The place: Europe. The time: 25,000 years ago, the last Ice Age. In reality, you live in an open-air tent or a bone hut. But you also belong to a rich culture that creates art. In and around your cave paintings are handprints and dots, x’s and triangles, parallel lines and spirals. Your people know what they mean. You also use them on tools and jewelry. And then you vanish—and with you, their meanings.Join renowned archaeologist Genevieve von Petzinger on an Indiana Jones-worthy adventure from the open-air rock art sites of northern Portugal to the dark depths of a remote cave in Spain that can only be reached by sliding face-first through the mud. Von Petzinger looks past the beautiful horses, powerful bison, graceful ibex, and faceless humans in the ancient paintings. Instead, she’s obsessed with the abstract geometric images that accompany them, the terse symbols that appear more often than any other kinds of figures—signs that have never really been studied or explained until now.Part travel journal, part popular science, part personal narrative, von Petzinger’s groundbreaking book starts to crack the code on the first form of graphic communication. It’s in her blood, as this talented scientist’s grandmother served as a code-breaker at Bletchley. Discernible patterns emerge that point to abstract thought and expression, and for the first time, we can begin to understand the changes that might have been happening inside the minds of our Ice Age ancestors—offering a glimpse of when they became us.

    But how truthful is this larger-than-life image? According to anthropologist Shepard Krech, the first humans in North America demonstrated all of the intelligence, self-interest, flexibility, and ability to make mistakes of human beings anywhere. As Nicholas Lemann put it in The New Yorker, "Krech is more than just a conventional-wisdom overturner; he has a serious larger point to make. . . . Concepts like ecology, waste, preservation, and even the natural (as distinct from human) world are entirely anachronistic when applied to Indians in the days before the European settlement of North America." "Offers a more complex portrait of Native American peoples, one that rejects mythologies, even those that both European and Native Americans might wish to embrace."—Washington Post

    Since 2000, science has seen a surge in data and interest on several fronts related to E.T. (extraterrestrials); A.I. (artificial intelligence); and SETI (search for extraterrestrial intelligence). The debate has intensified over whether life exists outside our solar system, what that life would look like, and whether we’ll ever make contact.Included here are essays from a broad spectrum of the scientific community: cosmologists, astrophysicists, NASA planetary scientists, and geneticists, to name just a few, discussing the latest research and theories relating to alien life. Some of the topics include: If life exists somewhere in space, what are the odds that it evolves into something we would recognize as intelligent? What will space travel look like in the future, and will it all be done by cyborg technology? How long until we are ruled by robot overlords? (This is actually a serious consideration.) Are we simply a simulation in the mind of some supreme being, acting out a virtual reality game?For those who have ever wondered, Is there anybody out there? here are the latest theories and evidence that move us closer to answering that question.

    Writing as the founder of the modern study of the history of religion, Romanian emigre--scholar Mircea Eliade (1907-86) surveys the practice of Shamanism over two & a half millennia of human history, moving from the Shamanic traditions of Siberia & Central Asia--where Shamanism was first observed--to North & South America, Indonesia, Tibet, China & beyond. In this authoritative survey, Eliade illuminates the magico-religious life of societies that give primacy of place to the figure of the Shaman--at once magician & medicine man, healer & miracle-doer, priest, mystic & poet. Synthesizing the approaches of psychology, sociology & ethnology, "Shamanism" will remain for years to come the reference book of choice for those intrigued by this practice.

