The Hidden Half of Nature  The Microbial Roots of Life and Health Book
Score: 4.5
From 2 Ratings

The Hidden Half of Nature The Microbial Roots of Life and Health


  • Author : David R. Montgomery
  • Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
  • File Size : 14,5 Mb
  • Release Date : 2015-11-16
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 320
  • ISBN 10 : 9780393244410

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"Sure to become a game-changing guide to the future of good food and healthy landscapes." —Dan Barber, chef and author of The Third Plate Prepare to set aside what you think you know about yourself and microbes. The Hidden Half of Nature reveals why good health—for people and for plants—depends on Earth’s smallest creatures. Restoring life to their barren yard and recovering from a health crisis, David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé discover astounding parallels between the botanical world and our own bodies. From garden to gut, they show why cultivating beneficial microbiomes holds the key to transforming agriculture and medicine.

Subtle Agroecologies Book

Subtle Agroecologies


  • Author : Julia Wright
  • Publisher : CRC Press
  • File Size : 18,6 Mb
  • Release Date : 2021-06-30
  • Genre: Nature
  • Pages : 509
  • ISBN 10 : 9780429804502

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This book is about the invisible or subtle nature of food and farming, and also about the nature of existence. Everything that we know (and do not know) about the physical world has a subtle counterpart which has been scarcely considered in modernist farming practice and research. If you think this book isn’t for you, if it appears more important to attend to the pressing physical challenges the world is facing before having the luxury of turning to such subtleties, then think again. For it could be precisely this worldview – the one prioritises the physical-material dimension of reality - that helped get us into this situation in the first place. Perhaps we need a different worldview to get us out? This book makes a foundational contribution to the discipline of Subtle Agroecologies, a nexus of indigenous epistemologies, multidisciplinary advances in wave-based and ethereal studies, and the science of sustainable agriculture. Not a farming system in itself, Subtle Agroecologies superimposes a non-material dimension upon existing, materially-based agroecological farming systems. Bringing together 43 authors from 12 countries and five continents, from the natural and social sciences as well as the arts and humanities, this multi-contributed book introduces the discipline, explaining its relevance and potential contribution to the field of Agroecology. Research into Subtle Agroecologies may be described as the systematic study of the nature of the invisible world as it relates to the practice of agriculture, and to do this through adapting and innovating with research methods, in particular with those of a more embodied nature, with the overall purpose of bringing and maintaining balance and harmony. Such research is an open-minded inquiry, its grounding being the lived experiences of humans working on, and with, the land over several thousand years to the present. By reclaiming and reinterpreting the perennial relationship between humans and nature, the implicati

The Hidden Half Book
Score: 4
From 1 Ratings

The Hidden Half


  • Author : Michael Blastland
  • Publisher : Atlantic Books
  • File Size : 12,7 Mb
  • Release Date : 2019-04-04
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 304
  • ISBN 10 : 9781786496386

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Why does one smoker die of lung cancer but another live to 100? The answer is 'The Hidden Half' - those random, unknowable variables that mess up our attempts to comprehend the world. We humans are very clever creatures - but we're idiots about how clever we really are. In this entertaining and ingenious book, Blastland reveals how in our quest to make the world more understandable, we lose sight of how unexplainable it often is. The result - from GDP figures to medicine - is that experts know a lot less than they think. Filled with compelling stories from economics, genetics, business, and science, The Hidden Half is a warning that an explanation which works in one arena may not work in another. Entertaining and provocative, it will change how you view the world.

Dirt Book
Score: 4
From 7 Ratings

Dirt


  • Author : David R. Montgomery
  • Publisher : Univ of California Press
  • File Size : 6,6 Mb
  • Release Date : 2007-05-14
  • Genre: Nature
  • Pages : 299
  • ISBN 10 : 9780520933163

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Dirt, soil, call it what you want—it's everywhere we go. It is the root of our existence, supporting our feet, our farms, our cities. This fascinating yet disquieting book finds, however, that we are running out of dirt, and it's no laughing matter. An engaging natural and cultural history of soil that sweeps from ancient civilizations to modern times, Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations explores the compelling idea that we are—and have long been—using up Earth's soil. Once bare of protective vegetation and exposed to wind and rain, cultivated soils erode bit by bit, slowly enough to be ignored in a single lifetime but fast enough over centuries to limit the lifespan of civilizations. A rich mix of history, archaeology and geology, Dirt traces the role of soil use and abuse in the history of Mesopotamia, Ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, China, European colonialism, Central America, and the American push westward. We see how soil has shaped us and we have shaped soil—as society after society has risen, prospered, and plowed through a natural endowment of fertile dirt. David R. Montgomery sees in the recent rise of organic and no-till farming the hope for a new agricultural revolution that might help us avoid the fate of previous civilizations.

