1001-Ideas-That-Changed-the-Way-We-Think

“ … it struck me that … a phenomenon of great significance was being overlooked …”

James R. Flynn

Flynn identified several possible causes for the increase in test scores, but the scientific community is still divided. Have we become smarter than our ancestors or are we better able to solve the kinds of questions posed in intelligence tests? If we are not more intelligent, do IQ tests measure what we think of as intelligence or do they measure something else? We do not know, but if one interpretation of the Flynn effect is right, it is only a matter of time before our intellectually superior descendants find out. MT

1987

Mitochondrial Eve

R. Cann, M. Stoneking, and A. Wilson

All people descend from a single woman who lived 200,000 years ago

If we could travel back in time and trace the origins of each person from their mother, we could conceivably find a single mother from whom all modern humans descend. This single, hypothetical woman has been dubbed “mitochondrial Eve,” in reference to the biblical story of Adam and Eve, and the DNA found in every human in the mitochondria organelles of their cells.

In the early 1980s, researchers discovered that samples of human mitochondrial DNA (mDNA)—DNA that is passed only from mother to offspring—were much more similar than samples taken from other primates. The closer the DNA of any two individuals, the more closely they are related, which means that humans, as a species, shared a common ancestor much more recently than other primates. In 1987, geneticists Rebecca Cann, Mark Stoneking (b. 1956), and Allan Wilson (1934–91) completed a study in which they sampled DNA from people across the world. They found that all modern humans shared mDNA from a single woman who, because the differences between samples were most pronounced in that region, probably lived in southern Africa about 200,000 years ago.

“Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living.”

The Bible, Genesis 3:20

While the theory of mitochondrial Eve did not refer to the most recent common human ancestor, it created an alternative explanation to the idea of Homo sapiens humanity arising simultaneously in different parts of the world. Due in large part to the discovery of mitochondrial Eve, the more widely held belief today is that all modern humans are descended from a single African ancestor, which makes us more closely related than anyone thought previously. MT

1987

Black Athena

Martin Bernal

An argument that European civilization sprang from Afro-Asian roots

The civilization of ancient Greece lies at the heart of Western culture. Most people take Greek culture to be quintessentially European, but what if its roots lay in the African and Asian societies of Egypt and Phoenicia?

In the three volumes of Black Athena: The Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization, published between 1987 and 2006, British historian Martin Bernal (b. 1937) examined the evidence. A scholar of modern Chinese history, he began to examine his Jewish roots and soon realized that Hebrew and Phoenician—both dialects of a single Canaanite, Semitic language—were very similar to ancient Greek. The Greeks themselves had always identified themselves with Egypt and Phoenicia, but why had these roots been ignored over the centuries? As he read, Bernal realized that the idea of what he called the Aryan model—that Greece had been settled by Aryans from central Europe—was wrong. In its place he suggested the ancient model, in which Egyptian and Phoenician influences were paramount. He was surprised to find that the shift between the two models had occurred quite recently, during the early nineteenth century, as Western anti-Semitism and racism gained academic credibility. The Aryan model became more racially acceptable, and thus Semitic and Egyptian influences on Greece were denied.

“The political purpose of Black Athena is … to lessen European cultural arrogance.”

Martin Bernal, Black Athena (1987)

The impact of such thinking was extremely political. Saying that the African and Asian roots of Greece have been deliberately replaced by European roots was to accuse academia of racism. Not everyone concurred, but Bernal’s theory has transformed thinking about the roots of Western civilization. SA

1988

Fairtrade

Solidaridad

A social movement that aims to improve the ethics of commerce

Fairtrade farmers in Kita, a cotton growing region of Mali.

Fairtrade is an international initiative that was set up to protect the incomes of workers in developing countries, and also to establish and maintain sustainable environmental growth and regeneration policies. The concept underlying Fairtrade was developed after World War II (1939–45) in Europe and North America by religious groups and nongovernmental organizations that offered for sale inexpensive handicrafts imported from the developing world.

Subsequently, however, the cause gained momentum and influence. The first Fairtrade label was launched in 1988, when Dutch development agency Solidaridad sold fairly traded Mexican coffee in Dutch supermarkets under the “Max Havelaar” label. By the end of the twentieth century, official monitoring organizations, such as Fairtrade International, Fair Trade USA, and Eco-Social, were issuing certificates to importers who satisfied their principal requirement: that the developing world should receive a reasonable share of the profits generated by the sale of its products in the industrialized nations. The fairtrade movement focused on the terms of trade applied to bananas, chocolate, cocoa, coffee, tea, cotton, flowers, fresh fruit, gold, handicrafts, honey, sugar, and wine.

Since 2002, produce that meets Fairtrade International standards has been certified with labels bearing the Fair Trade Certified Mark. In order to earn this stamp of approval, goods must be reasonably priced and the profits distributed fairly; in addition, the producers must demonstrate that they aid social development and protect and conserve the environment. The goods must also be produced exclusively by individuals and companies that abide by United Nations and International Labor Organization requirements to ensure safety in the workplace, to guarantee the right to form unions, and to ban child labor and slave labor. GL

1988

Passive Housing

Bo Adamson and Wolfgang Feist

Building to a standard that dramatically reduces energy consumption

Passive housing in the Vauban quarter, Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany.

The Passivhaus (passive housing) concept was first discussed in 1988 by two professors, Bo Adamson of Lund University, Sweden, and Wolfgang Feist of the German Institute for Housing and Environment. The first development of the kind was a row of four terraced homes in Darmstadt, Germany, completed in 1990. It became Europe’s first inhabited multi-family house to achieve a documented heating energy consumption of less than 12 kilowatt hours per square meter per year. In September 1996 the Passivhaus-Institut was founded, also in Darmstadt, to promote and control the standard of passive houses.

Passive houses—which can be offices, schools, or shops as well as homes—are structures intended to maximize energy efficiency. Most are purpose-built, but preexistent buildings can also be refurbished into passive houses. They are airtight, or as close to airtight as possible: door and window frames are fitted with great care to eliminate drafts; walls are made from dense or lightweight materials. Windows are positioned to catch the sunshine, which powers a green heat-recovery ventilation system. Further warmth is derived from internal sources, such as the excess heat generated by refrigerators and washing machines and even the body heat of the inhabitants. If residents feel cold, they can light natural oil heaters; if they feel hot, they can open skylights. All artificial lighting comes from low-energy lamps powered by solar panels.

The building cost of a passive house is about 14 percent more than that of a conventional equivalent. However, the energy savings are immense: domestic power bills are reduced by at least 75 percent and sometimes by more than 90 percent. Passive housing is catching on: at the time of writing, there are around 30,000 certified structures of this type in Europe (mainly in Austria, Germany, and Scandinavia), and thus far the total has increased every year. GL

1988

LGBT

United States

An acronym referring to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community

Thousands march for equal rights for LGBT people at the Gay Pride parade in São Paulo, Brazil, in 2003.

Labels always present problems, particularly if they are affixed to people. One person’s description can be another’s offense, and nowhere is this truer than in the realm of human sexuality. As a result, it has taken years of negotiation and compromise to come up with the initialism “LGBT” to describe, in turn, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. No one person can claim credit for its first usage, and no single article or document can claim to be its founding manifesto, but from 1988 onward it gained increasing acceptance.

When differing sexual identities were first discussed in the late nineteenth century, the term “homosexual,” or “of the same sex,” was the preferred usage for gay people. But “lesbian” was preferred by some women because the “homo” of homosexual suggested it referred to men only. Homosexual, however, had negative connotations, and was gradually replaced by “gay” during the 1970s. Feminists in search of equality with men insisted on using lesbian, and so the lesbian and gay community took wing. Both terms, however, are gender specific and thus ignore bisexuals and transgendered people. It became impossible to find one term that fitted all, and thus LGBT came into being.

“What is straight? A line can be straight, or a street, but the human heart, oh, no …”

Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire (1947)

While lesbians, gays, and bisexuals are primarily concerned with sexual orientation, transgendered and transsexual people are concerned with gender identity. Many argue that the term is divisive rather than inclusive, yet alternative generic terms are found wanting. “Queer” is negative to those who remember the word as an insult, and “rainbow” (embodied by the LGBT flag) is linked with the New Age movement. SA

1989

European Single Currency

European Commission

The notion of a single currency that could be spent throughout Europe

Europe first enjoyed a common currency when it was part of the Roman Empire (27 BCE–476 CE). The first modern proposal was made in 1929 by German foreign minister Gustav Stresemann (1878–1929) as a way of ending post-World War I economic divisions. A second attempt was made in 1969, when the European Commission (EC) set out a plan for “greater coordination of economic policies and monetary cooperation.” International economic turbulence soon sabotaged that idea, however.

The third and most successful attempt was initiated at a European summit meeting in Hannover in 1988, when the then president of the EC, Jacques Delors (b. 1925), was asked to draw up a timetable for economic and monetary union. In April 1989, Delors announced a three-stage plan that eventually led to the introduction of new euro notes and coins in twelve European Union (EU) countries, on January 1, 2002. Five further EU countries later joined the currency, and it is also used in non-EU Montenegro and Kosovo, as well as in other EU-linked territories around the world.

“Inspiration for the € symbol came from … the first letter of the word Europe …”

European Commission (October 30, 2010)

Currently used by 326 million people, the euro has become the world’s second most traded currency after the U.S. dollar. Its economic impact, however, has been disastrous. Common interest and exchange rates without the strengths of a full fiscal union have removed two crucial monetary levers from government control at a national level. What works for rich Germany does not work for poor Greece. The euro will survive because its politicians will it, but it has yet to prove its economic potential. SA

1989

Restorative Justice

John Braithwaite

Doing justice by restoring the harm rather than punishing the offense

Restorative justice is a response to injustice, particularly crime, that involves a process of restitution, restoration, and reconciliation. In restorative justice, everybody affected by the crime is included in, and given a degree of authority over, the process; the participants are expected to attain a deliberative consensus; and the outcome is oriented toward reparation and reconciliation, rather than punishment. It is contrasted with retributive justice, according to which crime is primarily an offense to the state, not a harm to the victim, and a proportionate punishment is the best response. Proponents of restorative justice generally contend that it is deeply rooted in human history, but it emerged as a conscious theoretical alternative to retributive justice in the 1980s, most notably with the publication of Crime, Shame and Reintegration in 1989 by Australian criminologist John Braithwaite (b. 1951).

“Restorative justice is about the idea that because crime hurts, justice should heal.”

John Braithwaite

As appealing as restorative justice may seem, critics have complained that it is formulated in unclear and conflicting ways, that it is really a view of punishment rather than of justice, that it is unsuccessful in reducing recidivism, that it is unjust in not ensuring equal treatment of similar offenders, and that it unduly focuses on individual offenders rather than on social conditions.

Restorative justice programs have become increasingly common since the 1990s, especially for cases involving youthful offenders and domestic violence. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established in 1995 to address the human rights violations of the apartheid era, is generally regarded as a mostly successful effort. GB

1989

Outsourcing

Kodak Eastman Company

A logical consequence of the idea of the division of labor

To outsource, in business, is to obtain goods or services from external sources rather than to produce or perform them internally. When the sources are foreign, outsourcing is sometimes called offshoring. The term “outsource” appeared in English in c. 1980, with the term “offshoring” appearing shortly thereafter, although both practices clearly predate the terms. The first formal identification of outsourcing as a business strategy, however, occured in 1989, when the Kodak Eastman Company decided to outsource its IT systems to IBM.

Outsourcing is typically driven by considerations of efficiency. By specializing, the external source can avail itself of economies of scale or scope, thus providing its goods or services at a lower cost than the outsourcing company could manage. Meanwhile, the outsourcing company can benefit by concentrating on its core business. The external source may also not be subject to costs that the outsourcing company would be subject to, such as hiring and training specialized staff, dealing with a unionized workforce, and complying with government regulations regarding worker benefits or environmental practices. But outsourcing is not necessarily a panacea: for example, companies considering whether to outsource may have concerns about the quality of the goods or services provided by the external source, or their loss of control over the supply chain, or the possibility of the external source eventually becoming a rival.

It is likely that the recent interest in outsourcing and offshoring was driven by the advent of inexpensive telecommunications and then the Internet, enabling the extension of outsourcing to goods and services that previously would have been produced or performed internally. Outsourcing and offshoring are bound to continue—and they will continue to be a source of turbulence in the labor market. GB

1989

World Wide Web / Internet

Tim Berners-Lee

The development of a worldwide interconnected data and information system that grew out of a Cold War-era defense program

This was the computer used at CERN by British scientist Tim Berners-Lee to devise the World Wide Web in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

The Internet is a system of interconnected computer networks that now uses the TCP/IP protocol suite to connect billions of users worldwide. However, its hugely influential present-day use was not envisaged at its inception. The Internet began as a Cold War-era initiative in the United States. Wary of Soviet technological supremacy after the launch of the Sputnik in 1957, and concerned that a single Soviet missile could obliterate the telephone network and cripple the nation, the U.S. government worked to develop a means to connect computers outside the telephone system. The result was the first file-sharing computer network, called ARPANET.

“The Internet has made me very casual with a level of omniscience that was unthinkable a decade ago. I now wonder if God gets bored knowing the answer to everything.”

Douglas Coupland, novelist

In the 1970s, U.S. computer scientists Vinton Cerf (b. 1943) and Bob Kahn (b. 1938) developed the TCP/IP protocol, which led to the National Science Foundation Network, or NSFNET, replacing ARPANET by the 1980s. However, it was a graduate of Oxford University, British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee (b. 1955), who, in 1989, invented the World Wide Web, an Internet-based hypermedia initiative for global information sharing, while working at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory. Berners-Lee created standards for hypertext documents (text documents with other data, such as images or links to other computers, embedded in them) shared across the NSFNET, and in 1990 wrote the first web client and server. The NSFNET was decommissioned in 1995, and the Internet was made available for private and commercial use.

Today the Internet is mainly used to access the World Wide Web’s conglomerate of hypertext documents. Nearly a third of the world’s 6.8 billion people frequently use the Internet. It enables personal enrichment, social connection, artistic development, economic development, commerce, and learning, and has shaped global politics and human society since the 1990s. APT

1989

The End of History

Francis Fukuyama

Western liberal democracy is the last form that human society will take

Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and Erich Honecker meet a month before the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

“The end of history” is a theory about the final evolution of human society. According to this theory, humankind will eventually reach a state of socioeconomic development at which there will be no further evolution but only refinements in the existing system. Contemporary proponents of the theory speculate that Western free market-based liberal democracy is the final socioeconomic development.

Philosophers Georg Hegel (1770–1831) and Karl Marx (1818–83) speculated about the end of history. Marx believed that history would end in a communist utopian society, while Hegel thought it would end in a liberal state. The theory gained new prominence, however, when U.S. political scientist and economist Francis Fukuyama (b. 1952) expounded his version of the theory in a paper, “The End of History?” (1989), which he subsequently developed into a best selling book, The End of History and the Last Man (1992).

“Marx believed that the evolution of human societies was not open-ended …”

Francis Fukuyama

The end of history theory does not claim that events will stop happening; it states that wholesale evolution of society will cease as all states converge on Western liberal democracy. The theory has important implications if true, since it controversially implies that communism, among other alternative forms of society, is retrogressive and unsustainable. This implication has been rejected by thinkers such as French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930–2004), who likened the theory to a “New Gospel” reinforcing Christian eschatology, and British historian Perry Anderson (b. 1938), who points out that Western liberal democracies are still rife with poverty, suffering, and injustice. APT

1990

Parental Advisory Label

Tipper Gore

A warning to parents on music products of content unsuitable for children

Introduced in 1990 on the instigation of author Tipper Gore (b. 1948), then wife of congressman Al Gore, parental advisory labels (PALs) originally took the form of square, nonremovable stickers with a dotted white line near the center and the legends “Explicit lyrics” at the top and “Parental advisory” at the bottom. The first album to carry a PAL was Banned in the USA (1990) by Luke featuring the 2 Live Crew. Two years later, PAL motifs began to be integrated into album cover artwork. In 1993, the logo was changed to a white box in a black rectangle, with “Explicit lyrics” becoming “Explicit content.”

PALs warned prospective purchasers that the albums to which they were affixed contained profane language, sexual references, incitements to violence, or other material that the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) deemed inappropriate for people under the age of seventeen. But the effects of PALs were not always those intended by the RIAA. Some musicians regarded a PAL as a badge of honor and deliberately courted notoriety, though research indicates that controversial lyrics have little effect on sales. Since there was no consensus about what justified a PAL, there were numerous anomalies. Some material, such as the Geto Boys’ self-titled album, was regarded as so extreme that it required additional warnings.

“Kids have had to learn how to cover the Parental Advisory labels on their CDs …”

Tom Breihan, pitchfork.com

PALs have helped customers to sift out material that they regard as unsuitable. In the United States, Best Buy and other big retail chains have used their power in the marketplace to insist that record companies wanting products stocked in their stores produce “clean” alternative versions without the PAL label. GL

1990

Anti-globalization

United States

A movement that seeks tighter controls over the powers of big international business

A demonstration blames the International Monetary Fund for the crash of East Asian economies in 1998.

The second half of the twentieth century saw a vast increase in the number of big firms whose commercial activities transcended national boundaries and jurisdictions. Among the initiatives that facilitated this development was the “maquiladora program” in the 1960s, which enabled foreign companies to import parts and raw materials duty-free into Mexico, where they were assembled by low-paid workers before being re-exported, again without surcharge. The growth of this phenomenon—known as globalization—was accelerated in the 1980s by the deregulation of the Western world’s financial markets.

This development had numerous benefits for industry but many potential disadvantages for individuals, not least because it was no longer clear which nation’s laws governed the firms’ activities.

The reaction against this trend took the form of what became known as the anti-globalization movement. It began as isolated murmurings of discontent, notably a demonstration on Wall Street, New York City, the day after Earth Day in 1990, but grew in the 1990s, mainly through the Internet, into a vocal and active pressure group. Supporters of anti-globalization oppose the unregulated economic and political power that has been rapidly acquired by multinational corporations, which have at the same time gained for themselves almost unrestricted liberty to maximize their profits, regardless of the interests or, in some cases, even the safety of their workers. Anti-globalists also object to the fact that big companies can cross borders and exploit natural resources almost at will, freedoms that are denied to most people.

Anti-globalization is to some extent a misnomer. Rather than oppose multinational and transnational businesses, supporters want to bring big firms under a new world authority that protects individuals and promotes sustainable development and fair trade. GL

1990

Godwin’s Law

Michael Godwin

Glib comparisons to the Nazis are inuring people to the full horror of their acts

A Cuban poster combines George W. Bush with Hitler to equal the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles.

An early adopter of computers, U.S. attorney and author Michael Godwin (b. 1956) coined what has become known as “Godwin’s Law” in 1990. After observing participants in Usenet newsgroups online discussion forums during the 1980s, he noticed that thoughtless comparisons to Hitler or the Nazis were abundant, and that people were losing perspective on what made the Nazis and the Holocaust so terrible.

