Focusing on the period between the 1970s and the present, Life as Surplus is a pointed and important study of the relationship between politics, economics, science, and cultural values in the United States today. Melinda Cooper demonstrates that the history of biotechnology cannot be understood without taking into account the simultaneous rise of neoliberalism as a political force and an economic policy. From the development of recombinant DNA technology in the 1970s to the second Bush administration's policies on stem cell research, Cooper connects the utopian polemic of free-market capitalism with growing internal contradictions of the commercialized life sciences. The biotech revolution relocated economic production at the genetic, microbial, and cellular level. Taking as her point of departure the assumption that life has been drawn into the circuits of value creation, Cooper underscores the relations between scientific, economic, political, and social practices. In penetrating analyses of Reagan-era science policy, the militarization of the life sciences, HIV politics, pharmaceutical imperialism, tissue engineering, stem cell science, and the pro-life movement, the author examines the speculative impulses that have animated the growth of the bioeconomy. At the very core of the new post-industrial economy is the transformation of biological life into surplus value. Life as Surplus offers a clear assessment of both the transformative, therapeutic dimensions of the contemporary life sciences and the violence, obligation, and debt servitude crystallizing around the emerging bioeconomy.

The author of the breakout hit Here Comes Everybody reveals how new technology is changing us for the better. In his bestselling Here Comes Everybody, Internet guru Clay Shirky provided readers with a much-needed primer for the digital age. Now, with Cognitive Surplus, he reveals how new digital technology is unleashing a torrent of creative production that will transform our world. For the first time, people are embracing new media that allow them to pool their efforts at vanishingly low cost. The results of this aggregated effort range from mind-expanding reference tools like Wikipedia to life-saving Web sites like Ushahidi.com, which allows Kenyans to report acts of violence in real time. Cognitive Surplus explores what's possible when people unite to use their intellect, energy, and time for the greater good.

Do you know how much food waste you create every day? Probably not. But it's much more than you think. Surplus: The food waste guide for chefs is a thought-provoking book for every chef that wants to effectively reduce and prevent food waste in a restaurant's kitchen. Written by the founder of the first zero-waste vegan restaurant in the world, it includes a few short stories from the restaurant, and covers the topic of food waste and plant-based cooking from motivation and mindset tips, to practical steps of food waste prevention. Believing that the food waste problem can be solved by combining a mindset change with technical knowledge, this book includes words of motivation and also an ingredient directory with tips on how to use every part of an ingredient, and a few zero-waste and plant-based recipes for inspiration. The methods and steps described in the book can be applied in every professional kitchen, whether it's a small bistro or a large restaurant. While this book is focused on the hospitality industry and professional chefs, the content provides a different viewpoint on the food waste solutions that can be valuable to anyone interested in reducing food waste or introducing plant-based options on the menu.

Maintains that Lacanian psychoanalysis is the proper continuation of the line of thought from Spinoza to Marx.

Ari Larissa Heinrich examines transnational Chinese aesthetic production--from the earliest appearance of Frankenstein in China to the more recent phenomenon of "cadaver art"-- to demonstrate how representations of the medically commodified body can illuminate the effects of biopolitical violence and postcolonialism in contemporary life.

Discusses and uses examples of how digital networks transform the ability of humans to gather and cooperate with one another.