Download or read book The Discovery of the Past written by Alain Schnapp and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every civilized society, beginning with that of the ancient Egyptians and Chinese, has entertained a passionate curiosity about its predecessors: we want to know about our past in order to understand and even manipulate our present. The means to that end is archaeology, whose history is the fascinating subject of The Discovery of the Past. Alain Schnapps' study is astonishing in the depth and breadth of its coverage. Beginning with the ancient Greek poet Hesiod and extending thought St. Augustine, Rabelais, Newton, and Thomas Jefferson, he shows that the history of archaeology is not one of uninterrupted progress, but of the rediscovery and reinterpretation -- often erratic -- of forgotten observations. The text is elegantly interwoven with illustrations and descriptions of objects surviving from antiquity, while extensive quotations from primary sources provide a fascinating insight into historical accounts. Contemporary depictions of ancient life, and incidents in its discovery, reveal the excitement of archaeological research.

Download or read book Antiquaries written by Rosemary Sweet and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2004-05-28 with total page 532 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eighteenth-century Britain saw an explosion of interest in its own past, a past now expanded to include more than classical history and high politics. Antiquaries, men interested in all aspects of the past, added a distinctive new dimension to literature in Georgian Britain in their attempts to reconstruct and recover the past. Corresponding and publishing in an extended network, antiquaries worked at preserving and investigating records and physical remains in England, Scotland and Ireland. In doing so they laid solid foundations for all future study in British prehistory, archaeology and numismatics, and for local and national history as a whole. Naturally, they saw the past partly in their own image. While many antiquaries were better at fieldwork and recording than at synthesis, most were neither crabbed eccentrics nor dilettanti. At their best, as in the works of Richard Gough or William Stukeley, antiquaries set new standards of accuracy and perception in fields ranging from the study of the ancient Britons to that of medieval architecture. Antiquaries is the definitive account of a great historical enterprise.

Download or read book Discovery of Ancient America written by David Allen Deal and published by . This book was released on 1984 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Errata slip inserted. Bibliography: p. 135-136.

