History & Philosophy

#1 New York Times bestseller #1 Washington Post bestseller #1 Indie Bestseller USA Today Bestseller John Green, award-winning author and passionate advocate for global healthcare reform, tells a deeply human story illuminating the fight against the world’s deadliest infectious...

As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science....

THE #1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER One of the world’s most beloved writers and New York Times bestselling author of A Walk in the Woods and The Body takes his ultimate journey—into the most intriguing and intractable questions that science seeks to answer. “Brims with strange and amazing facts...

How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don’t understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science? Find out....

From one of our leading chroniclers of the intersection of innovation and capitalism, a landmark reckoning—based on unprecedented access—with one of the world’s most brilliant and driven tech visionaries, and his game-changing company Even by the standard of a tech industry stacked with...

A daring and intimate exploration of how genetics complicates our ideas about blame, punishment, and moral responsibility, from acclaimed psychologist and author of The Genetic Lottery Kathryn Paige Harden. “An extraordinary book, the very best of science writing, because it is about not just...

Over the last 220 years, society has evolved a universal belief that electricity is "safe" for humanity and the planet. Scientist and journalist Arthur Firstenberg disrupts this conviction by telling the story of electricity in a way it has never been told before....

Winner of the James Beard Award for Literary Writing "Engrossing...hard to put down." — The New York Times Book Review “Frostbite is a perfectly executed cold fusion of science, history, and literary verve . . . as a fellow nonfiction writer, I bow down. This is how it's done.” — Mary...

For the millions of Americans who want spirituality without religion, Sam Harris’s latest New York Times bestseller is a guide to meditation as a rational practice informed by neuroscience and psychology. From Sam Harris, neuroscientist and author of numerous New York Times bestselling books...

From one of the world’s most celebrated intellectuals, a “fascinating” (Financial Times), brilliantly insightful work that explains how we think about each other’s thoughts about each other’s thoughts, ad infinitum. It sounds impossible, but “superlatively gifted science writer”...

The science of emotion is in the midst of a revolution on par with the discovery of relativity in physics and natural selection in biology....

"This engaging, conversational book begs to be read aloud, and who better than its author?... Tyson’s warmth and erudition make him a superb narrator of this excellent, thought-provoking book."- Library Journal "Like a spaceship traveling the stars, Tyson's voice flows smoothly as he delivers...

The follow-up to celebrated grief expert, neuroscientist, and psychologist Dr. Mary-Frances O’Connor’s The Grieving Brain focuses on the impact of grief—and life’s other major stressors—on the human body. Coping with death and grief is one of the most painful human experiences. While...

An oddly compelling, often hilarious exploration of the strange lives of our bodies postmortem....

Read by the author. Will technology change what it means to be human? You don't have to be a computer scientist to have discerning conversations about artificial intelligence and technology. We all wonder where we're headed. Even now, technological innovations and machine learning have a daily...

An exciting scientific adventure from the days of wooden ships and iron men, LONGITUDE is full of heroism and chicanery, brilliance and the absurd. It is also a captivating brief history of astronomy, navigation and clockmaking. During the great ages of exploration, "the longitude problem" was...

The companion book to COURSERA's wildly popular massive open online course "Learning How to Learn" Whether you are a student struggling to fulfill a math or science requirement, or you are embarking on a career change that requires a new skill set, A Mind for Numbers offers the tools you need...

The New York Times bestselling author of Darwin’s Doubt presents groundbreaking scientific evidence of the existence of God, based on breakthroughs in physics, cosmology, and biology. Beginning in the late 19th century, many intellectuals began to insist that scientific knowledge conflicts...

A mind-bending but brilliantly accessible exploration of the shifting science behind the reality of time. What is Now? This immediate moment, what we're experiencing right now . . . it bathes us like air, or gravity. Yet when we try to grasp this quality, to scrutinize it or bring it into...

From the author of the bestselling The Professor and the Madman comes the fascinating story of William Smith, the orphaned son of an English country blacksmith, who became obsessed with creating the world's first geological map and ultimately became the father of modern geology. In 1793 William...

NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER From the world's leading forest ecologist who forever changed how people view trees and their connections to one another and to other living things in the forest—a moving, deeply personal journey of discovery “Finding the Mother Tree reminds us that the world...

Science Magazine reporter Sam Kean reveals the periodic table as it’s never been seen before....

Richard Dawkins turns his considerable intellect on religion, denouncing its faulty logic and the suffering it causes....

AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The “lively” (The New Yorker), “convincing” (Forbes), and “riveting pick-me-up we all need right now” (People) that proves humanity thrives in a crisis and that our innate kindness and cooperation have been the greatest factors in our long-term...

A bold and all-embracing exploration of the nature and progress of knowledge from one of today's great thinkers....

Rebecca Solnit offers a thrilling account of the sheer breadth and scale of social, political, scientific, and cultural change over the past three quarters of a century. In this sequel to her enduring bestseller Hope in the Dark, Solnit surveys a world that has changed dramatically since the year 1960. Despite the forces seeking to turn back the clock on history, change is not a possibility; it is an inevitability.

An energetic and impassioned work of popular science about scientists who have had to fight for their revolutionary ideas to be accepted—from Darwin to Pasteur to modern day Nobel Prize winners. For two decades, Matt Kaplan has covered science for the Economist. He’s seen breakthroughs often...

A daring and intimate exploration of how genetics complicates our ideas about blame, punishment, and moral responsibility, from acclaimed psychologist and author of The Genetic Lottery Kathryn Paige Harden. “An extraordinary book, the very best of science writing, because it is about not just...

