Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
By: Carl Zimmer
3.94
Format: 368 pages, Hardcover
We all assume we know what life is, but the more scientists learn about the living world--from prot…
Want to Read $ 14.99"It was a biochemical Jackson Pollock: a field of strings, tangles, loops."-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
"Thirteen thousand years ago it fell to Antarctica. It rested in the Allan Hills as the Ice Age glaciers retreated, farmers discovered agriculture, cities rose, and rockets shot into space."-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
"The disgusting smell of death of death is the result of certain airborne molecules with evocative names like cadaverine and putrescine. These molecules are not produced by death, however, but by life growing on death. After an animal dies, its cells self destruct and become food for the body's resident bacteria. They chew through the walls of the gut and spread through the body. They release cadaverine and putrescine merely as byproducts of their metabolism. These molecules are not actually dangerous to us. They won't kill us like a whiff of sarin or cyanide. Yet our ancestors evolved a keen sensitivity to these molecules, along with an instinctive response to recoil at the merest whiff."-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
If you liked the nonfiction plot in Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive by Carl Zimmer , here is a list of 27 books like this:
1. Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Evolution on Earth (Princeton Science Library)
By: Andrew H. Knoll
4.00
Format: 288 pages, Paperback
Australopithecines, dinosaurs, trilobites--such fossils conjure up images of lost worlds filled wit… read more
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- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- science
2. I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
By: Ed Yong
4.18
Format: 368 pages, Hardcover
Every animal, whether human, squid, or wasp, is home to millions of bacteria and other microbes. Ma… read more
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- science
- biology
- medicine
- evolution
- nonfiction
- popular science
- nature
- audiobook
"I was struck by how different everything seemed with microbes in mind."-Ed Yong, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
"The brutal contract of natural selection ensures that if one partner is unnecessary, it gets dumped."-Ed Yong, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
"As palaeontologist Andrew Knoll once said, "Animals might be evolution's icing, but bacteria are really the cake."-Ed Yong, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
"There’s a popular saying among doctors: There’s no such thing as alternative medicine; if it works, it’s just called medicine."-Ed Yong, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
3. The Story of the Human Body: Evolution, Health, and Disease
By: Daniel E. Lieberman
3.87
Format: 252 pages, ebook
A landmark book of popular science--a lucid, engaging account of how the human body evolved over mi… read more
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4. Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology
By: Jim Al-Khalili , Johnjoe McFadden
4.67
Format: 40 pages, Hardcover
New York TimesBestseller and an Amazon Best Science Book of 2015 Life is the most extraordinary phe… read more
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5. The Vital Question: Energy, Evolution, and the Origins of Complex Life
By: Nick Lane
3.86
Format: 336 pages, Paperback
The Earth teems with life: in its oceans, forests, skies and cities. Yet there's a black hole at th… read more
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6. Knowing What We Know: The Transmission of Knowledge: From Ancient Wisdom to Modern Magic
By: Simon Winchester
3.84
Format: 432 pages, Hardcover
From the creation of the first encyclopedia to Wikipedia, from ancient museums to modern kindergart… read more
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- audiobook
- history
- philosophy
- nonfiction
- science
7. Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution
By: Carlo Rovelli
4.08
Format: 256 pages, Hardcover
A startling new look at quantum theory, from the bestselling author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physi… read more
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- science
- history
- philosophy
- nonfiction
- popular science
- audiobook
"But structures are processes are not there so that organisms can survive and reproduce. It is the other way round: organisms survive and reproduce because these structures have happened to gradually …"-Carlo Rovelli, Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution
"Credo che uno dei grandi errori che fanno gli esseri umani quando tentano di capire qualcosa sia volere certezze. La ricerca della conoscenza non si nutre di certezze: si nutre di una radicale assenz…"-Carlo Rovelli, Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution
"In qualunque angolo dell'universo troviamo vertiginosi pozzi di strati di realtà. In questi strati siamo riusciti a riconoscere regolarità, sulle quali abbiamo raccolto informazione rilevante per noi…"-Carlo Rovelli, Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution
8. The Rise and Reign of the Mammals: A New History, from the Shadow of the Dinosaurs to Us
By: Steve Brusatte
4.38
Format: 528 pages, Hardcover
In his acclaimed bestseller The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, American paleontologist Steve Brusa… read more
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- science
- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
9. The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human
By: Siddhartha Mukherjee
4.28
Format: 473 pages, Hardcover
Winner of the 2023 PROSE Award for Excellence in Biological and Life Sciences and the 2023 Chautauq… read more
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- science
- history
- biology
- medicine
- nonfiction
- popular science
- nature
- audiobook
10. Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues
By: Jonathan Kennedy
3.94
Format: 304 pages, Hardcover
An account of how the major transformations in history—from the rise of Homo sapiens to the birth o… read more
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- science
- history
- biology
- medicine
- nonfiction
