Download or read book Home written by John S Allen and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2015-12-29 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A leading anthropologist studies the science behind "feeling at home" to show us how home made us human Home is where the heart is. Security, comfort, even love, are all feelings that are centered on the humble abode. But what if there is more to the feeling of being at home? Neuroanthropologist John S. Allen believes that the human habitat is one of the most important products of human cognitive, technological, and cultural evolution over the past two million years. In Home, Allen argues that to "feel at home" is more than just an expression, but reflects a deep-seated cognitive basis for the human desire to have, use, and enjoy a place of one's own. Allen addresses the very basic question: How did a place to sleep become a home? Within human evolution, he ranks house and home as a signature development of our species, as it emerged alongside cooperative hunting, language, and other critical aspects of humanity. Many animals burrow, making permanent home bases, but primates, generally speaking, do not: most wander, making nests at night wherever they might find themselves. This is often in home territory, but it isn't quite home. Our hominid ancestors were wanderers, too -- so how did we, over the past several million years, find our way home? To tell that story Allen will take us through evolutionary anthropology, neuroscience, the study of emotion, and modern sociology. He examines the home from the inside (of our heads) out: homes are built with our brains as much as with our hands and tools. Allen argues that the thing that may have been most critical in our evolution is not the physical aspect of a home, but developing a feeling of defining, creating, and being in a home, whatever its physical form. The result was an environment, relatively secure against whatever horrors lurked outside, that enabled the expensive but creative human mind to reach its full flowering. Today, with the threat of homelessness, child foster-care, and foreclosure, this idea of having a home is more powerful than ever. In a clear and accessible writing style, Allen sheds light on the deep, cognitive sources of the pleasures of having a home, the evolution of those behaviors, and why the deep reasons why they matter. Home is the story about how humans evolved to create a space not only for shelter, but also for nurturing creativity, innovation, and culture -- and why "feeling at home" is a fundamental aspect of the human condition.
Download or read book Grass written by Joe C. Truett and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2009-11-03 with total page 237 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Part autobiography, part philosophical rumination, this evocative conservation odyssey explores the deep affinities between humans and our original habitat: grasslands. In a richly drawn, anecdotally driven narrative, Joe C. Truett, a grasslands ecologist who writes with a flair for language, traces the evolutionary, historical, and cultural forces that have reshaped North American rangelands over the past two centuries. He introduces an intriguing cast of characters—wildlife and grasslands biologists, archaeologists, ranchers, and petroleum geologists—to illuminate a wide range of related topics: our love affair with turf and how it manifests in lawns and sports, the ecological and economic dimensions of ranching, the glory of cowboy culture, grasslands and restoration ecology, and more. His book ultimately provides the background against which we can envision a new paradigm for restoring rangeland ecosystems—and a new paradigm for envisioning a more sustainable future.
Download or read book People Habitat written by F. Kaid Benfield and published by People Habitat Communications. This book was released on 2014-01-06 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With over 80 percent of Americans now living in cities and suburbs, getting our communities right has never been more important, more complicated, or more fascinating. Longtime sustainability leader Kaid Benfield shares 25 enlightening and entertaining essays about the wondrous ecology of human settlement, and how to make it better for both people and the planet. People Habitat explores topics as diverse as “green” housing developments that are no such thing, the tricky matter of gentrifying inner cities, why people don’t walk much anymore, and the relationship between cities and religion. Written with intellect, insight, and from-the-heart candor, each real-world story in People Habitat will make you see our communities in a new light.
Download or read book Habitat written by Tom Hegen and published by . This book was released on 2018-11 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The work of photographer Tom Hegen (b. 1991) deals with human interventions in natural habitats.His photographs document the strong impact human beings' have on our environment and show how we have altered our landscape through our actions.Including many impressive aerial photos, this photo book invites viewers to discover their environment from a new perspective, to comprehend the scale of human interventions on our earth's surface, and, ultimately, to assume responsibility.English and German text.
Download or read book The Human Habitat written by Ellsworth Huntington and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Architectonic Space written by Hans van der Laan and published by BRILL. This book was released on 1983 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Architectonic Space is the most complete and coherent treatise on the nature, purpose and meaning of architecture that has so far been attempted. It is the product of its author's lifetime pursuit of an idea that has haunted him from childhood: a search for the archetypal basis of the act of building.Seeing architecture not merely as the expression, but as the precondition of human culture, Hans van der Laan believes that its principles must be sought within architecture itself, rather than in technological, social or ideological factors. His buildings and writings stand out like tablets of stone amid the prevailing uncertainty and opportunism. The style and method of his book its rational building up of an argument founded on simple everyday experience remind one forcibly of the early Greek thinkers, just as Van der Laan's architecture recalls the houses and cities of the ancient world.
