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Hope for cynics : the surprising science of human goodness / by Zaki, Jamil,1980-author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Runaway cynicism is turning our world into a meaner, sicker place; director of the Stanford Social Neuroscience Lab, Dr. Jamil Zaki, is about to disrupt this narrative. For thousands of years, people have argued about whether humanity is selfish or generous, cruel or kind. In 1972, half of Americans agreed that most people can be trusted; by 2018, that figure had fallen to 30%. Different generations, genders, religions, and political parties can't seem to agree on anything, except, perhaps, on one idea: that human virtue is evaporating. Cynicism is a perfectly understandable response to a world full of injustice, harm, and inequality. But in many cases, cynicism has become the first -- or only -- tool that people reach for these days. It is the psychological hammer of our age, and we are treating others more and more like nails. Knee-jerk cynicism worsens social problems because our beliefs don't just reflect the world -- they change it. When we expect people to be awful, we coax awfulness out of them. Cynicism is a disease, with a history, symptoms, and a cure"--
Subjects: Cynicism; Hope.; Social justice;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The Day After Trinity. by Else, Jon,film director.; Frees, Paul,actor.; Juno Films (Firm),dst; Kanopy (Firm),dst;
Paul FreesOriginally produced by Juno Films in 1981.When theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer became director of the Manhattan Project, he brought with him a love of poetry, philosophy and Eastern religion. In the years following Trinity, the classified maiden test of a prototype atomic bomb, Oppenheimer revealed himself as a thoughtful man who felt both a duty to his country and a deep regret for the death and destruction caused by his leadership in the development of the weapon that heralded the arrival of the Atomic Age. It features interviews with several Manhattan Project scientists, as well as newly declassified archival footage.Mode of access: World Wide Web.
Subjects: Documentary films.; Science.; Documentary films.; Physics.; History.; Atomic bomb.; Discoveries in science.; Scientists.; Physicists.; Nuclear physics.;
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The signature of all things / by Gilbert, Elizabeth,1969-;
"Spanning much of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the novel follows the fortunes of the extraordinary Whittaker family as led by the enterprising Henry Whittaker--a poor-born Englishman who makes a great fortune in the South American quinine trade, eventually becoming the richest man in Philadelphia. Born in 1800, Henry's brilliant daughter, Alma (who inherits both her father's money and his mind), ultimately becomes a botanist of considerable gifts herself. As Alma's research takes her deeper into the mysteries of evolution, she falls in love with a man named Ambrose Pike who makes incomparable paintings of orchids and who draws her in the exact opposite direction--into the realm of the spiritual, the divine, and the magical. Alma is a clear-minded scientist; Ambrose a utopian artist--but what unites this unlikely couple is a desperate need to understand the workings of this world and the mechanisms behind all life. he story is peopled with unforgettable characters: missionaries, abolitionists, adventurers, astronomers, sea captains, geniuses, and the quite mad. But most memorable of all, it is the story of Alma Whittaker, who--born in the Age of Enlightenment, but living well into the Industrial Revolution--bears witness to that extraordinary moment in human history when all the old assumptions about science, religion, commerce, and class were exploding into dangerous new ideas"--Provided by publisher.
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Enlightenment; Industrial revolution; Painters; Women botanists;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Power shift : the longest revolution / by Armstrong, Sally,1943-author.;
Includes bibliographical references."The facts are indisputable. When women get even a bit of education, the whole of society improves. When they get a bit of healthcare, everyone lives longer. In many ways, it has never been a better time to be a woman: a fundamental shift has been occurring. Yet from Toronto to Timbuktu the promise of equality still eludes half the world's population. In her 2019 CBC Massey Lectures, award-winning author, journalist, and human rights activist Sally Armstrong illustrates how the status of the female half of humanity is crucial to our collective surviving and thriving. Drawing on anthropology, social science, literature, politics, and economics, she examines the many beginnings of the role of women in society, and the evolutionary revisions over millennia in the realms of sex, religion, custom, culture, politics, and economics. What ultimately comes to light is that gender inequality comes at too high a cost to us all."--Provided by publisher.