- audiobook
"Pathogens thrive on inequality and injustice."-Jonathan Kennedy, Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues
"Across the whole of the Americas, the introduction of infectious diseases from Europe resulted in a 90 percent fall in the population, from about 60.5 million in 1500 to 6 million a century later."-Jonathan Kennedy, Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues
"There is one universally incorrect choice: do nothing. This didn't work when humans thought that plagues were a punishment sent by angry gods. Nor does a laissez-faire approach help stop disease when…"-Jonathan Kennedy, Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues
11. Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
By: Nick Lane
4.04
Format: 400 pages, Hardcover
What brings the Earth to life, and our own lives to an end? For decades, biology has been domina… read more
Want to Read $ 9.99Similar categories in Nick Lane's Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- science
- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
"Almost the only thing we know for sure about consciousness is that it is, so to speak, soluble in ether, chloroform and a variety of other solvents ..."-Nick Lane, Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
"Core metabolism has changed little in part because it was never powered down in its four-billion-year history. The genes are custodians of this flame, but without the flame life is – dead."-Nick Lane, Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
"Keen to progress the work on photosynthesis, Lawrence hired Melvin Calvin, a colleague from the Manhattan Project, immediately after the war. The story has it that on the day of the Japanese surrende…"-Nick Lane, Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
"Putting terms aside, we’ll see that the ancient biosynthetic Krebs cycle was fixing CO2 a billion years before rubisco and the evolution of photosynthesis in the cyanobacterial ancestors of plant chl…"-Nick Lane, Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
12. An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
By: Ed Yong
4.47
Format: 464 pages, Hardcover
A grand tour through the hidden realms of animal senses that will transform the way you perceive th… read more
Want to Read $ 4.99Similar categories in Ed Yong's An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- audiobook
- biology
- nonfiction
- nature
- science
"It's ironic that we associate taste with connoisseurship, subtlety, and fine discrimination when it is among the coarsest of senses."-Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
"We are closer than ever to understanding what it is like to be another animal, but we have made it harder than ever for other animals to be."-Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
"Earth teems with sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields. But every animal can only tap into a small fraction of realities fullness. Each is enclos…"-Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
"A striking pattern emerged on days with the most intense solar storms, grey whales were 4 times more likely to beach themselves. This correlation doesn't prove that whales have a compass but it stron…"-Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
13. It's Elemental: The Hidden Chemistry in Everything
By: Kate Biberdorf
3.69
Format: 304 pages, Hardcover
In this fresh and engaging guide to chemistry, Dr. Kate Biberdorf, aka "Kate the Chemist," reveals … read more
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- popular science
- science
- nonfiction
- audiobook
14. Interstellar: The Search for Extraterrestrial Life and Our Future in the Stars
By: Avi Loeb
3.51
Format: 252 pages, Kindle Edition
“The world's leading alien hunter” — New York Times Magazine From acclaimed Harvard astrophysicist… read more
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- science
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
15. Metazoa: Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind
By: Peter Godfrey-Smith
3.89
Format: 352 pages, Hardcover
The scuba-diving philosopher who wrote Other Minds explores the origins of animal consciousness … read more
Want to Read $ 11.99Similar categories in Peter Godfrey-Smith's Metazoa: Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- history
- biology
- evolution
- philosophy
- nonfiction
- nature
- science
16. Furia
By: Marcel Moss
3.70
Format: 352 pages, Paperback
Od obłędu dzieli nas tylko chwila. Przez świat przetacza się fala totalnego zdziczenia i furii. … read more
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- audiobook
17. The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market
By: Naomi Oreskes
4.42
Format: 576 pages, Hardcover
The bestselling authors of Merchants of Doubt offer a profound, startling history of one of America… read more
Want to Read $ 14.46Similar categories in Naomi Oreskes's The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- nonfiction
- history
- audiobook
18. Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
By: Carl Zimmer
3.94
Format: 368 pages, Hardcover
We all assume we know what life is, but the more scientists learn about the living world--from prot… read more
Want to Read $ 14.99Similar categories in Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- science
- history
- biology
- medicine
- evolution
- philosophy
- nonfiction
- popular science
- nature
- audiobook
"It was a biochemical Jackson Pollock: a field of strings, tangles, loops."-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
"Thirteen thousand years ago it fell to Antarctica. It rested in the Allan Hills as the Ice Age glaciers retreated, farmers discovered agriculture, cities rose, and rockets shot into space."-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
"The disgusting smell of death of death is the result of certain airborne molecules with evocative names like cadaverine and putrescine. These molecules are not produced by death, however, but by life…"-Carl Zimmer, Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
19. Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality
By: Frank Wilczek
3.90
Format: 272 pages, Hardcover
“ Fundamentals might be the perfect book for the winter of this plague year. . . . Wilczek writes … read more
Want to Read $ 13.99Similar categories in Frank Wilczek's Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- audiobook
