Power

List of Figures
List of Sidebars
Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. Power in Nature: From Mitochondria to Emotion and Deception
The Basis of Life’s Power
Power and Bodies
Power and Behaviors
Proto-Human Powers

2. Power in the Pleistocene: On Spears, Fires, Furs, Words, and Flutes — And Why Men Are Such Power-Hogs Hands and Stone
The Fire Ape
Skins
From Grunts to Sentences
Gender Power
The Power of Art

3. Power in the Holocene: The Rise of Social Inequality
Gerdening, Big Men, and Chiefs: Power from Food Production
Plow and Plunder: Kings and the First States
Herding Cattle, Flogging Slaves: Power from Domestication
Stories of Our Ancestors: Religion and Power
Tools for Wording: Communication Technologies
Numbers on Money
Pathologies of Power

4. Power in the Anthropocene: The Wonderful World of Fossil Fuels
It’s All Energy
The Coal Train
Oil, Cars, Airplanes, and the New Middle Class
Oil-Age Wars and Weapons
Electrifying!
The Human Superorganism

5. Overpowered: The Fine Mess We’ve Gotten Ourselves Into
Climate Chaos and Its Remedies
Disappearance of Wild Nature
Resource Depletion
Soaring Economic Inequality
Pollution
Overpopulation and Overconsumption
Global Debt Bubble
Weapons of Mass Destruction

6. Optimum Power: Sustaining Our Power Over Time
Involuntary Power Limits: Death, Extinction, Collapse
Self-Limitation in Natural and Human-Engineered Systems
Taboos, Souls, and Enlightenment
Taxes, Regulations, Activism, and Rationing: Power Restraint in the Modern World
Games, Disarmament, and Degrowth
Denial, Optimism Bias, and Irrational Exuberance

7. The Future of Power: Learning to Live Happily Within Limits
All Against All
Trade-Offs Along the Path of Self-Restraint
The Fate of the Superorganism
Questioning Technology
Learning to Live with Less Energy and Stuff
Lessening Inequality
Population: Lowering It and Keeping It Steady
Fighting Power with Power
Long-Term Power Through Beauty, Spirituality, and Happiness

Notes
Index
About the Author
About New Society Publishers