The vitality and accessibility of Fritjof Capra's ideas have made him perhaps the most eloquent spokesperson of the latest findings emerging at the frontiers of scientific, social, and philosophical thought. In his international bestsellers The Tao of Physics and The Turning Point, he juxtaposed physics and mysticism to define a new vision of reality. In The Web of Life, Capra takes yet another giant step, setting forth a new scientific language to describe interrelationships and interdependence of psychological, biological, physical, social, and cultural phenomena--the "web of life." During the past twenty-five years, scientists have challenged conventional views of evolution and the organization of living systems and have developed new theories with revolutionary philosophical and social implications. Fritjof Capra has been at the forefront of this revolution. In The Web of Life, Capra offers a brilliant synthesis of such recent scientific breakthroughs as the theory of complexity, Gaia theory, chaos theory, and other explanations of the properties of organisms, social systems, and ecosystems. Capra's surprising findings stand in stark contrast to accepted paradigms of mechanism and Darwinism and provide an extraordinary new foundation for ecological policies that will allow us to build and sustain communities without diminishing the opportunities for future generations. Now available in paperback for the first time, The Web of Life is cutting-edge science writing in the tradition of James Gleick's Chaos, Gregory Bateson's Mind and Matter, and Ilya Prigogine's Order Out of Chaos.

Integrating both social and historical factors, this radical analysis of the development of capitalism reveals the ever-deepening relationship between capital and ecology Finance. Climate. Food. Work. How are the crises of the twenty-first century connected? In Capitalism in the Web of Life, Jason W. Moore argues that the sources of today’s global turbulence have a common cause: capitalism as a way of organizing nature, including human nature. Drawing on environmentalist, feminist, and Marxist thought, Moore offers a groundbreaking new synthesis: capitalism as a “world-ecology” of wealth, power, and nature. Capitalism’s greatest strength—and the source of its problems—is its capacity to create Cheap Natures: labor, food, energy, and raw materials. That capacity is now in question. Rethinking capitalism through the pulsing and renewing dialectic of humanity-in-nature, Moore takes readers on a journey from the rise of capitalism to the modern mosaic of crisis. Capitalism in the Web of Life shows how the critique of capitalism-in-nature—rather than capitalism and nature—is key to understanding our predicament, and to pursuing the politics of liberation in the century ahead.

Capra argues that at the end of the 20th century we are shifting away from the mechanistic world of Descartes and Newton to a holistic, ecological view. He establishes patterns between ideas from such diverse fields as Buddhism and quantum physics.

Creative, science-grounded stories about nature for the curious and imaginative of all ages.

The first volume to integrate life's biological, cognitive, social, and ecological dimensions into a single, coherent framework.

Leonardo da Vinci was a brilliant artist, scientist, engineer, mathematician, architect, inventor, and even musician—the archetypal Renaissance man. But he was also a profoundly modern man. Not only did Leonardo invent the empirical scientific method over a century before Galileo and Francis Bacon, but Capra's decade-long study of Leonardo's fabled notebooks reveals that he was a systems thinker centuries before the term was coined. At the very core of Leonardo's science, Capra argues, lies his persistent quest for understanding the nature of life. His science is a science of living forms, of qualities and patterns, radically different from the mechanistic science that emerged 200 years later. Because he saw the world as an integrated whole, Leonardo always applied concepts from one area to illuminate problems in another. His studies of the movement of water informed his ideas about how landscapes are shaped, how sap rises in plants, how air moves over a bird's wing, and how blood flows in the human body. His observations of nature enhanced his art, his drawings were integral to his scientific studies, and he brought art, science, and technology together in his beautiful and elegant mechanical and architectural designs. Capra describes seven defining characteristics of Leonardo da Vinci's genius and includes a list of over forty discoveries he made that weren't rediscovered until centuries later. Capra follows the organizational scheme Leonardo himself intended to use if he ever published his notebooks. So in a sense, this is Leonardo's science as he himself would have presented it. Obviously, we can't all be geniuses on the scale of Leonardo da Vinci. But his persistent endeavor to put life at the very center of his art, science, and design and his recognition that all natural phenomena are fundamentally interconnected and interdependent are important lessons we can learn from. By exploring the mind of the preeminent Renaissance genius, we can gain profound insights into how to address the complex challenges of the 21st century.

Animals ranging from mosquitoes to elephants use their own words to guide humanity to a deeper spiritual awakening. • Contains interviews with 25 professional animal communicators and over 100 different animals and animal spirits. • Provides a thrilling glimpse of the possibilities of direct animal-human dialogue. According to Echo, an Arabian mare, "Humans are beings of love who have forgotten what love is and who they are." Along with a host of other animal communicators, Dawn Baumann Brunke gives animals like Echo a voice--a direct line of communication to the human mind. Through Animal Voices, the animal kingdom delivers a message about deepening our spirituality and reconnecting with the web of life. Our earliest ancestors had an ongoing shamanic dialogue with the animal kingdom, but this ability has been lost to most in the modern world. Brunke provides the techniques to reopen these connections, reminding us that when we are open to communication with animals, we are open to deeper layers of ourselves. The main contributors to this book are actual animals, who reveal themselves to be sentient beings with their own thoughts, emotions, and spiritual reasons for being on the planet. How Brunke overcame her initial skepticism and learned to hear their voices is a fascinating story. Throughout Animal Voices the author integrates her own reflections with those of the animals she interviews. The result is something that will delight animal lovers and force skeptics to reconsider their ideas about the nature of animal consciousness and the possibility of telepathic human-animal communication.

Lifecycles combines the best scientific testimonies about reincarnation with philosophically sound yet accessible arguments about its implications. Lifecycles is the first book to both describe the dynamics of rebirth and explore the ramifications of adopting a reincarnationist perspective. The book begins with a masterful synthesis of recent findings from consciousness research and near-death studies. It includes the work of such eminent therapists and scholars as Stanislav Grof and Dr. Ian Stevenson, and critically surveys the most compelling evidence for rebirth. Lifecycles emphasizes the lessons for self-awareness and spiritual growth inherent in a reincarnationist world view, showing us how we can reconnect with the order, intelligence, and beauty of the universe around us.