Subjects: Sex discrimination against women.; Sex discrimination.; Women's rights.; Women; Women; Women; Social justice.; Human rights.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Everything there is : a novel / by Vassanji, M. G.,author.;
Includes bibliographical references."From two-time Giller Prize winner M.G. Vassanji, one of Canada's finest and most celebrated writers, comes a brilliant new novel that vividly examines the seemingly incongruous worlds of science, religion and desire. Nurul Islam is a world-renowned physicist, professor at Imperial College, London, and one half of the Islam-Rosenfeld theory, the first step in a grand unification of forces and a Theory of Everything. A sensitive character, from a small town in undivided India, a family man profoundly influenced by his pious father, Nurul is happily married to Sakina Begum by an arranged marriage. They have three children. But when Nurul travels to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to give a public lecture at Harvard, he falls in love with a graduate student, Hilary Chase. At the same time Nurul Islam's outspoken, philosophical views about the nature of physics and God have earned him the ire of fundamentalist preachers in Pakistan. When approached to contribute to Pakistan's nuclear weapons project, he declines, recalling the catastrophe of India's Partition, thus making enemies of the political and military establishments. Meanwhile, a contingent of physicists begins a smear campaign, claiming that Nurul Islams's contribution to the unification theory was plagiarized from Rosenfeld. All these events link together and converge upon Sakina Begum who, smarting from her husband's betrayal, unwittingly commits a betrayal of her own. Everything that had worked together as though preordained since his childhood to take him to the pinnacle of scientific achievement suddenly falls apart. An intimate and intelligent account of love, honour, guilt and genius, Everything There Is gives us an engaging portrait of a traditional, spiritual man facing the onslaught of inescapable forces."--
Subjects: Psychological fiction.; Novels.; Betrayal; College teachers; Man-woman relationships; Married people; Physicists; Revenge;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The other significant others : reimagining life with friendship at the center / by Cohen, Rhaina,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.Why do we assume romantic relationships are more important than friendships? What do we lose when we expect a spouse to meet all our needs? And what can we learn about commitment, love, and family from people who put deep friendship at the center of their lives? In 'The Other Significant Others', NPR's Rhaina Cohen invites us into the lives of people who have defied convention by choosing a friend as a life partner-these are friends who are home co-owners, co-parents or each other's caregivers. Their riveting stories unsettle widespread assumptions about relationships, including the idea that sex is a defining feature of partnership and that people who raise kids together should be in a romantic relationship. Platonic partners from different walks of life-spanning age and religion, gender and sexuality and more-reveal how freeing and challenging it can be to embrace a relationship model that society doesn't recognize. And they show that orienting your world around friends isn't limited to daydreams and episodes of 'The Golden Girls', but actually possible in real life. Based on years of original reporting and striking social science research, Cohen argues that we undermine romantic relationships by expecting too much of them, while we diminish friendships by expecting too little of them. She traces how, throughout history, our society hasn't always fixated on marriage as the greatest source of meaning, or even love. At a time when many Americans are spending large stretches of their lives single, widowed or divorced, or feeling the effects of the "loneliness epidemic," Cohen insists that we recognize the many forms of profound connection that can anchor our lives. A rousing and incisive book, 'The Other Significant Others' challenges us to ask what we want from our relationships-not just what we're supposed to want-and transforms how we define a fulfilling life.
Subjects: Conduct of life.; Friendship.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Big History: The Big Bang, Life on Earth, and the Rise of Humanity. by Christian, David,actor.; The Great Courses (Firm),dst; Kanopy (Firm),dst;
David ChristianOriginally produced by The Great Courses in 2008.How is it possible for the disciplines of cosmology, geology, anthropology, biology, and history to fit together? These 48 lectures by Professor David Christian of Macquarie University (Sydney, Australia) answer that question by weaving a single story from accounts of the past developed by a variety of scholarly disciplines. The result is a tale stretching from the origins of the universe to the present day and beyond, in which human history is seen as part of the history of our Earth and biosphere, and the Earth's history, in turn, is seen as part of the history of the universe. It's no wonder that Bill Gates declared this to be his favorite Great Course!Like traditional creation stories told by the world's great religions and mythologies, this lecture series provides a map of our place in space and time. But it does so using the insights and knowledge of modern science, as synthesized by a renowned historian. While you may have heard parts of this story before in courses on geology, history, anthropology, biology, cosmology, and other scholarly disciplines, Professor Christian provides more than just a recap of those disciplines. "To understand ourselves," says Professor Christian, "we need to know the very large story, the largest story of all." And that, perhaps, is one of the greatest benefits of Big History: It provides a thought-provoking way to help us understand our own place within the Universe.Mode of access: World Wide Web.
