[PDF] Improbable Planet eBook

Author : Hugh Ross
Publisher : Baker Books
Page : 358 pages
File Size : 31,72 MB
Release : 2016-09-06
Category : Religion
ISBN : 149340539X

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The Latest Scientific Discoveries Point to an Intentional Creator Most of us remember the basics from science classes about how Earth came to be the only known planet that sustains complex life. But what most people don't know is that the more thoroughly researchers investigate the history of our planet, the more astonishing the story of our existence becomes. The number and complexity of the astronomical, geological, chemical, and biological features recognized as essential to human existence have expanded explosively within the past decade. An understanding of what is required to make possible a large human population and advanced civilizations has raised profound questions about life, our purpose, and our destiny. Are we really just the result of innumerable coincidences? Or is there a more reasonable explanation? This fascinating book helps nonscientists understand the countless miracles that undergird the exquisitely fine-tuned planet we call home--as if Someone had us in mind all along.

Author : Judith D. Schwartz
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
Page : 242 pages
File Size : 34,54 MB
Release : 2013-05-20
Category : Technology & Engineering
ISBN : 1603584331

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In Cows Save the Planet, journalist Judith D. Schwartz looks at soil as a crucible for our many overlapping environmental, economic, and social crises. Schwartz reveals that for many of these problems—climate change, desertification, biodiversity loss, droughts, floods, wildfires, rural poverty, malnutrition, and obesity—there are positive, alternative scenarios to the degradation and devastation we face. In each case, our ability to turn these crises into opportunities depends on how we treat the soil. Drawing on the work of thinkers and doers, renegade scientists and institutional whistleblowers from around the world, Schwartz challenges much of the conventional thinking about global warming and other problems. For example, land can suffer from undergrazing as well as overgrazing, since certain landscapes, such as grasslands, require the disturbance from livestock to thrive. Regarding climate, when we focus on carbon dioxide, we neglect the central role of water in soil—"green water"—in temperature regulation. And much of the carbon dioxide that burdens the atmosphere is not the result of fuel emissions, but from agriculture; returning carbon to the soil not only reduces carbon dioxide levels but also enhances soil fertility. Cows Save the Planet is at once a primer on soil's pivotal role in our ecology and economy, a call to action, and an antidote to the despair that environmental news so often leaves us with.

Author : Walter Alvarez
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Page : 223 pages
File Size : 37,86 MB
Release : 2016-11-15
Category : Science
ISBN : 0393292703

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"A thrilling synthesis from a brilliant scientist who discovered one of the most important chapters in our history." —Sean B. Carroll Big History, the field that integrates traditional historical scholarship with scientific insights to study the full sweep of our universe, has so far been the domain of historians. Famed geologist Walter Alvarez—best known for the “Impact Theory” explaining dinosaur extinction—has instead championed a science-first approach to Big History. Here he wields his unique expertise to give us a new appreciation for the incredible occurrences—from the Big Bang to the formation of supercontinents, the dawn of the Bronze Age, and beyond—that have led to our improbable place in the universe.

Author : Jonathan B. Losos
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 386 pages
File Size : 39,49 MB
Release : 2017-08-08
Category : Science
ISBN : 0399184937

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A major new book overturning our assumptions about how evolution works Earth’s natural history is full of fascinating instances of convergence: phenomena like eyes and wings and tree-climbing lizards that have evolved independently, multiple times. But evolutionary biologists also point out many examples of contingency, cases where the tiniest change—a random mutation or an ancient butterfly sneeze—caused evolution to take a completely different course. What role does each force really play in the constantly changing natural world? Are the plants and animals that exist today, and we humans ourselves, inevitabilities or evolutionary flukes? And what does that say about life on other planets? Jonathan Losos reveals what the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology can tell us about one of the greatest ongoing debates in science. He takes us around the globe to meet the researchers who are solving the deepest mysteries of life on Earth through their work in experimental evolutionary science. Losos himself is one of the leaders in this exciting new field, and he illustrates how experiments with guppies, fruit flies, bacteria, foxes, and field mice, along with his own work with anole lizards on Caribbean islands, are rewinding the tape of life to reveal just how rapid and predictable evolution can be. Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution. Losos's insights into natural selection and evolutionary change have far-reaching applications for protecting ecosystems, securing our food supply, and fighting off harmful viruses and bacteria. This compelling narrative offers a new understanding of ourselves and our role in the natural world and the cosmos.