What Your Food Ate  How to Heal Our Land and Reclaim Our Health Book

What Your Food Ate How to Heal Our Land and Reclaim Our Health


  • Author : David R. Montgomery
  • Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
  • File Size : 15,8 Mb
  • Release Date : 2022-06-21
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 400
  • ISBN 10 : 9781324004547

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Are you really what you eat? David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé take us far beyond the well-worn adage to deliver a new truth: the roots of good health start on farms. What Your Food Ate marshals evidence from recent and forgotten science to illustrate how the health of the soil ripples through to that of crops, livestock, and ultimately us. The long-running partnerships through which crops and soil life nourish one another suffuse plant and animal foods in the human diet with an array of compounds and nutrients our bodies need to protect us from pathogens and chronic ailments. Unfortunately, conventional agricultural practices unravel these vital partnerships and thereby undercut our well-being. Can farmers and ranchers produce enough nutrient-dense food to feed us all? Can we have quality and quantity? With their trademark thoroughness and knack for integrating information across numerous scientific fields, Montgomery and Biklé chart the way forward. Navigating discoveries and epiphanies about the world beneath our feet, they reveal why regenerative farming practices hold the key to healing sick soil and untapped potential for improving human health. Humanity’s hallmark endeavors of agriculture and medicine emerged from our understanding of the natural world—and still depend on it. Montgomery and Biklé eloquently update this fundamental reality and show us why what’s good for the land is good for us, too. What Your Food Ate is a must-read for farmers, eaters, chefs, doctors, and anyone concerned with reversing the modern epidemic of chronic diseases and mitigating climate change.

The Diet Myth Book
Score: 4.5
From 2 Ratings

The Diet Myth


  • Author : Tim Spector
  • Publisher : Abrams
  • File Size : 16,9 Mb
  • Release Date : 2015-09-08
  • Genre: Health & Fitness
  • Pages : 291
  • ISBN 10 : 9781468312843

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What should we eat? It’s a simple and fundamental question that still bewilders us, despite a seemingly infinite amount of available information on which foods are best for our bodies. Scientists, dieticians, and even governments regularly publish research on the dangers of too much fat and sugar, as well as on the benefits of exercise, and yet the global obesity crisis is only worsening. Most diet plans prove to be only short-term solutions, and few strategies work for everyone. Why can one person eat a certain meal and gain weight, while another eating the same meal drops pounds? Part of the truth lies in genetics, but more and more, scientists are finding that the answer isn’t so much what we put into our stomachs, but rather the essential digestive microbes already in them.Drawing on the latest science and his team's own pioneering research, The Diet Myth explores the hidden world of the microbiome, and demystifies the common misconceptions about fat, calories, vitamins, and nutrients. Dr. Tim Spector shows us that only by understanding what makes our own personal microbes tick and interact can we overcome the confusion of modern nutrition, allowing us to regain natural balance in our bodies. Countless recent scientific papers have been written on weight-loss topics like prebiotics and fructans, and The Diet Myth gathers these latest findings into one place, revealing new information about how best to lose weight and manage our bodies. Mixing cutting-edge discoveries, illuminating science, and his own case studies, Spector reveals why we should abandon fads and instead embrace diversity for a balanced diet, a healthy stomach, and a nourished body.

Growing a Revolution  Bringing Our Soil Back to Life Book
Score: 4.5
From 3 Ratings

Growing a Revolution Bringing Our Soil Back to Life


  • Author : David R. Montgomery
  • Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
  • File Size : 10,8 Mb
  • Release Date : 2017-05-09
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 320
  • ISBN 10 : 9780393608335

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Finalist for the PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award “A call to action that underscores a common goal: to change the world from the ground up.”—Dan Barber, author of The Third Plate For centuries, agricultural practices have eroded the soil that farming depends on, stripping it of the organic matter vital to its productivity. Now conventional agriculture is threatening disaster for the world’s growing population. In Growing a Revolution, geologist David R. Montgomery travels the world, meeting farmers at the forefront of an agricultural movement to restore soil health. From Kansas to Ghana, he sees why adopting the three tenets of conservation agriculture—ditching the plow, planting cover crops, and growing a diversity of crops—is the solution. When farmers restore fertility to the land, this helps feed the world, cool the planet, reduce pollution, and return profitability to family farms.