Godwin came up with his Internet adage in an attempt to promote more considered dialogue: “I thought that if we continued to make trivial comparisons to Nazis or to Hitler or to the Holocaust, we in some ways were papering over how spiritually traumatic that period was for all of Western civilization, and maybe for civilization generally.” He decided to spread around his notion of Godwin’s Law in various online forums. The law is a meme suggesting that the longer any online discussion goes on, whatever its scope or topic, it is inevitable that someone will make a comparison to Adolf Hitler or the Nazis. The law recognizes that heated debates usually proceed in predictable ways, with escalating rhetoric, and when participants want to call someone the worst thing they can think of, they suggest they are like Hitler or the Nazis; alternatively, people might also see fit to compare an unfortunate or undesirable event to the Holocaust. Godwin’s Law is designed to point out that calling someone a Nazi on trivial grounds—for example, because they have mildly offensive views on healthcare policy—is inappropriate hyperbole.

Internet users began to quote and cite Godwin’s Law in response to offending posts, and glib comparisons to Hitler and the Nazis became an Internet faux pas. Although Godwin originally framed his theory in criticism of online culture, it is also applied to traditional media culture and the wider world, and has thus entered into popular culture. CK

1990

Queer Theory

Teresa de Lauretis

A theory of “otherness” that challenges existing notions of gender and sexuality

Once considered as a pathological problem subject to the criminal code, homosexuality is now generally considered to be an acceptable sexuality alongside heterosexuality. But this model implies a duality that some critics argue is wrong. Sexuality is not a matter of either straight or gay, they say, and is too ambivalent to be thus confined. From these basic ideas have arisen the principles of queer theory.

The term “queer theory” was first used in 1990 by Teresa de Lauretis (b. 1938), an Italian-born academic working in the United States, at a working conference on lesbian and gay sexualities held at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She later formally introduced it in the article “Queer Theory, Lesbian and Gay Sexualities,” published in a special issue of A Journal of Feminist and Cultural Studies in 1991. As she put it, “Queer unsettles and questions the genderedness of sexuality.” De Lauretis abandoned the term when it was adopted by those it had intended to subvert, but the idea stuck.

“Queer is … whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant.”

David Halperin, gender theorist

Queer theory arose out of feminist challenges to the idea that gender is part of our essential selves, and also from gay and lesbian studies of socially constructed ideas about sexuality. For queer theorists, sexual identities and gender itself are not fixed and cannot be labeled or categorized. The theory came of age in response to the AIDS crisis, when AIDS was termed a “gay disease” and homophobia dramatically increased. It has had a huge impact in film and literature, and in the Queercore movement of music, art, and magazines. The theory continues to challenge sexual stereotypes and celebrate the deviant and the different. SA

1991

Generational Attitudes

William Strauss and Neil Howe

How and why attitudes change from generation to generation

The notion that every generation shares certain attitudes to life is not new, but it was partly codified by William Strauss (1947–2007) and Neil Howe (b. 1951), whose book Generations (1991) recounted the history of the United States from 1584 as a series of generational biographies. In The Fourth Turning (1997), the two U.S. academics further posited that generational attitudes are cyclic and complete a full revolution roughly once every eighty or ninety years.

Within each cycle are four phases, which Strauss and Howe likened to the seasons of the year. The high point of each cycle is a period during which new ideas—artistic, philosophical, religious, or scientific—inspire a surge of creativity: they call this point an “awakening” (corresponding to summer). The nadir is a major setback, such as a large-scale military conflict, which they term a “crisis” (corresponding to winter). Between these extremes are transitional periods analogous to spring and fall. The authors contend that such cycles have recurred throughout U.S. history: for example, the crisis of the Great Depression and World War II (1929–45) was followed, after a transitional period, by the revolution in consciousness of the 1960s, which represented an awakening.

What goes around comes around: each phase of the cycle lasts for approximately twenty years; at the conclusion of the fourth phase, attitudes and social norms have generally reverted to their original position. While only a construct, the theory has resonated and made it conventional for Westerners living at the start of the twenty-first century to identify themselves, depending upon their age, as “war children” (those born between roughly 1939 and 1945), “baby boomers” (1946–64), “Generation X” (mid-1960s to mid-1980s), or “Generation Y” (alternatively called “the Millennials,” from around 1982 to 2000). GL

1993

Ontology in Information Science

Tom Gruber

Developing a taxonomy of concepts to enable computers to reason more efficiently and communicate with one another more effectively

British artificial intelligence researcher Steve Grand with his robot, “Lucy,” whose success depends on a common ontology shared by its internal circuits and computerized neural software.

Ontology in its original sense, as expounded by philosophers, refers to the study of the categories of being. When someone reflects on the nature of existing things, how many there are, and what kinds of things there are, they engage in ontology in the traditional sense. In the twentieth century, however, the term took on a new meaning: an ontology became a domain-specific taxonomy of concepts designed to clarify thought by illuminating the relations between the various concepts residing in a specified domain, such as medicine, chess, architecture, or music.

“The key role of ontologies with respect to database systems is to specify a data modeling representation at a level of abstraction above specific database designs (logical or physical), so that data can be exported … and unified.”

Tom Gruber

Ontology in the information science sense began with the work of computer scientists in the late twentieth century, notably U.S. computer scientist Tom Gruber (b. 1959), in his paper “A Translation Approach to Portable Ontology Specifications,” published in 1993 in the journal Knowledge Acquisition. Gruber and his peers realized that producing artificially intelligent machines that could reason in a manner analogous to humans required equipping those machines with detailed taxonomic information that allowed them to make correct inferences about the relations between their various concepts. The realization sparked a boom in research on various possible taxonomies, or ontologies.

Ontology has also enabled more efficient database communication in such diverse areas as biomedical informatics, library science, software engineering, warfare, and national security. For example, it has been suggested as a tool for resolving what British ontological scientist Barry Smith (b. 1952) has referred to as the “Database Tower of Babel Problem.” This problem results from the idiosyncratic terminologies used by databases to organize their information. Databases constructed with shared ontologies can communicate more efficiently, with the result that less information is lost in the communication process. APT

1993

McDonaldization

George Ritzer

The notion that the body politic aspires to the condition of a fast-food chain

In The McDonaldization of Society (1993), U.S. sociologist George Ritzer (b. 1940) analyzed the internal workings of the fast-food chain McDonald’s and argued that they are symptomatic of developments in global society and economics. He examined five characteristics of the company, which he termed efficiency, calculability, predictability, control, and culture. Efficiency is the minimization of the time it takes to turn a hungry customer into a full one. Calculability is the principle that the only accurate measurement of success is sales; sales will hold up for as long as customers make no distinction between cheap, large quantities (which are measurable) and good quality (which is subjective). He further contended that McDonald’s restaurants are predictable (the same all over the world) and controlling (every member of staff performs a strictly defined and limited function). And, as the restaurant chain has proliferated, it has imposed its culture on indigenous dining traditions.

“McDonaldization has shown every sign of being an inexorable process …”

George Ritzer, The McDonaldization of Society 6 (2011)

In Ritzer’s view, McDonald’s mirrors society, mainly in the United States but increasingly worldwide. He regards the introduction of monolithic systems in the name of efficiency as dehumanizing, because they deny individual freedom to think. This he calls the “iron cage” of bureaucracy, which creates “settings in which people cannot always behave as human beings.”

Many people shared Ritzer’s disapproval of these trends, and there was a consequent wave of hostility toward McDonald’s. However, executives of the fast-food chain protested that Ritzer’s account of their business practices was substantially inaccurate. GL

1994

Metrosexuality

Mark Simpson

The rise of urban males with preoccupations that are traditionally taken to be female

A Pakistani metrosexual enjoys having a facial beauty treatment applied at a salon in Karachi in 2011.

“Metrosexual” is a term for an urban male who is concerned about his physical appearance and who spends a notable amount of time and money on personal grooming. The first recorded use of the word is in an article by British journalist Mark Simpson, published in November 1994. While Simpson is widely credited with having coined the term, he strenuously asserts that he picked it up from common parlance.

In addition to fastidious personal grooming, a metrosexual also enjoys devoting a conspicuous part of his (usually substantial) disposable income to the purchase of modish consumer products, such as designer-label clothing, sports cars, and fragrances. He typically lives in or within easy reach of a city (“metro” is a contraction of “metropolitan”) and its supporting infrastructure of gyms, manicurists, hairdressers, and stores. A metrosexual may be bisexual or gay, but the term is more significant if he is straight because his heterosexuality is offset by characteristics that may, in other contexts, be regarded as feminine or effeminate.

“It represents a fundamental shift in what men are allowed to be and want.”

Mark Simpson

The popularization of the term served a useful purpose because it provided a way of describing a man who takes pride in his appearance without risking the pejorative overtones of words such as “dandy” or “narcissist.” Among the celebrities to whom it has been applied are British soccer player David Beckham (b. 1975, who made it acceptable for straight Western men to wear sarongs) and U.S. movie star Brad Pitt (b. 1963), whose macho image is tempered by the softness of one who, like many metrosexuals, may be said to be “in touch with his feminine side.” GL

1994

W3C

Tim Berners-Lee

A visionary computer scientist standardizes information sharing across the Internet

Tim Berners-Lee in 1995, holding the title of the consortium that he helped to found.

W3C, or the World Wide Web Consortium, is the primary international standards organization for the World Wide Web. Tim Berners-Lee (b. 1955), British computer scientist and architect of the modern Internet, working at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Laboratory for Computer Science, founded the Consortium in 1994 in conjunction with DARPA, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and the European Commission. The Consortium works to maintain agreement among HTML content providers, such as businesses and government agencies, to ensure compatibility in the display of World Wide Web content. As of 2012 it had 351 member organizations.

The World Wide Web itself is a network of hypertext documents accessible via the Internet. Virtually all of an individual’s interaction with the Internet occurs within the World Wide Web, which is accessed with a web browser. Globally, the volume of web user “traffic” is vast, and the standards upheld by W3C are essential in maintaining the World Wide Web and leading it to its full potential. W3C streamlines the international sharing of information, allowing computers in different geographic regions to “talk” to one another with optimal ease.

“The Web does not just connect machines, it connects people.”

Tim Berners-Lee

W3C is crucial for the viability of the World Wide Web—without it, information sharing on a global scale would be hugely problematic. Failure would have major consequences. For example, consider the events of the Arab Spring (2010–), in which Web-based social media such as Twitter and Facebook played a key role. Arguably, without W3C, and the social media that rely on it, this democratic movement would never have occurred. APT

1994

Video on Demand

Cambridge Cable Network

A system allowing users to watch video content whenever they wish

Video on demand (VOD) is a technology that delivers video content that users can choose to watch and listen to when they want, irrespective of broadcast schedules. Upon receiving a user’s request, with VOD, a centralized server streams online video data in real time to the viewer’s set-top box, computer, or cell phone, so they can start watching the selected video almost immediately. The video remains on the transmitting server as compressed digital files. VOD is a convenient way for people to organize their television viewing to suit their own schedule and to watch movies at home, or on the move, rather than at a cinema. Often the paid-for video is available for a limited time.

The first successful experiments in VOD took place in Cambridge, England, in 1994 via the Cambridge Digital Interactive Television Trial conducted by academics and various companies. Video was streamed to homes and schools connected to the Cambridge Cable Network. The project, although successful, ended in 1996. In 1998, a fully commercial VOD service was launched that included broadcast television and Internet services.

“Couch potatoes dislike wading through alphabetical lists of titles.”

The Economist (2011)

Despite the success of early such experiments, VOD only took off in commercial terms in the 2000s when the cost of equipment dropped, the necessary bandwidth became available at a competitive price, and companies began to provide content that people actually wanted to watch. VOD grew throughout Europe, the United States, and the rest of the world to become the common way for users to consume entertainment that it is today. CK

1994

Amazon.com

Jeffrey P. Bezos

The online store that enabled consumers to buy books at the touch of a button

The inside of the logistics center of amazon.de in Bad Hersfeld, Germany.

For hundreds of years, if readers wanted a book, they went to a bookstore; if the title was not in stock, they had to order it and wait for notification from the bookstore that it had come in. But the advent of the Internet in the 1990s gave U.S. businessman Jeffrey P. Bezos (b. 1964) the opportunity to make every book in existence—not just every title currently in print—available to anyone with a PC and a method of paying: the customer no longer had to leave home to shop.

Amazon.com (a name chosen principally because “A” is at the start of the alphabet) was founded in Washington State in 1994 and sold its first book in July of the following year. It later expanded into other markets, including CDs, DVDs, MP3 downloads, software, video games, clothing, domestic electronic appliances, food, toys, and jewelry. Meanwhile it spread its operations from the United States to other countries: the firm currently also has websites and warehouses in Canada, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, and the United Kingdom; by 2012, some 44 percent of its $12.8 billion sales were coming from outside the United States. At the time of writing, amazon.com is the biggest retailer in the world, with 69,000 employees fulfilling orders from 19.5 million customers a day, and the business is still growing.

With business booming, amazon.com has been able to reduce prices below a level that smaller competitors find economical, and, crucially, cut delivery times to the bone: for popular items, the time lag between receiving the order and making the delivery may be as little as twenty-four hours, at least in urban areas. Amazon.com has revolutionized the book world, challenging publishers to fulfill orders faster than ever before and confronting traditional main street retailers with a choice between streamlining and diversifying or closing forever. In the case of music, main street sellers have already all but disappeared in many areas. GL

1994

Upcycling

Reiner Pilz

Recycling unwanted materials in ways that enhance their value

A market stall in Siem Reap, Cambodia, sells handbags made from upcycled rice sacks.

The limitation of some forms of recycling is that they reduce the already low value of the basic material. Expensive bricks end up as cheap aggregate that is used in the foundations of buildings and highways. Soda cans are flattened into sheets of aluminum that cost, ton for ton, less than the original drinks containers.

Many people believe that conservationists should set their sights higher than this. Instead of breaking up hardwood taken from refurbished buildings and reselling it as cheap firewood, environmentalists should mill it into flooring planks and thus increase its value.

This is not a new idea: laptop cases are made from old wetsuits; broken piano keys are turned into jewelry. However, the concept had no name until 1994, when Reiner Pilz, whose German company manufactures electronic safety equipment for industrial machinery, remarked in an interview that “recycling” would be better termed “downcycling.” “What we need,” Pilz added, “is upcycling, where old products are given more value, not less.”

Pilz’s label stuck and was given wider currency by its use in books including Upcycling (1999) by Gunter Pauli and Johannes F. Hartkemeyer, and Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things (2002) by Michael Braungart and William McDonough. The latter book also highlighted the ways in which reduction in the use of new raw materials can cause a corresponding decrease in energy usage, air and water pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions.

Once identifiable, the upcycling process became easier to promote. Upcycling first caught on in developing countries that could least afford new materials, but the new approach soon came westward. In 2010, Etsy, a U.S. e-commerce website selling handmade artifacts, offered just under 8,000 upcycled products; less than two years later, the number of products exceeded 150,000. GL

1994

V-chip

Brett West and John P. Gardner

Technology to block television shows deemed inappropriate for children

In the late twentieth century there was growing concern worldwide that unsupervised children were being exposed to violent or sexually explicit television programs. To counter this, V-chip technology was developed by Canadian professor Tim Collings and patented in 1994 by two Americans, Brett West and John P. Gardner. The V-chip enables certain shows to be blocked on certain receivers (television sets). “V” originally stood for “viewer control,” but, because the device is used mainly by adults wanting to protect children, it is more commonly taken to stand for “violence.” Since 2000, all new televisions in the United States have had to have the chip installed by law.

The V-chip reads a code in the broadcast signal that gives any show a rating of between one and at least thirteen, depending on the amount of violence, sex, and foul language it contains. Ratings often appear on the screen at the start of programs. If the encoded number is higher than the number that has been set on a particular television, that show will not be accessible on that set. The encoded number is preset by the broadcaster according to strict guidelines, but those guidelines apply only to programs that are likely to be contentious: news bulletins and sports broadcasts do not have such ratings and are therefore unblockable.

“We’re handing the TV remote control back to America’s parents …”

Bill Clinton, U.S. president 1993–2001

The limitation of the V-chip is that it can be reset or deactivated by anyone who knows how to reset the television controls to 0000: hence it is reliably effective only with young children and technophobes. The device has also been criticized by Americans who believe that it violates the First Amendment. GL

1995

Angie’s List

Bill Oesterle and Angie Hicks

A dependable way to get good advice about prospective tradespeople

U.S. entrepreneur Angie Hicks launched the company that was to become Angie’s List in suburban Columbus, Ohio, in 1995. The launch came in response to frustrations encountered by her cofounder, U.S. venture capitalist Bill Oesterle, who was trying to restore a 1920s home but had difficulty finding a reputable heating, ventilation, and air conditioning company. Knowing that Bill’s problem was not unique, Bill and Angie decided to find a way to solve it that would benefit all homeowners.

The implementation of the idea fell to Angie, who went door to door recruiting members, collecting insights from homeowners, and signing them up for the new service. She also researched homeowners’ issues and talked to service professionals, putting together a monthly newsletter designed to help homeowners find the right service professional for their needs. Within a year, Angie had enrolled more than 1,000 members to her neighborhood “grapevine group” and laid the foundation for what would become one of the fastest growing companies in the United States.

In 1999, the accumulated database of what was now known as Angie’s List was transferred to the Internet. It then spread across North America, meanwhile broadening its scope to cover a wide range of services, including healthcare and automobile maintenance. At the time of writing, it has around 1.5 million subscribers, who post almost half a million reviews annually. Angie’s List derives its revenue from two sources: individual subscriptions, the cost of which varies from region to region, and advertising. Companies are not allowed to join, and Angie’s List staff monitor contributors to ensure that they do not receive payment for their comments. In an age when the opportunities to disseminate misinformation are greater than ever before, Angie’s List is a boon to the consumer. GL

1995

eBay

Pierre Omidyar

Originally set up to facilitate the purchase and sale of collectibles by auction, the eBay Internet site is now used by millions every day as a form of mass entertainment

Pierre Omidyar, founder of eBay, photographed in 2002. His auction website was focused originally on collectibles such as soft toys, and innumerable items continue to be traded.

In 1995, Iranian-U.S. entrepreneur Pierre Omidyar (b. 1967) set himself the task of writing a computer code on his personal web page that would enable people to bid in online auctions. In the same year, he launched the online service Auction Web, one of the first websites to link buyers and sellers via the Internet. Now called eBay and based in San Jose, California, it is a global online auction and trading company.

“eBay is a community anchored in commerce. It is a commerce site that built a community around it.”

Meg Whitman, CEO Hewlett-Packard Co.

One key attraction of eBay is its trustworthiness, achieved through its use (and, since 2002, ownership) of PayPal, an automated online clearing house for the transfer of money. Also, in order to filter out unscrupulous or incompetent sellers, eBay solicits feedback that is posted online so that prospective purchasers can see how satisfied previous customers have been. However, one drawback is that low ratings are not always the fault of the seller, whose goods may be delayed or damaged in transit. After some vendors attempted to sabotage rivals by posting bad reviews in 2008, eBay removed the facility to post negative descriptions; the rating system now involves numerical scores only.

