The twentieth century—a time of unprecedented progress—has produced a tremendous strain on the very elements that comprise life itself: This raises the key question of the twenty-first century: How much longer can this go on? With wit and erudition, Ronald Wright lays out a-convincing case that history has always provided an answer, whether we care to notice or not. From Neanderthal man to the Sumerians to the Roman Empire, A Short History of Progress dissects the cyclical nature of humanity's development and demise, the 10,000-year old experiment that we've unleashed but have yet to control. It is Wright's contention that only by understanding and ultimately breaking from the patterns of progress and disaster that humanity has repeated around the world since the Stone Age can we avoid the onset of a new Dark Age. Wright illustrates how various cultures throughout history have literally manufactured their own end by producing an overabundance of innovation and stripping bare the very elements that allowed them to initially advance. Wright's book is brilliant; a fascinating rumination on the hubris at the heart of human development and the pitfalls we still may have time to avoid.

    While it's clear that women and girls are vital voices and agents of change for this planet, they are too often missing from the proverbial table. More than a problem of bias, it's a dynamic that sets us up for failure. To change everything, we need everyone.All We Can Save illuminates the expertise and insights of dozens of diverse women leading on climate in the United States--scientists, journalists, farmers, lawyers, teachers, activists, innovators, wonks, and designers, across generations, geographies, and race--and aims to advance a more representative, nuanced, and solution-oriented public conversation on the climate crisis. These women offer a spectrum of ideas and insights for how we can rapidly, radically reshape society.Intermixing essays with poetry and art, this book is both a balm and a guide for knowing and holding what has been done to the world, while bolstering our resolve never to give up on one another or our collective future. We must summon truth, courage, and solutions to turn away from the brink and toward life-giving possibility. Curated by two climate leaders, the book is a collection and celebration of visionaries who are leading us on a path toward all we can save. With essays and poems by: Emily Atkin • Xiye Bastida • Ellen Bass • Colette Pichon Battle • Jainey K. Bavishi • Janine Benyus • adrienne maree brown • Régine Clément • Abigail Dillen • Camille T. Dungy • Rhiana Gunn-Wright • Joy Harjo • Katharine Hayhoe • Mary Annaïse Heglar • Jane Hirshfield • Mary Anne Hitt • Ailish Hopper • Tara Houska, Zhaabowekwe • Emily N. Johnston • Joan Naviyuk Kane • Naomi Klein • Kate Knuth • Ada Limón • Louise Maher-Johnson • Kate Marvel • Gina McCarthy • Anne Haven McDonnell • Sarah Miller • Sherri Mitchell, Weh’na Ha’mu Kwasset • Susanne C. Moser • Lynna Odel • Sharon Olds • Mary Oliver • Kate Orff • Jacqui Patterson • Leah Penniman • Catherine Pierce • Marge Piercy • Kendra Pierre-Louis • Varshini Prakash • Janisse Ray • Christine E. Nieves Rodriguez • Favianna Rodriguez • Cameron Russell • Ash Sanders • Judith D. Schwartz • Patricia Smith • Emily Stengel • Sarah Stillman • Leah Cardamore Stokes • Amanda Sturgeon • Maggie Thomas • Heather McTeer Toney • Alexandria Villaseñor • Alice Walker • Amy Westervelt • Jane Zelikova

    Farmers, manufacturers, supermarkets and consumers in North America and Europe discard up to half of their food—enough to feed all the world's hungry at least three times over. Forests are destroyed and nearly one tenth of the West's greenhouse gas emissions are released growing food that will never be eaten. While affluent nations throw away food through neglect, in the developing world crops rot because farmers lack the means to process, store and transport them to market.But there could be surprisingly painless remedies for what has become one of the world's most pressing environmental and social problems. Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal traces the problem around the globe from the top to the bottom of the food production chain. Stuart’s journey takes him from the streets of New York to China, Pakistan and Japan and back to his home in England. Introducing us to foraging pigs, potato farmers and food industry CEOs, Stuart encounters grotesque examples of profligacy, but also inspiring innovations and ways of making the most of what we have. The journey is a personal one, as Stuart is a dedicated freegan, who has chosen to live off of discarded or self-produced food in order to highlight the global food waste scandal.Combining front-line investigation with startling new data, Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal shows how the way we live now has created a global food crisis—and what we can do to fix it.