What is Now? This immediate moment, what we're experiencing right now . . . it bathes us like air, or gravity. Yet when we try to grasp this quality, to scrutinize it or bring it into focus, it vanishes, slipping through our fingers like a dream. And worse, according to the most trusted models of physics, Now doesn't even exist. If all this is so, then what, exactly, are we experiencing? How do we carve out time, sensation, self, and meaning from a blank, Now-less canvas?

Unlock the magic of symmetry woven into the very fabric of our universe with "Symmetry and Beauty." This captivating eBook invites you on a journey to explore the profound connection between symmetry and beauty, offering a unique perspective on the world around us. Begin with an insightful introduction that demystifies symmetry, a fundamental concept crucial to understanding aesthetics beyond superficial looks. Dive into nature's creativity in the chapters on natural symmetry, where the geometry of flora and fauna come alive through spirals, stripes, and intricate ecosystems. Explore the ...

Humanity's relationship with black holes began in 1783 in a small English village, when clergyman John Michell posed a startling question: What if there are objects in space that are so large and heavy that not even light can escape them? Almost 250 years later, in April 2019, scientists presented the first picture of a black hole. Physicist Jonas Enander has traveled the world to investigate how our understanding of these elusive celestial objects has evolved since the days of Michell.

Throughout the seventeenth century, medical lecturers demonstrated human anatomy by dissecting a cadaver while surrounded by students. After the Revolutionary War, though, instructors realized that they needed many more cadavers to serve a growing number of medical students. Enter the “resurrectionists”–body snatchers. Resurrectionists were a cruel lot; men (almost always men and often medical students themselves) who would sneak into a cemetery under the cover of darkness, remove a body, and then sell it to a physician or anatomist–usually for around $100.

Where do we learn math: From rules in a textbook? From logic and deduction? Not really, according to mathematician Eugenia Cheng: we learn it from human curiosity—most importantly, from asking questions. This may come as a surprise to those who think that math is about finding the one right answer, or those who were told that the “dumb” question they asked just proved they were bad at math. But Cheng shows why people who ask questions like “Why does 1 + 1 = 2?” are at the very heart of the search for mathematical truth.

Science has given humanity extraordinary power. It has cured diseases, mapped the cosmos, unlocked the secrets of DNA, and placed a library of knowledge in the palm of your hand. For many people, science has become more than a method—it has become the final authority on truth itself. But here is the uncomfortable question few people stop to ask: Can science really explain everything? Scientism for Beginners: Understanding the Limits of Science in Explaining Reality takes readers on a fascinating journey through one of the most important intellectual debates of the modern age. It explores ...

A doctor begs his colleagues to wash their hands. They laugh at him. Thousands of mothers keep dying. A scientist leaves a petri dish uncovered by accident and discovers the drug that will save more lives than any other in history. A surgeon opens a man’s chest and holds his beating heart. Inside Medical Pioneers, the latest volume in the bestselling Famous in STEM series, you’ll meet the extraordinary doctors, surgeons, and healers who transformed medicine from guesswork into science and the dramatic, often heartbreaking stories behind their breakthroughs. Discover the healers who ...

A woman supervises the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge because the men in charge can’t. A rocket scientist designs a machine powerful enough to carry humans to the Moon. An ironworker builds a tower in Paris that the whole city hates, until it becomes the most visited monument on Earth. Inside Extraordinary Engineers, the latest volume in the bestselling Famous in STEM series, you’ll meet the builders, inventors, and visionaries who turned impossible ideas into the structures, machines, and systems that define the modern world. Discover the engineers who built the future: • ...

Nikola Tesla no fue solo un inventor extraordinario. Fue una mente que veía el futuro antes de que el mundo estuviera preparado para entenderlo. Mientras otros pensaban en soluciones inmediatas, Tesla imaginaba sistemas completos, visualizaba máquinas enteras en su mente y resolvía problemas antes incluso de construirlos. Su forma de pensar era tan poderosa que muchas de sus ideas tardaron décadas en ser comprendidas. Este libro no es una biografía tradicional. Es un recorrido por las lecciones mentales y creativas que hicieron posible una de las mentes más brillantes de la historia. ...

What if the most world-changing discoveries in history began with a single, daring experiment? Inside Explosive Chemists, the latest volume in the Famous in STEM series, you’ll meet the brilliant, rebellious, and often tragic figures who shaped the modern world through chemistry. These are not dry textbook entries, but gripping human stories of genius, obsession, sacrifice, and discovery. Discover the chemists who changed everything: • Alfred Nobel — invented dynamite, then created the world’s most famous prize to redeem his legacy • Rosalind Franklin — took the photograph that ...

In the Synthesis of Time and Feedback, A.C. Zito presents a bold, cross-disciplinary framework for understanding why systems across biology, economics, relationships, artificial intelligence, and society either flourish, stabilize, or collapse. Rather than treating growth, decay, and healing as unrelated mysteries, this work argues they emerge from a single, underlying dynamic: the dominant feedback loop operating within a structured system.

Modern civilization is built on innovation. From industrial chemistry to pharmaceuticals, from nuclear energy to artificial intelligence, each breakthrough has been framed as a step forward — a solution to scarcity, disease, inefficiency, or inconvenience. But history reveals a more complicated truth. When Progress Kills is a structural analysis of technological optimism and its unintended consequences. It explores how celebrated advancements — once hailed as miracles — later revealed catastrophic human, environmental, and social costs. Across twenty chapters, this book examines: • ...