Although eBay strives to ensure that no offensive or illegal material is traded on the website, questions remain about its responsibility for transactions. The company has faced lawsuits for alleged complicity in the sale of counterfeit and damaged goods.

Although some items on eBay are advertised at a fixed price, most are open to offers for a certain period, at the end of which they are sold to the highest bidder. Many countries have their own eBay website: the original one covers the United States and Canada; most nations in Europe and many in Asia have their own; in Latin America, eBay operates in association with another e-commerce company, Mercado Libre. There are currently more than 300 million registered eBay users worldwide. GL

1995

Ubuntu

Southern Africa

An African attitude to the world that has helped in the transition from apartheid

In 1995, the first democratically elected government of South Africa set up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) with Desmond Tutu (b. 1931), first black archbishop of Cape Town, at its head. The commission investigated atrocities carried out under the previous apartheid regime. Although the TRC was not without its limitations, and was criticized by some for excessive leniency to those arraigned, it is nevertheless widely regarded as the greatest success of Nelson Mandela’s presidency because it helped to end one period of enmity without starting another.

The TRC was strongly influenced by Ubuntu, a humanist philosophy that originated in southern Africa but came to the attention of the Western world in the late 1990s. The word came into English from Swahili, one of more than 250 Bantu languages in which the word occurs. In common with other philosophies, Ubuntu cannot be easily summarized, but, according to Archbishop Tutu in his book No Future Without Forgiveness (1999), it is “about the fact that you can’t exist as a human being in isolation … what you do affects the whole world.” More specifically, Ubuntu counsels forgiveness rather than vengeance; conciliation rather than confrontation; tolerance, compassion, and respect for the humanity of others—all of them much easier to recite than to practice.

“Ubuntu does not mean that people should not enrich themselves …”

Nelson Mandela, politician

The word “Ubuntu” has been adopted as a pre-game chant by the Boston Celtics basketball team, and the Ubuntu axiom “I am because we are” became the title of a documentary about orphans in Malawi released in 2008 by popstar Madonna. GL

1995

Craigslist

Craig Newmark

The Internet’s leading contact network for music gigs, goods, and love

A humorous portrait of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark in 2005, surrounded by tradeable artifacts.

Craigslist is an online service that provides classified advertisements, community information, and community discussion forums. It is the brainchild of software engineer Craig Newmark (b. 1952), who, feeling lonely in California away from his native New Jersey, decided to set up a free e-mail service alerting like-minded people to forthcoming events in and around San Francisco. It was so successful after its launch in 1995 that it soon expanded into a website on which members could post information, initiate or participate in discussions, buy and sell goods, and find jobs. However, Craigslist became best known as a forum for people wishing to contact others for romance or sex.

What started as a hobby became in 1999 an incorporated, for-profit private company. In 2001, Craigslist made its first foreign sortie, to Vancouver, Canada. By 2005, it had at least one website in every U.S. state, and it later expanded into seventy countries. There are now Craigslists available in French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish.

“What works for us is the culture of trust our community has built with us.”

Craig Newmark

Worldwide, Craigslist now posts millions of advertisements each month. It is free to most private individuals, although following an agreement with forty U.S. state attorneys in 2008, charges were introduced for adverts for erotic services; in 2010 the “adult” category was withdrawn from both the U.S. and Canadian versions. Craigslist’s chief sources of revenue are companies that place adverts for jobs and, in New York City, brokered apartment listings. Craigslist runs no paid-for banner adverts, a factor that has increased its perceived independence and trustworthiness. GL

1996

Darwin’s Black Box

Michael J. Behe

A scientist’s challenge to the Darwinian assumption that there is no God

A colored microscopic image of a blood clot, which Behe states has no proven evolutionary origin.

In his book On the Origin of Species (1859), naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–82) described his study of various creatures in South America and concluded that life on Earth evolves over time. Because Darwin argued that everything in the universe can be explained in evolutionary terms, other writers later used his findings to support the view that there is no God.

The publication in 1996 of Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge of Evolution by U.S. biochemist Michael J. Behe (b. 1952) presented a new challenge to the Darwinian view by questioning the validity of its key assumption. The “black box” of the title refers to anything unproven that has to be taken on trust before a whole concept can be believed.

Among the things that Behe regarded as inexplicable in evolutionary terms are blood clotting and the immune system. These, he elaborated, are like components of a spring-loaded mousetrap: if one part of the whole is altered or removed, the whole contraption fails to work. Blood clotting and the immune system have not been proved to have evolved from something else, and it is unscientific to assume that they must have, just because evolution has been shown to apply to, for example, certain species of Galapagos chaffinch. Behe concluded that the essential quality of such things is what he termed their “irreducible complexity.”

The content of Behe’s book was essentially one scientist pointing out possible flaws in the findings of another. Darwin’s Black Box received a cool reception from critics, who objected that its ideas were a rehash of the “watchmaker analogy”—that the world’s apparently intelligent design requires an intelligent designer, God—first propounded by William Paley (1743–1805) and widely discredited post Darwin. Religious fundamentalists, however, cited Behe’s theories as evidence that God could exist after all. GL

1996

Naturalistic Dualism

David Chalmers

Thought processes include ideas we can express and feelings that we cannot

According to Chalmers, accounting for the feelings aroused by colors is a “hard problem” of consciousness.

Why are some thoughts and feelings easier to communicate than others? We can identify and tell each other the symptoms of a headache; we can recognize when we are awake; and know when we are hot or cold. But how do we put into words the feelings evoked in us by, for example, the color blue, the sound of a certain musical note, or the smell of charcoal?

According to Australian philosopher David Chalmers (b. 1966) in his book The Conscious Mind (1996), the former are examples of “easy problems” of consciousness, while the latter are “hard problems”—inexplicable but nevertheless real.

The distinction is important because, by acknowledging it, philosophy and science can move away from their traditional dependence on physicalism (the notion that things exist only insofar as they are perceived and describable) toward what Chalmers terms “naturalistic dualism”—an acceptance that consciousness has properties that are unquantifiable. Chalmers’s theory is controversial because it posits a form of experience that cannot be explained in physical terms, and therefore implies that consciousness is ultimately more than just the individual’s interpretation of neural processes in his or her brain.

Chalmers himself recognizes the difficulty: “It is widely agreed that experience arises from a physical basis, but we have no good explanation of why and how it so arises. Why should physical processing give rise to a rich inner life at all? It seems objectively unreasonable that it should, and yet it does.”

The idea has its detractors, who say that as soon as we have defined consciousness, distinctions between hard and soft forms of it will dissipate. However, its supporters, foremost among whom is British philosopher Colin McGinn (b. 1950), have used it as the basis for a new mysterianism positing that parts of consciousness are beyond understanding. GL

1996

AMBER Alert

Richard Hagerman

An initiative to thwart child abductors before they can do any harm

An AMBER Alert is a rapidly issued news bulletin to notify the public that a child may have been abducted. First used in the United States in 1996, the AMBER Alert was originally named in memory of nine-year-old Amber Hagerman, who was kidnapped and murdered in Arlington, Texas, that year. Amber’s father, Richard Hagerman, was instrumental in setting up the broadcast alerts. Later, the term was incorrectly taken to be an acronym for “America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response.”

AMBER Alerts are subject to strict guidelines: a law enforcement agency must confirm that an abduction has taken place; the child, who must be under the age of eighteen, must be at risk; descriptions of both the victim and, if possible, the suspected kidnapper should be provided. If these criteria are satisfied, the alerts are broadcast through all modern communications media—television, radio, and (since 2002) Internet, e-mail, and SMS messaging—as well as sometimes on road signs with LED displays. Most kidnapped children are murdered within three hours of their abduction, so rapid response to such events is crucial.

“The goal of an AMBER Alert is to instantly galvanize the entire community …”

U.S. Department of Justice website

By 2006, the AMBER Alert had been adopted in twenty-six U.S. states, sometimes under other names. The system is not without its limitations; critics complain that too many notifications of this type are broadcast about children who have merely been taken out by a noncustodial parent. Nevertheless, similar schemes have now been introduced in Australia, Canada, France, Ireland, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. GL

1996

Colonization of Mars

Robert Zubrin

Traveling to the Red Planet in order to escape overcrowding on Earth

A visualization by photographer and artist Victor Habbick of mining operations on the surface of Mars.

The fear that the rapid increase in the human population of the Earth may continue until the whole planet is overcrowded, coupled with concerns that the global climate may be changing so much that it will make life insupportable, have inspired plans for colonizing another part of the solar system. Prominent among these is The Case for Mars: The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must, published in 1996 by U.S. aerospace engineer Robert Zubrin (b. 1952).

Mars is the celestial body that is most suitable—or perhaps least unsuitable—for human habitation. It has enough atmosphere to protect settlers from solar and cosmic radiation, days that are less than one hour longer than those on Earth, similar (but longer) seasons (the Martian year is approximately two Earth years), and enough water (albeit frozen) and chemical elements to make it potentially conducive to human life.

“I believe that we will eventually establish self-sustaining colonies on Mars …”

Stephen Hawking, theoretical physicist

One significant advantage of Mars is its relative proximity to Earth: at a minimum distance of 34 million miles (54.4 million km), it can be reached in nine months by modern spacecraft, and journey times may be reduced to as little as a fortnight by the introduction of nuclear rockets. Gravity is low (approximately one-third of that on Earth), as is the mean surface temperature (almost as low as the coldest day ever recorded in Antarctica). Nevertheless, several organizations are exploring the possibilities, including the Mars Society, which in association with NASA has set up analog research stations in Canada and Alaska, and Mars One, whose declared intention is to establish a permanent human colony on Mars by 2023. GL

1996

Cognitive Fluidity

Steven Mithen

An explanation of how humans made the leap from barbarism to civilization

A mixed group of anthropological models representing different stages of human evolution.

As far as anthropologists can tell, the minds of the earliest humans were focused exclusively on hunting, gathering, and staying alive. Then, no fewer than 30,000 years ago—suddenly in anthropological terms—there was a marked increase in enterprise and creativity; our human ancestors started to make tools and paint the walls of their caves, as well as to bury their dead instead of leaving them to decompose in the open air. Developments such as these laid the foundations of science, art, and religion.

The brains of our Homo erectus and Neanderthal forebears were the same size as those of today’s humans and they had the same capacity for language, so what happened to make them turn some of their attention away from eking out their existence and toward imaginative and creative thinking?

The answer, according to British archaeologist Steven Mithen, is that, as a result of a genetic accident that rewired their primitive brains, cavemen developed a capacity to see likenesses in unlike things, to think laterally, and to apply experiences from certain particular parts of their lives to others. He named this newly acquired capacity “cognitive fluidity,” and noted that, although it inspired the great leap forward from barbarism to civilization, it also had the disadvantage that it enabled people to entertain theories, such as parapsychology, that have no rational basis.

Mithen’s account, first published in 1996 as The Prehistory of the Mind: A Search for the Origins of Art, Religion, and Science, was not without its limitations: in particular, it made no attempt to identify what might have caused this great change. Nevertheless, the work has provided a plausible account of the so-called “missing link”—the evolutionary bridge that humans crossed at some point in prehistory, thereby separating themselves from animals, particularly the apes that they most resemble in appearance and behavior. GL

1996

Cloning

Roslin Institute, Edinburgh

The first successful cloning of an animal from an adult cell, not an embryo

Dolly the sheep (in foreground) was indistinguishable from sheep produced naturally.

In 1996, English embryologist Ian Wilmut (b. 1944), Scottish biologist Keith Campbell (b. 1954), and researchers at the Roslin Institute near Edinburgh, Scotland, transplanted the nucleus from a mammary gland cell of a Dorset sheep into the extracted egg of a blackface ewe from Scotland. The egg was electrically stimulated to set off cell division, and when the cell began to divide it was placed within the uterus of a third ewe. The egg had been emptied of its own nucleus, and after seven days of being nurtured and cultured it was ready to begin reprogramming the introduced adult cell and develop it into an embryo.

When “Dolly,” the world’s first cloned mammal, was born 148 days later, she was a precise genetic copy of the first ewe. The fact that it took the researchers more than 270 attempts at fertilization using twenty-nine embryos implanted into thirteen surrogate mothers before success was achieved hardly seemed to matter.

Dolly was part of a program of experiments at the Roslin Institute designed to advance research into the production of medicines from the milk of farm animals. The ewe went on to give birth to six lambs, and lived out the remainder of her days at the Roslin Institute, enjoying a lifestyle that only can be described as pampered. After developing a lung tumor, the “world’s most famous sheep” was euthanized on February 14, 2003, at the age of six and a half years.

Dolly had opened the door to a Brave New World of genetic engineering and all of the ethical minefields it would bring with it. In 2008, Samuel Wood, a biotech company executive with Stemagen, a privately held embryonic stem cell research company, became the first adult to witness a clone of himself mature into an embryo. Some DNA had been extracted from his skin cells and injected into a human egg, after which the multicelled embryo had developed. Dolly was just the beginning of an important chapter in science. BS

1997

Decentralized Energy

International Cogeneration Alliance

The generation of electricity from many small energy sources

Smaller wind turbines can be placed on site-specific green roofs.

The International Cogeneration Alliance was founded in 1997 when the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change called for cogeneration to be placed higher on the international agenda. In 2002, the organization changed its name to the World Alliance for Decentralized Energy and broadened its scope to include all forms of distributed generation, including renewable technologies such as solar photovoltaic panels and small-scale wind power.

Decentralized energy (DE) is the generating of electricity at a local level, not from massive centralized facilities such as gas and coal-powered plants and hydro-electric power stations, which involve huge inefficiencies and transmission losses due to the distances that energy is transmitted. Instead, compact wind, solar, and cogeneration units are placed close to where the power they generate will be consumed.

“The electricity system … is going to change beyond recognition.”

Walt Patterson, Royal Institute of International Affairs

DE cuts carbon emissions and also reduces spending on infrastructure. DE technologies include small cogeneration units combining in the production of electricity and thermal energy; off-grid photovoltaic solar cells particularly suitable for remote locations; and wind turbines small enough to be mounted on urban rooftops. Small-scale local hydropower units are proving popular in China, Tanzania, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka, and are able to deliver 90 kilowatts of power to 300 homes. Especially efficient are combined heat and power systems, which require 30 percent less fuel than traditional plants. The heat they produce as a by-product of generating electricity is converted to steam for use on site in various industrial processes. BS

1997

Contactless Smart Card

Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway

A plastic card that allows for faster payments and reduces the need for cash

The contactless smart card looks like an ATM card or a credit card: a thin plastic sheet, typically measuring around 3 by 2 inches (8 x 5 cm). In it are embedded integrated electronic circuits that can store and process data, and communicate with a terminal by means of radio waves. The cards are used for identification, authentication, data storage, and as a fast and convenient method of paying for purchases that requires minimal human involvement.

The cards were first used in 1997 on the Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway (MTR), which introduced them to speed up ticketing: previously, passengers had to buy tickets at booking office windows; under the new system, known as Octopus, they could swipe in and out of stations by passing their cards over electronic readers that would debit either their bank accounts or their prepaid credit by the appropriate fare. The success of the MTR scheme soon led to widespread adoption, first by numerous transportation systems—notably in Beijing, Shanghai, and London—and later by credit and debit card companies, including MasterCard, Visa, and American Express.

“Every day tens of millions of people safely use contactless technology …”

Robert Siciliano, personal security expert

The advantages for the issuing organizations are clear: after the initial setup costs, cards are cheap to produce, administration requires minimal staffing, and receipt of payment is automatic and guaranteed. For users, the cards increase the speed of transactions but, if lost or stolen, they are easy to use dishonestly. Either way, such cards are the future: at the time of writing, an estimated two million passengers owned London’s Oyster cards for use on the capital’s transport alone. GL

1997

Blog

Various

Online diaries that enable anyone with an Internet connection to express a view

A blog is an online journal in which individuals or groups can record activities, thoughts, or beliefs. The term “web log” was coined in 1997 by Jorn Barger to describe his own website. In 1999, it was conflated to “blog” by Peter Merholz; the word rapidly acquired universal currency.

The identity of the first blogger is disputed, but among those with claims to the distinction is Tim Berners-Lee (b. 1955), widely credited as the creator of the Internet in 1992. Whatever the truth, by 1997 blogs had proliferated. At the start of 2013, the part of the Internet known as the blogosphere contained 2.5 billion sites that are accessed by visitors (a total of 376 million a day) plus an uncounted number of other blogs that are never viewed. The total is growing at the rate of one every second: this is partly due to the increasing number of languages on the Internet; the most prolific new entries are blogs in Chinese.

“So is blogging really a tool or a weapon? It depends on what way you take it …”

Aman Tiwari, Weird Blogger’s Diaries website

One reason for the success of blogs is the opportunity they provide for dialogue: online conversation in the form of comments and responses are often emphasized. The most popular blogs are news filters with brief comments and links to their sources. In some cases, they have spawned “superblogs,” such as The Huffington Post, which publishes articles on politics and current affairs. At the other end of the spectrum are blogs that air grievances that the bloggers might hesitate to express via other methods. Some blogs raise revenue through sidebar advertisements; most, however, are produced without profit for the blogger’s own amusement. GL

1998

Dark Energy

Michael Turner

The mysterious force that makes the universe expand at ever-increasing speed

Conceptual computer artwork of the universe. The galaxies inside are pushed apart by dark energy.

At the start of the twentieth century, scientists believed that the universe was of a constant size and held in place by gravity. When Albert Einstein formulated the general theory of relativity he acknowledged it as “the cosmological constant” because his other findings contradicted the convention of a static universe.

In the 1920s U.S. astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered through observation of the red shift of light from distant galaxies that, far from being static, the universe is expanding. This prompted Einstein to declare the cosmological constant his “greatest blunder.” It was then assumed that the rate of expansion would be slowing as gravity pulls galaxies toward each other. However, in 1998 three astrophysicists—Americans Adam Reiss and Saul Perlmutter and Australian Brian Schmidt—discovered that the expansion was accelerating. This necessitated the reintroduction of the cosmological constant into the theory of relativity: it was not a blunder after all.

“Dark energy will govern expansion and determine the fate of the universe.”

Eric Linder, physicist

U.S. cosmologist Michael Turner (b. 1949) coined the term “dark energy.” Dark energy pushes galaxies apart and accounts for approximately 73 percent of the total mass energy of the universe. The remaining problem is that physicists who have tried to calculate the amount of it in space have come up with an answer that seems excessive by a factor of 10120. An explanation of this anomaly may lie in “inflationary theory,” which suggests the possibility of more than one universe. The theory of multiple universes is supported by string theory, which has 10,500 possible solutions, one of which may account for the amount of dark energy in our universe. GL

1998

Guideline Daily Amounts

United Kingdom

Labeling to help people work out whether their foods constitute a balanced diet

In the United States, the 1990 Nutrition Labeling and Education Act stipulated that packaged foods (excluding meat and poultry) should bear labels giving nutritional information about them, such as their fat and calorie content. Useful though these guidelines were, consumers still struggled to reassure themselves that they were eating the right foods, and in the right quantities, to best suit their personal needs.