    We think we're making smart, rational choices. But are we?In a series of illuminating, often surprising experiments, MIT behavioral economist Dan Ariely refutes the common assumption that we behave in fundamentally rational ways. Blending everyday experience with groundbreaking research, Ariely explains how expectations, emotions, social norms, and other invisible, seemingly illogical forces skew our reasoning abilities.Not only do we make astonishingly simple mistakes every day, but we make the same "types" of mistakes, Ariely discovers. We consistently overpay, underestimate, and procrastinate. We fail to understand the profound effects of our emotions on what we want, and we overvalue what we already own. Yet these misguided behaviors are neither random nor senseless. They're systematic and predictable--making us "predictably" irrational.From drinking coffee to losing weight, from buying a car to choosing a romantic partner, Ariely explains how to break through these systematic patterns of thought to make better decisions. "Predictably Irrational" will change the way we interact with the world--one small decision at a time.

    Brower's voice is passionate, perfectly cadenced, humorous, and very wise. And original: while most writers point to where we are, this one draws the map.?Edward O. Wilson, author, "The Diversity of Life and Naturalist"Credited with galvanizing an entire generation of environmentalists in the 60's, David Brower, the highly respected "archdruid" of the modern environmental movement, recalls with wit and wisdom his 50 years of controversial activism and offers an inspired strategy for the next generation of "those who would save the Earth."In this intelligent and engaging chronicle of his years as an agitatator for the planet, Brower points out the irony that since the first Earth Day 25 years ago, we've lost one-seventh of the world's productive land to pollution, clearcutting, and pavement-and our population has doubled! From the politics of preserving the environment and how to use New York-style PR to save tigers and dolphins, to reengineering cities, the future of hypercars, and his vision for the Earth Corps, Brower takes us on a sweeping journey of what has been and what could be if we apply CPR (Conservation, Preservation, Restoration) to our wounded world. Printed on entirely tree-free kenaf paper, "Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run" follows its own prescription for saving the world's forests.TABLE OF CONTENTSCPR for the Earth: An InvitationPART I: OPPORTUNITIES1. Seeing and Remembering2. Climbing Mountains3. The Bristlecone Pine4. Visions of a Wild CenturyPART II: SOLUTIONS5. Havens6. Cities with Boundaries7. Eco-Preserves8. Forest Revolution9. More Monks10. HypercarsPART III: RESTORATION11. A World Restored12. Making a Difference13. The CPR Service14. What will it Cost?15. The Cure for What Ails UsPART IV: WILDNESS16. Where the Wilderness Is17. Listening to Mountains18. Rachel Carson's Pelicans19. Neat TricksPART V: SAVING THE EARTH20. The Third Planet: Operating Instructions21. Unwise Misuse22. Rule Number 6 Revisited23. Let Heaven and Nature Sing24. For Those Who Would Save the Earth

    You’ll get the dirt on what not to buy and why, and the dish on great gifts, clothes, home supplies and more. Based on the popular and authoritative "Ecoholic" column that appears weekly in NOW, Ecoholic is a cheeky and eye-opening guide to all of life’s greenest predicaments.The Best Green ProductsFor the home: cleaning and laundry supplies, furniture, linensFor renovations: flooring, paint, insulation, carpets, cabinetryFor the kitchen: cookware, appliancesFor your body: cool clothes, jewellery, shoes, beauty careFor baby: toys, cribs, organic food, diapersFor the garden: fertilizer, pest control, patio furnitureFor the office: supplies, equipment, energy savingsFor your pet: natural food, flea control, litter solutionsFor the fun of it: sporting goods, camping equipment, holidaysThe Most Current InformationAvoiding toxins in the homeBuying pesticide-free foodSustainable seafood, meat and veggie choicesReducing energy and water useGreening your love lifeEco-tourismKeeping your home and garden pest-free without harmful chemicalsGreen gift-giving and ethical investingChoosing an environmentally friendly careerThe big issues facing Canada and how to get involvedThe Most Helpful ServicesElectronics and computer recyclersAlternative energy suppliersGreen general storesLocal organic food deliveryIncentives and rebates for greening your homeLocal and national environmental groupsHousehold hazardous waste disposalAlso includes a city-by-city guide:Calgary, Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg

    Her work has influenced filmmakers (the Tree of Souls of James Cameron's Avatar) and her TED talks have been viewed by more than 10 million people worldwide.Now, in her first book, Simard brings us into her world, the intimate world of the trees, in which she brilliantly illuminates the fascinating and vital truths--that trees are not simply the source of timber or pulp, but are a complex, interdependent circle of life; that forests are social, cooperative creatures connected through underground networks by which trees communicate their vitality and vulnerabilities with communal lives not that different from our own.Simard writes--in inspiring, illuminating, and accessible ways--how trees, living side by side for hundreds of years, have evolved, how they perceive one another, learn and adapt their behaviors, recognize neighbors, and remember the past; how they have agency about the future; elicit warnings and mount defenses, compete and cooperate with one another with sophistication, characteristics ascribed to human intelligence, traits that are the essence of civil societies--and at the center of it all, the Mother Trees: the mysterious, powerful forces that connect and sustain the others that surround them.Simard writes of her own life, born and raised into a logging world in the rainforests of British Columbia, of her days as a child spent cataloging the trees from the forest and how she came to love and respect them--embarking on a journey of discovery, and struggle. And as she writes of her scientific quest, she writes of her own journey--of love and loss, of observation and change, of risk and reward, making us understand how deeply human scientific inquiry exists beyond data and technology, that it is about understanding who we are and our place in the world, and, in writing of her own life, we come to see the true connectedness of the Mother Tree that nurtures the forest in the profound ways that families and human societies do, and how these inseparable bonds enable all our survival.

    There is now simply no way to prevent the planet breaching the threshold of two degrees Celsius set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. What are the likely political and economic outcomes of this? Where is the overheating world heading?To further the struggle for climate justice, we need to have some idea how the existing global order is likely to adjust to a rapidly changing environment. Climate Leviathan provides a radical way of thinking about the intensifying challenges to the global order. Drawing on a wide range of political thought, Joel Wainwright and Geoff Mann argue that rapid climate change will transform the world's political economy and the fundamental political arrangements most people take for granted. The result will be a capitalist planetary sovereignty, a terrifying eventuality that makes the construction of viable, radical alternatives truly imperative.

    It’s the epic story of the making of modern economics, and of how economics rescued mankind from squalor and deprivation by placing its material fate in its own hands rather than in Fate. Nasar’s account begins with Charles Dickens and Henry Mayhew observing and publishing the condition of the poor majority in mid-nineteenth-century London, the richest and most glittering place in the world. This was a new pursuit. She describes the often heroic efforts of Marx, Engels, Alfred Marshall, Beatrice and Sydney Webb, and the American Irving Fisher to put those insights into action—with revolutionary consequences for the world. From the great John Maynard Keynes to Schumpeter, Hayek, Keynes’s disciple Joan Robinson, the influential American economists Paul Samuelson and Milton Freedman, and India’s Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen, she shows how the insights of these activist thinkers transformed the world—from one city, London, to the developed nations in Europe and America, and now to the entire planet. In Nasar’s dramatic narrative of these discoverers we witness men and women responding to personal crises, world wars, revolutions, economic upheavals, and each other’s ideas to turn back Malthus and transform the dismal science into a triumph over mankind’s hitherto age-old destiny of misery and early death. This idea, unimaginable less than 200 years ago, is a story of trial and error, but ultimately transcendent, as it is rendered here in a stunning and moving narrative.

    From the roots to the crown and back to the seeds, Richard Powers’s twelfth novel unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fables that range from antebellum New York to the late twentieth-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. There is a world alongside ours—vast, slow, interconnected, resourceful, magnificently inventive, and almost invisible to us. This is the story of a handful of people who learn how to see that world and who are drawn up into its unfolding catastrophe.A New York Times Bestseller.

    But according to science, all of these statements are profoundly misleading.When it comes to climate change, the media, politicians, and other prominent voices have declared that “the science is settled.” In reality, the long game of telephone from research to reports to the popular media is corrupted by misunderstanding and misinformation. Core questions—about the way the climate is responding to our influence, and what the impacts will be—remain largely unanswered. The climate is changing, but the why and how aren’t as clear as you’ve probably been led to believe. Now, one of America’s most distinguished scientists is clearing away the fog to explain what science really says (and doesn’t say) about our changing climate. In Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters, Steven Koonin draws upon his decades of experience—including as a top science advisor to the Obama administration—to provide up-to-date insights and expert perspective free from political agendas. Fascinating, clear-headed, and full of surprises, this book gives readers the tools to both understand the climate issue and be savvier consumers of science media in general. Koonin takes readers behind the headlines to the more nuanced science itself, showing us where it comes from and guiding us through the implications of the evidence. He dispels popular myths and unveils little-known truths: despite a dramatic rise in greenhouse gas emissions, global temperatures actually decreased from 1940 to 1970. What’s more, the models we use to predict the future aren’t able to accurately describe the climate of the past, suggesting they are deeply flawed. Koonin also tackles society’s response to a changing climate, using data-driven analysis to explain why many proposed “solutions” would be ineffective, and discussing how alternatives like adaptation and, if necessary, geoengineering will ensure humanity continues to prosper. Unsettled is a reality check buoyed by hope, offering the truth about climate science that you aren’t getting elsewhere—what we know, what we don’t, and what it all means for our future.

