harnessed fire, which led to language; 10,000 years ago, we developed agriculture, which led to cities and warfare; 5,000 years ago, we invented the wheel and writing, which lead to the nation state. We are now on the doorstep of a fourth change brought about by two technologies: AI and robotics. “Timely, highly informative, and certainly optimistic” (Booklist), The Fourth Age provides an essential background on how we got to this point, and how—rather than what—we should think about the topics we’ll soon all be facing: machine consciousness, automation, changes in employment, creative computers, radical life extension, artificial life, AI ethics, the future of warfare, superintelligence, and the implications of extreme prosperity. By asking questions like “Are you a machine?” and “Could a computer feel anything?”, Reese leads you through a discussion along the cutting edge in robotics and AI, and provides a framework by which we can all understand, discuss, and act on the issues of the Fourth Age and how they’ll transform humanity.
Download or read book Wasted written by Byron Reese and published by Currency. This book was released on 2021-06-01 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wasted is a riveting exploration of the complicated, and often surprising, ways that waste occurs in our businesses, our communities, and our lives “A smart, unconventional book that takes readers far beyond what they think they know about a complex subject.”—Kari Byron, former cast member of MythBusters Waste. We spend a great deal of energy trying to avoid it, but once you train your eyes to look for it, you’ll see it all around you—in your home, your business, and your everyday life. In Wasted, futurist Byron Reese and entrepreneur Scott Hoffman take readers on a fascinating journey through this modern world of waste, drawing on science, economics, and human behavior to envision what a world with far less of it—or none of it at all—might look like. Along the way, they explore thought-provoking issues such as • why the United States got a higher proportion of its energy from renewable sources in 1950 than it does today • whether the amount of gold in unused mobile phones can be extracted for profit • how switching to water fountains on a single route from Singapore to Newark could prevent the use of 3,400 plastic bottles—on each flight • whether the amount of money you save buying goods in bulk is offset by the amount you lose when some spoil. Ultimately, the question of reducing waste is scientific, philosophical, and, most of all, complex. According to Reese and Hoffman, the rush toward simple answers has often led to well-meaning efforts that cause more waste than they save. The only way we can hope to make progress is to treat waste as the complicated issue it is. While the authors don’t promise easy answers, in this compelling book they take an important step toward solutions by examining the questions at play, giving actionable steps, and ensuring that you’ll never see the world of waste the same way again.
Download or read book Tenth of December written by George Saunders and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-01-03 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The prize-winning, New York Times bestselling short story collection from the internationally bestselling author of Lincoln in the Bardo 'The best book you'll read this year' New York Times 'Dazzlingly surreal stories about a failing America' Sunday Times WINNER OF THE 2014 FOLIO PRIZE AND SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD 2013 George Saunders's most wryly hilarious and disturbing collection yet, Tenth of December illuminates human experience and explores figures lost in a labyrinth of troubling preoccupations. A family member recollects a backyard pole dressed for all occasions; Jeff faces horrifying ultimatums and the prospect of Darkenfloxx(TM) in some unusual drug trials; and Al Roosten hides his own internal monologue behind a winning smile that he hopes will make him popular. With dark visions of the future riffing against ghosts of the past and the ever-settling present, this collection sings with astonishing charm and intensity.
Download or read book Tiptoe Into Kindergarten written by Jacqueline Rogers and published by Turtleback Books. This book was released on 2003-05 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Loaded Dice written by James Swain and published by . This book was released on 2004-08 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Valentine is in Las Vegas, on the trail of his wayward son, Gerry, who has gone AWOL from card-counting school. Mixing work with parental responsibility, Tony also agrees to help maverick casino owner Nick Nicocropolis prevent two rival owners from putting him out of business.