An initiative to improve the usefulness of information provided on food labels, guideline daily amounts (GDAs) were first introduced in the United Kingdom in 1998 as a collaboration between government, the food industry, and consumer watchdog organizations. Each product was required to have two labels: one on the front, showing the number of calories, and the other on the back, listing the percentage the food contained of the average person’s daily requirement of each constituent and the total amount thereof in each package. Consumers then needed only to add up the percentages given on various foods to achieve the 100 percent that represented the optimum intake of that food element (energy, fat, salt) over one day.

“People can eat some of the foods they enjoy but still have a balanced diet.”

Lindsay Farrar, Mirror Group Newspapers

The British lead was followed by the United States and much of Europe, but there were soon disputes about whether, for example, the calorie intake of men, women, and children could be standardized meaningfully. Neither do GDAs state that saturated fats are superfluous to anybody’s requirements. Today, GDAs keep consumers’ minds focused on the question of healthy eating, even if they cannot, at least in their present form, provide all the right answers. GL

1999

Safe Haven Law

Geanie W. Morrison

Legislation that permits parents to put babies into care with no questions asked

Some people cannot cope with parenthood, and in extreme cases they may abandon their children. For years, such conduct was illegal and for fear of being caught desperate parents would leave their babies alone in locations where (in the best-case scenario) they hoped they would be found by someone who would care for them; the parents’ main priority, however, was to avoid arrest.

In an effort to prevent small children from being thus endangered, in 1999, state representative Geanie W. Morrison of Texas filed legislation initially titled “the baby Moses law,” under which adults (usually, but not necessarily, the parents) were permitted to leave unwanted newborn babies in safe places, such as a hospital or a police station. These locations were equipped with signs designating them as safe havens. The adults were not required to leave their names. The children would then be placed in the care of the state’s child welfare department.

By 2008, every other U.S. state had enacted some form of what is now known as a “safe haven law.” The upper-age limit for legal abandonment varies across the country: several states will not accept any child more than three days old; others will take babies for varying periods after birth up to one year; Nebraska, however, formed its legislation in such a way that it could be interpreted to mean anyone under the age of eighteen years (the Nebraska Supreme Court later reduced the age limit to thirty days).

Around twenty states have provisions for parents later to reclaim the infant, usually within a specified period. Five states permit a non-relinquishing parent to petition for custody of the child. Safe haven laws have definitely reduced the number of “baby dumpings” and possibly the number of terminations and infanticides. GL

1999

GloFish

Dr. Gong Zhiyuan

Created to help in pollution studies, GloFish are now being marketed as the first genetically altered house pet

Fluorescent fish have also been used by scientists to help with understanding cellular disease and development, as well as cancer and gene therapy.

GloFish is the trade name of fish that have been genetically modified (GM) so that they are fluorescent (able to emit light that is brighter than that which they receive). They were patented in the United States by Yorktown Technologies of Austin, Texas, which started with black-and-white striped zebra fish (Brachydanio rerio; native to the rivers of India and Bangladesh) and now sells fluorescent fish in a wide range of colors—blue, green, orange, purple, red, and yellow—in the ornamental aquarium market. The company is today one of the leading sellers of ornamental and aquarium livestock.

“Very little is known about biotechnology. By understanding how we made the fish, people will understand the technology better and be less afraid.”

Dr. Gong Zhiyuan

The first fish of this type were created in 1999 by Dr. Gong Zhiyuan and his colleagues at the National University of Singapore. Taking a gene that naturally produces a green fluorescent protein in jellyfish, they inserted it into zebra fish embryos. Red zebra fish were then created by injecting them with a gene from a sea coral. Next, a team of researchers at the National Taiwan University created a GM rice fish (Oryzias latipes) that emitted a green light; other colors soon followed. The scientists’ original aim had been to create fish that would give off warning lights on coming into contact with toxins, enabling the speedy detection of contamination in waterways. However, it quickly became apparent that they had created a potential marketing phenomenon.

In 2003, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved GloFish for sale because, although the creatures have been treated with drugs, they are inedible and will therefore not enter the human food chain. GloFish remain illegal in California, and are banned in Canada and throughout the European Union, but sales elsewhere are now in their billions: GloFish are found illuminating aquaria and ponds almost wherever they are permitted. GL

2000

Krumping

Ceasare “Tight Eyez” Willis and Jo’Artis “Big Mijo” Ratti

A dance craze that spread across the world from its birthplace on the U.S. Pacific coast

A teenager dances in face paint, a still from the documentary Krumped (2004) by David LaChapelle; the filmmaker would return to the subject with Rize in 2005.

Krumping is a form of street dancing created by Ceasare “Tight Eyez” Willis and Jo’Artis “Big Mijo” Ratti in Los Angeles, California, in 2000. It is thought to have developed from “clowning,” a dance devised in 1992 by Tommy Johnson and the Hip Hop Clowns, children’s entertainers in South Central Los Angeles. Krumping was much wilder, but the link is demonstrated by krumpers who would paint their faces to look like circus performers; alternatively, they may make up like fierce warriors. Dropping the face paint by early 2001, groups of krumpers would do battle with rival groups as an alternative to violence and drug abuse in the inner city.

“The aggressive and visually stunning dance modernizes moves indigenous to African tribal rituals and features mind-blowing, athletic movement sped up to impossible speeds.”

Sujit R. Varma, dance commentator

The etymology of “krump” is obscure, but after the word gained common currency it was said to stand for “Kingdom Radically Uplifted Mighty Praise.” This explanation was evidently an attempt to give the dance religious connotations, but most people regard the acronym as too contrived to be anything other than a back formation.

Although difficult to codify, the dance broadly consists of free and exaggerated movements of all parts of the body in any direction to fast-paced music. In contrast to b-boying, in which dancers may lie on the floor, the main rule in krumping is that the dancer should remain upright at all times. Apart from that stipulation, krumping is entirely freestyle, never choreographed, and has been well described as “extreme hip-hop.” According to the MTV website, if krumping “makes you look like Bozo [an incompetent person] having spasms, you’re doing it right.”

From its West Coast cradle, krumping quickly spread across the world, thanks partly to the publicity it gained from David LaChapelle’s film documentary Rize (2005). Once the dance became mainstream, it was featured in several music videos, including “Hung Up” by Madonna and “Hey Mama” by The Black Eyed Peas, and retains its popularity today. GL

2000

Evo-devo

National Academy of Sciences, United States

How life on Earth became so various in spite of its origins in a relatively small pool of genes

A selection of fossils, casts, and bones illustrates how quill knobs for feathers on a prehistoric velociraptor (A and B) show similarities to those of the modern turkey vulture (C–F).

“Evo-devo” is a popular, informal term for the field of evolutionary developmental biology in general, and particularly its current efforts to resolve a problem that has puzzled researchers for hundreds of years. In 2000, a special section of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) in the United States was devoted to “evo-devo,” which saw the concept ushered into the mainstream.

“Evolution was in a strange mood when that creation came along … It makes one wonder just where the plant world leaves off and the animal world begins.”

John Colton, on flesh-eating plants

Scientists have long wondered about the causes of radical changes in the appearance and characteristics of various species, such as the way in which the scales of prehistoric avians turned, over millions of years, into the feathers on modern birds. Some researchers maintain that the function of the creature dictates the creature’s form—British naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–82) held that the finches of the Galapagos Islands evolved beaks of different shapes in order to access particular food sources.

Others have concluded that form precedes function—in other words, that the creature’s characteristics are genetically predetermined and that it cuts its behavioral coat according to the cloth of its heredity. One of the early leaders of this school of thought was French zoologist Etienne Geffroy Saint-Hilaire (1722–1844), whose studies of invertebrates convinced him that the anatomical structure of a creature preordains its mode of existence.

The question is not whether evolution takes place—both schools agree that it does—but exactly what drives and influences the process. Genetic mutation is also a fact: evo-devo has demonstrated that a vast number of evolutionary changes have been driven by only a very small number of genes. What remains uncertain is exactly how mutations are preprogrammed at the embryonic stage and how an organism’s phenotypes (observable traits) may be influenced by the organism’s surroundings. GL

2000

The Anthropocene

Paul J. Crutzen

A new geological term for the modern age of human influence on Earth

Modern impact on the planet can be seen in the amount of light sources seen from space.

The Anthropocene is a (currently unofficial) name for the most recent period of geological time, from the second half of the eighteenth century to the present day. The term, which is derived from the Greek meaning “recent age of man,” was thought to be required because it is during this period, including the start of the Industrial Revolution in c. 1760, that the activities of humans have altered, more than ever before, Earth’s surface, atmosphere, oceans, and systems of nutrient cycling. According to environmental journalist Elizabeth Kolbert, “Many stratigraphers [geologists who study rock layers] have come to believe that … human beings have so altered the planet in the past century or two that we’ve ushered in a new epoch.” It was therefore thought appropriate to distinguish it from the Holocene Epoch, of which the past 200 years were formerly held to be a part, which covers approximately the previous 11,700 years, from the rise of modern humans at the start of the Stone Age.

The term “Anthropocene,” coined by U.S. biologist Eugene F. Stoermer sometime in the late 1980s, was brought to public attention in 2000, when it was used in a speech and an article by Paul J. Crutzen, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995.

In 2008, a motion was put before the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London, England, proposing that the Anthropocene be formally adopted as an epoch on the geological time scale. At the time of writing, the matter was still under consideration. Opponents say that evidence of human impact on the Earth predates the 1750s by perhaps as many as 15,000 years, and that it would be redundant to distinguish the last two centuries from the rest of the Holocene. Nevertheless the term is in widespread use, notably by the Geological Society of America, which titled its annual meeting in 2011 “Archean to Anthropocene: The past is the key to the future.” GL

c. 2000

Virtual Workplace

Various

Computers have made it possible to run big companies without offices

Lack of a physical office may not hinder productivity.

By-products of the development of the Internet, virtual workplaces are offices without a physical location, but in which employees can collaborate regardless of where in the world they happen to be: residents of Sydney, Australia, can and do work for companies in London, England, not as field representatives but as fully functioning members of in-house teams.

A virtual workplace significantly reduces company overheads, most notably by saving the cost of premises that can accommodate all the staff. Tasks are distributed by email or other forms of electronic data transfer, performed by workers on or within reach of their own computers, and then returned to base or headquarters via the same media.

The system also has advantages for employees, saving them the cost of commuting and childcare, and enabling them (with the company’s agreement) to work more flexible hours than are normally possible in a traditional office. According to a survey by Global Workplace Analytics, it is popular: 79 percent of respondents said they would rather work at home than in an office, and 39 percent of those said they would prefer a virtual workplace to a pay rise. However, some managers complain that virtual workplaces have restricted their ability to monitor their subordinates’ working methods: they can now judge employees only on their performance.

Another of the problems associated with virtual workplaces is their inability to generate a sense of shared purpose, morale, or esprit de corps. The problem may be reduced by interactive systems such as teleconferencing and WYSIWIS (“what you see is what I see”) technology, but even these do not entirely eliminate the difficulty: psychologists believe that tone of voice and gesture alone are insufficient to convey the finest nuances of meaning, which can be gathered only through physical proximity. GL

2000

Y-chromosomal Adam

Peter Underhill

The identification of our most recent common male ancestor

Computer-generated artwork showing the banding patterns on a male Y chromosome.

The human Y chromosome does not recombine with the X chromosome but is transferred intact from father to son. Over time it may mutate, and mutations may be used to identify patrilineal descent. This gave molecular biologist Peter Underhill of Stanford University the basis for a research program that in 2000 revealed that the oldest common ancestor from whom all men alive today are descended lived around 59,000 years ago.

The news media had fun with the age gap between Y-chromosomal Adam and his female equivalent, mitochondrial Eve, who lived around 84,000 years earlier and had been identified a decade previously. Using the names of the first two humans in the Bible is potentially misleading: these were not the first people, merely the oldest that have been traced. Such red herrings diverted attention from Underhill’s most important findings, which concerned migration. From his study of 167 mutations in the Y chromosome of 1,062 men from twenty-one geographical regions, he determined that there had not been only one great exodus from Africa: some early humans had left the continent and later their descendants returned there; others went to Australia or India and Asia and then to Europe. Underhill also discovered that there are fewer Y chromosome lineages than mitochondrial, probably because the males were more promiscuous.

“We are all Africans at the Y chromosome level and we are really all brothers.”

Peter Underhill

Although Y-chromosomal Adam is not expected to retain the title of our most recent common ancestor for long, his discovery represents a great advance in archaeogenetics—the reconstruction of human history from evidence contained in genes. GL

2001

Six Green Principles

Global Green movement

Creation of a clear manifesto for ecologist political parties and environmentalists

At its inaugural convention in Canberra, Australia, in April 2001, the Global Green movement unveiled a charter that identified its aims and enabled environmentalists to focus their social and political ambitions more clearly than ever before. The document is known as the Six Green Principles and contains the following aspirations:

1) Ecological wisdom: based on the ecological philosophy formulated primarily by Norwegian Arne Naess (1912–2009), which emphasizes the need to protect “deep ecology”—the most fundamental things that sustain Earth—rather than waste effort combating minor abuses;

2) Social justice: the notion that everyone is equal and that people should all act in solidarity;

“The ‘control of nature’ is a phrase conceived in arrogance …”

Rachel Carson, Silent Spring (1962)

3) Participatory democracy: every adult man and woman should have a vote, and their choices at the ballot box should be real and more diverse than is often reflected in many two-party systems;

4) Nonviolence: ending all forms of physical conflict;

5) Sustainability: ensuring that humans replace and replenish everything that they destroy in order to live;

6) Respect for diversity: the fair and equal treatment of minorities.

These desiderata are based on earlier manifestos produced by the Green movement, including their statement at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 and the 2001 Accord between the Green Parties of the Americas and the Ecologist Parties of Africa. The Six Green Principles, however, are more codified than anything that preceded them. GL

2001

War on Terror

United States

The military struggle to defeat Islamist and other terrorism

The term “war on terror” is commonly used to refer to the military campaign launched by the United States in response to the events of 9/11. However, the phrase—introduced on September 20, 2001, when President George W. Bush made the unscripted remark that “This war on terrorism is going to take a while”—also encompasses the more general concept of a global war against terrorism.

The notion of a “war on terror” has proved deeply controversial since its introduction. For the Bush administration it provided justification for a national security policy that permitted the United States to engage in armed conflict against terrorist groups wherever they operate, with or without the support of the sovereign authority of a given country. Critics, however, argue that it has done more harm than good, leading to the United States’ isolation from Europe and increasing anti-American feeling abroad. Moreover, by regarding the fight against terrorism as a war, it has had the unintended effect of allowing terrorist groups to claim legitimacy for their actions—they are now “acts of war” and the perpetrators are viewed as soldiers rather than simply murderers.

“Our nation’s security and defeating terrorism trump all other priorities.”

Arlen Specter, U.S. senator

The war on terror has dominated international politics for more than a decade and had far-reaching effects. In 2009 the then British Foreign Secretary David Miliband argued that the phrase gave “the impression of a unified, transnational enemy,” when “the reality is that the motivations and identities of terrorist groups are disparate.” Many politicians have since sought to distance themselves from the concept. GL

2001

Wikipedia

Jimmy Wales and Tim Shell

An online tool labeled as the world’s most widely used reference source

Jimmy Wales (left) has vowed to keep Wikipedia free and free from advertising.

Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that may be read for free by anyone with access to the Internet and that is potentially available to any writer who wants to make a new contribution or amend an existing entry.

Wikipedia was founded in 2001 by Jimmy Wales, a U.S. former bond trader, in succession to his Nupedia, another free online encyclopedia, which had become so bogged down in the verification process that it took around five years to clear the first twenty articles for publication. Contrastingly, in its first year of operation, Wikipedia—compiled by unpaid volunteers and unencumbered by an official advisory board—published 20,000 articles in eighteen languages. By its tenth anniversary, it had more than 3.5 million entries and appeared in 350 different language editions.

Ease of access is not without its problems: there have been several cases of people hacking into the entries and vandalizing them. However, trusted contributors are given access privileges that enable them to remove such material, and this self-correction process has produced a resource of unparalleled scope.

“[With] Wikipedia … my childish idea of Heaven had been created here on Earth.”

Victoria Pynchon, Forbes magazine

Although Wikipedia’s authentication procedures do not satisfy the most rigorous academic requirements, footnote references in the fully developed entries provide links to independently verifiable source material. There are also “stubs” (the germs of entries that require expanding and developing); talk pages (discussions between contributors); and a related site called Wikipedia Commons, which is a repository of media files (photographs, maps, and so on) in use and usable in all Wikipedia material. GL

2002

Big Crunch Theory

Andrei Linde

A proposal that dark energy will collapse the universe in a “big crunch”

As scientists struggled to understand the physics behind the big bang that led to the creation of the universe, they also pondered whether the universe would ever end. It has always been thought that the universe was constantly expanding; however, recent astronomical observations have led scientists, including Andrei Linde of Stanford University, to rethink their ideas about this end.

In 1998 astronomers concluded that the expansion of the universe was speeding up, rather than slowing down as previously assumed. The gravitational pull of matter that controlled the expansion of the universe was now being overruled by an anti-gravity force that was pushing the universe apart. As matter in the universe thinned out as the universe itself expanded, a repulsive force gained influence in its place. This suspect force, or dark energy, is an unknown, invisible substance distributed evenly throughout space and accounting for around 73 percent of the universe. Until this discovery, it was assumed that the universe would expand so much that it eventually fell apart in some big rip. Linde’s insight, announced in 2002, is that this dark energy will not just drop to zero as the universe expands, but become negative. When it does, it will slow and then reverse the universe’s expansion and cause space and time to collapse in a “big crunch.”

“A few years ago, nobody would even seriously think about the end of the world.”

Andrei Linde, New Scientist (September 6, 2002)

Since the universe is already 14 billion years old, and if the collapse is dated to about 10 to 20 billions years’ time, than we are currently living in its middle age. Whether Linde is right will never be known, for Earth will have collapsed into the Sun long before that. SA

2003

Flash Mob

Bill Wasik

A publicity stunt that started a worldwide craze for spontaneous performances

Young people take part in a flash mob on the Moscow subway in 2011.

The term “flash mob” was first recorded in 2003. It refers to a group of people who gather together suddenly in public, perform some kind of unusual, theatrical, or seemingly pointless act, and then disperse as quickly as they appeared.

The essence of a flash mob is its apparent spontaneity. It is a form of performance art. Although some flash mobs have been planned long in advance, they are more commonly spur of the moment conventions of people who have arranged to meet only shortly beforehand via cell phones or social media.

