Jan's Reviews > Big History: From the Big Bang to the Present

If you like premise of Daniel Quinn’s Ismael but found the tone somewhat off putting, you might want to try Big History. Instead of beginning with mankind’s recorded history, this historian starts her story 13.7 billion years ago with the big bang and string theory and dark matter.

We learn to appreciate the Gaia theory as all life forms on earth share the same genetic code, the same biochemical network. If we telescope the age of the earth to one 24 hour period, humans would appear less than two minutes before midnight and agriculture and cities would appear just a few seconds before midnight.

The rise of man was fueled by agriculture, cities, and later industrialization and technology. The major unresolved challenge obviously is how do to keep our growth from outstripping our finite resources.

A very thoughtful and well-reasoned book.