National Book Award Finalist. How did humanity originate and why does a species like ours exist on this planet? Do we have a special place, even a destiny in the universe? Where are we going, and perhaps, the most difficult question of all, "Why?" In The Meaning of Human Existence, his most philosophical work to date, Pulitzer Prize–winning biologist Edward O. Wilson grapples with these and other existential questions, examining what makes human beings supremely different from all other species. Searching for meaning in what Nietzsche once called "the rainbow colors" around the outer edges of knowledge and imagination, Wilson takes his readers on a journey, in the process bridging science and philosophy to create a twenty-first-century treatise on human existence—from our earliest inception to a provocative look at what the future of mankind portends. Continuing his groundbreaking examination of our "Anthropocene Epoch," which he began with The Social Conquest of Earth, described by the New York Times as "a sweeping account of the human rise to domination of the biosphere," here Wilson posits that we, as a species, now know enough about the universe and ourselves that we can begin to approach questions about our place in the cosmos and the meaning of intelligent life in a systematic, indeed, in a testable way. Once criticized for a purely mechanistic view of human life and an overreliance on genetic predetermination, Wilson presents in The Meaning of Human Existence his most expansive and advanced theories on the sovereignty of human life, recognizing that, even though the human and the spider evolved similarly, the poet's sonnet is wholly different from the spider's web. Whether attempting to explicate "The Riddle of the Human Species," "Free Will," or "Religion"; warning of "The Collapse of Biodiversity"; or even creating a plausible "Portrait of E.T.," Wilson does indeed believe that humanity holds a special position in the known universe. The human epoch that began in biological evolution and passed into pre-, then recorded, history is now more than ever before in our hands. Yet alarmed that we are about to abandon natural selection by redesigning biology and human nature as we wish them, Wilson soberly concludes that advances in science and technology bring us our greatest moral dilemma since God stayed the hand of Abraham.

Human beings have questioned their existence for as long as they have been able to ponder and reason. In attempting to answer the questions of human existence, some have become religious, others atheist; some spiritual, others agnostic; some scientific, others philosophical. Regardless of how the questions have been answered, we have only been left with more questions or the concession that many things about our existence are just unknowable or beyond our ability to understand. Because of the difficulty in continually pondering the conclusions of what seem to be unanswerable questions, we have turned our attention to fantasy and science fiction-genres of thought that allow us to escape the reality of own ignorance. Finally-a book has been written that solves this human dilemma! It is the most powerful book ever composed on the subject matter. It transcends fantasy and science fiction in its simple presentation of reality and leaves the reader with the most profound perspective of human existence available. It has the potential of changing one's life, even the whole world, forever. This book answers all of life's questions, leaving none on which to speculate or remained confused. It provides the most complete and comprehensive answers to human reality ever given. Every piece of the puzzle needed to understand who we are and why we exist is included. And the most compelling element is that it speaks to our common sense-the very essence of our humanity! If read with an open mind, this book will unfold a whole new perspective of the world and its inhabitants and what their relationship is with the rest of the Universe. With this new and much needed perspective, we stand to gain a full understanding of ourselves. We will no longer remain shackled with the chains of ignorance, prejudice, and inequality that have kept humankind in bondage and misery for thousands of years. Armed with this knowledge, we will be able to reshape our individual realities and together transform our world, not just for ourselves, but for all life upon earth.

From the author of the international bestseller Future Files comes the one book you need to read to prepare for the world of tomorrow. On most measures that matter, we've never had it so good. Physically, life for humankind has improved immeasurably over the last fifty years. Yet there is a crisis of progress slowly spreading across the world. Perhaps this is due to a failure of vision; in the 1960s we dreamed of flying cars and moon hotels; today what we've ended up with are status updates and cat videos. To a large degree, the history of the next fifty years will be about the relationship between people and technologies created by a tiny handful of designers and developers. These inventions will undoubtedly change our lives, but the question is, to what end? What do we want these technologies to achieve on our behalf? What are they capable of, and -- as they transform the media, the economy, healthcare, education, work, and the home -- what kind of lives do we want to lead? Richard Watson hereby extends an exuberant invitation for us to think deeply about the world of today and envision what kind of world we wish to create in the future. In a fascinating and accessible way, Digital vs Human examines the possible effects of technology on every area of our lives.