Flash mobs were the brainchild of Bill Wasik, senior editor of Harper’s Magazine in New York City, who wanted to satirize people prepared to turn up at any event, no matter how trivial. His first attempt to create such a happening was thwarted when the management of the proposed location, a retail store in Manhattan, was tipped off in advance. Learning from this experience that leaks could ruin everything, Wasik next got a total of 130 participants to gather at four different bars: none of them was told the final destination or what they would do until they got to these preliminary staging posts. From there they proceeded to the ninth floor of Macy’s, where they all briefly pretended to be shopping for a single “love rug.”

“It is a new way to perform and find an audience … a new fun stage.”

Bill Wasik

The success of this flash mob, on June 3, 2003, started a trend that swept the world. Public enthusiasm for them diminished somewhat, however, after reports of “flash robs,” in which large groups would congregate in a store and steal, overwhelming the staff by force of numbers. GL

2003

The Freecycle Network

Deron Beal

A novel method of reducing waste by finding new homes for unwanted materials

The Freecycle Network (TFN) is an organization through which individuals and groups can acquire at no cost materials that are unwanted and that would otherwise be dumped in landfills. Its slogan is “Changing the world one gift at a time.”

TFN originated in Tucson, Arizona, in 2003, when local resident Deron Beal compiled an inventory of what other homeowners were planning to throw away and emailed the list to friends and neighbors. In the process he proved that one person’s trash is another person’s treasure.

The idea soon caught on throughout the United States. Each local group operated independently, but first had to be approved by TFN’s regional new group approvers. In 2005, TFN gained its first corporate sponsor, Waste Management Inc., which donated $130,000. In 2006, membership broke the 2 million mark and two years later TFN opened its own website, www.Freecycle.org. By the end of 2012, there were more than 5,000 groups in eighty-five countries with a total of more than 9 million members.

“The goal is to make it easier to give something away than to throw it away.”

Deron Beal

Meanwhile, Beal’s control of TFN became controversial. In 2009, U.K. Freecycle members sought greater autonomy. Eventually, U.K. groups broke away and set up rival websites. TFN still has a presence in the United Kingdom, but now faces competition from Freecycle U.K. In 2010, Beal’s claims to copyright in the term “freecycling” and his insistence on licencing all TFN groups in the United States were ruled unlawful. Nevertheless, no matter who controls freecycling, the practice is firmly established across the globe. GL

2005

Sexting

Sunday Telegraph magazine

The practice of sending suggestive proposals by cell phone

People who send explicit erotic messages or images to one another by cell phone are said to be “sexting,” which is a portmanteau of “sex” and “texting.” The earliest recorded use of the term was in the British Sunday Telegraph magazine in 2005; seven years later, in 2012, “sexting” was officially recognized by Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary.

However, the prevalence of the practice remains uncertain: one survey reported that 59 percent of respondents had created, sent, or received a sexually explicit message or image by phone, while another received affirmative answers from only 2.5 percent of those questioned. The effectiveness of this research is restricted partly by the difficulty of verifying claims and partly by differing definitions of what constitutes “sexually explicit.” Another difficulty is that, although indecent images of minors are unlawful, the age of majority is not the same in every state.

For people wishing to express an intimate desire or display an erotic image to another individual, sexting has the advantage of not requiring the participation of a third party—cell phones have built-in digital cameras that obviate the need for photographs or film clips to be developed. Conversely, such messages remain private only with the consent of sender and recipient, and there have been several cases in which their contents have been forwarded, accidentally or deliberately, to a wider audience. There is also the problem of bullying: sexting people who do not invite the messages and find receiving such material threatening and oppressive.

Although sexting is a contentious activity, it has increased the number of ways in which people can communicate their desires. It has also inspired a new tranche of text code initials, including “PiR” (parent in room) and “GNOC” (get naked on camera). GL

2005

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

Bobby Henderson

A satirical entity that was invented to challenge creationsim and the education policy of Middle America

In 2005, Bobby Henderson, a twenty-four-year-old physics graduate from Oregon State University, wrote to the Kansas State Board of Education in Topeka to ask whether, in view of the fact that they had just moved to allow intelligent design and creationism to be taught in public schools as an alternative to theories of evolution, they would consider giving equal classroom time to his own god, the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM), a supernatural being made of pasta and meatballs, who, he claimed to believe, had created the universe. Henderson also suggested that the first true believers in the FSM were pirates, and that the reduction in their number over the last 200 years was the direct cause of global warming.

“The central belief is that an invisible and undetectable Flying Spaghetti Monster created the universe ‘after drinking heavily.’”

thethinkingatheist.com

Receiving no reply from Topeka, Henderson posted his letter online, and his website (www.venganza.org) soon became one of the most popular on the Internet, with millions of hits. He also received approximately 60,000 emails, 95 percent of whose authors clearly understood that his original intention had been to satirize the board’s extraordinary willingness to rank belief and science equally.

Before long, Henderson’s frivolous deity had garnered a vast number of followers, a development that moved its creator to style himself a prophet and found the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. In 2006 he published The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, which to date has reportedly sold more than 100,000 copies.

The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster may have been created as a satire, but like all satire it has a serious purpose. The ersatz institution has provided a rallying point for people who take the view that unverifiable assertions, such as the creation of the world in seven days and the divinity of Jesus Christ, should not be treated as facts. GL

2005

Equitrade

Malagasy Company

A scheme enabling poor countries to keep a bigger share of the wealth they generate

Equitrade goes one step further than Fairtrade, which ensures that growers and farmers in the developing world receive the correct market rate for their produce. Although Fairtrade helps to reduce exploitation of the poor, most of the value of their cash crops is added by processing, and most processing takes place in the developed world. Thus, for example, only 5 percent of the ultimate resale price of a bar of Fairtrade chocolate remains in the country that produced the cacao from which it is made. The balance goes to the wealthy nations in which the bar is made and sold.

Equitrade (short for “equitable trade”) was set up in 2005 to enable poor nations to process and package their raw materials into finished products themselves, and thus to earn a greater share of the profits. Under a pilot Equitrade chocolate-producing scheme run by the Malagasy Company in Madagascar, just over half of the revenue remained in the country of origin, 40 percent of it going to the local manufacturer and packager, and 11 percent to the government in tax, which was then reinvested in the industry. The remaining 49 percent was divided between the exporter, the distributor, and the retailer.

“Equitrade is … a standalone foundation and intends to extend to many products.”

Neil Kelsall, Noetic Associates

According to Neil Kelsall of Noetic Associates, a British company pioneering this approach, “All it would take to end poverty in Madagascar is £750 million a year.” The island’s farms cannot generate that amount of money, but Equitrade aims to enable the nation to profit more substantially. To do that, it needs only equipment and a little expertise: by providing both, Equitrade could make poverty history. GL

2006

Top-down Cosmology

Stephen Hawking and Thomas Hertog

A theory proposing that the origins of the universe depend upon an observer—us

The top-down theory of cosmology was proposed by British theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking (b. 1942) and Belgian cosmologist Thomas Hertog (b. 1975) to explain the origins of the universe. They collaborated to produce a paper outlining their theory, “Populating the landscape: A top-down approach” (2006). They drew on an interpretation of quantum mechanics, the paradox illustrated in the Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger’s cat thought experiment, whereby an observer is required to decide if a particle is in a particular state.

Top-down cosmology posits that the universe had no unique, carefully fine-tuned initial state. (The bottom-up approach to cosmology includes the possibility of such a state being proscribed by an outside agency.) The top-down approach provides a framework that essentially traces histories backward, with the present time influencing the past. It asserts that the universe depends on what is being observed, contrary to the prevailing notion that the universe’s history is independent of an observer. Thus, the universe emerges via observation and its history depends on the questions we ask today. Top-down cosmology envisions a set of alternative universes.

Hawking and Hertog’s theory provides a possible resolution to the fine-tuning question, which is a topic of debate for theologians, philosophers, and cosmologists. The idea of a fine-tuned universe proposes that life in the universe exists because of a narrow range of fundamental physical constants. By claiming observation to be essential to the universe, top down-cosmology introduces ideas of metaphysics—intention, the mind, and so on—into how the universe is conceived. Top-down cosmology is one of several approaches to cosmology, including the Big Bang, multiverse, and eternal inflation theories. CK

2006

Venture Philanthropy

Warren Buffett

Increasing the funds of charitable enterprises without expectation of significant profit, while actively influencing the ways in which the funds are used

Warren Buffett addresses a press conference in New York, regarding his pledge of 10 million class B shares of the Berkshire Hathaway Corporation to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Venture capital consists of money and other investments put in to new companies whose success cannot be assured because, although they may seem like good ideas, they do not conform to any established business model. Venture capitalism is high risk.

“Venture philanthropy remains something of a Rorschach test. Depending on whom you ask, it is the future of philanthropy, a passing fad, good grantmaking, or misguided hubris.”

Neil F. Carson, Responsive Philanthropy (2000)

Venture philanthropy is a variation on that theme, which, though not in itself new, gained prominence in the first decade of the twenty-first century. In contrast to charitable donors, venture philanthropists advise on and may direct the ways in which funds are allocated, helping the schemes in which they have invested to increase their efficiency and grow. A leading example occurred in 2006 when U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett (b. 1930) pledged shares worth approximately $1.5 billion to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on condition that income from the shares be distributed each year. Buffett’s contribution effectively doubled the charity’s annual financial and material backing for organizations, concepts, and techniques deemed to benefit society as a whole.

Most venture philanthropy investments are made in organizations funded mainly by charitable donations and staffed by professionals. Prominent examples include the Robin Hood Foundation and Tipping Point Community, which alleviate and aim to eradicate poverty in, respectively, New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area in the United States.

Naturally, the financial returns on venture philanthropy are small at best, and may be negligible. Nevertheless, this form of investment can be attractive to people who are wealthy enough or want to provide their services pro bono. Venture philanthropists may also use their donations to gain seats on the boards of corporate donors to the organization in which they have invested, thus diversifying their own business interests while benefiting society at large. GL

2006

UK Biobank

Wellcome Trust

A stockpile of human genes and tissue used to advance scientific research

A biobank is a store of human biological material that has been collected for research purposes. Historically, biological material gathered by scientists was kept in their own laboratories, seldom if ever contributing to any wider pool of knowledge. A cardiologist, for example, might have a collection of heart tissue of which gynecologists were completely unaware. For as long as it was believed that every genetic disease had a single cause, that situation was not seen as a problem, but by the 1990s it had become clear that most such diseases are caused by defects in multiple genes. It therefore became imperative to share information more widely than ever before.

Fortunately, this realization came at a time when computer technology had advanced to a state whereby the cost of making a genome-wide sweep of possible pathogens was no greater than that of examining a single gene. In 2006, the UK Biobank was established in Manchester, England, with initial volunteers being enrolled over the next four years. In addition to supplying biological samples, donors gave details of their medical histories, nutritional habits, and lifestyles so that researchers using their tissues would be fully informed of their medication taking and other factors.

“Scientists are faced with a growing need for biospecimens: blood, saliva, plasma …”

J. Sterling, GEN (2012)

Thereafter biobanks proliferated throughout the world. In the United States alone, by 2012 they stored nearly 400 million specimens; the total is increasing by around 20 million a year. The U.S. collections are linked by computer, enabling researchers to access information from any of them at any time. Biobanks represent a great leap forward in medicine. GL

2009

Amortality

Catherine Mayer

Holding back the aging process by hiding most of its visible signs

“Amortality” was a word coined in 2009 by U.S. journalist Catherine Mayer to describe the increasing tendency of Western men and women to disguise and, to some limited extent, defer the normal aging process. Thus, fewer and fewer middle-aged and elderly people display the external signs of physical decline, which are hidden beneath perma-tans, disguised by Botox treatment and, in extreme cases, removed by nips and tucks and other forms of cosmetic surgery. No longer do the rich end their lives in the way that William Shakespeare proposed as a universal truth in his play As You Like It (c. 1599): “Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.” Dentists give octogenarians teenagerlike smiles; laser surgery restores 20/20 vision to people who might otherwise be functionally blind; the drug Viagra sustains the libido of men long after they should have passed Shakespeare’s Third Age. None of these interventions can stop people dying; they have become amortal, but not immortal.

“The important thing is … what you are able and willing to do”

Nick Bostrom, Future of Humanity Institute

Mayer wrote a detailed account of her observations in her book Amortality: The Pleasures and Perils of Living Agelessly (2011). She recalls, for example, Rolling Stone Mick Jagger saying in 1975, when he was thirty-two, that he “would rather be dead than singing ‘Satisfaction’ at forty-five,” yet his band was still touring in the second decade of the twenty-first century, by which time its lead singer was approaching seventy years of age.

The defining characteristic of amortals is that they live the same way from the end of adolescence until death, continually fighting off external signs of decay. Mayer added a useful word to the language. GL

2010

World Anti-Piracy Observatory

United Nations

A website that coordinates and publicizes efforts to counter copyright infringement

The unauthorized use of people’s intellectual property—a category that includes books they have written, movies they have directed, music they have recorded, computer software programs they have devised—is known to lawyers as copyright infringement, otherwise known as piracy. To help combat it, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched in 2010 the World Anti-Piracy Observatory (WAPO). This is a freely accessible website written in English, French, and Spanish that provides and can receive information about the efforts of all 200 UNESCO member states to stop such crimes and apprehend the culprits.

There are no universal copyright laws, and WAPO takes full account of regional differences. Its principal function is to collocate up-to-date information received from governments, authors’ societies, cultural bodies, and private individuals throughout the world about legal, administrative, and nonlegislative anti-piracy policies. In addition to news, WAPO provides specimen contracts and the contact details of copyright authorities in each member nation, as well as best-practice case studies that may be used as templates for future action.

“I applaud the plan to collect 150 copyright laws on the WAPO website.”

Hartwig Thomas, Digitale Allmend

WAPO has attracted considerable online criticism for lack of scope and depth, but UNESCO is determined to develop the website further until it enables every national copyright enforcement authority to keep abreast of what its equivalents in other countries are doing, and hence assist the harmonization of international opposition to piracy. GL

2011

Occupy Movement

Adbusters Media Foundation

Protests intended to inspire people to redistribute the world’s wealth more evenly

An Occupy protester wearing a Guy Fawkes mask presents an ironic message in London in 2011.

The Occupy movement is a nonviolent international protest group opposing the control that, it believes, large corporations currently exercise over the global financial system. Its most commonly used slogan—“We are the 99 percent”—refers to what supporters regard as the iniquitous distribution of the world’s wealth in favor of the remaining 1 percent. The name “Occupy” is taken from the movement’s strategy of massing in a single building or confined public space and remaining there until its demands are addressed by the authorities.

The movement began in the United States in March of 2011 with Occupy Wall Street, which was well advertised in advance by the Canadian-based group Adbusters Media Foundation, and drew around 1,000 supporters to the financial district of New York City. Over the following year, similar demonstrations were held in major cities worldwide, including Sydney, São Paulo, Paris, Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Leipzig, Tokyo, Auckland, Madrid, and Zurich. Numerous British cities also saw Occupy demonstrations; in London, around 3,000 protesters settled outside St. Paul’s Cathedral after being barred access to the Stock Exchange.

“We shouldn’t go into debt for an education, medical care, or to put food on the table.”

occupywallst.org

Occupy’s objectives are numerous but often ill-reported. They include the imposition on the largest multinational companies of a one-off levy, known as a Robin Hood tax because its objective is to take from the rich and give to the poor. The movement also demands the arraignment of fraudsters whom it holds responsible for the global financial crash in 2008, wide-ranging reforms of banking practices, and investigations into political corruption. GL

2012

Commercial Space Flight

Space X and Virgin Galactic

Private companies open up Earth’s orbit to commerce and tourism

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, the world’s first commercial spacecraft.

The era of commercial space travel dawned on October 7, 2012, with the first of twelve proposed cargo resupply missions to the International Space Station (ISS) by a Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft, designed, built, and owned by the private, California-based company Space X. The launch, from Cape Canaveral in Florida, marked the beginning of a major resupply program and included the delivery of materials crucial to almost 170 ISS experiments in the fields of plant cell biology and human biotechnology.

The flight followed a successful demonstration mission in May when Space X became the world’s first commercial company to rendezvous successfully with the orbiting station. At first, returning Dragon capsules will plunge into and be recovered from the Pacific Ocean, though Space X plans to fit subsequent capsules with deployable landing gear. Space X has ambitions far beyond hauling cargo, however. The company wants to colonize Mars, too, and to that end received, in August 2012, the Mars Pioneer Award.

Space X is not the only company intent on ending the monopoly on the cosmos previously enjoyed exclusively by the world’s space agencies. Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic is also pioneering private space flight, backed by new Californian legislation designed to facilitate corporate investment in spaceflight technologies. Virgin’s suborbital, air-launched SpaceShipTwo, a spaceplane designed for the purpose of space tourism, is part of a proposed fleet of five that will each begin to take eight passengers (six tourists and two pilots) into orbit from late 2013.

Spaceport America, the world’s first purpose-built commercial spaceport, located in New Mexico, was declared open in October 2011. Its 10,000-foot-long (3,000 m) runway will take SpaceShipTwo into space and launch mankind into a new era of tourism, high above the surface of Earth. BS

2012

Not-junk DNA

ENCODE

Far more of the human genome has vital functions than was first realized

Transcription factors (blue and green) regulate the flow of DNA (orange and pink) to RNA.

The ribbons of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) in our cells carry instructions for building proteins and thus continuing life, but it was long believed that stretches of them are useless. The idea of “junk DNA” was first formulated by the Japanese-American geneticist Susumu Ohno (1928–2000), writing in the Brookhaven Symposium in Biology in 1972. He argued that the human genome can only sustain a very limited number of genes and that, for the rest, “the importance of doing nothing” was crucial. In effect, he dismissed 98 percent of the total genetic sequence that lies between the 20,000 or so protein-coding genes.

Yet scientists always thought that such junk must have a purpose. And indeed, a breakthrough in 2012 revealed that this junk is in fact crucial to the way our human genome, that is the complete set of genetic information in our cells, actually works.

After mapping of the entire human genome was completed in 2003, scientists focused on the so-called junk DNA. Nine years later, in 2012, the international ENCODE (Encyclopedia of DNA Elements) project published the largest single genome update in Nature and other journals. It found that, far from useless, the so-called junk contained 10,000 genes—around 18 percent of the total—that help control how the protein-coding genes work. Also found were 4 million regulatory switches that turn genes on and off (it is the failure of these switches that leads to diseases such as type 2 diabetes and Crohn’s disease). In total, ENCODE predicted that up to 80 percent of our DNA has some sort of biochemical function.

The discovery of these functioning genes will help scientists to understand common diseases and also to explain why diseases affect some people and not others. If that can be achieved, drugs can be devised to treat those diseases. Much work still needs to be done, but the breakthrough has been made. SA

Acknowledgments

Quintessence Editions would like to thank the following individuals for their assistance in the creation of this book: Rebecca Gee, Helen Snaith, and Anna, Angelika, and Julia at akg-images.