Download or read book We Are Agora written by Byron Reese and published by BenBella Books. This book was released on 2023-12-12 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover a groundbreaking new way of thinking about life, society, and the future of our species that bridges science and human history. Could humans unknowingly be a part of a larger superorganism—one with its own motivations and goals, one that is alive, and conscious, and has the power to shape the future of our species? This is the fascinating theory from author and futurist Byron Reese, who calls this human superorganism “Agora.” In We Are Agora, Reese starts by asking the question, “What is life and how did it form?” From there, he looks at how multicellular life came about, how consciousness emerged, and how other superorganisms in nature have formed. Then, he poses eight big questions based on the Agora theory, including: If ants have colonies, bees have hives, and we have our bodies, how does Agora manifest itself? Does it have a body? Can Agora explain things that happen that are both under our control and near universally undesirable, such as war? How can Agora theory explain long-term progress we’ve made in the world? In this unique and ambitious work that spans all of human history and looks boldly into its future, Reese melds science and history to look at the human species from a fresh new perspective. Told with his characteristic wit and compulsive readability, We Are Agora will give readers a better understanding of where we’ve been, where we’re going, and how our fates are intertwined.
Download or read book Touching Ice written by Laurann Dohner and published by . This book was released on 2016-11-21 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What can go wrong overseeing a bunch of android sex bots on an automated whorehouse in deep space? Great job, if Megan doesn't die of boredom. Then she catches sight of the sexiest male she's ever seen. On her grainy security monitor, she watches all his sexual exploits with the bots, and fantasizes. But that's all she can do because he's a cyborg. Then fate steps in. There's a crash and Megan must escape or die. The cyborgs are rescuing the sex bots-taking them onboard their ship. She knows cyborgs hate humans. They'll kill her if she asks for help so she devises an insane plan-pretend to be the most realistic sex bot ever made. His name is Ice, and Megan is now his personal sex bot. He will satisfy every sexual fantasy she's ever had-and as many more as she can dream up. She just has to figure out how to keep her big, sexy cyborg from discovering that she is all woman.
Download or read book The Light Between Oceans written by M.L. Stedman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012 with total page 339 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A cloth bag containing ten copies of the title.
Download or read book Blindsight written by Peter Watts and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2006-10-03 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hugo and Shirley Jackson award-winning Peter Watts stands on the cutting edge of hard SF with his acclaimed novel, Blindsight Two months since the stars fell... Two months of silence, while a world held its breath. Now some half-derelict space probe, sparking fitfully past Neptune's orbit, hears a whisper from the edge of the solar system: a faint signal sweeping the cosmos like a lighthouse beam. Whatever's out there isn't talking to us. It's talking to some distant star, perhaps. Or perhaps to something closer, something en route. So who do you send to force introductions with unknown and unknowable alien intellect that doesn't wish to be met? You send a linguist with multiple personalities, her brain surgically partitioned into separate, sentient processing cores. You send a biologist so radically interfaced with machinery that he sees x-rays and tastes ultrasound. You send a pacifist warrior in the faint hope she won't be needed. You send a monster to command them all, an extinct hominid predator once called vampire, recalled from the grave with the voodoo of recombinant genetics and the blood of sociopaths. And you send a synthesist—an informational topologist with half his mind gone—as an interface between here and there. Pray they can be trusted with the fate of a world. They may be more alien than the thing they've been sent to find. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Download or read book More of Us to the West written by Trinity Dunn and published by . This book was released on 2021-04-14 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two very different worlds for two very different lives.When tragedy strikes, her love story is anything but over.
Download or read book Backlash written by Sarah Darer Littman and published by Scholastic Inc.. This book was released on 2015-04-28 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In critically acclaimed author Sarah Darer Littman's gripping new novel what happens online doesn't always stay online . . . Lara just got told off on Facebook. She thought that Christian liked her, that he was finally going to ask her to his school's homecoming dance. It's been a long time since Lara's felt this bad, this depressed. She's worked really hard since starting high school to be happy and make new friends.Bree used to be BBFs with overweight, depressed Lara in middle school, but constantly listening to Lara's problems got to be too much. Bree's secretly glad that Christian's pointed out Lara's flaws to the world. Lara's not nearly as great as everyone thinks.After weeks of talking online, Lara thought she knew Christian, so what's with this sudden change? And where does he get off saying horrible things on her wall? Even worse - are they true?But no one realized just how far Christian's harsh comments would push Lara. Not even Bree. As online life collides with real life, the truth starts to come together and the backlash is even more devastating than anyone could have imagined.
