
Grand Transitions
How the Modern World Was Made
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Narrated by:
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Robert Fass
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By:
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Vaclav Smil
About this listen
What makes the modern world work? The answer to this deceptively simple question lies in four "grand transitions" of civilization - in populations, agriculture, energy, and economics - that have transformed the way we live.
Societies that have undergone all four transitions emerge into an era of radically different population dynamics, food surpluses (and waste), abundant energy use, and expanding economic opportunities. Simultaneously, in other parts of the world, hundreds of millions remain largely untouched by these developments.
Through erudite storytelling, Vaclav Smil investigates the fascinating and complex interactions of these transitions. He argues that the moral imperative to share modernity's benefits has become more acute with increasing economic inequality, but addressing this imbalance would make it exceedingly difficult to implement the changes necessary for the long-term preservation of the environment. Thus, managing the fifth transition - environmental changes from natural-resource depletion, biodiversity loss, and global warming - will determine the success or eventual failure of the grand transitions that have made the world we live in today.
©2021 Oxford University Press (P)2021 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
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Oxygen takes the listener on an enthralling journey, as gripping as a thriller, as it unravels the unexpected ways in which oxygen spurred the evolution of life and death.
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A Story About Pretty Much Everything
- By ZebraBear on 09-09-20
By: Nick Lane
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A Monetary and Fiscal History of the United States, 1961-2021
- By: Alan S. Blinder
- Narrated by: Todd McLaren
- Length: 15 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Alan Blinder, one of the world's most influential economists and one of the field's best writers, draws on his deep firsthand experience to provide an authoritative account of sixty years of monetary and fiscal policy in the United States. Spanning twelve presidents, from John F. Kennedy to Joe Biden, and eight Federal Reserve chairs, from William McChesney Martin to Jerome Powell, this is an insider's story of macroeconomic policy that hasn't been told before—one that is a pleasure to listen to, and as interesting as it is important.
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Listen for Nixon's Sake
- By Tricia on 10-26-22
By: Alan S. Blinder
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21st Century Monetary Policy
- The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19
- By: Ben S. Bernanke
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 16 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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A former chair of the Federal Reserve explains the transformation of one our most powerful and consequential institutions.
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don't buy, horrible narration
- By Mr. Incognito on 05-18-22
By: Ben S. Bernanke
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Size
- How It Explains the World
- By: Vaclav Smil
- Narrated by: Stephen Perring
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Size explains the regularities—and peculiarities—of the key processes shaping life (from microbes to whales), the Earth (from asteroids to volcanic eruptions), technical advances (from architecture to transportation), and societies and economies (from cities to wages).
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Worth a read
- By Rurik McKaiser on 05-21-23
By: Vaclav Smil
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Conquering the Electron
- The Geniuses, Visionaries, Egomaniacs, and Scoundrels Who Built Our Electronic Age
- By: Derek Cheung, Eric Brach
- Narrated by: Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 14 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Want to know how AT&T's Bell Labs developed semiconductor technology - and how its leading scientists almost came to blows in the process? Want to understand how radio and television work - and why RCA drove their inventors to financial ruin and early graves? Conquering the Electron offers these stories and more, presenting each revolutionary technological advance right alongside blow-by-blow personal battles that all too often took place.
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Tech, science, engineering & the people behind it.
- By James S. on 05-29-20
By: Derek Cheung, and others
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Symphony in C
- Carbon and the Evolution of (Almost) Everything
- By: Robert M. Hazen
- Narrated by: Paul Brion
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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An enchanting biography of the most resonant - and most necessary - chemical element on Earth. Carbon. It's in the fibers in your hair, the timbers in your walls, the food that you eat, and the air that you breathe. It's worth billions as a luxury and half a trillion as a necessity, but there are still mysteries yet to be solved about the element that can be both diamond and coal. Where does it come from, what does it do, and why, above all, does life need it?