Download or read book The Discovery of Global Warming written by Spencer R. Weart and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2001 a panel representing virtually all the world's governments and climate scientists announced that they had reached a consensus: the world was warming at a rate without precedent during at least the last ten millennia, and that warming was caused by the buildup of greenhouse gases from human activity. The consensus itself was at least a century in the making. The story of how scientists reached their conclusion--by way of unexpected twists and turns and in the face of formidable intellectual, financial, and political obstacles--is told for the first time in The Discovery of Global Warming. Spencer R. Weart lucidly explains the emerging science, introduces us to the major players, and shows us how the Earth's irreducibly complicated climate system was mirrored by the global scientific community that studied it. Unlike familiar tales of Science Triumphant, this book portrays scientists working on bits and pieces of a topic so complex that they could never achieve full certainty--yet so important to human survival that provisional answers were essential. Weart unsparingly depicts the conflicts and mistakes, and how they sometimes led to fruitful results. His book reminds us that scientists do not work in isolation, but interact in crucial ways with the political system and with the general public. The book not only reveals the history of global warming, but also analyzes the nature of modern scientific work as it confronts the most difficult questions about the Earth's future. Table of Contents: Preface 1. How Could Climate Change? 2. Discovering a Possibility 3. A Delicate System 4. A Visible Threat 5. Public Warnings 6. The Erratic Beast 7. Breaking into Politics 8. The Discovery Confirmed Reflections Milestones Notes Further Reading Index Reviews of this book: A soberly written synthesis of science and politics. --Gilbert Taylor, Booklist Reviews of this book: Charting the evolution and confirmation of the theory [of global warming], Spencer R. Weart, director of the Center for the History of Physics of the American Institute of Physics, dissects the interwoven threads of research and reveals the political and societal subtexts that colored scientists' views and the public reception their work received. --Andrew C. Revkin, New York Times Book Review Reviews of this book: It took a century for scientists to agree that gases produced by human activity were causing the world to warm up. Now, in an engaging book that reads like a detective story, physicist Weart reports the history of global warming theory, including the internal conflicts plaguing the research community and the role government has had in promoting climate studies. --Publishers Weekly Reviews of this book: It is almost two centuries since the French mathematician Jean Baptiste Fourier discovered that the Earth was far warmer than it had any right to be, given its distance from the Sun...Spencer Weart's book about how Fourier's initially inconsequential discovery finally triggered urgent debate about the future habitability of the Earth is lucid, painstaking and commendably brief, packing everything into 200 pages. --Fred Pearce, The Independent Reviews of this book: [The Discovery of Global Warming] is a well-written, well-researched and well-balanced account of the issues involved...This is not a sermon for the faithful, or verses from Revelation for the evangelicals, but a serious summary for those who like reasoned argument. Read it--and be converted. --John Emsley, Times Literary Supplement Reviews of this book: This is a terrific book...Perhaps the finest compliment I could give this book is to report that I intend to use it instead of my own book...for my climate class. The Discovery of Global Warming is more up-to-date, better balanced historically, beautifully written and, not least important, short and to the point. I think the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] needs to enlist a few good historians like Weart for its next assessment. --Stephen H. Schneider, Nature Reviews of this book: This short, well-written book by a science historian at the American Institute of Physics adds a serious voice to the overheated debate about global warming and would serve as a great starting point for anyone who wants to better understand the issue. --Maureen Christie, American Scientist Reviews of this book: I was very pleasantly surprised to find that Spencer Weart's account provides much valuable and interesting material about how the discipline developed--not just from the perspective of climate science but also within the context of the field's relation to other scientific disciplines, the media, political trends, and even 20th-century history (particularly the Cold War). In addition, Weart has done a valuable service by recording for posterity background information on some of the key discoveries and historical figures who contributed to our present understanding of the global warming problem. --Thomas J. Crowley, Science Reviews of this book: Weart has done us all a service by bringing the discovery of global warming into a short, compendious and persuasive book for a general readership. He is especially strong on the early days and the scientific background. --Crispin Tickell, Times Higher Education Supplement A Capricious Beast Ever since the days when he had trudged around fossil lake basins in Nevada for his doctoral thesis, Wally Broecker had been interested in sudden climate shifts. The reported sudden jumps of CO2 in Greenland ice cores stimulated him to put this interest into conjunction with his oceanographic interests. The result was a surprising and important calculation. The key was what Broecker later described as a "great conveyor belt'"of seawater carrying heat northward. . . . The energy carried to the neighborhood of Iceland was "staggering," Broecker realized, nearly a third as much as the Sun sheds upon the entire North Atlantic. If something were to shut down the conveyor, climate would change across much of the Northern Hemisphere' There was reason to believe a shutdown could happen swiftly. In many regions the consequences for climate would be spectacular. Broecker was foremost in taking this disagreeable news to the public. In 1987 he wrote that we had been treating the greenhouse effect as a 'cocktail hour curiosity,' but now 'we must view it as a threat to human beings and wildlife.' The climate system was a capricious beast, he said, and we were poking it with a sharp stick. I found the book enjoyable, thoughtful, and an excellent introduction to the history of what may be one of the most important subjects of the next one hundred years. --Clark Miller, University of Wisconsin The Discovery of Global Warming raises important scientific issues and topics and includes essential detail. Readers should be able to follow the discussion and emerge at the end with a good understanding of how scientists have developed a consensus on global warming, what it is, and what issues now face human society. --Thomas R. Dunlap, Texas A&M University

Download or read book Ten Discoveries That Rewrote History written by Patrick Hunt and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2007-09-25 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The world’s greatest archaeological finds and what they tell us about lost civilizations Renowned archaeologist Patrick Hunt brings his top ten list of ancient archaeological discoveries to life in this concise and captivating book. The Rosetta Stone, Troy, Nineveh's Assyrian Library, King Tut’s Tomb, Machu Picchu, Pompeii, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Thera, Olduvai Gorge, and the Tomb of 10,000 Warriors—Hunt reveals the fascinating stories of these amazing discoveries and explains the ways in which they added to our knowledge of human history and permanently altered our worldview. Part travel guide to the wonders of the world and part primer on ancient world history, Ten Discoveries That Rewrote History captures the awe and excitement of finding a lost window into ancient civilization.

