Future Evolution

Caitlin Shetterly discovered the importance of GMOs the hard way. Shortly after she learned that her son had an alarming sensitivity to GMO corn, she was told that she had the same condition, and her family's daily existence changed forever. An expansion of Shetterly's viral Elle article "The Bad Seed", Modified delves deep into the heart of the matter - from the cornfields of Nebraska to the beekeeping conventions in Brussels - to shine a light on the people, the science, and the corporations behind the food we serve ourselves and our families every day.

Just 45 years ago, the age of gene modification was born. Researchers could create glow-in-the-dark mice, farmyard animals producing drugs in their milk, and vitamin-enhanced rice that could prevent half a million people going blind every year. But now GM is rapidly being supplanted by a new system called CRISPR or "gene editing". Using this approach, scientists can manipulate the genes of almost any organism with a degree of precision, ease and speed that we could only dream of ten years ago.

Are humans close to living forever? With advances in medicine and new therapies that prolong life expectancy, we are on track to make aging even more manageable. This new entry in the exciting Alice in Futureland series explores both the science and cultural impulse behind extending lifespans, and the numerous ways the quest for eternity forces us to reevaluate what it means to be human. Some experts believe that we haven’t fully realized our true human potential, and we are about to embark on an extraordinary evolutionary shift.

It is rare for life to change Earth, yet three organisms have profoundly transformed our planet over the long course of its history. Elemental reveals how microbes, plants, and people used the fundamental building blocks of life to alter the climate, and with it, the trajectory of life on Earth in the past, present, and future. Taking listeners from the deep geologic past to our current era of human dominance, Stephen Porder focuses on five of life’s essential elements—hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus.

En esta novela un viajero logra avanzar cientos de siglos en el tiempo y se encuentra con el estado final de la evolucion humana, en que las clases trabajadoras acaban siendo esclavas de las privilegiadas, en una forma tan sutil que ni ellos mismos se dan cuenta.

This book raises ethical questions that might become part of mainstream consciousness in years to come and points out the role of communication and language in helping create (or avoid) a potentially dystopian future.