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The Language Puzzle
- Piecing Together the Six-Million-Year Story of How Words Evolved
- Narrated by: Kerry Hutchinson
- Length: 13 hrs and 55 mins
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Publisher's summary
A top scholar reveals the most complete picture to date of how early human speech led to the languages we use today
The invention of language began with the apelike calls of our earliest ancestors. Today, the world is home to thousands of complex languages. Yet exactly how, when, and why this evolution occurred has been one of the most enduring—and contentiously debated—questions in science.
In The Language Puzzle, renowned archaeologist Steven Mithen puts forward a groundbreaking new account of the origins of language. Scientists have gained new insights into the first humans of 2.8 million years ago, and how numerous species flourished but only one, Homo sapiens, survives today. Drawing from this work and synthesizing research across archaeology, psychology, linguistics, genetics, and more, Mithen details a step-by-step explanation of how our human ancestors transitioned from apelike calls to words, and from words to language as we use it today. He explores how language shaped our cognition and vice versa; how metaphor advanced Homo sapiens’ ability to formulate abstract concepts, develop agriculture, and—ultimately—shape the world. The result is a master narrative that builds bridges between disciplines, stuns with its breadth and depth, and spans millennia of societal development.
Deeply researched and brilliantly told, The Language Puzzle marks a seminal understanding of the evolution of language.
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Adventures in Volcanoland
- An Exploration of Volcanic Places and What They Tell Us About the World and About Ourselves
- By: Tamsin Mather
- Narrated by: Emma Spurgin Hussey
- Length: 11 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In this captivating book from one of the most influential geochemists in the field, Tamsin Mather takes us along on her globe-spanning excursions from Nicaragua to Hawaii, Santorini to Ethiopia and beyond. With warmth and lyricism, she explores the cultural roles volcanoes play throughout history, and the growing and evolving science behind their formation and eruptions.
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Impressive!
- By MolllyT on 06-19-24
By: Tamsin Mather
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Better Faster Farther
- How Running Changed Everything We Know About Women
- By: Maggie Mertens
- Narrated by: Maggie Mertens, Lauren Fleshman - introduction
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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More than a century ago, a woman ran in the very first modern Olympic marathon. She just did it without permission. Award-winning journalist Maggie Mertens uncovers the story of how women broke into competitive running and how they are getting faster and fiercer every day—and changing our understanding of what is possible as they go.
By: Maggie Mertens
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A Great Disorder
- National Myth and the Battle for America
- By: Richard Slotkin
- Narrated by: Chris Sorensen
- Length: 20 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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A Great Disorder is a bold, urgent work that helps us make sense of today's culture wars through a brilliant reconsideration of America's foundational myths and their use in contemporary politics. Richard Slotkin identifies five myths, born of different eras, that have shaped our conception of what it means to be American: the myths of the Frontier, the Founding, the Civil War (which he breaks into two opposing camps, Emancipation and the Lost Cause), and the Good War, embodied by the multiethnic platoon fighting for freedom.
By: Richard Slotkin
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The Nature of Our Cities
- Harnessing the Power of the Natural World to Survive a Changing Planet
- By: Nadina Galle
- Narrated by: Eileen Stevens
- Length: 9 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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We live in an age when humanity spends 90% of its time indoors, yet the nature around us—especially in America’s cities—has never been more vital. This distancing from nature has sparked crises in mental health, longevity, and hope for the next generation, while also heightening the risks we face from historic floods, heatwaves, and wildfires. Indeed, embracing nature holds untapped potential to strengthen and fortify our cities, suburbs, and towns, providing solutions spanning flood preparation, wildfire management, and promoting longevity.
By: Nadina Galle
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Complicit
- How Our Culture Enables Misbehaving Men
- By: Reah Bravo
- Narrated by: Reah Bravo
- Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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When Reah Bravo began working at the Charlie Rose show, the open secret of Rose’s conduct towards women didn’t deter her from pursuing a position she thought could launch her career in broadcast journalism. She considered herself more than capable of handling any unprofessional behavior that might come her way. But she soon learned a devastating truth: we don’t always react to abusive situations as we imagine we will.
By: Reah Bravo
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Accidental Astronomy
- How Random Discoveries Shape the Science of Space
- By: Chris Lintott
- Narrated by: Chris Lintott
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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If you learn about the scientific method, you learn that first we hypothesize about something we’ve experienced, and then we look for more of it. This works well enough—but what if you are interested in studying a heretofore unknown comet or supernova? That is the essential problem of the astronomer: the most important discoveries happen without notice! Indeed, as Chris Lintott argues in Accidental Astronomy, luck defines astronomy. Lintott explores the ways in which happenstance shapes how we investigate the sky.