Download or read book The Discovery of France A Historical Geography written by Graham Robb and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2008-10-17 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A witty, engaging narrative style…[Robb's] approach is particularly engrossing." —New York Times Book Review A narrative of exploration—full of strange landscapes and even stranger inhabitants—that explains the enduring fascination of France. While Gustave Eiffel was changing the skyline of Paris, large parts of France were still terra incognita. Even in the age of railways and newspapers, France was a land of ancient tribal divisions, prehistoric communication networks, and pre-Christian beliefs. French itself was a minority language. Graham Robb describes that unknown world in arresting narrative detail. He recounts the epic journeys of mapmakers, scientists, soldiers, administrators, and intrepid tourists, of itinerant workers, pilgrims, and herdsmen with their millions of migratory domestic animals. We learn how France was explored, charted, and colonized, and how the imperial influence of Paris was gradually extended throughout a kingdom of isolated towns and villages. The Discovery of France explains how the modern nation came to be and how poorly understood that nation still is today. Above all, it shows how much of France—past and present—remains to be discovered. A New York Times Notable Book, Publishers Weekly Best Book, Slate Best Book, and Booklist Editor's Choice.

Download or read book Drug Discovery written by Walter Sneader and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2005-10-31 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by a leading authority with an excellent reputation and ability for writing a good narrative, Drug Discovery: A History is a far cry from simply a list of chemical structures. This lively new text considers the origins, development and history of medicines that generate high media interest and have a huge social and economic impact on society. Set within a wide historical, social and cultural context, it provides expanded coverage of pre-twentieth century drugs, the huge advances made in the twentieth century and the latest developments in drug research. Hallmark features: Up-to-the-minute information in drug research Vignettes of special and unusual information, and anecdotes Discusses drug prototypes from all sources More comprehensive than other volumes on history of drug discovery From the reviews: "...an excellent bibliographic resource for those interested in the background papers that serve as the foundation for discovery of specific drug entities." JOURNAL OF MEDICAL CHEMISTRY, June 2006 "...a very comprehensive overview of drug development. It should be on the shelf on any aspiring pharmacist, medicinal chemist, or person interested in the history of therapeutic agents." JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION, February 2006 "...a very readable and closely researched book..." CHEMISTRY & INDUSTRY, October 2005

Download or read book Deep History written by Andrew Shryock and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2011-11-07 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This breakthrough book brings science into history to offer a dazzling new vision of humanity across time. Team-written by leading experts in a variety of fields, it maps events, cultures, and eras across millions of years to present a new scale for understanding the human body, energy and ecosystems, language, food, kinship, migration, and more.