    In Four Futures, Frase imagines how this post-capitalist world might look, deploying the tools of both social science and speculative fiction to explore what communism, rentism, socialism and exterminism might actually entail.Could the current rise of real-life robocops usher in a world that resembles Ender’s Game? And sure, communism will bring an end to material scarcities and inequalities of wealth—but there’s no guarantee that social hierarchies, governed by an economy of “likes,” wouldn’t rise to take their place. A whirlwind tour through science fiction, social theory and the new technologies already shaping our lives, Four Futures is a balance sheet of the socialisms we may reach if a resurgent Left is successful, and the barbarisms we may be consigned to if those movements fail.

    This and other developments will prompt utilities to undergo the largest changes in their history. Smart Power examines the many facets of this unprecedented transformation. This enlightening book begins with a look back on the deregulatory efforts of the 1990s and their gradual replacement by concerns over climate change, promoting new technologies, and developing stable prices and supplies. In thorough but non-technical terms it explains the revolutionary changes that the Smart Grid is bringing to utility operations. It also examines the options for low-carbon emissions along with the real-world challenges the industry and its regulators must face as the industry retools and finances its new sources and systems. Throughout the book, Peter Fox-Penner provides insights into the policy choices and regulatory reform needed to face these challenges. He not only weighs the costs and benefits of every option, but presents interviews with informed experts, including economists, utility CEOs, and engineers. He gives a brief history of the development of the current utility business model and examines possible new business models that are focused on energy efficiency.Smart Power explains every aspect of the coming energy revolution for utilities in lively prose that will captivate even the most techno-phobic readers.

    Sowell reveals the general principles behind any kind of economy-capitalist, socialist, feudal, and so on. In readable language, he shows how to critique economic policies in terms of the incentives they create, rather than the goals they proclaim. With clear explanations of the entire field, from rent control and the rise and fall of businesses to the international balance of payments, this is the first book for anyone who wishes to understand how the economy functions.

    Author Jigar Shah, internationally recognized for revolutionizing the now multi-billion-dollar solar energy industry, outlines how entrepreneurs and investors can unlock the massive potential that climate change represents. Shah argues that, while new technical innovation is valuable, deployment of existing technologies are the key to reaching our near-term climate targets. Rather than waiting for yet to be developed technology, business model innovation is the key to attract mainstream capital and unlock transformational change. Shah makes a compelling case for reaching our 2020 climate change goals through 100,000 companies worldwide, each generating $100 million in sales. Unlocking our next economy will be driven by thousands of companies deploying existing clean and resource-efficient technologies in electricity-supply (like solar), transportation, building materials, industry, forestry, waste, and agriculture. Shah is not alone; according to the International Energy Agency, and others, $10 trillion can be invested profitably—today—in the world’s existing technologies, making Shah’s plan of 100,000 companies each generating $100 million in sales a reality in catalyzing a new economy in the process. Creating Climate Wealth is also the personal story of Shah’s journey through the solar industry and the founding of SunEdison, the world’s largest solar energy company. Through business model innovations, SunEdison helped trigger the multi-billion dollar solar energy services industry. Shah’s revolutionary approach has been emulated throughout the solar industry. But perhaps more important, it is also being adapted for other industrial sectors like agriculture and transportation – unlocking incredible new revenue streams, creating hundreds of thousands of jobs, and positively transforming the planet on a global level. This implementation of business-based solutions to solve complex social problems represents a new economic movement; driven by “Impact Investments.” Impact Investments are changing the world for the better, promoting development and economic growth, and encouraging local entrepreneurship. Unlocking these opportunities represent the largest wealth creation opportunity of our generation. Whether you are interested in climate change, poverty alleviation, or just promoting projects that make financial sense, this book is for you. Jigar Shah provides a proven roadmap to understanding the Impact Economy, and creating the lasting changes that will improve our world for future generations.