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There is a Caveat
- By Joseph L Contreras on 06-26-19
By: Robert M. Hazen
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A Short History of Financial Euphoria
- By: John Kenneth Galbraith
- Narrated by: Liam Gerrard
- Length: 2 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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With incomparable wisdom, skill, and wit, world-renowned economist John Kenneth Galbraith traces the history of the major speculative episodes in our economy over the last three centuries. Exposing the ways in which normally sane people display reckless behavior in pursuit of profit, Galbraith asserts that our "notoriously short" financial memory is what creates the conditions for market collapse. By recognizing these signs and understanding what causes them we can guard against future recessions and have a better hold on our country's (and our own) financial destiny.
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Good
- By SEB24 on 11-12-24
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Energy
- An Audio Guide
- By: Vaclav Smil
- Narrated by: Dave Ferguson
- Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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In this user-friendly and informative audiobook, prolific author and academic Vaclav Smil provides an introduction to this far-reaching term and gives the reader a greater understanding of energy's place in both past and present society. Starting with an explanation of the concept, he goes on to cover such exciting topics as the inner workings of the human body, and the race for more efficient and environmentally friendly fuels.
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Listening to the Encyclopedia of Energy
- By See Reverse on 03-02-18
By: Vaclav Smil
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Spark
- The Life of Electricity and the Electricity of Life
- By: Timothy J. Jorgensen
- Narrated by: Gary Tiedemann
- Length: 14 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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When we think of electricity, we likely imagine the energy humming inside our home appliances or lighting up our electronic devices - or perhaps we envision the lightning-streaked clouds of a stormy sky. But electricity is more than an external source of power, heat, or illumination. Life at its essence is nothing if not electrical.
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The best book on electricity.
- By Anonymous User on 01-10-22
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The Nature of Plants
- An Introduction to How Plants Work
- By: Craig N. Huegel
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Plants play a critical role in how we experience our environment. They create calming green spaces, provide oxygen for us to breathe, and nourish our senses. In The Nature of Plants, ecologist and nursery owner Craig Huegel demystifies the complex lives of plants and provides listeners with an extensive tour into their workings.
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So informative!
- By Stephanie Mora on 08-17-22
By: Craig N. Huegel
What listeners say about Grand Transitions
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Dan Ziemer
- 06-28-22
Thorough
Nobody I know covers their subjects as thoroughly as Bacliv Smil - and he does so in a manner that invites thought and contemplation long after the book is finished.
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1 person found this helpful
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- jaga
- 04-17-22
A BLIZZARD OF STATISTICS, BALANCED VIEWS
There is a lot in this book. Most of the book reads like an academic paper but the last chapter brings it all together. A like how Smil looks at all the different aspects / data relating to a topic and gives a comprehensive set of views on the way one could interpret that data. As opposed to cherry picking data to fit a predetermined narrative, which he calls out several well known commentators for doing just that. I love Smil’s work, the only thing holding me back from giving a 5 is the readability of the book.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Sam J.
- 08-29-22
Nihil novum sub soli
This is one of the most difficult-to-read books I’ve put myself through lately because of the torrential cascade of measurements, numbers, dates, percentages, and rates of change committed to pages for “funzies”. If you come to accept the data that Smil is proposing as true, it is hard to argue with his parting conclusion of “there is nothing new under the sun” because despite being a data agglomeration of sorts, this is really a historical view of humanity condensed to just numbers. If you can tolerate that, you know what you’re getting by choosing to read this. It’s an anthropologist data history book.
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- A. Bailey
- 04-12-23
A fantastic peak at the potential future...
Fantastic exposition of how we got to where we are, and a great guide to where we may be headed.
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- Stephen Esch
- 05-07-23
Very academic book
Struggled listening to this book. it really feels like an academic diatribe about some factoids. Not really sure this is what I signed up for. Was expecting something totally different.
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- Amazon Customer
- 01-31-24
Narrator sucks
Interesting factual information and logical format…. Horrible narrator. Made me want to read the Bible starting at the beginning and pushing all the way through while getting kicked in the balls and poked in the eyes the whole time rather than listen to the guy read the book. Should be fired and black listed, if not a covid casualty already.
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