{"product_id":"world-of-patterns-9781421443447","title":"World of Patterns","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA comprehensive account of the methods of knowledge production throughout human history and across the globe.   The idea that the world can be understood through patterns and the principles that govern them is one of the most important human insightsit may also be our greatest survival strategy. Our search for patterns and principles began 40,000 years ago, when striped patterns were engraved on mammoths' bones to keep track of the moon's phases. What routes did human knowledge take to grow from these humble beginnings through many detours and dead ends into modern understandings of nature and culture? In this work of unprecedented scope, Rens Bod removes the Western natural sciences from their often-central role to bring us the first global history of human knowledge. Having sketched the history of the humanities in his ground-breaking A New History of the Humanities, Bod now adopts a broader perspective, stepping beyond classical antiquity back to the Stone Age to answer the question\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eWorld of Patterns\u003c\/i\u003e is an impressive work, not only thanks to its truly global grasp but also because it spans huge periods of time, from the Paleolithic to the beginning of the nineteenth century, and furthermore because it covers a wide variety of knowledge fields, from the natural sciences to the human sciences—among them astronomy, mathematics, medicine, history, philology, linguistics, literary sciences, and jurisprudence.\u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eIsis: A Journal of the History of Science Society\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003ePreface: The Wonder of Knowledge\u003cbr\u003eIntroduction. Understanding the World through Patterns and Principles\u003cbr\u003eChapter 1. The Awareness of Patterns: Prehistory\u003cbr\u003eChapter 2. The Explosion of Patterns and the Awareness of Principles: Early Antiquity\u003cbr\u003eChapter 3. The Explosion of Principles and the Awareness of Deduction: Classical Antiquity\u003cbr\u003eChapter 4. The Reduction of Principles: Postclassical Period\u003cbr\u003eChapter 5. The Discovery of Patterns in Deductions: The Modern Era\u003cbr\u003eConclusion. The Origin, Growth, and Future of Knowledge\u003cbr\u003eAcknowledgments\u003cbr\u003eNotes\u003cbr\u003eBibliography\u003cbr\u003eIndex\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Johns Hopkins University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48739136405847,"sku":"9781421443447","price":45.9,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/world-of-patterns-9781421443447","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}