The Hidden Half Book

The Hidden Half


  • Author : Patricia Albers
  • Publisher : VNR AG
  • File Size : 13,9 Mb
  • Release Date : 1983
  • Genre: Social Science
  • Pages : 290
  • ISBN 10 : 0819129569

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Covering a wide range of topics, this volume presents case studies which focus on particular aspects of the female condition in Plains Indian societies, mostly concentrated on tribal groups in the northern Plains region of the United States and Canada. The focus is primarily historical, dealing with the conditions of Plains Indian women in the pre-reservation period, but also contains selections concerned with the role and status of women in the modern reservation era.

The Rocks Don t Lie  A Geologist Investigates Noah s Flood Book
Score: 4
From 9 Ratings

The Rocks Don t Lie A Geologist Investigates Noah s Flood


  • Author : David R. Montgomery
  • Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
  • File Size : 20,9 Mb
  • Release Date : 2012-08-27
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 320
  • ISBN 10 : 9780393083965

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How the mystery of the Bible's greatest story shaped geology: a MacArthur Fellow presents a surprising perspective on Noah's Flood. In Tibet, geologist David R. Montgomery heard a local story about a great flood that bore a striking similarity to Noah’s Flood. Intrigued, Montgomery began investigating the world’s flood stories and—drawing from historic works by theologians, natural philosophers, and scientists—discovered the counterintuitive role Noah’s Flood played in the development of both geology and creationism. Steno, the grandfather of geology, even invoked the Flood in laying geology’s founding principles based on his observations of northern Italian landscapes. Centuries later, the founders of modern creationism based their irrational view of a global flood on a perceptive critique of geology. With an explorer’s eye and a refreshing approach to both faith and science, Montgomery takes readers on a journey across landscapes and cultures. In the process we discover the illusive nature of truth, whether viewed through the lens of science or religion, and how it changed through history and continues changing, even today.

King of Fish Book
Score: 2
From 1 Ratings

King of Fish


  • Author : David Montgomery
  • Publisher : Basic Books
  • File Size : 11,9 Mb
  • Release Date : 2009-04-28
  • Genre: Social Science
  • Pages : 304
  • ISBN 10 : 9780786739936

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The salmon that symbolize the Pacific Northwest's natural splendor are now threatened with extinction across much of their ancestral range. In studying the natural and human forces that shape the rivers and mountains of that region, geologist David Montgomery has learned to see the evolution and near-extinction of the salmon as a story of changing landscapes. Montgomery shows how a succession of historical experiences -first in the United Kingdom, then in New England, and now in the Pacific Northwest -repeat a disheartening story in which overfishing and sweeping changes to rivers and seas render the world inhospitable to salmon. In King of Fish , Montgomery traces the human impacts on salmon over the last thousand years and examines the implications both for salmon recovery efforts and for the more general problem of human impacts on the natural world. What does it say for the long-term prospects of the world's many endangered species if one of the most prosperous regions of the richest country on earth cannot accommodate its icon species? All too aware of the possible bleak outcome for the salmon, King of Fish concludes with provocative recommendations for reinventing the ways in which we make environmental decisions about land, water, and fish.

Nature Obscura Book
Score: 4
From 1 Ratings

Nature Obscura


  • Author : Kelly Brenner
  • Publisher : Mountaineers Books
  • File Size : 10,5 Mb
  • Release Date : 2020-04-01
  • Genre: Nature
  • Pages : 208
  • ISBN 10 : 9781680512083

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With wonder and a sense of humor, Nature Obscura author Kelly Brenner aims to help us rediscover our connection to the natural world that is just outside our front door--we just need to know where to look. Through explorations of a rich and varied urban landscape, Brenner reveals the complex micro-habitats and surprising nature found in the middle of a city. In her hometown of Seattle, which has plowed down hills, cut through the land to connect fresh- and saltwater, and paved over much of the rest, she exposes a diverse range of strange and unknown creatures. From shore to wetland, forest to neighborhood park, and graveyard to backyard, Brenner uncovers how our land alterations have impacted nature, for good and bad, through the wildlife and plants that live alongside us, often unseen. These stories meld together, in the same way our ecosystems, species, and human history are interconnected across the urban environment.