The best introduction to biologist Jeremy Griffith’s world-saving explanation of the human condition! The transcript of acclaimed British actor and broadcaster Craig Conway’s astonishing, world-changing and world-saving 2020 interview with Australian biologist Jeremy Griffith about his book FREEDOM: The End Of The Human Condition which presents the completely redeeming, uplifting and healing understanding of the core mystery and problem about human behaviour of our so-called good and evil -stricken human condition thus ending all the conflict and suffering in human life at its source, and providing the now urgently needed road map for the complete rehabilitation and transformation of our lives and world! In fact, a former President of the Canadian Psychiatric Association, Professor Harry Prosen, has described it as the most important interview of all time! This world-saving interview was broadcast across the UK in 2020 and is being replayed on radio & TV stations around the world. This book is supported by a very informative website at www.humancondition.com, where you can watch the video of the interview.

Robert Lanza is one of the most respected scientists in the world a US News and World Report cover story called him a genius and a renegade thinker, even likening him to Einstein. Lanza has teamed with Bob Berman, the most widely read astronomer in the world, to produce Biocentrism, a revolutionary new view of the universe. Every now and then a simple yet radical idea shakes the very foundations of knowledge. The startling discovery that the world was not flat challenged and ultimately changed the way people perceived themselves and their relationship with the world. For most humans of the 15th century, the notion of Earth as ball of rock was nonsense. The whole of Western, natural philosophy is undergoing a sea change again, increasingly being forced upon us by the experimental findings of quantum theory, and at the same time, toward doubt and uncertainty in the physical explanations of the universes genesis and structure. Biocentrism completes this shift in worldview, turning the planet upside down again with the revolutionary view that life creates the universe instead of the other way around. In this paradigm, life is not an accidental byproduct of the laws of physics. Biocentrism takes the reader on a seemingly improbable but ultimately inescapable journey through a foreign universe our own from the viewpoints of an acclaimed biologist and a leading astronomer. Switching perspective from physics to biology unlocks the cages in which Western science has unwittingly managed to confine itself. Biocentrism will shatter the readers ideas of life--time and space, and even death. At the same time it will release us from the dull worldview of life being merely the activity of an admixture of carbon and a few other elements; it suggests the exhilarating possibility that life is fundamentally immortal. The 21st century is predicted to be the Century of Biology, a shift from the previous century dominated by physics. It seems fitting, then, to begin the century by turning the universe outside-in and unifying the foundations of science with a simple idea discovered by one of the leading life-scientists of our age. Biocentrism awakens in readers a new sense of possibility, and is full of so many shocking new perspectives that the reader will never see reality the same way again.

Our species is misnamed. Though sapiens defines human beings as "wise" what humans do especially well is to prospect the future. We are homo prospectus. In this book, Martin E. P. Seligman, Peter Railton, Roy F. Baumeister, and Chandra Sripada argue it is anticipating and evaluating future possibilities for the guidance of thought and action that is the cornerstone of human success. Much of the history of psychology has been dominated by a framework in which people's behavior is driven by past history (memory) and present circumstances (perception and motivation). Homo Prospectus reassesses this idea, pushing focus to the future front and center and opening discussion of a new field of Psychology and Neuroscience. The authors delve into four modes in which prospection operates: the implicit mind, deliberate thought, mind-wandering, and collective (social) imagination. They then explore prospection's role in some of life's most enduring questions: Why do people think about the future? Do we have free will? What is the nature of intuition, and how might it function in ethics? How does emotion function in human psychology? Is there a common causal process in different psychopathologies? Does our creativity change with age? In this remarkable convergence of research in philosophy, statistics, decision theory, psychology, and neuroscience, Homo Prospectus shows how human prospection fundamentally reshapes our understanding of key cognitive processes, thereby improving individual and social functioning. It aims to galvanize interest in this new science from scholars in psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy, as well as an educated public curious about what makes humanity what it is.