Download or read book It s Not Your Mother s Bridge Club written by Michele VanOrt Cozzens and published by Sandy Point Resort. This book was released on 2008 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eight women who are middle-aged, middle to upper-middle class, and in the middle of each other's lives, gather each month to play bunko. It's an eventful year in which friendships are tested and strengthened, and true characters are revealed.
Download or read book My Family and Other Animals written by Gerald Durrell and published by Penguin Books Limited. This book was released on 2011-04-07 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'What we all need,' said Larry, 'is sunshine . . . a country where we can grow.' 'Yes, dear, that would be nice,' agreed Mother, not really listening. 'I had a letter from George this morning - he says Corfu's wonderful. Why don't we pack up and go to Greece?' 'Very well, dear, if you like,' said Mother unguardedly. Escaping the ills of the British climate, the Durrell family - acne-ridden Margo, gun-toting Leslie, bookworm Lawrence and budding naturalist Gerry, along with their long-suffering mother and Roger the dog - take off for the island of Corfu. But the Durrells find that, reluctantly, they must share their various villas with a menagerie of local fauna - among them scorpions, geckos, toads, bats and butterflies. Recounted with immense humour and charm My Family and Other Animals is a wonderful account of a rare, magical childhood. 'Durrell has an uncanny knack of discovering human as well as animal eccentricities' Sunday Telegraph
Download or read book Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes written by Cory O'Brien and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2013-03-05 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the creator of Myths Retold comes a hilarious collection of Greek, Norse, Chinese and even Sumerian myths retold in their purest, bawdiest forms! All our lives, we’ve been fed watered-down, PC versions of the classic myths. In reality, mythology is more screwed up than a schizophrenic shaman doing hits of unidentified…wait, it all makes sense now. In Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes, Cory O’Brien, creator of Myths RETOLD!, sets the stories straight. These are rude, crude, totally sacred texts told the way they were meant to be told: loudly, and with lots of four-letter words. Did you know? Cronus liked to eat babies. Narcissus probably should have just learned to masturbate. Odin got construction discounts with bestiality. Isis had bad taste in jewelry. Ganesh was the very definition of an unplanned pregnancy. And Abraham was totally cool about stabbing his kid in the face. Still skeptical? Here are a few more gems to consider: • Zeus once stuffed an unborn fetus inside his thigh to save its life after he exploded its mother by being too good in bed. • The entire Egyptian universe was saved because Sekhmet just got too hammered to keep murdering everyone. • The Hindu universe is run by a married couple who only stop murdering in order to throw sweet dance parties…on the corpses of their enemies. • The Norse goddess Freyja once consented to a four-dwarf gangbang in exchange for one shiny necklace. And there’s more dysfunctional goodness where that came from.
Download or read book The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie written by Muriel Spark and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2012-03-20 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A perfect book”—and basis for the Maggie Smith film—about a teacher who makes a lasting impression on her female students in the years before World War II (Chicago Tribune). “Give me a girl at an impressionable age, and she is mine for life!” So asserts Jean Brodie, a magnetic, dubious, and sometimes comic teacher at the conservative Marcia Blaine School for Girls in Edinburgh. Brodie selects six favorite pupils to mold—and she doesn’t stop with just their intellectual lives. She has a plan for them all, including how they will live, whom they will love, and what sacrifices they will make to uphold her ideals. When the girls reach adulthood and begin to find their own destinies, Jean Brodie’s indelible imprint is a gift to some, and a curse to others. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is Spark’s masterpiece, a novel that offers one of twentieth-century English literature’s most iconic and complex characters—a woman at once admirable and sinister, benevolent and conniving. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Muriel Spark including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author’s archive at the National Library of Scotland.
