The Fourth Age: Smart Robots, Conscious Computers, and the Future of Humanity is a book that was written by Byron Reese is about the way technology is impacting the way people live in a highly interconnected world. In it, Reese outlines the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) and how it could change the world. He … Read more
Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity is a book about, well, exactly what the title says. Author Jamie Metzel dives into the world of CRISPR technology and its implications for the future of humanity. He makes a compelling case that we need to start having conversations about how we want to use … Read more
The True Believer is a 1951 book by American writer Eric Hoffer, in which the author discusses the psychological causes of fanaticism. The book was widely influential, and is still cited today. In 2002, the Book-of-the-Month Club ranked The True Believer number 23 on its list of the 100 most influential books of the 20th … Read more
Phillip Rief’s book, Freud: The Mind of the Moralist, is a thorough and well-researched account of Sigmund Freud’s life and work. Rief does an excellent job of highlighting both Freud’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as providing readers with a clear understanding of his intellectual development. While Rief is clearly sympathetic to Freud’s theories, he … Read more
The Freud Files is a fascinating book that explores the life and work of Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis. Borch-Jacobsen does an excellent job of summarizing Freud’s complex ideas and providing readers with a clear understanding of his influential theory. Sigmund Freud was born in Austria in 1856. He studied medicine at the University … Read more
A Scanner Darkly is a science fiction novel by Philip K. Dick, first published in 1977. The novel is set in a future world where the use of illegal drugs has become widespread, leading to a crime-ridden society. It follows the life of an undercover agent who is tasked with infiltrating a group of drug … Read more
The Civilizing Process by Norbert Elias is a seminal work that explores the rise of civilization and the formation of modern society. Elias argues that civilization is a process that involves the gradual domestication of human beings. Over time, humans have become more disciplined and controlled, which has resulted in the development of sophisticated social … Read more
In his book Chaos, James Gleick tells the story of how chaos theory came to be. He chronicles the lives and work of the early pioneers of chaos theory, including Edward Lorenz, Benoit Mandelbrot, and Mitchell Feigenbaum. Gleick also explains how chaos theory has been used in fields as diverse as weather forecasting and stock … Read more
In her book Surveillance Capitalism, author Shoshana Zuboff provides a detailed analysis of the business practices of companies like Google and Facebook. Zuboff coins the term “surveillance capitalism” to describe the way these companies collect data on users and then use that data to sell targeted ads. Zuboff argues that surveillance capitalism is a new … Read more
In Greek philosophy, Logos was the divine reason or active principle forming the universe, ordering it and humanity. The Stoics believed that the entire universe was a manifestation of the single divine Logos. In the Christian tradition, Logos is understood as the divine Word, Christ as incarnation of the Logos. In the beginning was the … Read more