Author : Eoin Colfer
Publisher : Hachette Books
Page : 364 pages
File Size : 46,36 MB
Release : 2009-10-12
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 1401394809

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And Another Thing ... will be the sixth novel in the now improbably named Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy. Eight years after the death of its creator, Douglas Adams, the author's widow, Jane Belson, has given her approval for the project to be continued by the international number one bestselling children's writer, Eoin Colfer, author of the Artemis Fowl novels. Douglas Adams himself once said, 'I suspect at some point in the future I will write a sixth Hitchhiker book. Five seems to be a wrong kind of number, six is a better kind of number.' Belson said of Eoin Colfer, 'I love his books and could not think of a better person to transport Arthur, Zaphod and Marvin to pastures new.' Colfer, a fan of Hitchhiker since his schooldays, said, 'Being given the chance to write this book is like suddenly being offered the superpower of your choice. For years I have been finishing this incredible story in my head and now I have the opportunity to do it in the real world.' Prepare to be amazed...

Author : Peter D. Ward
Publisher : Springer
Page : 359 pages
File Size : 21,56 MB
Release : 2007-05-08
Category : Science
ISBN : 0387218483

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What determines whether complex life will arise on a planet, or even any life at all? Questions such as these are investigated in this groundbreaking book. In doing so, the authors synthesize information from astronomy, biology, and paleontology, and apply it to what we know about the rise of life on Earth and to what could possibly happen elsewhere in the universe. Everyone who has been thrilled by the recent discoveries of extrasolar planets and the indications of life on Mars and the Jovian moon Europa will be fascinated by Rare Earth, and its implications for those who look to the heavens for companionship.

Author : Hugh Ross
Publisher : Baker Books
Page : 240 pages
File Size : 18,54 MB
Release : 2011-10-01
Category : Religion
ISBN : 1441234322

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Arguably the oldest book in the Bible, the book of Job has a surprising amount to say about some of the newest scientific discoveries and controversies. Far from a book that is just about suffering, Job is filled with rich insight into both ancient and modern questions about the formation of the world the difference between animals and humans cosmology dinosaurs and the fossil record how to care for creation and more With careful consideration and exegesis, internationally known astrophysicist and Christian apologist Hugh Ross adds yet another compelling argument to the case for the veracity of the biblical commentary on the history of the universe, Earth, life, and humanity. Hidden Treasures in the Book of Job shows that the Bible is an accurate predictor of scientific discoveries and a trustworthy source of scientific information, and that both the book of Scripture and the book of nature are consistent both internally and externally.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Page : 352 pages
File Size : 22,49 MB
Release : 1997-09-17
Category : Science
ISBN : 0393070522

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A brilliant book celebrating improbability as the engine that drives life, by the acclaimed author of The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker. The human eye is so complex and works so precisely that surely, one might believe, its current shape and function must be the product of design. How could such an intricate object have come about by chance? Tackling this subject—in writing that the New York Times called "a masterpiece"—Richard Dawkins builds a carefully reasoned and lovingly illustrated argument for evolutionary adaptation as the mechanism for life on earth. The metaphor of Mount Improbable represents the combination of perfection and improbability that is epitomized in the seemingly "designed" complexity of living things. Dawkins skillfully guides the reader on a breathtaking journey through the mountain's passes and up its many peaks to demonstrate that following the improbable path to perfection takes time. Evocative illustrations accompany Dawkins's eloquent descriptions of extraordinary adaptations such as the teeming populations of figs, the intricate silken world of spiders, and the evolution of wings on the bodies of flightless animals. And through it all runs the thread of DNA, the molecule of life, responsible for its own destiny on an unending pilgrimage through time. Climbing Mount Improbable is a book of great impact and skill, written by the most prominent Darwinian of our age.

Author : Guillermo Gonzalez
Publisher : Regnery Gateway
Page : 466 pages
File Size : 18,98 MB
Release : 2020-01-07
Category : Science
ISBN : 1684510775

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Earth. The Final Frontier Contrary to popular belief, Earth is not an insignificant blip on the universe’s radar. Our world proves anything but average in Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay W. Richards’ The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos Is Designed for Discovery. But what exactly does Earth bring to the table? How does it prove its worth among numerous planets and constellations in the vastness of the Milky Way? In The Privileged Planet, you’ll learn about the world’s life-sustaining capabilities, water and its miraculous makeup, protection by the planetary giants, and how our planet came into existence in the first place.

Author :
Publisher : Paradigma Ltd
Page : 437 pages
File Size : 31,34 MB
Release :
Category : Science
ISBN : 1906833710

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With this book Immanuel Velikovsky first presented the revolutionary results of his 10-year-long interdisciplinary research to the public, founded modern catastrophism - based on eyewitness reports by our ancestors - shook the doctrine of uniformity of geology as well as Darwin's theory of evolution, put our view of the history of our solar system, of the Earth and of humanity on a completely new basis - and caused an uproar that is still going on today. Worlds in Collision - written in a brilliant, easily understandable and entertaining style and full to the brim with precise information - can be considered one of the most important and most challenging books in the history of science. Not without reason was this book found open on Einstein's desk after his death. For all those who have ever wondered about the evolution of the earth, the history of mankind, traditions, religions, mythology or just the world as it is today, Worlds in Collision is an absolute MUST-READ!