By: Chris Lintott
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Homo Sapiens Rediscovered
- The Scientific Revolution Rewriting Our Origins
- By: Paul Pettitt
- Narrated by: Julian Elfer
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Who are we? How do scientists define Homo sapiens, and how does our species differ from the extinct hominins that came before us? In this accessible account palaeoarchaeologist Paul Pettitt shows how the latest scientific advances, especially in genetics, are revolutionizing our understanding of human evolution. Pettitt reveals the extraordinary story of how our ancestors adapted to unforgiving and relentlessly changing climates, leading to remarkable innovations in art, technology, and society that we are only now beginning to comprehend.
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A Good Overview
- By Brandon on 02-08-23
By: Paul Pettitt
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How to Argue with a Racist
- What Our Genes Do (and Don't) Say About Human Difference
- By: Adam Rutherford
- Narrated by: Adam Rutherford
- Length: 4 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Racist pseudoscience is on the rise - fueling hatred, feeding nationalism, and seeping into our discourse on everything from sports to intelligence. Even the well-intentioned repeat stereotypes based on "science", because cutting-edge genetics are hard to grasp - and all too easy to distort. Paradoxically, misconceptions are multiplying amid today's unprecedented surge of research on human genetics. We've never had a clearer picture of who we are and where we come from, and the science, when accurately understood, is a powerful and definitive ally against racism.
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Terrible argument repeated ad-nauseum
- By Niall on 11-17-20
By: Adam Rutherford
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The Secret Lives of Numbers
- A Hidden History of Math’s Unsung Trailblazers
- By: Kate Kitagawa, Timothy Revell
- Narrated by: Daphne Kouma
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Mathematics shapes almost everything we do. But despite its reputation as the study of fundamental truths, the stories we have been told about it are wrong—warped like the sixteenth-century map that enlarged Europe at the expense of Africa, Asia and the Americas. In The Secret Lives of Numbers, renowned math historian Kate Kitagawa and journalist Timothy Revell make the case that the history of math is infinitely deeper, broader, and richer than the narrative we think we know.
By: Kate Kitagawa, and others
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Rakesfall
- By: Vajra Chandrasekera
- Narrated by: Shiromi Arserio
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Some stories take more than one lifetime to tell. There are wrongs that echo through the ages, friendships that outpace the claws of death, loves that leave their mark on civilization, and promises that nothing can break. This is one such story. Annelid and Leveret met as children in the middle of the Sri Lankan civil war. They found each other in a torn-up nation, peering through propaganda to grasp a deeper truth. And in a demon-haunted wood, another act of violence linked them and propelled their souls on a journey throughout the ages.
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The Self-Assembling Brain
- How Neural Networks Grow Smarter
- By: Peter Robin Hiesinger
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 12 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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How does a neural network become a brain? While neurobiologists investigate how nature accomplishes this feat, computer scientists interested in AI strive to achieve this through technology. The Self-Assembling Brain tells the stories of both fields, exploring the historical and modern approaches taken by the scientists pursuing answers to the quandary: What information is necessary to make an intelligent neural network? As Peter Robin Hiesinger argues, "the information problem" underlies both fields.
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The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands
- A Novel
- By: Sarah Brooks
- Narrated by: Katie Leung, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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There is only one way to travel across the Wastelands: on the Trans-Siberian Express, a train as famous for its luxury as for its danger. The train is never short of passengers, eager to catch sight of Wastelands creatures more miraculous and terrifying than anything they could imagine. But on the train's last journey, something went horribly wrong, though no one seems to remember what exactly happened. Not even Zhang Weiwei, who has spent her life onboard and thought she knew all of the train’s secrets.
By: Sarah Brooks
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Caledonian Road
- A Novel
- By: Andrew O'Hagan
- Narrated by: Michael Abubakar
- Length: 22 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Campbell Flynn, art historian, professor, and fêted fixture of the literati, always knew that when his life came crashing down, it would happen in public—yet he never imagined that a single year in London would expose so much. He’s never taken other people half as seriously as they take themselves, which is the first of his mistakes. The second is a new project: opportunistic and precisely calibrated to rake in a fortune.
By: Andrew O'Hagan
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Spice
- The 16th-Century Contest That Shaped the Modern World
- By: Roger Crowley
- Narrated by: Samuel Roukin
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Spices drove the early modern world economy, and for Europeans they represented riches on an unprecedented scale. Cloves and nutmeg could reach Europe only via a complex web of trade routes, and for decades Spanish and Portuguese explorers competed to find their elusive source. But when the Portuguese finally reached the spice islands of the Moluccas in 1511, they set in motion a fierce competition for control.
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Spice or Megellan?
- By BarbieAlaska on 06-21-24
By: Roger Crowley
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1974
- A Personal History
- By: Francine Prose
- Narrated by: Francine Prose
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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The first memoir from critically acclaimed, bestselling author Francine Prose, about the close relationship she developed with activist Anthony Russo, one of the men who leaked the Pentagon Papers—and the year when our country changed.
By: Francine Prose