In 1740, George Anson and his fleet set off to harass Spanish commerce in the Pacific and attack towns on the coasts of Chile and Peru. Four years later, over half the men had died and of the seven ships which left Portsmouth only the Centurion had completed its objective of attacking Spanish possessions around the globe. Although this journey came at the cost of numerous lives and ships, the Centurion had succeeded in capturing the biggest prize of all time, the Acapulco galleon. Captain Philip Saumarez kept a daily record of the voyage around the world in his four log books, which along with a wealth of letters and documents give brilliant insight into life aboard these ships. Leo Heaps has compiled and edited these manuscripts to provide a complete chronicle of the expedition which saw men decimated by scurvy, mutinies among marooned sailors, ships battered by mountainous waves around Cape Horn and eventual glory in the capture of the gold-laden Nuestra Señora de la Covadonga. Log of the Centurion is a unique account of a daring maritime expedition across the high seas of the globe in the mid-eighteenth century. “It is a tribute to her officers that she not only captured the greatest prize at sea, but that she returned at all.” Christopher Lloyd, former Professor of History at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich “It is an absorbing tale … The merit of this book lies in its realistic evocation of the mid-18th century. We have fine descriptions of China and the delicate negotiations conducted with the Manchus for supplies and repairs. Patagonia, Juan Fernandez (Crusoe’s island), Madeira, and other exotic places are vividly described.” Regis A. Courtemanche, History: Reviews of New Books

    Sayed Ammar Nashawani's lectures on the biographies of the fourteen infallible figures in Shi'a Islam.An invaluable resource that represents a Shi'a view of the history of Islam, the Prophet and Imams for the present day audience. This excellent book will be of benefit to many in understanding the true nature of Islam and also illustrate how the illustrious figures as representing and manifesting universal human values that can serve humanity at large

    Through the prisms of archaeology, theology, and evolutionary psychology, Wright's findings overturn basic assumptions about Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and are sure to cause controversy. He explains why spirituality has a role today, and why science, contrary to conventional wisdom, affirms the validity of the religious quest. And this previously unrecognized evolutionary logic points not toward continued religious extremism, but future harmony. Nearly a decade in the making, The Evolution of God is a breathtaking re-examination of the past, and a visionary look forward.

    Evo Devo Evolutionary Developmental Biology is the new science that has finally cracked open the box. Within the pages of his rich and riveting book, Sean B. Carroll explains how we are discovering that complex life is ironically much simpler than anyone ever expected.

    The Red Queen answers dozens of other riddles of human nature and culture -- including why men propose marriage, the method behind our maddening notions of beauty, and the disquieting fact that a woman is more likely to conceive a child by an adulterous lover than by her husband. Brilliantly written, The Red Queen offers an extraordinary new way of interpreting the human condition and how it has evolved.

    

    For almost 500 years, the masses have been thoroughly deceived by a cosmic fairy-tale of astronomical proportions. We have been taught a falsehood so gigantic and diabolical that it has blinded us from our own experience and common sense, from seeing the world and the universe as they truly are. Through pseudo-science books and programs, mass media and public education, universities and government propaganda, the world has been systematically brain-washed, slowly indoctrinated over centuries into the unquestioning belief of the greatest lie of all time. A multi-generational conspiracy has succeeded, in the minds of the masses, to pick up the fixed Earth, shape it into a ball, spin it in circles, and throw it around the Sun! The greatest cover-up of all time, NASA and Freemasonry's biggest secret, is that we are living on a plane, not a planet, that Earth is the flat, stationary center of the universe.

    In the mid-1970s, scientists began using DNA sequences to reexamine the history of all life. Perhaps the most startling discovery to come out of this new field—the study of life’s diversity and relatedness at the molecular level—is horizontal gene transfer (HGT), or the movement of genes across species lines. It turns out that HGT has been widespread and important. For instance, we now know that roughly eight percent of the human genome arrived not through traditional inheritance from directly ancestral forms, but sideways by viral infection—a type of HGT.David Quammen chronicles these discoveries through the lives of the researchers who made them—such as Carl Woese, the most important little-known biologist of the twentieth century; Lynn Margulis, the notorious maverick whose wild ideas about “mosaic” creatures proved to be true; and Tsutomu Wantanabe, who discovered that the scourge of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a direct result of horizontal gene transfer, bringing the deep study of genome histories to bear on a global crisis in public health.

