Social Creature

Author: Tara Isabella Burton
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0525436413
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
One of the Best Books of the Year: Janet Maslin, The New York Times Vulture NPR "Social Creature is a wicked original with echoes of the greats (Patricia Highsmith, Gillian Flynn)." —Janet Maslin, The New York Times For readers of Gillian Flynn and Donna Tartt, a dark, propulsive and addictive debut thriller, splashed with all the glitz and glitter of New York City. They go through both bottles of champagne right there on the High Line, with nothing but the stars over them... They drink and Lavinia tells Louise about all the places they will go together, when they finish their stories, when they are both great writers-to Paris and to Rome and to Trieste... Lavinia will never go. She is going to die soon. Louise has nothing. Lavinia has everything. After a chance encounter, the two spiral into an intimate, intense, and possibly toxic friendship. A Talented Mr. Ripley for the digital age, this seductive story takes a classic tale of obsession and makes it irresistibly new.

Social Creatures

Author: Clifton P. Flynn
Publisher: Lantern Books
ISBN: 1590561236
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 458

Book Description
In more than thirty essays, Social Animals examines the role of animals in human society. Collected from a wide range of periodicals and books, these important works of scholarship examine such issues as how animal shelter workers view the pets in their care, why some people hoard animals, animals and women who experience domestic abuse, philosophical and feminist analyses of our moral obligations toward animals, and many other topics.

The Social Animal

Author: David Brooks
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0812979370
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 450

Book Description
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER With unequaled insight and brio, New York Times columnist David Brooks has long explored and explained the way we live. Now Brooks turns to the building blocks of human flourishing in a multilayered, profoundly illuminating work grounded in everyday life. This is the story of how success happens, told through the lives of one composite American couple, Harold and Erica. Drawing on a wealth of current research from numerous disciplines, Brooks takes Harold and Erica from infancy to old age, illustrating a fundamental new understanding of human nature along the way: The unconscious mind, it turns out, is not a dark, vestigial place, but a creative one, where most of the brain’s work gets done. This is the realm where character is formed and where our most important life decisions are made—the natural habitat of The Social Animal. Brooks reveals the deeply social aspect of our minds and exposes the bias in modern culture that overemphasizes rationalism, individualism, and IQ. He demolishes conventional definitions of success and looks toward a culture based on trust and humility. The Social Animal is a moving intellectual adventure, a story of achievement and a defense of progress. It is an essential book for our time—one that will have broad social impact and will change the way we see ourselves and the world.

The Social Animal

Author: Elliot Aronson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Social psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Book Description

The Social Lives of Animals

Author: Ashley Ward
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541600843
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 346

Book Description
A rat will go out of its way to help a stranger in need. Lions have adopted the calves of their prey. Ants farm fungus in cooperatives. Why do we continue to believe that life in the animal kingdom is ruled by competition? In The Social Lives of Animals, biologist Ashley Ward takes us on a wild tour across the globe as he searches for a more accurate picture of how animals build societies. Ward drops in on a termite mating ritual (while his guides snack on the subjects), visits freelance baboon goatherds, and swims with a mixed family of whales and dolphins. Along the way, Ward shows that the social impulses we’ve long thought separated humans from other animals might actually be our strongest connection to them. Insightful, engaging, and often hilarious, The Social Lives of Animals demonstrates that you can learn more about animals by studying how they work together than by how they compete.

For Small Creatures Such as We

Author: Sasha Sagan
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 073521879X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 305

Book Description
"A charming book, ringing with the joy of existence." --Richard Dawkins The perfect gift for a loved one or for yourself, For Small Creatures Such as We is part memoir, part guidebook, and part social history, a luminous celebration of Earth's marvels that require no faith in order to be believed. Sasha Sagan was raised by secular parents, the astronomer Carl Sagan and the writer and producer Ann Druyan. They taught her that the natural world and vast cosmos are full of profound beauty, and that science reveals truths more wondrous than any myth or fable. When Sagan herself became a mother, she began her own hunt for the natural phenomena behind our most treasured occasions--from births to deaths, holidays to weddings, anniversaries, and more--growing these roots into a new set of rituals for her young daughter that honor the joy and significance of each experience without relying on a religious framework. As Sagan shares these rituals, For Small Creatures Such as We becomes a moving tribute to a father, a newborn daughter, a marriage, and the natural world--a celebration of life itself, and the power of our families and beliefs to bring us together.