Download or read book History written by DK and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2019-08-20 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Journey back in time and marvel at the history of our world like never before with this children's encyclopedia perfect for curious kids. Forming part of a fantastic series of kid's educational books, this bold and brilliant kid's encyclopedia uses ground-breaking CGI imagery to reveal the world as you've never seen it before. Informative, diverse in subject matter, easy-to-read and brimming with beautiful graphics, young learners can explore the incredibly detailed cross-sections and cutaways that reveal the inner workings of just about everything! This charming children’s encyclopedia opens the world in new ways, with: - Packed with facts, charts, timelines, and infographics that cover a vast range of topics. - Encompassing a visual approach with illustrations, photographs and extremely detailed 3D CGI images. - Crystal clear text distills the key information. - DK's encyclopedias are fact-checked by subject experts to offer accuracy beyond online sources of information. This fully-updated edition of Knowledge Encyclopedia History! is the perfect encyclopedia for children aged 9-12, ideal for inquisitive minds, bringing key moments in history to life, from exploring the lives of early humans to visiting the Vikings, learning about The Industrial Revolution, and looking towards a greener future! Jam-packed with fun facts about the world, including fascinating statistics, maps, timelines, graphics, and superb photorealistic cross-sections, young history lovers can peer inside ancient buildings, marvel at elaborate outfits, and get close to the battles of history! Explore, Discover And Learn! DK's Knowledge Encyclopedia History! uncovers the marvels of our world in unprecedented detail and with stunning realism. Encompassing engaging historical facts about our world, you can spend quality time diving into the past with your children, accompanied by impressive visuals to engage their senses. A must-have volume for curious kids with a thirst for knowledge, this enthralling children’s encyclopedia is structured in such a way that your child can read a bit at a time, and feel comfortable to pause and ask questions. Doubling up as the perfect gift for young readers, who are always asking questions about our planet! At DK, we believe in the power of discovery. This thrilling kid’s encyclopedia is part of the Knowledge Encyclopedia educational series. Celebrate your child’s curiosity as they complete the collection and discover diverse facts about the world around them. Dive into the deep blue with Knowledge Encyclopedia Ocean! Travel back in time to when dinosaurs roamed the earth with Knowledge Encyclopedia Dinosaur! And hone your knowledge on how the human body works with Knowledge Encyclopedia Human Body! Whatever topic takes their fancy, there’s an encyclopedia for everyone!

Download or read book The Discovery of Time written by Stephen Edelston Toulmin and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1982-05-15 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A discussion of the historical development of our ideas of time as they relate to nature, human nature and society. . . . The excellence of The Discovery of Time is unquestionable."—Martin Lebowitz, The Kenyon Review

Download or read book New Worlds Ancient Texts written by Anthony Grafton and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1995-03-15 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describing an era of exploration during the Renaissance that went far beyond geographic bounds, this book shows how the evidence of the New World shook the foundations of the old, upsetting the authority of the ancient texts that had guided Europeans so far afield. What Anthony Grafton recounts is a war of ideas fought by mariners, scientists, publishers, and rulers over a period of 150 years. In colorful vignettes, published debates, and copious illustrations, we see these men and their contemporaries trying to make sense of their discoveries as they sometimes confirm, sometimes contest, and finally displace traditional notions of the world beyond Europe.

Download or read book Empire of Light written by Sidney Perkowitz and published by Joseph Henry Press. This book was released on 1998-11-23 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Empire of Light, Sidney Perkowitz combines the expertise of a physicist with the vision of an art connoisseur and the skill of an accomplished writer to offer a unique view of the most fundamental feature of the universe: light. Empire of Light discusses the nature of light, how the eye sees, and how our understanding of these phenomena have emerged over the ages, including the role of light in the development of quantum physics. The author examines the making of electrical light and its integration into commerce, telecommunications, entertainment, medicine, warfare, and every other aspect of our daily lives. And he presents the role of light in the search for the beginning and the end of the universe, as astronomers with their instruments penetrate ever deeper into the sky. Visible light spans the spectrum between infrared and ultraviolet, but this book reaches across many other spectra as well--from the cave paintings at Lascaux to Mark Rothko's stark blocks of color in today's art museums, from Plato's speculation that the eye sends out rays to Ramon y Cajal's discovery that vision actually works in the opposite way, from Tycho Brahe's elegant antetelescope measurements of planet positions to the Hubble telescope's exquisite sensitivity to light from billions of light years away. What are the biological and neurological processes of perceiving visible light? How does a person typically scan a scene? Do you see red or blue the same way I do? What are our physiological reactions and emotional responses to light? Perkowitz explores these and many other fascinating questions, drawing together the experiences, achievements, and perspectives of a diverse cast of characters, including Galileo, Einstein, Newton, Van Gogh, and Edison. Empire of Light is written so that lay readers will readily grasp the scientific principles and science professionals will readily appreciate the human experience. It will impart new wonder to the daily experience of light in our world. Sidney Perkowitz is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Physics at Emory University. His work has appeared in national publications such as The Sciences, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The American Prospect, and Technology Review.

