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The great wave : the era of radical disruption and the rise of the outsider / by Kakutani, Michiko,author.;
Includes bibliographical references."An urgent examination of how disruptive politics, technology, and art are capsizing old assumptions in a great wave of change breaking over today's world, creating both opportunity and peril-from the Pulitzer Prize-winning critic and author of the New York Times bestseller The Death of Truth. The twenty-first century is experiencing a watershed moment defined by chaos and uncertainty, as one emergency cascades into another, underscoring the larger dynamics of change that are fueling instability across the world. Since the global financial crisis of 2008, people have increasingly lost trust in institutions and elites, while seizing upon new digital tools to sidestep traditional gatekeepers. As a result, powerful new voices-once regarded as radical, unorthodox or marginal-are disrupting the status quo in politics, business and culture. Meanwhile, social and economic inequalities are stoking populist rage across the world, toxic partisanship is undermining democratic ideals, and the internet and AI have become high-speed vectors for the spread of misinformation. Writing with a critic's understanding of cultural trends and a journalist's eye for historical detail, Michiko Kakutani looks at the consequences of these new asymmetries of power. She maps the migration of ideas from the margins to the mainstream and explores the growing influence of outsiders-those who have sown anger and fear (like Donald Trump), and those who have provided inspirational leadership (like Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky). At the same time, she situates today's multiplying crises in context with those that defined earlier hinge moments in history, from the waning of the Middle Ages, to the transition between the Gilded Age and Progressive era at the end of the nineteenth century. Kakutani argues that today's crises are not only signs of an interconnected globe's profound vulnerabilities, but stress tests pointing to the essential changes needed to survive this tumultuous era and build a more sustainable future"--
Subjects: Civilization, Modern; Elite (Social sciences); Globalization.; Political culture.; Power (Social sciences); Uncertainty.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The vaccine : inside the race to conquer the COVID-19 pandemic / by Miller, Joe(Correspondent),author.; Şahin, Uğur,1965-author.; Türeci, Özlem,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Winners of the Paul Ehrlich Prize The dramatic story of the married scientists who founded BioNTech and developed the first vaccine against COVID-19. Nobody thought it was possible. In mid-January 2020, Ugur Sahin told Özlem Türeci, his wife and decades-long research partner, that a vaccine against what would soon be known as COVID-19 could be developed and safely injected into the arms of millions before the end of the year. His confidence was built upon almost thirty years of research. While working to revolutionize the way that cancerous tumors are treated, the couple had explored a volatile and overlooked molecule called messenger RNA; they believed it could be harnessed to redirect the immune system's forces against any number of diseases. As the founders of BioNTech, they faced widespread skepticism from the scientific community at first; but by the time Sars-Cov-2 was discovered in Wuhan, China, BioNTech was prepared to deploy cutting edge technology and create the world's first clinically approved inoculation for the coronavirus. The Vaccine draws back the curtain on one of the most important medical breakthroughs of our age; it will reveal how Doctors Sahin and Türeci were able to develop twenty vaccine candidates within weeks, convince Big Pharma to support their ambitious project, navigate political interference from the Trump administration and the European Union, and provide more than three billion doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to countries around the world in record time. Written by Joe Miller-the Financial Times' Frankfurt correspondent who covered BioNTech's COVID-19 project in real time-with contributions from Sahin and Türeci, as well as interviews with more than sixty scientists, politicians, public health officials, and BioNTech staff, the book covers key events throughout the extraordinary year, as well as exploring the scientific, economic, and personal background of each medical innovation. Crafted to be both completely accessible to the average reader and filled with details that will fascinate seasoned microbiologists, The Vaccine explains the science behind the breakthrough, at a time when public confidence in vaccine safety and efficacy is crucial to bringing an end to this pandemic"--
Subjects: COVID-19 (Disease); Vaccines.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Cemetery Road : a novel / by Iles, Greg,author.;
