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Welcome to our website! We hope
you will be led by this website to fresh and radical
perspectives on nature, science, and technology.
2009 Summer Courses. We will offer two summer courses this year.
The general public course, Experiencing Wholeness in Nature, will be held from June 21 to June 27. For more information, click here.
For the second time, we are offering a course for science teachers, Bringing Science to Life: Experiential Learning in Science. This course will be held from July 5 to July 11. For more information, click here.
Two new articles about evolution.
See In Context #21
for fresh perspectives on the plumage patterns of birds, the
"morphodynamics" of dinosaurs, and the evolution of "evolution." There is
room, it turns out, for radical re-thinking about the driving forces of
evolutionary history and the relations between species.
 Nontarget Effects of Genetic
Manipulation: A Growing Database
The Nature Institute is now steadily expanding a
project designed to set the public debate about genetic engineering
upon a more accessible scientific foundation. Distilling a voluminous
technical literature, we are summarizing on our website both the intended
and unintended consequences of transgenic experiments. The emerging
picture tells a dramatic story - one that, to date, has scarcely begun
to inform the public conversation about genetic engineering.
Nontarget effects have proven both extensive and wildly
unpredictable. The evidence for their occurrence, while mostly buried
in the technical literature, is not disputable or even particularly
controversial. It's simply not widely known. Once it is known, the
frequently heard claim that genetic manipulation of organisms is
a "precise science" without dramatic risks will either be
voiced no more or will be recognized as dishonest. To view this web
resource, click here - or click on "Nontarget Effects of
Genetic Manipulation" in the menu at left. |
 A New Book from Nature Institute Staff
"Craig Holdrege and Steve Talbott's analysis of genetic engineering is the smartest, most original, and most compelling I have seen anywhere, in journalism or academia." (Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma)
The University Press of Kentucky has just released our new book, Beyond Biotechnology: The Barren Promise of Genetic Engineering. The book is in the Press' "Culture of the Land" series, whose editorial advisors include Wendell Berry, Bill McKibben, Wes Jackson, Vandana Shiva, and others. As Sheldon Krimsky (Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning, Tufts University) describes the book, "The authors offer a refreshing style of scientific interpretation and have brought the discussion of the issues to a new level by making excellent use of current scientific findings that disclose how genes operate in vivo and by drawing on bioethical discussions."
To find out more about this book or to order it, click here. |
Devices of the Soul: Battling for Our Selves in the Age of Machines.
You can now order Nature Institute senior researcher Steve Talbott's book of that title from our bookstore. Here's what one reviewer wrote about it: "Devices of the Soul is, first, a careful and illuminating examination of technological society by a man conversant with its sources and mechanics; second, a calm, elegant but unrelenting polemic against the particular disorder and infirmity engendered by it; and third, a series of intimations toward the recovery of health. In all three guises, the book is a valuable contribution" (Paul J. Cella III, The New Atlantis). Click here for details.
The Work of Martin Wagenschein: The Nature Institute is translating some of the writings of the German science educator and physicist Martin Wagenschein. To read about Wagenschein and to access the translations we have done so far, click here.
How Shall We Live? The way we experience ourselves in the world - our habits of perception and the relation between our sense of Self and sense of the Other - are decisively important for everything from the achievement of a truly adequate science to the restoration of social health to the establishment of an environmentally responsible ethics. Human progress in all fields depends upon how we engage the phenomena around us. This is why the book Being on Earth: Practice In Tending the Appearances, a full-text, online document, is so important. Written by physicist Georg Maier, the late philosopher Ronald Brady, and the late physicist Stephen Edelglass, it explores what it means for us to be on earth as knowers, as participants in earth's various ecological settings, and in company with one another. The book breaks down the barriers between fact and value, between science and aesthetics.
* (New:) Being on Earth is now available as a 196-page softcover paperback from Logos Verlag in Berlin. The price is 40.5 euros (approximately 63 US dollars). You can order the book over the internet by clicking here.
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A thought-provoking publication
The
Giraffe's Long Neck: From Evolutionary Fable
to Whole Organism
by Craig Holdrege
A fresh look at the giraffe and evolution.
To find out more about this book, click
here. |
Can Biotech Feed the World?
In this article Craig Holdrege describes the broader
ecological, agricultural, and social context of feeding
the hungry. The often heard claim that biotechnology
is needed to feed the world's growing population shows
itself to be rooted more in hype than in reality.
Click
here to access the article.
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