Download or read book Sustainability in the Twenty First Century written by Mohan Munasinghe and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-05-23 with total page 689 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides a rigorous analysis of sustainable development that includes practical, policy-relevant, global case studies, explained concisely and clearly.
Download or read book Human Habitat and Health written by and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Our Better Angels written by Jonathan Reckford and published by St. Martin's Essentials. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Inspiring and insightful, Our Better Angels: Seven Simple Virtues That Will Change Your Life and the World celebrates the shared principles that unite and enable us to overcome life’s challenges together. “When the waters rise, so do our better angels.”—President Jimmy Carter Jonathan Reckford, the CEO of Habitat for Humanity, has seen time and again the powerful benefits that arise when people from all walks of life work together to help one another. In this uplifting book, he shares true stories of people involved with Habitat as volunteers and future homeowners who embody seven timeless virtues—kindness, community, empowerment, joy, respect, generosity, and service—and shows how we can all practice these to improve the quality of our own lives as well as those around us. A Vietnam veteran finds peace where he was once engaged in war. An impoverished single mother offers her family’s time and energy to enrich their neighbors’ lives. A Zambian family of nine living in a makeshift tent makes room to shelter even more. A teenager grieving for his mother honors her love and memory by ensuring other people have a place to call home. A former president of the United States leads by example with a determined work ethic that motivates everyone around him to be the best version of themselves. These stories, and many others, illustrate how virtues become values, how cooperation becomes connection, and how even the smallest act of compassion can encourage actions that transform the world around us. Here are tales that will make readers laugh and cry and embrace with passion the calling of our better angels to change the way we take care of ourselves, our families, our communities, and the world.
Download or read book The Human Habitat written by Ellsworth Huntington and published by Palala Press. This book was released on 2015-09-06 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Download or read book Habitat Fragmentation and Landscape Change written by David B. Lindenmayer and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2013-02-22 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Habitat loss and degradation that comes as a result of human activity is the single biggest threat to biodiversity in the world today. Habitat Fragmentation and Landscape Change is a groundbreaking work that brings together a wealth of information from a wide range of sources to define the ecological problems caused by landscape change and to highlight the relationships among landscape change, habitat fragmentation, and biodiversity conservation. The book: synthesizes a large body of information from the scientific literature considers key theoretical principles for examining and predicting effects examines the range of effects that can arise explores ways of mitigating impacts reviews approaches to studying the problem discusses knowledge gaps and future areas for research and management Habitat Fragmentation and Landscape Change offers a unique mix of theoretical and practical information, outlining general principles and approaches and illustrating those principles with case studies from around the world. It represents a definitive overview and synthesis on the full range of topics that fall under the widely used but often vaguely defined term "habitat fragmentation."
Download or read book The Humane Gardener written by Nancy Lawson and published by Chronicle Books. This book was released on 2017-04-18 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this eloquent plea for compassion and respect for all species, journalist and gardener Nancy Lawson describes why and how to welcome wildlife to our backyards. Through engaging anecdotes and inspired advice, profiles of home gardeners throughout the country, and interviews with scientists and horticulturalists, Lawson applies the broader lessons of ecology to our own outdoor spaces. Detailed chapters address planting for wildlife by choosing native species; providing habitats that shelter baby animals, as well as birds, bees, and butterflies; creating safe zones in the garden; cohabiting with creatures often regarded as pests; letting nature be your garden designer; and encouraging natural processes and evolution in the garden. The Humane Gardener fills a unique niche in describing simple principles for both attracting wildlife and peacefully resolving conflicts with all the creatures that share our world.
Download or read book Habitats of the World written by Iain Campbell and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-09-28 with total page 568 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Habitats of Australasia (Australia, NZ and New Guinea) -- Habitats of the Neotropics (Central and South America) -- Habitats of the Afrotropics (SSaharan Africa) -- Habitats of the Palearctic (Europe, North Asia and North Africa) -- Habitats of the Nearctic (North America).