Social

Author: Matthew D. Lieberman
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307889114
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 390

Book Description
We are profoundly social creatures--more than we know. In Social, renowned psychologist Matthew Lieberman explores groundbreaking research in social neuroscience revealing that our need to connect with other people is even more fundamental, more basic, than our need for food or shelter. Because of this, our brain uses its spare time to learn about the social world--other people and our relation to them. It is believed that we must commit 10,000 hours to master a skill. According to Lieberman, each of us has spent 10,000 hours learning to make sense of people and groups by the time we are ten. Social argues that our need to reach out to and connect with others is a primary driver behind our behavior. We believe that pain and pleasure alone guide our actions. Yet, new research using fMRI--including a great deal of original research conducted by Lieberman and his UCLA lab--shows that our brains react to social pain and pleasure in much the same way as they do to physical pain and pleasure. Fortunately, the brain has evolved sophisticated mechanisms for securing our place in the social world. We have a unique ability to read other people’s minds, to figure out their hopes, fears, and motivations, allowing us to effectively coordinate our lives with one another. And our most private sense of who we are is intimately linked to the important people and groups in our lives. This wiring often leads us to restrain our selfish impulses for the greater good. These mechanisms lead to behavior that might seem irrational, but is really just the result of our deep social wiring and necessary for our success as a species. Based on the latest cutting edge research, the findings in Social have important real-world implications. Our schools and businesses, for example, attempt to minimalize social distractions. But this is exactly the wrong thing to do to encourage engagement and learning, and literally shuts down the social brain, leaving powerful neuro-cognitive resources untapped. The insights revealed in this pioneering book suggest ways to improve learning in schools, make the workplace more productive, and improve our overall well-being.

Social Beings

Author: Susan T. Fiske
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119492734
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 592

Book Description
It is a nearly universal truth that people need people; humans have adapted to life with other humans, and the interactions and relationships that result are the most relevant adaptation environment. This book explores the core motives and goals that shape these interactions with others, with the self, and collectively as a group; in other words, “Why do people do what they do?” A brief overview of the field’s unifying themes—belonging, understanding, controlling, enhancing self, and trusting—gives way to a detailed exploration of the human condition as well as the techniques used to study and understand it. By delving into the motivations behind attraction, helping, bias, persuasion, aggression, and more, this book helps students grasp the complex interplay of internal and external cues and influences that inform every interaction. An emphasis on real-world applications relates social psychology principles to everyday life, and this latest revision has been updated with the most recent research and trends to provide an accurate picture of the state of the field. Blending traditional topics with new developments in an informal, readable style makes this the ideal text to ignite students’ deeper interest and full engagement with social psychology concepts.

Social Animals

Author: Neoxenok
Publisher: Trigg Publishing
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 394

Book Description
Becoming an employee for the SCP Foundation is no small thing. For Dr. Joseph Taylor, it was the moment his life changed forever. Aside from the secrecy and focus on security, it didn't seem that different from what he would have expected from a secretive organization. The first project he and a team of colleagues are given involves an anomalous wormhole: a gateway to a parallel Earth. It does not take long until it becomes apparent just how dangerous this other world is. It is so dangerous, in fact, that Dr. Taylor and his colleagues may be moved off the project entirely as they scrap their plans for the new facility Dr. Taylor was supposed to be a part of. However, when a Foundation prisoner escapes during the initial containment operations of the anomaly, Dr. Taylor sees an opportunity. Eager to prove his worth, impress his superiors, and advance his career, Dr. Taylor volunteers to find the prisoner and study this world in detail before the wormhole is permanently closed. Now, Dr. Taylor must find the escaped prisoner, study how this world came to be the way it is and the all-powerful architects of the new shape this world has taken, and return home without being found. If he fails, our world may suffer a fate worse than total extinction.

The Secret Social Lives of Reptiles

Author: J. Sean Doody
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421440679
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 437

Book Description
Revealing the secrets of reptilian social relationships through original quantitative research, field studies, laboratory experiments, and careful analysis of the literature, The Secret Social Lives of Reptiles elevates these fascinating animals to key players in the science of behavioral ecology.