    He provides readers with non-trivial insights into research fields they may not have encountered previously . . . I think everyone who has ever considered the possibility that other intelligent civilizations exist elsewhere within our galaxy will enjoy Where Is Everybody? They will find much to agree with, and much to argue about, in this very accessible volume.� �SCIENCE During a Los Alamos lunchtime conversation that took place more than 50 years ago, four world-class scientists agreed, given the size and age of the Universe, that advanced extraterrestrial civilizations simply had to exist. The sheer numbers demanded it. But one of the four, the renowned physicist and back-of-the-envelope calculator Enrico Fermi, asked the telling question: If the extraterrestrial life proposition is true, he wondered, "Where IS everybody?" In this lively and thought-provoking book, Stephen Webb presents a detailed discussion of the 50 most cogent and intriguing answers to Fermi's famous question, divided into three distinct groups: - Aliens are already here among us. Here are answers ranging from Leo Szilard's suggestion that they are already here, and we know them as Hungarians, to the theorists who claim that aliens built Stonehenge and the Easter Island statues. - Aliens exist, but have not yet communicated. The theories in this camp range widely, from those who believe we simply don't have the technologies to receive their signals, to those who believe the enormities of space and time work against communication, to those who believe they're hiding from us. - Aliens do not exist. Here are the doubters' arguments, from the Rare Earth theory to the author's own closely argued and cogently stated skepticism. The proposed solutions run the gamut from the crackpot to the highly serious, but all deserve our consideration. The varieties of arguments -- from first-rate scientists, philosophers and historians, and science fiction authors -- turn out to be astonishing, entertaining, and vigorous intellectual exercises for any reader interested in science and the sheer pleasure of speculative thinking. Stephen Webb is a physicist working at the Open University in England and the author of Measuring the Universe.

    The Golden Bough" describes our ancestors' primitive methods of worship, sex practices, strange rituals and festivals. Disproving the popular thought that primitive life was simple, this monumental survey shows that savage man was enmeshed in a tangle of magic, taboos, and superstitions. Revealed here is the evolution of man from savagery to civilization, from the modification of his weird and often bloodthirsty customs to the entry of lasting moral, ethical, and spiritual values.

    The Los Angeles Times has listed it among the one hundred most influential books published in the last quarter century, Outside Magazine has included it in a survey of books that changed our world, and it has been called the Book of Genesis for environmentalists. Now a fourth edition of this highly regarded work is available, with a new preface and epilogue in which Nash explores the future of wilderness and reflects on its ethical and biocentric relevance.

    Presents an illustrated history of North American Indians from their origins to the present, and includes contemporary interviews and excerpts from journals.

    The lion was not always king. From antiquity to the Middle Ages, the bear's centrality in cults and mythologies left traces in European languages, literatures, and legends from the Slavic East to Celtic Britain. Historian Michel Pastoureau considers how this once venerated creature was deposed by the advent of Christianity and continued to sink lower in the symbolic bestiary before rising again in Pyrrhic triumph as a popular toy.The early Church was threatened by pagan legends of the bear's power, among them a widespread belief that male bears were sexually attracted to women and would violate them, producing half-bear, half-human beings--invincible warriors who founded royal lines. Marked for death by the clergy, bears were massacred. During the Renaissance, the demonic prestige bears had been assigned in biblical allegory was lost to the goat, ass, bat, and owl, who were the devil's new familiars, while the lion was crowned as the symbol of nobility. Once the undefeated champions of the Roman arena, prized in princely menageries, bears became entertainers in the marketplace, trained to perform humiliating tricks or muzzled and devoured by packs of dogs for the amusement of humans. By the early twentieth century, however, the bear would return from exile, making its way into the hearts of children everywhere as the teddy bear.This compelling history reminds us that men and bears have always been inseparable, united by a kinship that gradually moved from nature to culture--a bond that continues to this day.

    Were humans created by God as Slaves? Was Abraham the first human Spy? Was Jesus an accidental Messiah? This work takes readers on a odyssey of the origins of humankind drawing on analogies between discoveries in genetic engineering and ancient archaeological finds.

    Originally published in 1948 as Dieu d'Eau, this near-classic offers a unique and first-hand account of the myth, religion, and philosophy of the Dogon.