    Vale: Four leading figures in social movements discuss the state of Western culture and what led to its demise, with firsthand accounts of their own experiences, including subjects that concern every creative artist and thinker: The Internet and social change; why every one must paint( ); mind control, marketing, branding and consumerism; corporate chain stores and the problem of Amazon; punk rock history; the rise of Do-It-Yourself (D-I-Y) culture production; fame and its downside; sex and relationships.

    Through scrupulous research and vivid first-person reporting, The First Human reveals the perils and the promises of fossil hunting on a grand competitive scale.

    The objective here is to explain science in a simple, attractive and fun form that is open to all.The first axiom of this approach was set out as follows: “We believe in the magic of science. We hope to show you that sci-ence is not a secret art, accessible only to a dedicated few. It involves learning about nature and society, and aspects of our existence which affect us all, and which we should all therefore have the chance to understand. We shall interpret science for those who might not speak its language fluently, but want to understand its meaning. We don’t teach, we just tell stories about the beginnings of science, the natural phenomena and the underlying principles through which they occur, and the lives of the people who discovered them.”The aim of the writings collected in this series is to present some key scientific events, ideas and personalities in the form of short stories that are easy and fun to read. Scientific and philo-sophical concepts are explained in a way that anyone may under-stand. Each story may be read separately, but at the same time they all band together to form a wide-ranging introduction to the history of science and areas of contemporary scientific research, as well as some of the recurring problems science has encountered in history and the philosophical dilemmas it raises today.Review“If I were the only survivor on a remote island and all I had with me were this book, a Swiss army knife and a bottle, I would throw the bottle into the sea with the note: ‘Don’t worry, I have everything I need.’”— Ciril Horjak, alias Dr. Horowitz, a comic artist“The writing is understandable, but never simplistic. Instructive, but never patronizing. Straightforward, but never trivial. In-depth, but never too intense.”— Ali Žerdin, editor at Delo, the main Slovenian newspaper“Does science think? Heidegger once answered this question with a decisive No. The writings on modern science skillfully penned by Sašo Dolenc, these small stories about big stories, quickly convince us that the contrary is true. Not only does science think in hundreds of unexpected ways, its intellectual challenges and insights are an inexhaustible source of inspiration and entertainment. The clarity of thought and the lucidity of its style make this book accessible to anyone … in the finest tradition of popularizing science, its achievements, dilemmas and predicaments.”— Mladen Dolar, philosopher and author of A Voice and Nothing More“Sašo Dolenc is undoubtedly one of our most successful authors in the field of popular science, possessing the ability to explain complex scientific achievements to a broader audience in a clear and captivating way while remaining precise and scientific. His collection of articles is of particular importance because it encompasses all areas of modern science in an unassuming, almost light-hearted manner.”— Boštjan Žekš, physicist and former president of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts

    With clear and witty writing, this book examines the science behind many popular myths, revealing why many "truths" we think we know, we don't really know at all.

    The first Indian Army officer to be promoted to the five-star rank of Field Marshal, Sam Bahadur continues to be the most admired of our Army Chiefs.

    But we are also an animal that does not think it is an animal. How well do we really know ourselves?How to Be Animal tells a remarkable story of what it means to be human and argues that at the heart of our existence is a profound struggle with being animal. We possess a psychology that seeks separation between humanity and the rest of nature, and we have invented grand ideologies to magnify this. As well as piecing together the mystery of how this mindset evolved, Challenger's book examines the wide-reaching ways in which it affects our lives, from our politics to the way we distance ourselves from other species. We travel from the origin of homo sapiens through the agrarian and industrial revolutions, the age of the internet, and on to the futures of AI and human-machine interface. Challenger examines how technology influences our sense of our own animal nature and our relationship with other species with whom we share this fragile planet.That we are separated from our own animality is a delusion, according to Challenger. Blending nature writing, history, and moral philosophy, How to Be Animal is both a fascinating reappraisal of what it means to be human, and a robust defense of what it means to be an animal.

    Practical Stoicism is a collection of short readings written to help bridge the gap between the essential teachings of the great Stoic philosophers and the things we must do, in the here and now, to achieve the fulfillment they promised. Pick a starting point anywhere within its pages whenever you need a quick reminder of how to move your philosophy out of your head and into your life. Version 2.3.1