The Hidden Lives of Owls Book
Score: 5
From 1 Ratings

The Hidden Lives of Owls


  • Author : Leigh Calvez
  • Publisher : Sasquatch Books
  • File Size : 12,6 Mb
  • Release Date : 2016-08-16
  • Genre: Nature
  • Pages : 224
  • ISBN 10 : 9781632170262

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In this New York Times bestseller that will appeal to readers of H is for Hawk, a naturalist probes the forest to comprehend the secret lives of owls. Join Leigh Calvez on adventures into the world of owls: owl-watching, avian science, and the deep forest—often in the dead of night. These birds are a bit mysterious, and that’s part of what makes them so fascinating. Calvez makes the science entertaining and accessible while exploring the questions about the human-animal connection, owl obsession, habitat, owl calls, social behavior, and mythology. From the Trade Paperback edition.

The Book Thief Book
Score: 4.5
From 2,620 Ratings

The Book Thief


  • Author : Markus Zusak
  • Publisher : Knopf Books for Young Readers
  • File Size : 12,6 Mb
  • Release Date : 2007-12-18
  • Genre: Young Adult Fiction
  • Pages : 578
  • ISBN 10 : 9780307433848

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#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE’S 100 BEST YA BOOKS OF ALL TIME The extraordinary, beloved novel about the ability of books to feed the soul even in the darkest of times. When Death has a story to tell, you listen. It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still. Liesel Meminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich, who scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can’t resist–books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement. In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak, author of I Am the Messenger, has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time. “The kind of book that can be life-changing.” —The New York Times “Deserves a place on the same shelf with The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank.” —USA Today DON’T MISS BRIDGE OF CLAY, MARKUS ZUSAK’S FIRST NOVEL SINCE THE BOOK THIEF.

Cut in Half Book
Score: 4
From 6 Ratings

Cut in Half


  • Author : Mike Warren
  • Publisher : Chronicle Books
  • File Size : 6,7 Mb
  • Release Date : 2018-10-09
  • Genre: Science
  • Pages : 144
  • ISBN 10 : 9781452168746

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What exactly is inside a laptop, a golf ball, a vacuum cleaner, or a novelty singing fish toy? The insides of these and dozens of other objects are revealed in this photographic exploration of the stuff all around us, exposed and explained. With the help of a high-pressure waterjet cutter able to slice through 4 inches of steel plate, designer and fabricator Mike Warren (creator of the popular Cut in Half YouTube channel) cuts into everything from boom boxes to boxing gloves, oil filters to seashells, describing and demystifying the inner workings and materials of each. With gorgeously detailed photography, Cut in Half is a fascinating and accessible popular science look at the extraordinary in the everyday.

An Immense World Book
Score: 4.5
From 6 Ratings

An Immense World


  • Author : Ed Yong
  • Publisher : Knopf Canada
  • File Size : 19,6 Mb
  • Release Date : 2022-06-21
  • Genre: Nature
  • Pages : 432
  • ISBN 10 : 9781039003910

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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Every kind of animal, including humans, is enclosed within its own unique sensory bubble, perceiving but a tiny sliver of our immense world. Pulitzer Prize–winning science journalist Ed Yong takes us on “a thrilling tour of nonhuman perception” (The New York Times), allowing us to experience the skeins of scent, waves of electromagnetism, and pulses of pressure that other animals perceive. “One of this year’s finest works of narrative nonfiction . . . Yong’s reporting is layered, seasoned with vivid scenes from laboratories and in the field, interviews with researchers across a spectrum of disciplines.”—Oprah Daily “A dazzling ride through the sensory world of astoundingly sophisticated creatures.”—The Wall Street Journal The Earth teems with sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields. In An Immense World, Ed Yong coaxes us beyond the confines of our own senses to encounter beetles that are drawn to fires, turtles that can track the Earth’s magnetic fields, fish that fill rivers with electrical messages, and even humans who wield sonar like bats. We discover that a crocodile’s scaly face is as sensitive as a lover’s fingertips, that the eyes of a giant squid evolved to see sparkling whales, that plants thrum with the inaudible songs of courting bugs, and that even simple scallops have complex vision. We learn what bees see in flowers, what songbirds hear in their tunes, and what dogs smell on the street. We listen to stories of pivotal discoveries in the field, while looking ahead at the many mysteries that remain unsolved. Funny, rigorous, and suffused with the joy of discovery, An Immense World takes us on what Marcel Proust called “the only true voyage . . . not to visit strange lands, but to possess other eyes.”