The Goldberg Center and Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective are excited to announce the publication of two new iBooks which are available for free on the Origins web site and also on iTunes. They are as follows: 

 

This book—part of the Yesterday & Today series from Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective — explores the role of food, disease, science, and technology in the human past and present. With the human population currently soaring past 7 billion, the question of how to feed, manage, and keep healthy this mass of people is more pressing than ever. The chapters here offer invaluable context and knowledge about the human social and political systems, the scientific and technological discoveries, and the agricultural and medical practices that have kept humans alive and thriving in previous centuries. As we confront the challenges of the twenty-first century, we need more than ever the essential insights that past human experience provide for solving today’s most urgent global problems of food, population, disease, medicine, and technology.

Read more.
 

 

 

The relationship between humans and the environment has never been more fiercely discussed and debated than in recent years. Yet, from our very first steps on this planet, humans have ceaselessly been required to work with, adapt to, and often suffer from the climate, environment, and other living organisms around them. This book—part of the Yesterday & Today series from Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective — explores the past and present of human-nature interactions:  from water, drought/flood, and fishing in the U.S. West, Australia, the Jordan River, and the Nile; to the many ways that climate change has transformed people across the centuries; our endless search for energy and power; and global efforts at nature conservation. The lessons we learn about the mutual embeddedness of humans and environment in the past may well save us today.