"The #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Natchez Burning trilogy returns with an electrifying tale of friendship, betrayal, and shattering secrets that threaten to destroy a small Mississippi town. When Marshall McEwan left his hometown at age eighteen, he vowed never to return. The trauma that drove him away ultimately spurred him to become one of the most successful journalists in Washington D.C. But just as the political chaos in the nation's capital lifts him to new heights, Marshall is forced to return home in spite of his boyhood vow. His father is dying, his mother is struggling to keep the family newspaper from failing, and the town is in the midst of an economic rebirth that might be built upon crimes that reach into the state capitol--and perhaps even to Washington. More disturbing still, Marshall's high school sweetheart, Jet, has married into the family of Max Matheson, patriarch of one of the families that rule Bienville through a shadow organization called the Bienville Poker Club. When archeologist Buck McKibben is murdered at a construction site, Bienville is thrown into chaos. The ensuing homicide investigation is soon derailed by a second crime that rocks the community to its core. Power broker Max Matheson's wife has been shot dead in her own bed, and the only other person in it at the time was her husband, Max. Stranger still, Max demands that his daughter-in-law, Jet, defend him in court. As a journalist, Marshall knows all too well how the corrosive power of money and politics can sabotage investigations. Without telling a soul, he joins forces with Jet, who has lived for fifteen years at the heart of Max Matheson's family, and begins digging into both murders. With Jet walking the dangerous road of an inside informer, they soon uncover a web of criminal schemes that undergird the town's recent success. But these crimes pale in comparison to the secret at the heart of the Matheson family. When those who have remained silent for years dare to speak to Marshall, pressure begins to build like water against a crumbling dam. Marshall loses friends, family members, and finally even Jet, for no one in Bienville seems willing to endure the reckoning that the Poker Club has long deserved. And by the time Marshall grasps the long-buried truth, he would give almost anything not to have to face it"--
Subjects: Thrillers (Fiction); Journalists; Homecoming; Murder;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 3
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A city on Mars : can we settle space, should we settle space, and have we really thought this through? / by Weinersmith, Kelly,author.; Weinersmith, Zach,1982-author,illustrator.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.In a world hurtling toward human expansion into space, 'A City on Mars' investigates whether the dream of new worlds won't create nightmares, both for settlers and the people they leave behind. In the process, Kelly and Zach Weinersmith answer every question about space you've ever wondered about, and many you've never considered. Can you make babies in space? Should corporations govern space settlements? What about space war? Are we headed for a housing crisis on the Moon's Peaks of Eternal Light-and what happens if you're left in the Craters of Eternal Darkness? With deep expertise, a winning sense of humor, and art from the beloved creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, the Weinersmiths investigate perhaps the biggest questions humanity will ever ask itself-whether and how to become multiplanetary.
Subjects: Humor.; Extraterrestrial anthropology.; Interplanetary voyages.; Life on other planets.; Space colonies.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Scarcity brain : fix your craving mindset and rewire your habits to thrive with enough / by Easter, Michael(Health and fitness writer),author.;
Are we hardwired to crave more? From food and stuff to information and influence, why can't we ever get enough? The author of The Comfort Crisis shows us how to overcome our built-to-crave mindset and discover the tools to finally feel satisfied. Anything is fine in moderation. But why are we so bad at moderating? Michael Easter, one of the world's leading experts on behavior change, shows that the problem isn't you. The problem is your scarcity mindset, left over from our ancient ancestors. They had to constantly seek and consume to survive because vital survival tools like food, material goods, information, power, and more were scarce and hard to find. But with our modern ability to easily fulfill our ancient desire for more, our hardwired "scarcity brain" is now backfiring. And new technology and institutions -- from dating and entertainment apps to our food and economic systems -- are exploiting our scarcity brain. They're bombarding us with subversive "scarcity cues," subtle triggers that lead us into low-reward cravings that hurt us in the long run. Scarcity cues can be direct and all-encompassing, like a sagging economy. Or they can be subtle and slight, like our neighbor buying a shiny new car. Easter traveled the world to consult with remarkable innovators and leading scientists who are finding surprising solutions for our scarcity brain. He discovered simple tactics that can move us towards an abundance mindset, cement healthy habits, and allow us to live our lives to the fullest and appreciate what we have, including how to: Detect hidden scarcity cues to stop cravings before they start, from a brilliant slot machine designer in a Las Vegas casino laboratory ; Turn alone time into the ultimate happiness hack, from artisanal coffee-making Benedictine monks ; Reignite your exploration gene for a more exciting and fulfilling life, from an astronaut onboard the International Space Station ; Reframe how we think about and fix addiction and bad habits, from Iraq's chief psychiatrist ; Recognize when you have enough, from a woman who left a million-dollar career path to adventure the world. Our world is overloaded with everything we're built to crave. The fix for scarcity brain isn't to blindly aim for less. It's to understand why we crave more in the first place, shake our worst habits, and use what we already have better. Then we can experience life in a new way -- a more satisfying way.