Subjects: Documentary films.; Science.; Agriculture.; History, Ancient.; Social sciences.; Instructional films.; Documentary films.; History.; Earth sciences.; Universe.;
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Question authority : a polemic about trust in five meditations / by Kingwell, Mark,1963-author.;
Includes bibliographical references."Philosopher Mark Kingwell thinks about thinking for yourself in an era of radical know-it-all-ism. "Question authority," the popular 1960s slogan commanded. "Think for yourself." But what started as a counter-cultural catchphrase, playful in logic but serious in intent, has become a practical paradox. Yesterday's social critics are the tone-policing tyrants of today, and critical theory that once augured emancipation has hardened into ideological enforcement. The resulting crisis of authority, made worse by rival political factions and chaotic public discourse, has exposed cracks in every facet of shared social life. Politics, academia, journalism, medicine, religion, science -- every kind of institutional claim is now routinely subject to objection, investigation, and outright disbelief. A recurring feature of this comprehensive distrust of authority is the firm, indeed unshakeable, belief in personal righteousness and superiority: what Mark Kingwell calls "addiction to conviction." In this critical survey of the predicament of contemporary authority, Kingwell draws on philosophical argument, personal reflection, and details from the headlines in an attempt to reclaim the democratic spirit of questioning authority and thinking for oneself. Defending a program of compassionate skepticism, Kingwell illuminates the connection between humility about human limits, including the limits of certainty, and the infinite project of justice."--
Subjects: Authority; Authority; Critical thinking.; Skepticism.; Trust;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The invention of good and evil : a world history of morality / by Sauer, Hanno,author.; Heinrich, Jo,translator.; translation of:Sauer, Hanno.Moral.English.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."What makes us moral beings? How do we decide what is good and what is evil? In the vein of Sapiens comes a grand history of our universal moral values at the moment of their greatest crisis. How did we learn to distinguish good from evil? Have we always been capable of doing so? And will we still be in the world to come? In this breathtaking book, ethics expert Hanno Sauer offers a great universal history of morality in the era of its darkest crisis. He finds that morality existed long before there was talk of God, religion, or philosophy. Its history is, first of all, the fruit of a process of natural selection, going back to the dawn of humanity, in the forests of East Africa which, five million years ago, thinned out owing to climate change. Among the early humans that came down from the trees, there were also our ancestors, who adapted to open spaces by organizing themselves into large groups. Under the pressure of environmental factors, morality emerges as the foundation for cooperation, a quality that is as precarious as it is essential to the survival of the species. Moving between paleontology and genetics, psychology and cognitive science, philosophy and evolutionism, Sauer traces a genealogy of morality and along the journey, marks the main moral transformations in the history of humanity. In the end, he concludes that millions of years of stratifications has led to the moral crisis of our present--and the only way to build a future together is to retrace our history."--
Subjects: Ethics;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Orphan black. [videorecording] / by Bruce, Dylan,1980-; Gavaris, Jordan,1989-; Maslany, Tatiana.; Entertainment One (Firm : Canada);
Disc 1. Nature under constraint and vexed -- Governed by sound reason and true religion -- Mingling its own nature with it -- Governed as it were by chance.Disc 2. Ipsa scientia potestas est -- To hound nature in her wanderings -- Knowledge of causes, and secret motion of things -- Variable and full of perturbation.Disc 3. Things which have never yet been done -- By means which have never yet been tried.Tatiana Maslany, Dylan Bruce, Jordan Gavaris, Kevin Hanchard, Maria Doyle Kennedy.Season two hits the ground running with Sarah in a desperate race to find her missing daughter Kira. Her scorched earth tactics spark a war with pro-clone Rachel, dividing and imperiling all the clones. As Sarah discovers more about her past, mysterious newcomers appear. But can they be trusted?Canadian Home Video Rating: 14A.DVD, NTSC, region 1, widescreen (16x9) presentation; stereo.
Subjects: Human cloning; Murder; Science fiction television programs.; Thrillers (Television programs); Video recordings for the hearing impaired.;
For private home use only.
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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