Human Biology

In this groundbreaking new book, researchers Andrew Newberg and Eugene d'Aquili offer an explanation that is at once profoundly simple and scientifically precise: The religious impulse is rooted in the biology of the brain. In Why God Won't Go Away, Newberg and d'Aquili document their pioneering explorations in the field of neurotheology, an emerging discipline dedicated to understanding the complex relationship between spirituality and the brain.

The knowledge of death is so terrifying that we live most of our lives in denial of it. Our fear of death has underpinned our religions, inspired our cultures, and also driven our science. Today we are living through a revolution in biology. Giant strides are being made in our understanding of why we age and die, and why some species live longer than others. Immortality, once a faint hope, has never been more within our grasp. Here, Nobel Prize-winning biologist Venki Ramakrishnan offers a definitive look at why we die - and whether we can do anything about it.

We’ve come a long way. The earliest human had a brain as small as a child’s fist; ours are four times bigger, with spectacular abilities and potential we are only just beginning to understand. This is How the Mind Changed, a seven-million-year journey through our own heads, packed with vivid stories, groundbreaking science, and thrilling surprises. Discover how memory has almost nothing to do with the past.

Why do you love? Why do you lie? What makes you happy? Every thought you have comes from one place: your brain. But what makes it tick? How much of it have we decoded, and how much of it remains an impenetrable mystery? Join author and cartoonist Jorge Cham and neuroscientist Dwayne Godwin on a deep dive into the fascinating world of the human brain, in which they will explore questions such as: What is consciousness? Where is you in the brain? And do we have free will? All while illuminating everything we know (and DON’T know) about one of the most complex objects in the known universe.

We humans are a strange bunch. We have self-awareness and yet often act on impulses that remain hidden. How did we get here? What is to become of us? To these age-old questions, science has in recent years brought powerful tools and reams of data, and in this audiobook, Becoming Human, we look at what this data has to tell us about who we are.

A natural history of the wilderness in our homes, from the microbes in our showers to the crickets in our basements Even when the floors are sparkling clean and the house seems silent, our domestic domain is wild beyond imagination. In Never Home Alone, biologist Rob Dunn introduces us to the nearly 200,000 species living with us in our own homes, from the Egyptian meal moths in our cupboards and camel crickets in our basements to the lactobacillus lounging on our kitchen counters. You are not alone.

The world is in crisis! What is the solution? Ultimately, we have to find the redeeming, and thus transforming, understanding of our psychologically troubled human condition. And it is precisely that dreamed-of insight, and its now desperately needed transformation of our lives, that Australian biologist Jeremy Griffith presents in this book.

The human body is full of many wonders, some of which we have yet to explore! There's so much to discover, especially for young scientists! Jump-start your child's learning of biology with this program. In this book, kids will take a journey with Dr. Discovery Jones on an exciting and educational journey throughout the human body looking at the cells, the tissues, and the organs! Filled with fun facts, this book will fill young and curious minds with a great foundational knowledge of how the human body works.

Explore each organ of the body in this immersive audiobook adaptation of Kay's Anatomy, read by world-wide multi-million bestselling author and former doctor Adam Kay with a full cast of voices, including Mark Gatiss, Sandi Toksvig, Andy Nyman and Lolly Adefope.

How did humans come to be who we are? In his marvelous, eccentric, and widely lauded book Being a Beast, legal scholar, veterinary surgeon, and naturalist extraordinaire Charles Foster set out to understand the consciousness of animal species by living as a badger, otter, fox, deer, and swift. Now, he inhabits three crucial periods of human development to understand the consciousness of perhaps the strangest animal of all—the human being.

This humbling and revelatory book shows how infectious disease has shaped humanity at every stage, from the first success of Homo sapiens over the equally intelligent Neanderthals to the fall of Rome and the rise of Islam. How did an Indonesian volcano help cause the Black Death, setting Europe on the road to capitalism? How could 168 men extract the largest ransom in history from an opposing army of eighty thousand? The latest science reveals that infectious diseases are not just something that happens to us, but a fundamental part of who we are.

In 2017, author Shanna Swan and her team of researchers completed a major study. They found that over the past four decades, sperm levels among men in Western countries have dropped by more than 50 percent. They came to this conclusion after examining 185 studies involving close to 45,000 healthy men. The result sent shockwaves around the globe - but the story didn’t end there.

The Gene is the story of one of the most powerful and dangerous ideas in our history, from best-selling, prize-winning author Siddhartha Mukherjee. Spanning the globe and several centuries, The Gene is the story of the quest to decipher the master code that makes and defines humans, that governs our form and function. The story of the gene begins in an obscure Augustinian abbey in Moravia in 1856, where a monk stumbles on the idea of a 'unit of heredity'.

Cat Bohannon answers questions scientists should have been addressing for decades. With boundless curiosity and sharp wit, she covers the past 200 million years to explain the specific science behind the development of the female sex. Eve is not only a sweeping revision of human history, it's an urgent and necessary corrective for a world that has focused primarily on the male body for far too long. Bohannon's findings will completely change what you think you know about evolution.

This book explores the underlying nature of the Seven Deadly Sins, their neuroscientific and psychological basis, their origin in our genes, and how certain medical disorders may give rise to them. We meet individuals whose physical and psychological conditions have given rise to these sins, where brain injury or psychological experiences have given rise to “immoral” actions, how illness has simply exposed what lies within us. We see how the origins of the definition of these traits as sins lie in evolutionary imperatives to preserve the tribe, to ensure the wellbeing of our societies.

Two hundred and six bones. One heart. Two eyes. Ten fingers. You may think we know what makes up a human. But it turns out our bodies are full of surprises. What makes tears of joy different from tears of sadness? Why is a gut feeling so much smarter than you think? And why is 90 percent of you not even human? You may think you know the human body - heart, lungs, brain and bones - but it's time to think again. Your body is full of extraordinary mysteries that science is only just beginning to understand.

Unveil the impressive mysteries of your own body with this interactive trivia book from Jeopardy! champ and New York Times bestselling author Ken Jennings. With this book about the amazing human body, you’ll become an expert and wow your friends and teachers with awesome anatomical facts: Did you know that your hair is as strong as copper wire? Or that if you could spread them out, your lungs would have the surface area of a tennis court?

Flush is both an urgent exploration of the world’s single most squandered natural resource, and a cri de coeur (or cri de colon?) for the vast, hidden value in our “waste.” Award-winning journalist and microbiologist Bryn Nelson, PhD, leads listeners through the colon and beyond with infectious enthusiasm, helping to usher in a necessary mental shift that could restore our balance with the rest of the planet and save us from ourselves.

Referring to Lewis Carroll's Red Queen from Through the Looking-Glass, a character who has to keep running to stay in the same place, Matt Ridley demonstrates why sex is humanity's best strategy for outwitting its constantly mutating internal predators.

Explore each organ of the body in this immersive audiobook edition of Kay's Anatomy, read by Adam Kay with a full cast of voices, including Mark Gatiss, Sandi Toksvig, Andy Nyman and Lolly Adefope. Do you ever think about your body and how it all works? Like really properly think about it? The human body is extraordinary and fascinating and, well...pretty weird. Yours is weird; mine is weird; your maths teacher's is even weirder. This book is going to tell you what's actually going on in there and answer the really important questions.