Contributors

Simon Adams (SA) is a historian and writer living and working in London. He studied history and politics at universities in London and Bristol and has written books for both adults and children for more than twenty years. He specializes in modern history, politics, and jazz.

Kimberly Baltzer-Jaray (KBJ), Ph.D., is a philosophy lecturer at the University of Guelph and King’s University College (UWO), Ontario. She is president of the North American Society for Early Phenomenology, a writer for Things & Ink Magazine, and author of the blog A Tattooed Philosopher’s Blog: Discussion of the Type I Ink, Therefore I Am.

Adam Barkman (AB), Ph.D. (Free University of Amsterdam), is associate professor of philosophy at Redeemer University College, Canada. He is the author of four books, including Imitating the Saints (2013) and C. S. Lewis and Philosophy as a Way of Life (2009), and is the coeditor of three books, most recently The Philosophy of Ang Lee (2013) and The Philosophy and Culture of Ridley Scott (2013).

Patricia Brace (PBr) is a professor of art history at Southwest Minnesota State University in Marshall, Minnesota. Her Ph.D. in comparative arts is from Ohio University. Her research interests include the aesthetic analysis of popular culture and her creative work is in jewelry design.

Glenn Branch (GB) studied philosophy at Brandeis University and the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit organization that defends the teaching of evolution and climate change.

Per F. Broman (PB) is associate professor of music theory and the associate dean of the College of Musical Arts, Bowling Green State University. He was editor-in-chief of What Kind of Theory Is Music Theory? (2008). He recently completed a chapter on Ingmar Bergman’s use of music in his films (Music, Sound and Filmmakers; 2012) and a monograph on composer Sven-David Sandström (Sven-David Sandström; 2012).

Bob Cassella (BC) holds a BA in history from Norwich University and an MA in management from The George Washington University. He is the author of Project Management Skills for Kids (2003) and “Leader Development by Design” (2010).

Timothy Dale (TD) is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. He teaches in the area of political philosophy, and his research interests include democratic theory, political messaging in popular culture, and the scholarship of teaching and learning. He is coeditor of Homer Simpson Marches on Washington: Dissent in American Popular Culture (2010), and coauthor of Political Thinking, Political Theory, and Civil Society (2009) and the collection Homer Simpson Ponders Politics: Popular Culture as Political Theory (2013).

Christopher R. Donohue (CRD) received his doctorate in history from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 2013. He is the historian of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institutes of Health. He is currently undertaking advanced research in public policy methodology at the National Research University Higher School of Economics in Moscow, Russia. He lives in Moscow and the United States.

Jeffrey Dueck (JD) is associate professor of philosophy at Nyack College. His teaching and writing focus on existentialism and pragmatism and how they intersect with issues in religion, ethics, and aesthetics.

George A. Dunn (GD) teaches in the philosophy and religion department of the University of Indianapolis and at the Ningbo Institute of Technology in Zhejiang Province, China. He is the editor of several volumes in the Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture series.

Jeff Ewing (JE) is a freelance writer and a graduate student in sociology at the University of Oregon. Jeff has published a number of essays on popular culture and philosophy, including chapters in Terminator and Philosophy (2009) and Arrested Development and Philosophy (2011).

Janey Fisher (JF) is a freelance writer, copyeditor, and indexer working on both academic and educational books. She graduated in modern history from the University of Oxford in 1976 and taught secondary (high) school for four years before going into publishing. She is coauthor of CSec Social Studies (2nd edition, 2008) and author of its companion revision guide (2013), and has published two novels under her maiden name, Jane Anstey (see www.janeanstey.co.uk). She also writes an occasional current affairs blog (http://janeanstey.blogspot.com), where you can find any big ideas she might have from time to time.

Reg Grant (RG) is the author of more than fifty books on historical and military subjects, including Flight: 100 Years of Aviation (2004) and Soldier: A Visual History of the Fighting Man (2007).

Jackie Higgins (JH) was a staff producer and director at the BBC, where she made documentaries for the flagship science strand Horizon and the natural history strand Natural World. She has also made films for National Geographic and Discovery Channel.

Thomas Johnson (TJ) completed a Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Melbourne, Australia, in 2005. Since then, he has taught philosophy and reviewed books in that area, and also continued researching many other areas in the humanities and sciences.

Carol King (CK) studied English literature at the University of Sussex, United Kingdom, and fine art at London’s Central St Martin’s. She is a freelance writer on art, travel, film, architecture, and photography.

Maria Kingsbury (MK) works as a librarian at Southwest Minnesota State University. She is currently a Ph.D. candidate in technical communication and rhetoric at Texas Tech University.

George Lewis (GL) graduated under another name from Oxford University and now writes encyclopedia entries and articles for a wide range of publications, from Cosmopolitan to The Times (London).

James McRae (JM) holds a Ph.D. in comparative philosophy from the University of Hawaii at Manoa, and currently serves as an associate professor of philosophy and religion and the coordinator for Asian studies at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri. His books include Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought (with J. Baird Callicott, 1989) and The Philosophy of Ang Lee (with Robert Arp and Adam Barkman, 2013).

Nicolas Michaud (NM) is an assistant professor of philosophy at Florida State College, Jacksonville. He has contributed to many philosophy texts, including Stephen Colbert and Philosophy (2009), Green Lantern and Philosophy (2011), and World of Warcraft and Philosophy (2009). He recently edited The Hunger Games and Philosophy (2012) and is currently completing Frankenstein and Philosophy (2013).

Darryl J. Murphy (DM) is a scholar and writer. He has published numerous scholarly articles and reviews, including a chapter in Breaking Bad and Philosophy (2012). Darryl’s first novel, Samantha McTaggart and the Fellowship of Travellers, Volume 1: Morgan’s DReAM, was published in 2012. Darryl studied philosophy and then planning at the University of Guelph, and completed his Ph.D. in philosophy at Wilfrid Laurier University. You can follow Darryl on Twitter @DarrylJMurphy and find him on Facebook at http://goo.gl/keSS5.

Janette Poulton (JP), Ph.D. was awarded her doctorate for research on the development of philosophical dispositions in the middle years of schooling. She recently served her second term as president of the Federation of Australasian Philosophy in Schools Associations, is the education officer for the Victorian Association for Philosophy in Schools, and is on the International Council of Philosophical Inquiry with Children Executive for Philosophy in Schools. She is employed as the academic coordinator of the School of Education at MIT, Melbourne.

Brendan Shea (BSh), Ph.D., is currently visiting assistant professor of philosophy at Winona State University in Minnesota, United States. His research and teaching interests include the history and philosophy of science, logic, and inductive reasoning, and also the philosophy of popular culture.

John R. Shook (JSh), Ph.D., was a professor of philosophy at Oklahoma State University until 2006. Since then, he has been research associate in philosophy and a faculty member of the Science and the Public EdM online program at the University at Buffalo, New York. His latest book is The God Debates: A 21st Century Guide for Atheists, Believers, and Everyone in Between (2010).

Jeff Stephenson (JS) is a visiting assistant professor of philosophy at Montana State University, Bozeman, with research interests in contemporary virtue theory, akrasia, moral psychology, and political philosophy. He spends his spare time hiking with his wife and dog.

Barry Stone (BS) is an internationally published author of numerous general history titles, on topics ranging from religious hermits to modern architecture, who, in his alter ego as a travel writer, spends far too much time plotting future destinations. He lives with his family in Picton, a rural hamlet an hour’s drive south of Sydney, Australia. His website is www.inscribedbystone.com.

Adam Patrick Taylor (APT) is a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the University at Buffalo in Buffalo, New York. He works primarily on the metaphysics of time and the human person and the philosophy of wellbeing.

Mark Theoharis (MT) is a writer and former attorney living in Kansas, United States. He writes about legal issues for law firms, businesses, and professionals who need to reach lay audiences.

Jamie Watson (JW) is assistant professor of philosophy at Young Harris College in Georgia, United States. He is coauthor of Critical Thinking: An Introduction to Reasoning Well (2011), Philosophy Demystified (2011), and What’s Good on TV? Understanding Ethics Through Television (2011), all with Robert Arp, and is also coauthor of the forthcoming Critical Thinker’s Toolkit, with Peter Fosl and Galen Foresman.

Lani Watson (LWa) is studying for a Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. Her research topic is the philosophy of questions, with a focus on the role of questions in education. This is naturally guided by an insatiable inquisitiveness concerning the history of ideas and the thinking domain.

Lucy Weir (LW) is a Ph.D. candidate at University College Cork and is writing a thesis about evolutionary science, Zen, and the environmental crisis. The thesis illustrates the realization that philosophy as “practice-enlightenment” allows a person to see themself see and that this integrated, non-dualistic perspective is key to responding to the ecological emergency.

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Picture Credits

Every effort has been made to credit the copyright holders of the images used in this book. We apologize for any unintentional omissions or errors and will insert the appropriate acknowledgment to any companies or individuals in subsequent editions of the work.

2 Gary Gay/Getty Images 20–21 De Agostini/Lebrecht Music and Arts 23 Natural History Museum, London/Science Photo Library 25 Museo di Antropologia ed Etnografia, Turin/Gianni Dagli Orti/The Art Archive 26 Kenneth Garrett/National Geographic/Getty Images 27 Gianni Dagli OrtiDe AgostiniGetty Images 29 De Agostini/A. De Gregorio/The Art Archive 30 © Heritage Images/Corbis 31 Museum Ulm, Germany/© Interfoto/Alamy 32 Pierre Andrieu/AFP/Getty Images 34 Museo Egizio, Turin/Erich Lessing/akg images 35 Courtesy University of Tubingen, photo: H. Jensen 37 De Agostini/Lebrecht Music and Arts 38 Dagli Orti/The Art Archive 39 Lea Goodman/Getty Images 40 University of Belgrade, Serbia/Giraudon/The Bridgeman Art Library 41 Museo Civico Archeologico, BolognaDe Agostiniakg images 42 Album/Oronoz/akg images 45 Z. Radovan/BPL/Lebrecht Music and Arts 46 © Niday Picture Library/alamy images 47 © Gianni Dagli Orti/Corbis 48 Greg Ward/Getty Images 51 British Museum/Erich Lessing/akg images 52 De Agostini/G. 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Michaud/akg images 237 Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples/The Art Archive 238 Philippe Maillard/akg images 238 SANAA/Philippe Maillard/akg images 240 Musée Farinier/Gianni Dagli Orti/The Art Archive 241 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 242 Albatross/akg images 244 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, USA/General Funds/Bridgeman Art Library 247 Palacio Real de Madrid, Spain/Bridgeman Art Library 248 IAM/akg images 249 British Museum/Eileen Tweedy/The Art Archive 250 Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria/Bridgeman Art Library 252 © Bettmann/Corbis 253 Galleria Sabauda, Turin, Italy/Alinari/Bridgeman Art Library 254 The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C., USA/Acquired 1922/Bridgeman Art Library 256 British Library/akg images 257 Archives Charmet Bridgeman Art Library 259 The Barnes Foundation, Merion, Pennsylvania, USABridgeman Art Library 260 Biblioteca Regionale Universitaria Di Messina/De Agostini Picture Library/Bridgeman Art Library 261 bilwissedition Ltd. & Co. 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Private Collection/The Stapleton Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 364 Universal Images Group/Getty Images 366 Pascal, Traité du triangle arithmétique/CCB.13.24(2)/Reproduced by kind permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library 367 Mary Evans Picture Library 369 Science & Society Picture Library/Getty Images 370 Omikron/Science Photo Library 371 Jean-Loup Charmet/Science Photo Library 372 Science Museum/Science and Society Picture Library/Getty Images 375 National Geographic Image Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 376 ullstein bild/akg images 377 Chewton Mendip, Somerset, UK/Bridgeman Art Library 378 Galleria Doria Pamphilij/akg images 379 Bridgeman Art Library 380 Cambridge, Trinity College/Erich Lessing/akg images 381 Historical Museum, Hanover/akg images 382 Science & Society Picture Library/Getty Images 383 Universal Images Group/Getty Images 385 Museo del Prado, Madrid/Erich Lessing/akg images 386 State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg/RIA Nowosti/akg images 387 Lebrecht Music & Arts 389 Private Collection/The Stapleton Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 390 Chartres, Cathedral, Treasury/Erich Lessing/akg images 391 Artist unknown 20th century/Private Collection/Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library 392 Bible Land Pictures/akg images 393 Royal Astronomical Society/Science Photo Library 395 © INTERFOTO alamy images 396 Hulton ArchiveRischgitz/Getty Images 398 Erich Lessing/akg images 401 Science & Society Picture Library/Getty Images 404 © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis 405 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 406 Time & Life Pictures/Alfred Eisenstaedt/Getty Images 409 © David Bathgate/Corbis 410 Hamburger Kunsthalle/Electa/Leemage/Lebrecht Music and Arts 413 akg images 414 Universal History Archive/UIG/Bridgeman Art Library 415 Geoff Caddick/AFP/Getty Images 416 Roger-Viollet/TopFoto.co.uk 419 John Massey Stewart Russian Collection/Mary Evans Picture Library 420 Chateau de Versailles, France/Giraudon/Bridgeman Art Library 421 IAM/akg images 423 Erich Lessing/akg images 424 Lebrecht Music and Arts 427 Photo by Werner Forman/Universal Images Group/Getty Images 428–429 Musée d’Orsay, Paris, France/Bridgeman Art Library 432 National Gallery, London, UK/Bridgeman Art Library 433 Mark Garlick/Science Photo Library 434 akg images 437 © 2008 Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images 438 © Wolfi Poelzer/alamy images 439 Bridgeman Art Library 440 Erich Lessing/akg images 442 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 445 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 447 Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG/Getty Images 448 akg images 451 akg images 452 Getty Images 454 © Bettmann/Corbis 456 Omniphoto/UIG/Bridgeman Art Library 457 akg images 458 Quint & Lox/akg images 460 Bibliothèque Sainte-Genevieve, Paris/Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library 462 ullstein bild/akg images 463 Science & Society Picture Library/Getty Images 464 © Astronomy NASA Space/alamy images 465 Gary Hincks/Science Photo Library 466 Science Photo Library 468 Omniphoto/UIG/Bridgeman Art Library 469 NIBSC/Science Photo Library 470 Kean Collection/Getty Images 471 Corbis 472 akg images 475 Brady Handy Collection/LC-DIG-cwpbh-02561/Library Of Congress 476 Interfoto/akg images 479 Mehau Kulyk/Science Photo Library 480 alamy images 482 De Agostini/Getty Images 483 Dr Jean Lorre/Science Photo Library 484 ©2013, Punch Ltd 485 akg images 486 Library of Congress/Science Photo Library 488 De Agostini/G Dagli Orti/Getty Images 489 Private Collection/Photo © Christie’s Images/Bridgeman Art Library 490 White Images/© Photo Scala, Florence 493 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 494 Tate Gallery/Erich Lessing/akg images 495 Hulton Archive/Stringer/Getty Images 496 akg images 497 ullstein bild/akg images 499 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 501 © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis 502 akg images 503 British Library/akg images 504 The Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham, UK/Bridgeman Art Library 506 Concordia Theological Seminary 507 Francis Frith Coll./akg images 509 © Ivy Press Images/alamy images 510 Bob Thomas/Popperfoto Getty Images 512 Bibliothèque Nationalede Franceakg images 513 Mondadori via Getty Images 514 Cliff Parnell Getty Images 516 Painted tinned-iron. 12 58 X 9 7/8 X 7 1/4 (32 X 25.1 X 18.4cm). Gift of Paul F. Walter. Acc. num. 360.1993/Digital image, The Museum of Modern Art, New York/Photo ©Scala, Florence 518 Herve Conge, ISM/Science Photo Library 519 © Sites & Photos/alamy images 520 The Art Archive 521 Etienne Carjat/Getty Images 522 Musée d’Orsay, Paris, France/Giraudon/Bridgeman Art Library 524 David Haring/DUPC/Oxford Scientific/Getty Images 525 Sheila Terry/Science Photo Library 526 John Hemmingsen/FlickrVision/Getty Images 528 © Werner H. Müller/Corbis 531 J. Baylor Roberts/NGS Image Collection/The Art Archive 532 http://healthpsychologyconsultancy.wordpress.com 533 Science Photo Library 534 Private Collection/The Stapleton Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 535 © Mary Evans Picture Library/alamy images 536 Musée du Louvre Paris/Dagli Orti/The Art Archive 539 Three Lions/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 540 Steve McQueen in Bullitt directed by Peter Yates, Warner Bros 17 October 1968/ © AF Archive/alamy images 541 De Agostini/Getty Images 542 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 544 Patrice Loiez, Cern/Science Photo Library 545 Karl Marx Museum Trier/Gianni Dagli Orti/The Art Archive 546 Gamma-Keystone/Getty Images 547 Hulton Archive/Getty Images 548 Advertising Archives 550 © Ashmolean Museum/Mary Evans Picture Library 551 akg images 552 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 553 http://aima.cs.berkeley.edu/2nd-ed/cover.htm 555 © Pictorial Press Ltd/alamy images 556 © Bettmann/Corbis 557 RIA Novosti/Lebrecht Music and Arts 558 De Agostini/G Dagli Orti/Getty Images 560 3D4medical.com/Science Photo Library 561 © The Art Archive/alamy images 562 © The Gallery Collection/Corbis 565 Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, USA/Bridgeman Art Library 566 akg images 568 © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis 570 De Agostini/G. Nimatallah/The Art Archive 571 Universal Images Group/Getty Images 572 © Pictorial Press Ltd/alamy images 574 Corbis 575 Corbis 576 culture-images/Lebrecht Music and Arts 578 Apic/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 580 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library 581 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 582 © Glasshouse Images/alamy images 583 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. All rights reserved/ © Photo Scala, Florence 585 Interfoto/akg images 587 Universal Images Group/Getty Images 588 Buyenlarge/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 590 Henning Dalhoff/Science Photo Library 591 Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty Images 592 Popperfoto/Getty Images 594 Josà © Fuste Raga/age fotostock/Getty Images/ © ARS, NY and DACS, London 2013 596 Popperfoto/Getty Images 598 Culver Pictures/The Art Archive 600 © Old Visuals/alamy images 601 Paul Thompson FPG/Getty Images 602 Buyenlarge/Hulton Fine Art Collection/Getty Images 603 New York Public Library/Bridgeman Art Library © Bettmann/Corbis 606–607 Jon Williamson, http://www.vintascope.com 608 Bibliothèque des Arts Decoratifs, Paris, France/Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library 610 Mondadori via Getty Images 612 © Everett Collection Historical/alamy images 614 The Granger Collection/TopFoto.co.uk 615 The Granger Collection/TopFoto.co.uk 616 © Pictorial Press/alamy images 618 Sofia Moro/Cover/Getty Images 619 TopFoto.co.uk 620 © ITAR-TASS Photo Agency/alamy images 621 © Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/Corbis 622 Topical press Agency/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 623 Musée de Tesse, Le Mans, France/Giraudon/Bridgeman Art Library 625 © Francois Werli/alamy images 626 © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis 630 Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA/Giraudon Bridgeman Art Library © Succession Picasso/DACS, London 2013 632 Hulton Archive/Getty Images 633 De Agostini/akg images 634 JP Jazz Archive/Redferns/Getty Images 636 Louvre, Paris/ © Photo Scala, Florence 638 © Bettmann/Corbis 639 © Pictorial Press Ltd/alamy images 641 courtesy Dr. W. S. Maclay and the Guttmann-Maclay Collection © D. Bayes/Lebrecht Music and Arts 642 NBC NewsWire/Getty Images 645 Corbis/ © Succession Marcel Duchamp/ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2013 646 Corbis 647 Julian Baum/Science Photo Library 648 Detlev van Ravenswaay/Science Photo Library 649 Anna Yu/Getty Images 651 akg images 652 Hulton Archive/Getty Images 653 © mugshot/alamy images 654 UIG via/Getty Images 656 Private Collection/Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library 657 © Bettmann/Corbis 659 Photo by Frank Driggs Collection/Getty Images 660 Tyler Stableford/Image Bank/Getty Images 662 RIA Novosti/Science Photo Library 663 © BBC/Corbis 665 © Pictorial Press Ltd/alamy images 666 Spencer Grant/Science Photo Library 667 © INTERFOTO/alamy images 669 © Bettmann/Corbis 671 Tarker/Lebrecht Music and Arts 673 © Bettmann/Corbis 674 akg images 675 Apic/Getty Images 677 Detlev van Ravenswaay/Science Photo Library 678 Popperfoto/Getty Images 679 American Institute of Physics/Science Photo Library 681 Mortimer Rare Book Room, Smith College/ © Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy Henrietta Garnett 682 Moviestore Collection/Rex Features 683 © Bettmann/Corbis 684 © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis 687 Frank Driggs Collection/Getty Images 688 Photo by Margaret Bourke-White/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 689 © Joshua Dalsimer/Corbis 692 University of Chicago/American Institute of Physics/Science Photo Library 694 Raul Gonzalez Perez/Science Photo Library 696 © Bettmann/Corbis 697 © World History Archive/alamy images 698 Corbis/ © FLC/ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2013 700 Imagno/akg images 701 Photo by Walter Nurnberg/SSPL/Getty Images 702 La Nausée, Jean Paul Sartre, cover of folio edition, 1977, Illustration by Gourmelin © Editions Gallimard 705 Image courtesy of the University of Minnesota 706 Photo by George Skadding/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 707 Private Collection/Photo © Christie’s Images/The Bridgeman Art Library 708 Kenneth Eward/Science Photo Library 709 Alan E. Cober/ © Images.com/Corbis 711 Photo by Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images 712 Amblin/Universal/Courtesy Kobal Collection 715 Photo by Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Getty Images 716 Photo by Thomas D. Mcavoy/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 719 Photo by Bob Gomel/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 720 Derek Bayes/Lebrecht Music and Arts/ © Trustees of the Paolozzi Foundation, Licensed by DACS 2013 723 © Michael Weber/imagebroker/Corbis 724 © Bettmann/Corbis 726 Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt/Pix Inc./Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 727 National Cancer Institute/Science Photo Library 729 Corbis 731 Getty Images 732 Design by Kurt Hilscher/akg images 734 Private Collection/Photo © Christie’s Images/Bridgeman Art Library 735 Roger Viollet/Getty Images 737 © Tony Korody/Sygma/Corbis 738 Massimo Braga, The Lighthouse/Science Photo Library 741 Michael Urban/ © Reuters/Corbis 742 NASA/ESA/Getty Images 745 Photo by Herve GLOAGUEN/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images 746 Photo by Joan Adlen/Getty Images 747 © Keystone/Corbis 749 Prominent Features/Bellomo F/Courtesy Kobal Collection 750 Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 753 Photo by Keystone/Getty Images 754 AFP/Getty Images 757 A. Barrington Brown/Science Photo Library 760 © Ted Streshinsky/Corbis 763 © Bettmann/Corbis 764 Private Collection/Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library 767 © JP Laffont/Sygma/Corbis 768 Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 769 © Swim Ink 2, LLC/Corbis 771 Photo by Fred W. McDarrah/Getty Images 772 © Lucien Aigner/Corbis 773 Moviepix/Getty Images 774 Photo by John Dominis/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 776 © Bettmann/Corbis 777 Corbis 779 Corbis 780 Photo: Arthur Ashatz/Time Life/Getty Images 782 © Bettmann/Corbis 787 Fortean/ © 2006 TopFoto.co.uk 788 Photo by Bill Pierce/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 789 David Nunnuk/Science Photo Library 790 Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images 792 Photo by Gjon Mili/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 793 Design Pics/The Irish Image Collection/Getty Images 795 Photo by Archive Photos/Getty Images 796 Photo by Bernard Gotfryd/Getty Images 798 Detini/F Bertola/Getty Images 799 Digital image, The Museum of Modern Art/ © Photo Scala, Florence/© ARS, NY and DACS, London 2013 800 Atlas Collaboration/CERN/Science Photo Library 802 Popperfoto/Getty Images 803 © Bettmann/Corbis 805 Photo by Henry Groskinsky/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 807 Bridgeman Art Library London 808 © Bettmann/Corbis 811 Popperfoto/Getty Images 812 Yoshikazuy Tsuno/AFP/Getty Images 814 © Sophie Bassouls/Sygma/Corbis 815 Photo by Louis MONIER/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images 817 Michael Gilbert/Science Photo Library 818 © Michael Ochs Archives/Corbis 820 © Farrell Grehan/Corbis 821 © David Reed/Corbis 822 Photo by J. R. Eyerman/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 824 Instituto da Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon, Portugal/Giraudon/Bridgeman Art Library 825 Michael & Patricia Fogden/Getty Images 826 David Redfern/Getty Images 828 © Laguna Design/Science Photo Library/Corbis 829 Peter Menzel/Science Photo Library 832 Photo by Rolls Press/Popperfoto/Getty Images 834 Photo by Andrew Lepley/Redferns/Getty Images 836 © Michael Ochs Archives/Corbis 838 Margie Politzer/Getty Images 840 Anthony Howarth/Science Photo Library 841 Laguna Design/Science Photo Library 842 Louvre, Paris, France/Giraudon/Bridgeman Art Library 843 Photo by John Scofield/National Geographic/Getty Images 847 Natural History Museum, London/Science Photo Library 848 © Mike Stewart/Sygma/Corbis 850 Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images 851 Science Photo Library 852 Tim Flach/Getty Images 854 © Bettmann/Corbis 857 © Interfoto/alamy images 858 Laguna Design/Science Photo Library 859 Fortean/TopFoto.co.uk 861 © Peter Dench/In Pictures/Corbis 863 Nemo Ramjet/Science Photo Library 865 © E. J. Camp/Corbis 866 Photo by David Corio/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 870 James Cavallini/Science Photo Library 873 Photo by Andreas Feininger/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 874 David A. Hardy, Futures: 50 Years in Space Science Photo Library 876 Pete Souza/White House/Corbis 877 Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images 878 © EMPICS/TopFoto.co.uk 879 David Mack/Science Photo Library 880 Photo by NBC/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Images 882 © JP Laffont/Sygma/Corbis 885 © Joerg Boethling/alamy images 888 © Simon Rawles/alamy images 889 Daniel Schoenen/Getty Images 890 © Levi Bianco/Getty Images 893 Photo by SSPL/Getty Images 894 © Reuters/Corbis 896 Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images 897 © Claudia Daut/Reuters/Corbis 899 Mark Thomas/Science Photo Library 901 Asif Hassan/AFP/Getty Images 902 Sam Ogden/Science Photo Library 904 © 2005 Keystone/TopFoto.co.uk 905 © Dan Herrick/alamy images 907 © Nathaniel Welch/Corbis 909 © Robyn Twomey/Corbis 910 CNRI/Science Photo Library 911 Pasieka/Science Photo Library 913 Victor Habbick Visions/Getty Images 914 P. Plailly/E. Daynes/Science Photo Library 915 Karen Kasmauski/Getty Images 916 © George Hammerstein/Corbis 919 Mehau Kulyk/Science Photo Library 921 Sam Yeh/AFP/Getty Images 922 © Jeff Minton/Corbis 923 © Mike Ellison 924 Felix Pharand-Deschenes, Globaia/Science Photo Library 925 © Topic Photo Agency/Corbis 926 JJP/Eurelios/Science Photo Library 928 Simon Dawson/Bloomberg/Getty Images 931 © RIA Novosti/TopFoto.co.uk 933 Bobby Henderson 935 Nicholas Roberts/AFP/Getty Images 936 Wellcome Library, London 939 © Jenny Matthews/In Pictures/Corbis 940 Photo by David McNew/Getty Images 941 Laguna Design/Science Photo Library