    These tiny, ghostly particles are formed by the billions in stars and pass through us constantly, unseen, at almost the speed of light. Yet half a century after their discovery, we still know less about them than all the other varieties of matter that have ever been seen. In this engaging, concise volume, renowned scientist and popular writer Frank Close gives a vivid account of the discovery of neutrinos and our growing understanding of their significance, also touching on some speculative ideas concerning the possible uses of neutrinos and their role in the early universe. Close begins with the early history of the discovery of radioactivity by Henri Becquerel and Marie and Pierre Curie, the early model of the atom by Ernest Rutherford, and problems with these early atomic models, and Wolfgang Pauli's solution to that problem by inventing the concept of neutrino (named by Enrico Fermi, neutrino being Italian for little neutron). The book describes how the confirmation of Pauli's theory didn't occur until 1956, when Clyde Cowan and Fred Reines detected neutrinos, and reveals that the first natural neutrinos were finally detected by Reines in 1965 (before that, they had only been detected in reactors or accelerators). Close takes us to research experiments miles underground that are able to track neutrinos' fleeting impact as they pass through vast pools of cadmium chloride and he explains why they are becoming of such interest to cosmologists--if we can track where a neutrino originated we will be looking into the far distant reaches of the universe. In telling the story of the neutrino, Close offers a fascinating portrait of a strand of modern physics that sheds light on everything from the workings of the atom and the power of the sun.

    government program, traveled to the planet Serpo and lived there for 13 years • Based on the debriefing of the Serpo team and the diary of the expedition’s commander • Explains how the aliens helped us reverse-engineer their antigravity spacecraft and develop technology to solve our planet-wide energy problems • Reveals how our government has an ongoing relationship with the Serpo aliens On July 16, 1965, a massive alien spacecraft from the Zeta Reticuli star system landed at the Nevada test site north of Las Vegas. Following a plan set in motion by President Kennedy in 1962, the alien visitors known as the Ebens welcomed 12 astronaut-trained military personnel aboard their craft for the 10-month journey to their home planet, Serpo, 39 light-years away. In November 2005, former and current members of the Defense Intelligence Agency--directed by Kennedy to organize the Serpo exchange program--came forward to reveal the operation, including details from the 3,000-page debriefing of the 7 members of the Serpo team who returned after 13 years on the planet. Working with the DIA originators of the Serpo project and the diary kept by the expedition’s commanding officer, Len Kasten chronicles the complete journey of these cosmic pioneers, including their remarkable stories of life on an alien planet, superluminal space travel, and advanced knowledge of alien technologies. He reveals how the Ebens presented the U.S. with “The Yellow Book”--a complete history of the universe recorded holographically, allowing the reader to view actual scenes from pre-history to the present. He explains how the Ebens helped us reverse-engineer their antigravity spacecraft and develop technology to solve our planet-wide energy problems--knowledge still classified. Exposing the truth of human-alien interaction and interplanetary travel, Kasten reveals not only that the Ebens have returned to Earth eight times but also that our government continues to have an ongoing relationship with them--a relationship with the potential to advance the human race into the future.

    Only now are we coming to a fuller appreciation of the nature and role of myth in human history. In these five lectures originally prepared for Canadian radio, Claude Lévi-Strauss offers, in brief summations, the insights of a lifetime spent interpreting myths and trying to discover their significance for human understanding. The lectures begin with a discussion of the historical split between mythology and science and the evidence that mythic levels of understanding are being reintegrated in our approach to knowledge. In an extension of this theme, Professor Lévi-Strauss analyzes what we have called “primitive thinking” and discusses some universal features of human mythology. The final two lectures outline the functional relationship between mythology and history and the structural relationship between mythology and music.

    Jack Slade and Sam Healey, flying partners during World War II, establish a bush pilot business in Alaska after the war. When their C-47 Dakota is forced down on a glacier by a wolverine in the cargo deck that breaks out of its cage, they discover a valley that offers the realization each man's dreams. To Jack Slade, itOCOs the ideal place to homestead, raise a family, and live simply as a professional hunting and fishing guide; to Healey, the pool of crude oil he locates under the glacial ice promises the wealth he always wanted. In scenes that range from AlaskaOCOs coastal fishing ports to the high, fierce wastelands of the interior, we watch each man lay the plans for their individual goals?and ultimately come into fatal conflict. Along the way, they meet a wide, colorful variety of Alaskan types, including Charlie Blue, a Tlingit Indian, shaman, and seer; Norman Ormandy, the tough saloonkeeper of Gurry Bay; and Malec Mummad-Afi, a wealthy exiled Iranian oil king and sheep hunter.