Download or read book Darwin Comes to Town written by Menno Schilthuizen and published by Picador. This book was released on 2018-04-03 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Carrion crows in the Japanese city of Sendai have learned to use passing traffic to crack nuts. *Lizards in Puerto Rico are evolving feet that better grip surfaces like concrete. *Europe’s urban blackbirds sing at a higher pitch than their rural cousins, to be heardover the din of traffic. How is this happening? Menno Schilthuizen is one of a growing number of “urban ecologists” studying how our manmade environments are accelerating and changing the evolution of the animals and plants around us. In Darwin Comes to Town, he takes us around the world for an up-close look at just how stunningly flexible and swift-moving natural selection can be. With human populations growing, we’re having an increasing impact on global ecosystems, and nowhere do these impacts overlap as much as they do in cities. The urban environment is about as extreme as it gets, and the wild animals and plants that live side-by-side with us need to adapt to a whole suite of challenging conditions: they must manage in the city’s hotter climate (the “urban heat island”); they need to be able to live either in the semidesert of the tall, rocky, and cavernous structures we call buildings or in the pocket-like oases of city parks (which pose their own dangers, including smog and free-rangingdogs and cats); traffic causes continuous noise, a mist of fine dust particles, and barriers to movement for any animal that cannot fly or burrow; food sources are mainly human-derived. And yet, as Schilthuizen shows, the wildlife sharing these spaces with us is not just surviving, but evolving ways of thriving. Darwin Comes toTown draws on eye-popping examples of adaptation to share a stunning vision of urban evolution in which humans and wildlife co-exist in a unique harmony. It reveals that evolution can happen far more rapidly than Darwin dreamed, while providing a glimmer of hope that our race toward over population might not take the rest of nature down with us.
Download or read book Topophilia and Topophobia written by Xing Ruan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-10-28 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is about the love and hate relations that humans establish with their habitat, which have been coined by discerning modern thinkers as topophilia and topophobia. Whilst such affiliations with the topos, our manmade as well as natural habitat, have been traced back to antiquity, a wide range of twentieth-century cases are studied here and reflected upon by dwelling on this framework. The book provides a timely reminder that the qualitative aspects of the topos, sensual as well as intellectual, should not be disregarded in the face of rapid technological development and the mass of building that has occurred since the turn of the millennium. Topophilia and Topophobia offers speculative and historical reflections on the human habitat of the century that has just passed, authored by some of the world’s leading scholars and architects, including Joseph Rykwert, Yi-Fu Tuan, Vittorio Gregotti and Jean-Louis Cohen. Human habitats, ranging broadly from the cities of the twentieth century, highbrow modern architecture both in Western countries and in Asia, to non-architect/planner designed vernacular settlements and landscapes are reviewed under the themes of topophilia and topophobia across the disciplines of architecture, landscape studies, philosophy, human geography and urban planning.
Download or read book The World Without Us written by Alan Weisman and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2008-08-05 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A penetrating take on how our planet would respond without the relentless pressure of the human presence
Download or read book Animals and Human Society written by Colin G. Scanes and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2017-09-18 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Animals and Human Society provides a solid, scientific, research-based background to advance understanding of how animals impact humans. Animals have had profound effects on people from the earliest times, ranging from zoonotic diseases, to the global impact of livestock, poultry and fish production, to the influences of human-associated animals on the environment (on extinctions, air and water pollution, greenhouse gases, etc.), to the importance of animals in human evolution and hunter -gatherer communities.As a resource for both science and non-science, Animals and Human Society can be used as a text for courses in Animals and Human Society or Animal Science, or as supplemental material for Introduction to Animal Science. It offers foundational background to those who may have little background in animal agriculture and have focused interest on companion animals and horses. The work introduces livestock production (including poultry and aquaculture) but also includes coverage of companion and lab animals. In addition, animal behavior and animal perception are covered.Animals and Human Society is likewise an excellent resource for researchers, academics, or students newly entering a related field or coming from another discipline and needing foundational information, as well as interested laypersons looking to augment their knowledge on the many impacts of animals in human society. - Features research-based and pedagogically sound content, with learning goals and textboxes to provide key information - Challenges readers to consider issues based on facts rather than polemics - Poses ethical questions and raises overall societal impacts - Balances traditional animal science with companion animals, animal biology, zoonotic diseases, animal products, environmental impacts and all aspects of human/animal interaction