Download or read book The Great Ages of Discovery written by Stephen J. Pyne and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 2021-02-23 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For more than 600 years, Western civilization has relied on exploration to learn about a wider world and universe. The Great Ages of Discovery details the different eras of Western exploration in terms of its locations, its intellectual contexts, the characteristic moral conflicts that underwrote encounters, and the grand gestures that distill an age into its essence. Historian and MacArthur Fellow Stephen J. Pyne identifies three great ages of discovery in his fascinating new book. The first age of discovery ranged from the early 15th to the early 18th century, sketched out the contours of the globe, aligned with the Renaissance, and had for its grandest expression the circumnavigation of the world ocean. The second age launched in the latter half of the 18th century, spanning into the early 20th century, carrying the Enlightenment along with it, pairing especially with settler societies, and had as its prize achievement the crossing of a continent. The third age began after World War II, and, pivoting from Antarctica, pushed into the deep oceans and interplanetary space. Its grand gesture is Voyager’s passage across the solar system. Each age had in common a galvanic rivalry: Spain and Portugal in the first age, Britain and France—followed by others—in the second, and the USSR and USA in the third. With a deep and passionate knowledge of the history of Western exploration, Pyne takes us on a journey across hundreds of years of geographic trekking. The Great Ages of Discovery is an interpretive companion to what became Western civilization’s quest narrative, with the triumphs and tragedies that grand journey brought, the legacies of which are still very much with us.

Download or read book Age of Discovery written by Ian Goldin and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2016-05-19 with total page 553 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'A landmark new book.' - The Guardian Age of Discovery looks at the world on the brink of a new Renaissance and asks the question, how do we avoid chaos and disruption, and share more widely the benefits of progress? Now is humanity's best moment. And our most fragile. Global health, wealth and education are booming. Scientific discovery is flourishing. But the same forces that make big gains possible for some of us deliver big losses to others-and tangle us together in ways that make everyone vulnerable. We've been here before. The first Renaissance, the time of Columbus, Copernicus, Gutenberg and others, redrew all maps of the world, liberated information and shifted Western civilization from the medieval to the early modern era. Such change came at a price: social division, political extremism, economic shocks, pandemics and other unintended consequences of human endeavour. Now is our second Renaissance. In the face of terrorism, Brexit, refugee crises and the global impact of a Trump presidency, we can flourish-if we heed the urgent lessons of history. Age of Discovery, revised and updated for this paperback edition, shows us how.

Download or read book The Dawn of Everything written by David Graeber and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2021-11-09 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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

Download or read book Silencing the Past written by Michel-Rolph Trouillot and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2015-03-17 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now part of the HBO docuseries Exterminate All the Brutes, written and directed by Raoul Peck The 20th anniversary edition of a pioneering classic that explores the contexts in which history is produced—now with a new foreword by renowned scholar Hazel Carby Placing the West’s failure to acknowledge the Haitian Revolution—the most successful slave revolt in history—alongside denials of the Holocaust and the debate over the Alamo, Michel-Rolph Trouillot offers a stunning meditation on how power operates in the making and recording of history. This modern classic resides at the intersection of history, anthropology, Caribbean, African-American, and post-colonial studies, and has become a staple in college classrooms around the country. In a new foreword, Hazel Carby explains the book’s enduring importance to these fields of study and introduces a new generation of readers to Trouillot’s brilliant analysis of power and history’s silences.

Download or read book The Discovery of Troy and Its Lost History written by Bernard Jones and published by . This book was released on 2019-05-02 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book removes the story of Troy from the realm of myth and places it firmly into the historical arena.