Subjects: Self-help publications.; Desire.; Desire; Happiness; Quality of life.; Scarcity.; Scarcity; Self-actualization (Psychology);
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Near abroad : Putin, the West, and the contest over Ukraine and the Caucasus / by Toal, Gerard,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Vladimir Putin's intervention into the Georgia/South Ossetia conflict in summer 2008 was quickly recognized by Western critics as an attempt by Russia to increase its presence and power in the "near abroad", or the independent states of the former Soviet Union that Russia still regards as its wards. Though the global economic recession that began in 2008 moved the incident to the back of the world's mind, Russia surged to the forefront again six years later when they invaded the heavily Russian Crimea in Ukraine and annexed it. In contrast to the earlier Georgia episode, this new conflict has generated a crisis of global proportions, forcing European countries to rethink their relationship with Russia and their reliance on it for energy supplies, as Russia was now squeezing natural gas from what is technically Ukraine. In Near Abroad, the eminent political geographer Gerard Toal analyzes Russia's recent offensive actions in the near abroad, focusing in particular on the ways in which both the West and Russia have relied on Cold War-era rhetorical and emotional tropes that distort as much as they clarify. In response to Russian aggression, US critics quickly turned to tried-and-true concepts like "spheres of influence" to condemn the Kremlin. Russia in turn has brought back its long tradition of criticizing western liberalism and degeneracy to grandly rationalize its behavior in what are essentially local border skirmishes. It is this tendency to resort to the frames of earlier eras that has led the conflicts to "jump scales," moving from the regional to the global level in short order. The ambiguities and contradictions that result when nations marshal traditional geopolitical arguments-rooted in geography, territory, and old understandings of distance-further contributes to the escalation of these conflicts. Indeed, Russia's belligerence toward Georgia stemmed from concern about its possible entry into NATO, an organization of states thousands of miles away. American hawks also strained credulity by portraying Georgia as a nearby ally in need of assistance. Similarly, the threat of NATO to the Ukraine looms large in the Kremlin's thinking, and many Ukrainians themselves self-identify with the West despite their location in Eastern Europe."--
Subjects: Geopolitics; Geopolitics; Geopolitics; South Ossetia War, 2008.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Alibaba's world : how a remarkable Chinese company is changing the face of global business / by Erisman, Porter.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."In September 2014, a Chinese company that most Americans had never heard of held the largest IPO in history - bigger than Google, Facebook and Twitter combined. Alibaba, now the world's largest e-commerce company, mostly escaped Western notice for over ten years, while building a customer base more than twice the size of Amazon's, and handling the bulk of e-commerce transactions in China. How did it happen? And what was it like to be along for such a revolutionary ride? In Alibaba's World, author Porter Erisman, one of Alibaba's first Western employees and its head of international marketing from 2000 to 2008, shows how Jack Ma, a Chinese schoolteacher who twice failed his college entrance exams, rose from obscurity to found Alibaba and lead it from struggling startup to the world's most dominant e-commerce player. He shares stories of weathering the dotcom crash, facing down eBay and Google, negotiating with the unpredictable Chinese government, and enduring the misguided advice of foreign experts, all to build the behemoth that's poised to sweep the ecommerce world today. And he analyzes Alibaba's role as a harbinger of the new global business landscape--with its focus on the East rather than the West, emerging markets over developed ones, and the nimble entrepreneur over the industry titan. As we face this near future, the story of Alibaba--and its inevitable descendants--is both essential and instructive"--"What is as powerful as Google, more popular than Facebook, and more economically disruptive than Amazon and eBay combined? Alibaba operates the world's biggest online shopping mall, with 600 million registered users (Amazon has roughly 200 million). It executes about 80% of China's e-commerce transactions and generates nearly 70% of all packages in China, making up close to 2% of China's GDP. And its