Index of Ideas by Category

Art and Architecture

Absolute music 459

Animation 549

Anthropomorphism 31

Aqueduct 130

Arch, The 132

Art deco 670

Art Nouveau 589

Artistic symbolism 583

Artworld theory 799

Atonality 629

Ballet 334

Ballroom dancing 337

Baroque architecture 332

Baroque music 341

Bauhaus 655

Belly dancing 54

Beowulf 285

Birth of Tragedy, The 537

Blues music 638

Breakdancing 837

Capoeira 330

Cartoon 484

Classical music 411

Classicism 168

Comedy 149

Country music 658

Cubism 631

Dadaism 645

Death of the Author, The 815

Dome structure, The 36

Don Quixote 344

Doppelganger 449

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 564

Drama 140

Equal temperament 207

Expressionism in art 577

Expressionism in music 631

Feng shui 60

Flying buttress 290

Form follows function 595

Formalism in art 194

Fountain of Youth, The 163

Futurism 633

Golden ratio, The 156

Gothic ideal 290

Gradgrind’s education 503

Happening 770

Hays Code 682

Hellenism 217

Hero 120

Homophony 314

How to Read a Book: The Art of Getting a Liberal Education 706

Illusionism 490

Impossible object 694

Impressionism in art 541

Impressionism in music 558

Industrial design 516

Intentional fallacy, The 718

Jazz music 635

Jewelry 28

Krumping 922

Less is a bore 807

Linear perspective in painting 310

Literature 73

Magazine 368

Magical realism 734

Mannerism 325

Megalithic monuments 56

Mesolithic sculpted figurines 40

Metaphysical poetry 342

Musical indeterminacy 744

Neoclassicism 417

Opera 338

Paleolithic cave art 33

Panopticon 438

Passive housing 889

Performance art 755

Perspective 180

Plainchant 240

Poetry 76

Pointillism 563

Polyphony 286

Pop art 721

Pop music 740

Postmodern music 834

Postmodernism 868

Pre-Raphaelitism 494

Program music 499

Pythagorean tuning 143

Radiant City, The 699

Rap music 867

Reformation art 324

Reggae 819

Renaissance music 314

Rhythm and blues 736

Robin Hood 297

Rock ’n’ roll 751

Rococo 399

Romanesque architecture 282

Romanticism 411

Salsa 685

Satire 175

Serialism 667

Sewer system 115

Sound collage 740

Sudoku 868

Surrealism 656

Swing music 686

Tonality 459

Tragedy 141

Trojan Horse 125

Wabi-sabi 293

Ways of Seeing 842

Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, The 700

Philosophy

A priori and a posteriori knowledge 219

Abduction 515

Absolute power corrupts absolutely 190

All is water 130

Allegory of the Cave 192

Analytic-synthetic distinction 431

Astrology 82

Banality of Evil, The 792

Beetle in a box, The 758

Binding problem, The 577

Bushidō 280

Casuistry 173

Categorical logic 207

Chicken and egg conundrum, The 200

Chinese room argument, The 872

Coherence theory of truth 627

Compatibilism 412

Confucian virtues 152

Consolation of philosophy 76

Constructivist epistemology 820

Correspondence theory of truth, The 616

Counterfactuals 721

Cultivate your garden 415

Cynicism 176

Daoism 136

Death of God, The 559

De Morgan’s Laws 498

Deconstruction 814

Deflationary theory of truth 649

Determinism 181

Emergentism 487

Empiricism 384

Enlightenment 432

Epistemological turn 355

Eternal flux 151

Eternal return 217

Eternal stasis 159

Evil genius 361

Existential nihilism 170

Explanation, reduction, and empiricism 787

Fallacy 210

Fatalism 163

First Categorical Imperative 435

Four causes, The 212

Freedom to choose otherwise 227

Functionalism 809

Gambler’s fallacy 450

Gettier problems 793

Grand Inquisitor, The 557

Gratuitous act 644

Hasty generalization 214

Hedonistic paradox, The 543

Hegelianism 473

Hell is other people 714

Humorism 177

I know that I do not know 165

“I think, therefore I am” 361

Idea of Freedom, The 776

Idealism 192

Identity of discernibles 381

“If a lion could speak …” 758

In Praise of Folly 320

Indeterminism 205

Infinite monkey theorem 643

Infinity 133

Innatism 154

Intentionality 563

Is/ought fallacy 403

Ju 138

Just war 263

Justified true belief 189

Kama Sutra 264

Kant’s Copernican turn 430

Knowledge by description/knowledge by acquaintance 639

Knowledge is power 365

Kōan 275

LaVeyan Satanism 808

Law of noncontradiction, The 205

Leap of faith 488

Liar’s Paradox, The 212

Lifeboat Earth 853

Linguistic turn 816

Ma’at 67

Man is the measure of all things 169

Master morality and slave morality 570

Materialism 181

Memento mori 236

Mind/body problem, The 358

Modal logic 650

Monadology 397

Moral absolutism 196

Moral relativism 171

Myth of Sisyphus, The 709

Mythologies 769

Naming and Necessity 872

Naturalism 350

Naturalistic dualism 911

Nature of personal identity 388

Nausea 703

No-miracles argument 860

Nothingness 161

Numerology 68

Objectivism 768

Occam’s razor 210

Optimism 395

Oration on the Dignity of Man 317

Original position, The 837

Paradox of omnipotence 270

Parallelism 390

Perfection 202

Pessimism 461

Philosophical hedonism 136

Philosophical realism 185

Platonic love 194

Porphyrian tree 258

Positivism 470

Pragmatic theory of truth 550

Pragmatism 538

Predicate logic 551

Primary and secondary qualities 387

Principles of Biomedical Ethics 870

Property dualism 543

Propositional logic 231

Question of being, The 675

Rationalism 356

Rest as the natural state of things 206

Russell’s paradox 610

Scholasticism 293

Second Categorical Imperative 435

Sense and reference 584

Skepticism 221

Socratic Method, The 166

Sophism 170

Space 195

Subjectivist fallacy 564

Substance dualism 356

Symbolic logic 553

Tantric sex 624

Teleology 214

Theory of Communicative Action, The 877

Theory of descriptions, The 623

Theosophy 300

Third Critique, The 443

Third Man Problem, The 201

To be is to be perceived 394

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 665

Transcendental idealism 430

Transcendentalism and self reliance 471

Two Dogmas of Empiricism 748

Ubuntu 908

Universals and particulars 185

Uses of Laughter, The 609

Verificationism 408

What does not kill you makes you stronger 572

What is it like to be a bat? 853

Wu wei 139

Yijing 126

You are what you eat 500

Zeno’s arrow 171

Politics and Society

A Room of One’s Own 680

Abolitionism 420

AD&D insurance 497

Against revolution 444

Ageism 830

Alcoholics Anonymous 695

Alien abduction 773

Amazon.com 904

AMBER alert 912

American civil rights 762

American Dream, The 688

Amortality 937

Anarchism 482

Anarcho-syndicalism 523

Ancient Olympic Games 129

Angie’s List 906

Animal rights 467

Anomie 586

Anti-globalization 896

Anti-Semitism 221

Antidisestablishmentarianism 537

Arranged marriage 53

Art of War, The 173

Aryanism 535

Atkins Diet, The 806

Bell curve grading 661

Big Brother 733

Black Athena 887

Black Power 810

Blog 918

Book of the City of Ladies, The 308

Cannibalism 22

Carpooling 710

CCTV for crime prevention 849

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 933

Civil disobedience 495

Code of Hammurabi 89

Coffeehouse 319

Colonialism 84

Communism 492

Compulsory education 191

Conspicuous consumption 600

Consumerism 605

Continual progress 129

Cosmopolis 215

Counterculture 827

Courtly love 288

Craigslist 908

Credit cards 741

Critique of Everyday Life 722

Critique of Inequality 413

Critique of Orientalism 865

Cultural hegemony 672

Cultural relativism 574

Cultural Revolution 813

Dandyism 443

Daylight saving time (DST) 589

Declaration of Rights 441

Democracy 151

Democratic peace theory 802

Desert versus merit 839

Dictatorship of the proletariat 545

Dictionary 74

Divine right of kings 338

Doctrine of double effect 303

Downsizing 883

Dozens, The 635

eBay 907

Encyclopedia 243

End of history, The 895

Enlightened despot 487

Equal education for women 445

Equitrade 934

Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics, and at Home 669

European single currency 891

Evil 50

Expanding circle, The 871

Fables 134

Fairtrade 888

Fascism 593

Feminism 442

Feudalism 280

Flash mob 930

Flynn effect 886

Freecycle Network, The 932

Freedom of speech 149

Freemasonry 399

Game theory 713

Generational attitudes 898

Gettysburg Address 520

Global village, The 797

Godwin’s Law 897

Great Leap Forward, The 778

Gross National Happiness 843

Guideline daily amounts 920

Guild 287

Gymnastics 55

Historian’s fallacy 555

History 164

Holocaust, The 697

Holy Blood, Holy Grail 878

Honoring the dead 23

Human adoption 89

Identity theft 801

In Praise of Cosmetics 521

Inflation 473

Infomercial 737

Infotainment 855

Inheritance 81

Intellectual property 154

International law 344

Invisible hand, The 425

Islamic state 276

ISO 722

Isolationism 362

Juvenile courts 599

Keynesian economics 695

Kwanzaa 810

Kyōsei 886

Leisure 52

Leninism 617

Leviathan 365

LGBT 891

Liberalism 388

Liberating violence 783

Limited liability corporation 507

Little Red Book, The 797

Loan 86

Madness and Civilization 781

Magna Carta 300

Male gaze 856

Malthusian Law 453

Man is born free 416

Manifest destiny 489

Marginal revenue productivity 569

McDonaldization 900

Meritocracy 778

Metrosexuality 900

Might makes right 491

Military-industrial complex 786

Minimum wage 587

Modern Olympic Games 496

Monetarism 637

Money 38

Montessori education 596

Morality of Terror, The 446

National nativism 481

Nationalism 422

Neoconservatism 850

Neoliberalism 690

News from Nowhere 580

News sheet 235

Nobel Prize 592

Nudism 618

Nunchi 308

Obeying laws 186

Occupy Movement 938

On Liberty 511

Orbis Pictus 367

Originalism 871

Outsourcing 892

Pacifism 613

Paralympic Games 752

Parental advisory label 895

Pareto efficiency 628

People’s War 703

Permanent revolution 624

Philosopher king, The 187

Physician-assisted suicide 179

Pictograms and alphabet 62

Political correctness 781

Polygamy 86

Ponzi scheme 653

Presumption of innocence 444

Prince, The 321

Product placement 540

Prohibition 650

Propaganda 352

Propaganda by deed 534

Property is theft 481

Protestant work ethic 619

Public library 316

Pursuit of happiness, The 425

Queer theory 898

Racialism/racism 628

Rational Dress 499

Rational ignorance 775

Reaganomics 876

Recycling 835

Regicide 94

Religious humanism 691

Religious pluralism 157

Religious tolerance 386

Renaissance Man/Woman 517

Repressive tolerance 804

Restaurant 283

Restorative justice 892

Road to Serfdom, The 714

Role model 736

Rosicrucianism 347

Safe Haven Law 920

Satyagraha 627

Scapegoat 117

Second Sex, The 735

Sedentism 36

Separation of church and state 455

Separation of powers 407

Sexism 794

Sexting 932

Sexual Politics 833

Sign language for the deaf 418

Simple life, The 502

Six degrees of separation 816

Six Green Principles 925

Six Sigma 884

Slavery 41

Small Is Beautiful 846

Social Darwinism 549

Social welfare 245

Societas publicanorum 237

Society of the Spectacle, The 823

Speed limit 529

Stages of history 400

State, The 321

Steiner education 629

Subsidiarity 581

Supermarket 646

Supply and demand 478

Televangelism 746

Terrorism 243

Thanksgiving 350

The end justifies the means 179

Think tank 474

Tipping point 770

Totem poles 426

Trade 28

Trade union 422

Trial by jury 298

Two Concepts of Liberty 777

Types of friendship 208

United Nations 717

Universal Declaration of Human Rights 731

Universal healthcare 559

Universal language 238

Universal suffrage 584

University, The 182

Utilitarianism 439

Utopia 323

Utopian socialism 461

Value-added tax 759

Vegetarianism 144

Venture philanthropy 935

Virtual workplace 925

Volapük 554

War is good 556

War on terror 928

Warehouse club 759

Wikipedia 928

World Anti-Piracy Observatory 938

Psychology

Anti-psychiatry 819

Archetypes 652

Autosuggestion 661

Behaviorism 643

Bloom’s Taxonomy 765

Child development 668

Child-centered child rearing 718

Codependency 835

Cognitivism 766

Comparative psychology 538

Connectionism 597

Constructivism 617

Crowd psychology 591

Death drive 664

Delusion 640

Doublethink 733

Dream interpretation 602

Duck-rabbit illusion 603

Enneagram 744

Family therapy 762

Five stages of grief, The 827

Freudian slip 579

Generative grammar 772

Gestalt psychology 640

Groupthink 755

Hierarchy of needs 713

Id, ego, and superego 664

Inferiority complex 658

Lateral thinking 820

Lobotomy 696

Man-machine, The 405

Masochism 567

Mental asylum 301

Milgram experiments 784

Mind-brain identity theory 766

Missing letter effect 864

MMPI 704

Multiple intelligences 881

Munchausen syndrome 748

Nature versus nurture 532

Near-death experience 859

Neuro-linguistic programming 861

Oedipus complex, The 63

Orgone energy 693

Passive-aggressive behavior 717

Pavlov’s dog 614

Peer pressure 747

Personality indicator 791

Phenomenology 609

Phrenology 455

Psychedelic experience 761

Psychoanalysis 579

Psychology laboratory 552

Rational choice theory 783

Rorschach test 666

Sadism 567

Self-fulfilling prophecy 730

Six thinking hats 883

Stockholm syndrome 849

Stream of consciousness 601

Structuralism 611

Tabula rasa 384

Voluntarism 569

Weber-Fechner law 478

Religion

Adam and Eve 110

Against original sin 264

Age of Reason, The 446

Agnosticism 100

All-powerful God 127

Anabaptist faith 326

Angels 110