- philosophy
- nonfiction
- popular science
- science
"The universe is a strange place, and we're all in it together."-Frank Wilczek, Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality
"Each of our human bodies contains far more atoms than there are stars in the visible universe, and our brains contain about as many as neurons as there are stars in our galaxy. The universe within is…"-Frank Wilczek, Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality
20. The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life
By: David Quammen
3.98
Format: 480 pages, Hardcover
Science writer David Quammen explains how recent discoveries in molecular biology can change our un… read more
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- science
- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
21. Some Assembly Required: Decoding Four Billion Years of Life, from Ancient Fossils to DNA
By: Neil Shubin
4.14
Format: 267 pages, Hardcover
In Some Assembly Required, Neil Shubin takes readers on a journey of discovery spanning centuries, … read more
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- science
- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
22. The Zoologist's Guide to the Galaxy: What Animals on Earth Reveal about Aliens – and Ourselves
By: Arik Kershenbaum
3.96
Format: 356 pages, Hardcover
DISCOVER HOW LIFE REALLY WORKS - ON EARTH AND IN SPACE We are unprepared for the greatest discov… read more
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- science
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- nature
- audiobook
"One of the most fundamental rules of natural selection, on Earth and across the universe, is that there is always a cost-benefit trade-off. Improving your abilities in one field must reduce your capa…"-Arik Kershenbaum, The Zoologist's Guide to the Galaxy: What Animals on Earth Reveal about Aliens – and Ourselves
"Whenever there is a conflict of interest (or a potential conflict of interest) between two animals making their own decisions to maximize their own fitness, then an evolutionary game is in play. Each…"-Arik Kershenbaum, The Zoologist's Guide to the Galaxy: What Animals on Earth Reveal about Aliens – and Ourselves
23. How to Die in Space
By: Paul M. Sutter
3.89
Format: 336 pages, Hardcover
So you've fallen in love with space and now you want to see it for yourself, huh? You want to witne… read more
Want to Read $ 18.99Similar categories in Paul M. Sutter's How to Die in Space book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- science
- nonfiction
- audiobook
24. First Steps: How Upright Walking Made Us Human
By: Jeremy Desilva
4.33
Format: 352 pages, ebook
In First Steps, paleoanthropologist Jeremy DeSilva explores how unusual and extraordinary this seem… read more
Want to Read $ 14.29Similar categories in Jeremy Desilva's First Steps: How Upright Walking Made Us Human book and Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- science
- history
- biology
- evolution
- nonfiction
- audiobook
"...Bipedalism in an overly aggressive ape with purely selfish tendencies and a low tolerance for other group member would have been a recipe for extinction."-Jeremy Desilva, First Steps: How Upright Walking Made Us Human
25. Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music
By: Alex Ross
4.18
Format: 784 pages, Hardcover
Alex Ross, renowned New Yorker music critic and author of the international bestseller and Pulitzer… read more
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- nonfiction
- history
- audiobook
26. Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living
By: Dimitris Xygalatas
3.77
Format: 320 pages, Hardcover
A pioneering anthropologist takes readers on a journey through the rich tapestry of human ritual—s… read more
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- nonfiction
- history
- science
- audiobook
"Costly rituals help communities grow stronger, and this can have major implications for their long-term survival and prosperity."-Dimitris Xygalatas, Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living
"Ceremony is a primordial part of human nature, one that helps us connect, find meaning and discover who we are: we are the ritual species."-Dimitris Xygalatas, Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living
"We spontaneously engage in ritualized behaviors when we face stressful and uncertain situations, and we intuitively expect those ritualized actions to have an effect."-Dimitris Xygalatas, Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living
"The logic behind these initiations provides an efficient solution to a pressing cooperation dilemma: in order for a group to survive, it must rely on the loyalty of its members."-Dimitris Xygalatas, Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living
27. Cywilizacja Słowian. Prawdziwa historia największego ludu Europy
By: Kamil Janicki
4.09
Format: 400 pages, Hardcover
Czy Słowianom udało się stworzyć własną cywilizację? Czy Słowianie znaleźli się na ziemiach pols… read more
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- nonfiction
- history
- audiobook
28. The Next Great Migration: The Beauty and Terror of Life on the Move
By: Sonia Shah
3.88
Format: 400 pages, Hardcover
A prize-winning journalist upends our centuries-long assumptions about migration through science, h… read more
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- audiobook
- history
- nonfiction
- nature
- science
29. Rebel Cell: Cancer, Evolution, and the New Science of Life's Oldest Betrayal
By: Kat Arney
4.30
Format: 416 pages, Paperback
Why do we get cancer? Is it our modern diets and unhealthy habits? Chemicals in the environment? An… read more
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- biology
- medicine
- nonfiction
- popular science
- science
30. Am I Normal?
By: Sarah Chaney
3.66
Format: 324 pages, Hardcover
A deep dive into the strange science of the 'Normal', and the roots of an anxiety-ridden modern obs… read more
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- nonfiction
- history
- science
- audiobook
31. Sugar Brain Fix: The 28-Day Plan to Quit Craving the Foods That Are Shrinking Your Brain and Expanding Your Waistline
By: Mike Dow
3.48
Format: 346 pages, Kindle Edition
We now have proof that sugar shrinks the human brain. So, the question is How do you regrow yours-… read more
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- nonfiction