marketplaces include another 60 million small and medium-size business users spread over 200 countries. This Chinese company is poised to make its global debut with an IPO that could be the largest in history. But what is Alibaba? How does it work? And why should we be paying attention? Porter Erisman shows how Jack Ma, a charismatic Chinese schoolteacher, rose from obscurity to revolutionize commerce in China, and now the world. He shares stories of weathering the dotcom crash, facing down eBay and Google, negotiating with the Web-phobic Chinese government, and enduring the misguided advice of foreign experts, all to build the behemoth that's poised to sweep the ecommerce world today. And he analyzes Alibaba's role as a harbinger of the new global business landscape--with its focus on the East rather than the West, emerging markets over developed ones, and the nimble entrepreneur over the industry titan. As we face this near future, the story of Alibaba--and its inevitable descendants--is both essential and instructive"--
Subjects: Ma, Yun, 1964-; Alibaba (Firm); Electronic commerce; Internet marketing;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Raising them right : the untold story of America's ultraconservative youth movement and its plot for power / by Spencer, Kyle,1970-author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."In the wake of the Obama presidency, a group of young charismatic conservatives catapulted onto the American political and cultural scenes, eager to thwart nationwide pushes for greater equity and inclusion. They dreamed of a cultural revolution-online and off-that would offer a forceful alternative to the progressive politics that were dominating American college campuses. In Raising Them Right, a gripping, character-driven read and investigative tour de force, Kyle Spencer chronicles the people and organizations working to lure millions of unsuspecting young American voters into the far-right fold-revealing their highly successful efforts to harness social media in alarming ways and capitalize on the democratization of celebrity culture. These power-hungry new faces may look and sound like antiestablishment renegades, but they are actually part of a tightly organized and heavily funded ultraconservative initiative to transform American youth culture and popularize fringe ideas. There is Charlie Kirk, the swashbuckling Trump insider and founder of the right-wing youth activist group Turning Point USA, who dreams of taking back the country's soul from weak-kneed liberals and becoming a national powerbroker in his own right. There is the acid-tongued Candace Owens, a Black ultraconservative talk-show host and Fox News regular who is seeking to bring Black America to the GOP and her own celebritydom into the national forefront. And there is the young, rough-and-tumble libertarian Cliff Maloney, who built the Koch-affiliated organization Young Americans for Liberty into a political force to be reckoned with, while solidifying his own power and pull inside conservative circles. Chock-full of original reporting and unprecedented access, Raising Them Right isa striking prism through which to view the extraordinary shifts that have taken place in the American political sphere over the last decade. It establishes Kyle Spencer as the premier authority on a new generation of young conservative communicators who are merging politics and pop culture, social media and social lives, to bring cruel economic philosophies, skeletal government, and dangerous antidemocratic ideals into the mainstream. Theirs is a crusade that is just beginning"--
Subjects: Republican Party (U.S. : 1854- ); Campaign funds; Christianity and politics; Identity politics; Political action committees; Radicalism; Right and left (Political science); Right-wing extremists; Youth; Youth;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The scientist and the spy : a true story of China, the FBI, and industrial espionage / by Hvistendahl, Mara,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."A riveting true story of industrial espionage in which a Chinese-born scientist is convicted of trying to steal U.S. trade secrets, by a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction. In September 2011, sheriff's deputies in Iowa encountered three neatly dressed Asian men at a cornfield that had been leased by Monsanto to grow corn from patented hybrids. What began as a routine inquiry into potential trespassing blossomed into a federal court case that saw one of the men -- Mo Hailong, also known as Robert Mo -- plead guilty to conspiracy to steal trade secrets from U.S. agro-giants DuPont Pioneer and Monsanto on behalf of the China-based DBN Group, one of the