Small World Big Ideas

Small World, Big Ideas collects twelve of the most inspiring and courageous activists together to share their stories and present an inspiring vision of what each of us can do to build a better world today. There's an activist in all of us, and you don't have to shout about it to be heard. And to prove it, life-long campaigner and former Jain monk Satish Kumar has invited twelve of those activists he most admires to share their own inspiring stories in Small World, Big Ideas, revealing—some, for the very first time—who or what made them want to change the world and what kind of world they want to help create. This book collects the thoughts, hopes and visions of some of the most significant figures in the global fight for a better and more compassionate world. As well as Satish Kumar, we hear from: Deepak Chopra - The mind-body healing pioneer discusses his journey from growing up in post-war India to learning about Ayurvedic medicine, to his current work promoting spiritual knowledge and working for world peace. Jane Goodall - The renowned scientist and conservationist tells of the people who have inspired her in her work to pretect animals, and the reasons she has for hope in the future. Franny Armstrong - The McLibel filmmaker writes about her politicisation as a teenager, her involvement with the Greenpeace movement and the next steps in the fight against climate change. Bob Brown - The Australian Green politician shares stories from his time as an ecologist and lawmaker, and his belief in how democracy can be used to bring people together to fight the looming crises facing Planet Earth. Tim Flannery - The explorer and ecologist tells of watching the ecosystems around him disappear, his travels to remote areas around the world and how the only hope for our future lies in connecting with others to act together. Polly Higgins -The late environmental lawyer discusses how the concept of Earth Law, and how she came to fight for ecocide to be recognised as a crime against humanity. Caroline Lucas - England's only Green MP, Lucas writes about how she has fought all her life to change the political system, and how radical change is always possible! Bill McKibben - The writer and activist discusses moving from writing to political campaigning, and how he founded 350.org, the global grass-roots organization that works to halt and reverse climate change. Carlo Petrini - The slow food advocate tells of growing up in Piedmont, and of how we can change the world by putting food back at the centre of our lives. Vandana Shiva - The ecofeminist discusses how the multiple crises which she has fought – climate change, misogyny and inequality – are all interlinked, and how our response must be similarly all-encompassing. Whether they have championed the tragic plight of Indian farmers impoverished by the domination of the agro-giants or shamed Hollywood into treating climate change as a serious concern these are the people who have made their voices heard. Their illuminating and often moving life stories will inspire all of us to get off the couch and do something ourselves to help shape a better world.

Ideas are like buses, you wait forever and then 500 come along atonce. The Big Idea Book is 500 novel, ingenious anddownright crazy ideas designed to inspire, amuse and divert.Developed by the team behind the innovative website, Idea-a-Day atwww.idea-a-day.com, itcovers everything from business to travel, politics to money andeverything in between. Idea-a-Day has a vast network of followers and contributors -some famous, some infamous, some revered, some reviled – whopost ideas to be read, enjoyed, used or abused. Seth Godin, MalcolmMaclaren and Wayne Hemmingway are just a few of its fans. In TheBig Idea Book all this creative energy is mixed together withunpublished ideas, quotes, cartoons, illustrations andthought-pieces to give creatives and cool office types a visual andintellectual treat guaranteed to kickstart the imagination andcreative flair!

Why has the flow of big, world-changing ideas slowed down? A provocative look at what happens next at the frontiers of human knowledge. The history of humanity is the history of big ideas that expand our frontiers—from the wheel to space flight, cave painting to the massively multiplayer game, monotheistic religion to quantum theory. And yet for the past few decades, apart from a rush of new gadgets and the explosion of digital technology, world-changing ideas have been harder to come by. Since the 1970s, big ideas have happened incrementally—recycled, focused in narrow bands of innovation. In this provocative book, Michael Bhaskar looks at why the flow of big, world-changing ideas has slowed, and what this means for the future. Bhaskar argues that the challenge at the frontiers of knowledge has arisen not because we are unimaginative and bad at realizing big ideas but because we have already pushed so far. If we compare the world of our great-great-great-grandparents to ours today, we can see how a series of transformative ideas revolutionized almost everything in just a century and a half. But recently, because of short-termism, risk aversion, and fractious decision making, we have built a cautious, unimaginative world. Bhaskar shows how we can start to expand the frontier again by thinking big—embarking on the next Universal Declaration of Human Rights or Apollo mission—and embracing change.

The climate crisis requires that we drastically reduce carbon dioxide emissions across all sectors of society. The Story of CO2 contributes to this vital conversation by highlighting the cutting-edge science and emerging technologies – a number of which are already commercially available – that can transform carbon dioxide into a myriad of products such as feedstock chemicals, polymers, pharmaceuticals, and fuels. This approach allows us to reconsider CO2 as a resource, and to add "carbon capture and use" to our other tools in the fight against catastrophic climate change. The Story of CO2 explores all aspects of carbon dioxide, from the atomic to the universal perspective, and takes the reader on an epic journey into our physical world, starting from the moment of the Big Bang, all the way to the present world in which atmospheric CO2 concentrations continue to grow. This story seeks to inspire readers with the latest carbon utilization technologies and explain how they fit within the broader context of carbon mitigation strategies in the shift towards a sustainable energy economy.

There's an activist in all of us, and you don't have to shout about it to be heard. In Small World, Big Ideas, Satish Kumar collects the voices of some of the most passionate activists fighting for a better world, and shares their insights into how we can achieve this.

'Engaging, smart and wise, Mini-Philosophy is a diverse taster menu of ideas on life, the mind and the world. Nutritious, bite-sized portions of philosophy that whet the appetite for more' - David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks Why do people enjoy watching scary movies? Should we bet on the existence of God? Why is pleasure better than pain? And when is a duck not a duck? Mini Philosophy is a fascinating journey into what some of the greatest minds of the last 2500 years have to say about the big questions in life, and why they are relevant to us today. Covering everything from Sun Tzu's strategy for winning at board games to Freud's insights into our 'death drive'; why De Beauvoir believed the mothering instinct is a myth to why Schopenhauer probably wasn't much fun at parties, these mini meditations will expand your mind (and bend it too).

Bring back playtime, all the time! Dive into a Bubbling Swamp World. Drum on an Outdoor Sound Wall. Explore the gooeyness of Glowing Slime. With the one-of-a-kind projects in 150+ Screen-Free Activities for Kids, your family will rediscover the spirit of imaginative play! These fun activities help develop your child's creativity and skills--all without a screen in sight. Featuring step-by-step instructions and beautiful photographs, each budget-friendly project will keep your child entertained, engaged, and learning all day long. Best of all, no one will complain about turning off the TV or computer with such entertaining activities as: Natural Dye Fingerpaints Taste-Safe, Gluten-Free Playdough Erupting Volcano Dinosaur World Fizzy Rainbow Slush Taste-Safe Glow Water Complete with dozens of exercises for babies, toddlers, and school-aged children, 150+ Screen-Free Activities for Kids will help your family step away from your devices and step into endless afternoons of playtime fun!

Time has always been the great Given, a fact of existence which cannot be denied or wished away; but the character of lived time is changing dramatically. Medical advances extend our longevity, while digital devices compress time into ever briefer units. We can now exist in several time-zones simultaneously, but we suffer from endemic shortages of time. We are working longer hours and blurring the distinctions between labour and leisure. For many, in an inversion of the old adage, time has become more valuable than money. In this look at life's most ineffable element, spanning fields from biology and culture to psychoanalysis and neuroscience, Eva Hoffman asks: are we coming to the end of time as we know it?