Popular Science

Misinformation and myths have attached themselves to the Egyptian pyramids since ancient Greece and Rome. While many Americans believe that the pyramids were built by aliens, archaeologists understand that the Giza pyramids were built by the pharaohs of the Fourth Dynasty around 2450 BCE. So why is there such a disconnect between scholarly opinion and the popular view of Egypt? Jason Colavito takes us back to Late Antique Egypt, where the replacement of polytheism with Christianity gave rise to local efforts to rewrite the stories of Egyptian history in the image of the Bible.

A groundbreaking history of the human mind told through our experience of dreams—from the earliest accounts to current scientific findings—and their essential role in the formation of who we are and the world we have made. "A resounding case for the mystery, beauty and cognitive importance...

In a fun and accessible way, Star Trek Psychology delves deep into the psyches of the show's well-known and beloved characters. The trailblazing franchise spans five TV series, 13 films, and countless novelizations. It celebrated, as no other form of entertainment had before, a world filled with space-traveling dreams and human diversity. In the process, it became one of the oldest and most popular sci-fi franchises of all time.

Tabletop games are ordinary and extraordinary. Ordinary because they're everywhere: played in bars and cafés, churches and casinos, through sunless winters in polar research stations and in the sweltering summer heat of Tanzanian villages and streamed live over Twitch to millions of viewers. And they're extraordinary for precisely the same reason: they're everywhere, in every civilization, everywhere in the world across all recorded human history. In Across the Board, tabletop game aficionado Tim Clare takes us through that history and across those civilizations.

In Electronic Dreams, Tom Lean tells the story of how computers invaded British homes for the first time, as people set aside their worries of electronic brains and Big Brother and embraced the wonder technology of the 1980s. This book charts the history of the rise and fall of the home computer, the family of futuristic and quirky machines that took computing from the realm of science and science fiction to being a user-friendly domestic technology.

This book introduces important concepts in philosophy through the vast array of provocative issues raised by the series, such as the ethics of the Prime Directive, Star Trek's philosophy of peace, Data and Voyager's Doctor as persons, moral relativism and the Federation's quest for liberation, the effect of alternate universes on reality and identity, the Borg as transhumanists, Federation Trekonomics, Star Trek's secular society, and much, much more!

In this audiobook, the authors of the widely-acclaimed Wellness Syndrome throw themselves headlong into the techniques of self-optimization, a burgeoning movement that seeks to transcend the limits placed on us as mere humans, whether the feebleness of our bodies or our mental incapacities. Cederstrom and Spicer, devoted each month of a roller coaster year to a different way of improving themselves: January was Productivity, February their bodies, March their brains. June was for sex and September for money. Perhaps the trickiest was April, a month devoted to relationships.

Long before Superman or Batman made their first appearances, there was Zorro. Born on the pages of the pulps in 1919, Zorro fenced his way through the American popular imagination, carving his signature letter Z into the flesh of evildoers in Old Spanish California. Zorro is the original caped crusader, the first hero to have a band called the Avengers, and the character who laid the blueprint for the modern American superhero. In Zorro's Shadow, historian and Latin American studies expert Stephen J. C. Andes investigates the legends behind the mask of Zorro.

In Distracted, journalist Maggie Jackson ponders our increasingly cyber-centric world and fears we're entering a dark age of interruption that will render us unable to think critically, work creatively or cultivate meaningful relationships.

Cuteness is an area where culture and biology get tangled up. Seeing a cute animal triggers some of the most powerful psychological instincts we have – the ones that elicit our care and protection – but there is a deeper story behind the broad appeal of Japanese cats and saccharine greetings cards. Joshua Paul Dale, a pioneer in the burgeoning field of cuteness studies, explains how the cute aesthetic spread around the globe, from pop brands to Lolita fashion, kids' cartoons and the unstoppable rise of Hello Kitty.

Uncommon Grounds tells the story of coffee from its discovery on a hill in ancient Abyssinia to the advent of Starbucks. In this updated edition of the classic work, Mark Pendergrast reviews the dramatic changes in coffee culture over the past decade, from the disastrous "Coffee Crisis" that caused global prices to plummet to the rise of the Fair Trade movement and the "third-wave" of quality-obsessed coffee connoisseurs.

The artificial intelligence revolution has begun. Today, there are self-driving cars on our streets, autonomous weapons in our armies, robot surgeons in our hospitals - and AI's presence in our lives will only increase. One thing is clear: this is a technology like no other, one that raises profound questions about freedom, justice and the very definition of human agency. In Moral AI, world-renowned researchers in artificial intelligence and philosophy, Jana Schaich Borg, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and Vince Conitzer tackle these thorny issues head-on.

How much do you know about the radiation all around you? Your electronic devices swarm with it; the sun bathes you in it. It's zooming at you from cell towers, microwave ovens, CT scans, mammogram machines, nuclear power plants, deep space, even the walls of your basement. You cannot see, hear...

Much of the world's landmass is already known. Deep sea and outer space are beyond most people's reach. It feels like there are fewer places left to discover. Psychedelics, on the other hand, reveal worlds that remain largely obscure. Altered states offer modern, 21st-century audiences boundless opportunities to explore what a human being can experience. In this book, I show you how to become a capable discovery-maker, sample-collecting naturalist, and rational thinker of visionary phenomena.

Since her introduction in 1959, Barbie’s impact has been revolutionary. Far from being a toy designed by men to oppress women, she was a toy invented by women to teach women what was expected of them, for better or for worse. Whether tarred-and-glittered as antifeminist puffery or celebrated as a feminist icon, Barbie has undeniably influenced generations of girls. In Forever Barbie, cultural critic, investigative journalist, and first-generation Barbie owner M. G. Lord uncovers the surprising story behind Barbie’s smash success.

Noah Lefevre, creator of Polyphonic, explores how our favorite music does more than entertain. From Aretha Franklin carving out her own space in what had been considered a man's world by reworking the chauvinistic lyrics to the 1967's hit "Respect," to Doja Cat's successful backlash against toxic fans of the digital age; from a broken amplifier on "Rocket 88" ushering in the distorted sounds of rock n' roll, to Kendrick Lamar's release of "Alright," which became the unofficial anthem to the BLM protests-each song mirrors the strife, change and progress of our country's narrative.

What part of your beautiful self were you taught to hate? We spend a lot of time trying to improve our 'defects', according to society's ideals of beauty. But these ideals that are often reductive, tyrannical and commercially entangled, imposed upon us by oppressive systems and further strengthened by our conditioned self-loathing. This book encourages unruliness, exploring the ways in which we can rebel against and subvert the current system.

This audio edition is read by the author, Andrew Gold, and includes an exclusive author Q&A. "Andrew Gold is the new Jon Ronson. Smart, funny, brave and deeply thoughtful, The Psychology of Secrets is an absolute must read" - Will Storr, bestselling author of The Status Game and The Science of...

A horror-story history of capitalism and its relationship to the haunted and the gothic, and a manifesto of Gothic Marxism, which finds revolutionary hope in the nightmare of modernity. What does it mean to see horror in capitalism? What can horror tell us about the state and nature of capitalism?

Britain's empire has gone. Our manufacturing base is a shadow of its former self; the Royal Navy has been reduced to a skeleton. In military, diplomatic and economic terms, we no longer matter as we once did. And yet there is still one area in which we can legitimately claim superpower status: our popular culture.