country's largest seed companies. The Mo case was part of the U.S. government's efforts to stanch the rising flow of industrial espionage by Chinese companies -- some with the assistance of the Chinese government itself -- on American companies. And it's not an isolated one. Economic espionage costs U.S. companies billions of dollars a year in lost revenue. As former Attorney General Eric Holder once put it, "There are only two categories of companies affected by trade secret theft: Those that know they've been compromised and those that don't know it yet." Using the story of Mo and of others involved in the case, journalist Mara Hvistendahl uncovers the fascinating and disquieting phenomenon of industrial espionage as China marches toward technological domination. In The Scientist and the Spy, she shines light on U.S. efforts to combat theft of proprietary innovation and technology and delves into the efforts to slow the loss of such secrets to other nations. As technology and innovation become more and more valuable, government agencies like the FBI and companies around the world are growing increasingly concerned -- and are increasingly outspoken about -- the threats posed to Western competitiveness. General Keith Alexander, the ex-director of the National Security Agency, has described Chinese industrial espionage and cyber crimes as "the greatest transfer of wealth in history." The Scientist and the Spy explains how the easy movement of experts and ideas affects development and the important role that espionage plays in innovation, both for the spies and the spied-upon. She also asks whether the current U.S. counter-espionage strategy helps or harms the greater public good. The result is a compelling nonfiction thriller that's also a call to arms on how we should rethink the best ways to safeguard intellectual property"--
Subjects: True crime stories.; United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation.; Agricultural industries; Business intelligence; Confidential business information; Spies;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The Mighty Red A Novel [electronic resource] : by Erdrich, Louise.aut; cloudLibrary;
A FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR FICTION In this stunning novel, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award–winning author Louise Erdrich tells a story of love, natural forces, spiritual yearnings, and the tragic impact of uncontrollable circumstances on ordinary people’s lives. History is a flood. The mighty red . . . In Argus, North Dakota, a collection of people revolve around a fraught wedding.  Gary Geist, a terrified young man set to inherit two farms, is desperate to marry Kismet Poe, an impulsive, lapsed Goth who can't read her future but seems to resolve his.  Hugo, a gentle red-haired, home-schooled giant, is also in love with Kismet. He’s determined to steal her and is eager to be a home wrecker.   Kismet's mother, Crystal, hauls sugar beets for Gary's family, and on her nightly runs, tunes into the darkness of late-night radio, sees visions of guardian angels, and worries for the future, her daughter’s and her own. Human time, deep time, Red River time, the half-life of herbicides and pesticides, and the elegance of time represented in fracking core samples from unimaginable depths, is set against the speed of climate change, the depletion of natural resources, and the sudden economic meltdown of 2008-2009. How much does a dress cost? A used car? A package of cinnamon rolls? Can you see the shape of your soul in the everchanging clouds? Your personal salvation in the giant expanse of sky? These are the questions the people of the Red River Valley of the North wrestle with every day. The Mighty Red is a novel of tender humor, disturbance, and hallucinatory mourning. It is about on-the-job pains and immeasurable satisfactions, a turbulent landscape, and eating the native weeds growing in your backyard. It is about ordinary people who dream, grow up, fall in love, struggle, endure tragedy, carry bitter secrets; men and women both complicated and contradictory, flawed and decent, lonely and hopeful. It is about a starkly beautiful prairie community whose members must cope with devastating consequences as powerful forces upend them. As with every book this great modern master writes, The Mighty Red is about our tattered bond with the earth, and about love in all of its absurdity and splendor. A new novel by Louise Erdrich is a major literary event; gorgeous and heartrending, The Mighty Red is a triumph.
Subjects: Electronic books.; Cultural Heritage; Native American & Aboriginal; Literary; Coming of Age;
© 2024., HarperCollins,
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