Anti-clericalism 323

Arhat 148

Atheism 100

Atonement 99

Avatar 114

Bahá’í faith 519

Biblical canonical criticism 833

Biblical form criticism 655

Biblical narrative criticism 875

Biblical psychological criticism 506

Biblical redaction criticism 426

Biblical rhetorical criticism 824

Biblical socio-scientific criticism 621

Biblical source criticism 412

Biblical textual criticism 392

Bodhisattva 235

Calvinism 328

Canonization of the Bible 261

Caste system 103

Chakras 107

Christian fundamentalism 595

Christian universalism 258

Christmas 260

Church of England 326

Confessions, The 263

Consubstantiation 289

Creatio ex nihilo 249

Creation myth 49

Cremation 65

Deism 353

Demons 159

Deobandi 408

Devil, The 113

Dharma 104

Dietary laws 122

Divine command 174

Easter 246

Egyptian funerary art 71

End of the world, The 99

Evangelicalism 376

Exorcism 96

Feminist biblical exegesis 377

Fideism 255

Five Pillars of Islam, The 275

Five proofs of God’s existence 305

Flood myth 79

Four Noble Truths, The 146

Free rein defense 248

Free will defense, The 267

Genesis Flood, The 786

Ghost Dance 575

Ghosts 49

Gnosticism 246

God and causation 305

Grace 239

Great Controversy, The 508

Halloween 126

Heaven and Hell 56

Holy Grail 295

Holy Trinity, The 253

Human sacrifice 46

Iconoclasm 278

Immaculate Conception, The 505

Immortality 80

Incarnation 85

Intellect and will 267

Jihad 273

Judgment Day 65

Kabbalah 306

Karma 107

Ladder of Divine Ascent 273

Liberation theology 839

Manichaeism 257

Mantra 108

Meditation 104

Mediumship 33

Messiah 116

Metanoia 255

Midrash 256

Millennialism 119

Miracles 50

Modern Christian apologetics 632

Monotheism 119

Mormonism 468

Mystical experience 91

New Age 780

Nirvana 145

Ontological argument for God, The 292

Oracle 82

Original sin 251

Pantheism 378

Papal infallibility 536

Pascal’s wager 373

Passover 121

Postmodern biblical criticism 644

Problem of evil, The 227

Quakerism 363

Rastafarianism 685

Reformed epistemology 823

Reincarnation 113

Roman gods 155

Samsara 103

Santa Claus 259

Scientology 751

Shamanism 30

Shintōism 276

Sikhism 318

Soul 34

Spiritualism 404

Second Coming, The 239

Secret Doctrine, The 571

Ten Commandments, The 122

Theistic Satanism 297

Three theological virtues 241

Transubstantiation 283

Twelve Olympians, The 125

Unitarianism 331

Voodoo 391

Watchmaker analogy, The 456

Wicca 761

Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali 234

Yoga Vasistha 228

Zen 295

Zoroastrianism 109

Science and Technology

Abacus 73

Abortion 93

Agriculture 43

Alchemy 224

Alemaking 43

Alpha male/female 723

Anesthesia 94

Animal magnetism 421

Anthropic Principle 845

Anthropocene, The 924

Antibiotics 678

Antimatter 679

Archimedes Principle, The 232

Artificial preservation of food 414

Assembly line 453

Atomic model 817

Atoms 177

Automobile child safety seat 791

Autopsy 71

Baldwin Effect, The 593

Bayes’ theorem 417

Bell curve 402

Big Bang theory, The 676

Big Crunch theory 930

Binary code 728

Biological cell 370

Biological warfare 135

Birth control 93

Birthday problem, The 704

Black hole 433

Bloodletting 252

Braille 462

Butterfly effect 825

Calendar 58

Catastrophism 79

Cell phone 881

Cell theory 479

Chance favors the prepared mind 501

Chaos theory 794

Chemical elements 441

Chemical substance 368

Chemotherapy 727

Cloning 915

Clothing 23

Cognitive fluidity 914

Colonization of Mars 912

Commercial air travel 485

Commercial space flight 940

Contact lens 355

Contactless smart card 917

Continental drift 337

Copenhagen Interpretation 670

Cryonics and cryogenics 804

Cryptozoology 765

Cybernetics 726

Dark energy 918

Dark matter 690

Dark night sky paradox 464

Darwin’s Black Box 910

Darwinism 517

Database 809

Decentralized energy 917

Decimal system 371

Devolution 500

Doppler effect, The 483

DNA double helix 756

Drake equation, The 784

DSM 756

Dyeing cloth 44

Electricity 340

Electrolysis 477

Electromagnetic theory 528

Elements, The 222

Elixir of life 231

Emergency room 637

Entropy 505

Epigenetics 708

Equals sign 332

Eugenics 561

Euler’s number (e) 402

Evo-devo 923

Eyeglasses 302

False Tidal Theory 349

Falsifiability 691

Fermat’s Last Theorem 359

Fermi paradox, The 743

Feynman diagram 725

Fibonacci numbers 298

Fifth element, The 199

Fifth (parallel) postulate, The 229

Fixed-point theorem 668

Flat Earth myth 59

Four elements, The 167

Fractals 858

Frame problem, The 829

Gaia hypothesis 840

Gene therapy 841

General relativity 647

Genetic determinism 560

Genetic engineering 855

Geocentrism 196

Geological deep time 436

Germ theory of disease 469

Global Positioning System 851

GloFish 921

GM food 884

Gradualism 449

Grandfather paradox 712

Graph theory 403

Gravity 383

Gray’s Anatomy 508

Great Chain of Being, The 189

Greenhouse effect 465

Gunpowder 285

Hamilton’s Rule/Kin selection 798

Hand-washing in hospitals 491

Handicap Principle 860

Heavier-than-air flight 457

Heliocentrism 328

Higgs boson 801

Hilbert’s axioms 603

Hippocratic Oath 182

Holography 730

Homeopathy 450

Homunculus 211

Hubble’s law 674

Human control of fire 22

Human flight 271

Hylomorphism 208

Hypothesis 199

Imaginary numbers 334

Incompleteness theorem 687

Infinitesimal calculus 380

Infinity of inhabited worlds 336

Information theory 728

Kinetoscope 582

Kinsey Reports, The 725

Knot theory 477

Lamarckian evolution 458

Laparoscopic surgery 613

Last universal ancestor 512

Latin square 431

Laws of falling bodies 343

Levallois technique 27

Light 527

Limits to Growth, The 845

Lives of a Cell, The 856

Logarithm 348

Manhattan Project, The 710

Many worlds theory 775

Map 74

Masters of nature 359

Mathematical function 374

Mathematical proof 223

Mathematics 68

Matrix 229

Maxwell’s demon 530

Mechanical clock 306

Mechanical programmability 400

Meme 862

Mendelian inheritance 525

Microbiology 374

Missing link, The 518

Mitochondrial Eve 887

Motion as the natural state of things 382

Motion pictures 476

Multiverse 590

Music of the spheres 146

Natural selection 511

Nature abhors a vacuum 215

Neocatastrophism 875

Newton’s color wheel 393

Not-junk DNA 941

Nuclear fusion 662

Ontology in information science 899

Organ transplantation 615

Oscillating universe 686

Outer space 160

Paradigm shift 788

Pascal’s triangle 366

Pasteurization 523

Perfect number 245

Perfume 66

Periodic table of the elements 533

Perpetual motion 279

Phlogiston theory 373

Phonograph 547

Photography 463

Pi 394

Planck’s law 611

Planned obsolescence 689

Poincaré Conjecture 620

Preserving food 39

Prime numbers 223

Printing press 311

Prisoner’s dilemma 743

Punctuated equilibrium 844

Pythagorean theorem 142

Radio waves 527

Rational/irrational numbers 152

Rational drug design 879

Ready-made clothing 474

Recapitulation theory 529

Reimann hypothesis 513

Relational database 830

Ring theory 486

Robotics 663

RSA algorithm 864

Schrödinger’s cat 699

Scientific method, The 202

SEALAB 803

Second thermodynamic law 467

Selfish Gene, The 862

Set theory 542

Sex reassignment surgery 683

Sexual selection 515

Silent Spring 788

Simple machines 44

Slide rule 353

Soap 72

Social networking service 867

Solar power 418

Space rocket 597

Special relativity 623

Speciesism 831

Spontaneous generation 201

Squaring the circle 224

Standard Model of Particle Physics, The 854

Steam power 397

String theory 828

Strong force 846

Subatomic particles 544

Sundial 62

Survival of the fittest 524

Symbols 35

Talkies 657

Telephone 546

Telescope 347

Television 672

Thalassotherapy 407

Theory 184

Theory of radioactivity 599

Three Laws of Robotics 707

Toothbrush 90

Top-down cosmology 934

Topology 492

Traffic light 530

Trigonometry 232

Turing machine 701

UK Biobank 937

Uncertainty principle 676

Uniformitarianism 436

Upcycling 905

Urey-Miller experiment, The 752

Urgent care clinic 831

Using sharp projectiles 26

V-chip 906

Vaccination 286

Vector spaces 573

Video on demand 903

Virtual reality 813

Vitalism 251

W3C 903

Waterpower 218

Wave theory of light 379

Weak force 693

Well-formed formula (WFF) 680

Wind power 61

Winemaking 47

World Wide Web/Internet 893

Wormholes 648

X-rays 587

Y-chromosomal Adam 927

Zero 97

General Index

Page numbers in bold indicate main entries.

A

a priori and a posteriori knowledge 219

abacus 73

Abd al-Rahman I of Moorish Spain 157

abduction theory 515

Abelard, Peter 185, 222

abolitionism 41, 420

abortion 93

absolute power corrupts absolutely 190

Adam and Eve 111, 251, 264

Adams, James Truslow 688

Adams, John 321

Adamson, Bo 889

Adbusters Media Foundation 938

Ade, George 134

Adleman, L. M. 864

Adler, Alfred 658

Adler, Mortimer

How to Read a Book: The Art of Getting a Liberal Education 706

The Idea of Freedom 776

adoption 89

Aeschylus 129, 140, 141

Aesop 134

ageism 830

agnosticism 100

agriculture 36, 43

Al-Biruni 202

al-Khwarizmi 97, 152

al-Kindi 214

Alberti, Leon Battista 180, 310

alchemy 224, 231

Alcoholics Anonymous 695

alemaking 43

Alexander I of Yugoslavia 94

Alexander the Great 44, 215, 217

Alhazen 202

alien abduction 773

allegory of the cave 192

alpha male/female 723

alphabets 62

Alter, Robert 875

Alvarez, Luis 875

Alvarez, Walter 79, 875

amazon.com 904

AMBER Alert 912

American civil rights 762

American Dream 688

Ames, Jean 791

amortality 937

Anabaptist faith 326

analytic-synthetic distinction 431

anarchism 482

anarcho-syndicalism 523

Anaxagoras 180

Anaximander 133

Anaximenes 167

anesthesia 94

angels 111

Anghiera, Peter Martyr d’ 163

Angie’s List 906

animal magnetism 421

animal rights 467, 831

animation 549

anomie 586

Anselm, St. 292, 293, 553

anthropic principle 845

Anthropocene 924

anthropomorphism 31

anti-clericalism 323

anti-globalization 896

anti-psychiatry 819

anti-Semitism 221

antibiotics 678

antidisestablishmentarianism 537

antimatter 679

Antisthenes 176, 215

aqueducts 130

Aquinas, Thomas 111, 136, 174, 214, 293, 356

doctrine of double effect 303

five proofs of God’s existence 305

God and causation 305

Archimedes 222, 224

Archimedes Principle 44, 232

architecture 168, 807

arch structures 132

Baroque 332

dome structure 36

flying buttress 290

Gothic 168, 290

passive housing 889

Romanesque 282

Archytas 44

Arcimboldo, Giuseppe 325

Arendt, Hannah 792

arhat 148

Aristarchus of Samos 62, 328

Aristippus of Cyrene 136

Aristophanes 149, 170, 175

Aristotle 129, 133, 140, 141, 160, 161, 166, 167, 168, 169, 171, 184, 251, 258, 263, 293, 356, 384

categorical logic 207

chicken and egg conundrum 200

fallacy 210, 214

fifth element 199

four causes 212

geocentrism 196

Great Chain of Being 189

homunculus 201, 211

hylomorphism 208

hypothesis 199

indeterminism 205

law of noncontradiction 205

nature abhors a vacuum 215

perfection 202

rest as the natural state of things 206

scientific method 202

spontaneous generation 201

teleology 214

Third Man Problem 201

types of friendship 208

Aristoxenus 207

Arlandes, François Laurent d’ 271

Arnaud, Émile 613

Arnold, Matthew 555

arts

art deco 670

Art Nouveau 589

artistic symbolism 583

Artworld theory 799

Bauhaus 655

Classicism 168

Dadaism 645

Egyptian funerary art 71

Expressionism 577

Formalism 194

Futurism 633

Impressionism 541

Mannerism 325

Mesolithic sculpted figurines 40

Paleolithic cave art 30, 33, 35

performance art 755, 770

perspective 180, 310

Pointillism 563

Pop art 721

Pre-Raphaelitism 494

Reformation art 324

Rococo 399

Romanticism 411

Surrealism 656

Aryanism 535, 549

Asch, Solomon 747

Asher, Richard 748

Asimov, Isaac Three Laws of Robotics 707

assembly line 453

astrology 82

astronomy 160, 196, 433, 464, 483, 676

atheism 100

Atkins, Robert Dr Atkins’ Diet Revolution 806

atoms 154, 159, 160, 161, 167, 177, 181

atomic model 817

atonement 99

Augustine of Hippo 129, 248, 267

Confessions of Saint Augustine 263

automobile child safety seats 791

autopsy 71

autosuggestion 661

avatars 114

Avicenna 177, 202

B

Babst, Dean V. 802

Bach, Johann Sebastian 341

Bacon, Francis 199, 271, 321, 323, 350, 359, 365

Bacon, Roger 202

Bahá’i Faith 119, 159, 519

Baigent, Michael The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail 878

Bakunin, Mikhail 534

Baldwin, James Mark 593

ballet 334

ballistics 232

Ballou, Adin 491

ballroom dancing 337

Bambaataa, Afrika 837

Banach, Stefan 668

Bandler, Richard 861

Barjavel, René 712

Baroque architecture 332

Baroque music 341

Barrès, Maurice 593

Barthes, Roland

Mythologies 769

The Death of the Author 815

Barwise, Jon 212

Bassi, Agostino 469

Baudelaire, Charles In Praise of Cosmetics 521

Bauhaus 655

Bayes’ Theorem 417

Bayle, Pierre 257

Beal, Deron 932

Beardsley, Monroe 718

Beauchamp, Tom L. Principles of Biomedical Ethics 870

Beaujoyeulx, Balthasar de 334

Beauvoir, Simone de The Second Sex 735, 794

Becher, Johann Joachim 373

Becquerel, Henri 599

Beethoven, Ludvig van 411

behaviorism 643

Behe, Michael J. Darwin’s Black Box 910

Bejerot, Nils 849

bell curve 402

bell curve grading 661

Bell, Alexander Graham 340, 546

belly dancing 54