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Nature and Science December 2020 |
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| Counting: How We Use Numbers to Decide What Matters by Deborah StoneThe big idea: Numbers can't be objective, argues political scientist Deborah Stone as she examines the cultural assumptions and social norms underlying the data we rely on to make policy decisions.
Topics include: How unemployment is measured; the ever-evolving race categories on the U.S. Census; the increasing role of automated systems in assessing everything from credit scores to recidivism rates.
Food for thought: "If every number begins with a judgment, and if we allow numbers to determine people's fates, we should hold numbers to the same ethical standards we hold our judges to." |
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| Molly: The True Story of the Amazing Dog Who Rescues Cats by Colin ButcherMeet: Molly, a rescue dog trained to track down lost pets; Molly's human partner, Colin, the former police officer who started the UK Pet Detective Agency, which has so far reunited 74 cats, 6 dogs and one tortoise with their families.
Read it for: Molly and Colin's heartwarming bond, details of Molly's rigorous on-the-job training, and an eye-opening tale of how they tracked down an Eastern European dognapping ring.
Also available in eAudiobook on CloudLibrary |
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| Into the Planet: My Life as a Cave Diver by Jill HeinerthWho: Canadian cave diver, explorer, and filmmaker Jill Heinerth, who proudly claims that adventure is in her DNA.
Where she's been: Florida's extensive network of caverns; Mexico's Sistema Huautla, the Western Hemisphere's deepest cave network; the interior of Antarctic iceberg B-15, at the time the largest free-floating object on Earth.
You might also like: Julie Hauserman's Drawn to the Deep; William Stone's Beyond the Deep. |
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| The Plant Messiah: Adventures in Search of the World's Rarest Species by Carlos MagdalenaMeet: Carlos Magdalena, dubbed "El MesÃas de las Plantas" by the media, who travels the world to save rare plants from extinction by propagating them.
Read it for: The author's enthusiasm for tropical plants, his unconventional career path and his travels to Mauritius, the Nazca Plains of Peru, and the Australian outback.
About the author: Carlos Magdalena is a senior botanical horticulturist at the Royal Botanic Garden at Kew, England. |
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| Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl; illustrated by Billy RenklWhat it is: A lyrical collection by New York Times contributor Margaret Renkl, containing 112 autobiographical vignettes about the natural world.
Reviewers say: "A jeweled patchwork of nature and culture" (NPR).
Want a taste? "The cycle of life might as well be called the cycle of death: everything that lives will die, and everything that dies will be eaten. Bluebirds eat insects, snakes eat bluebirds, hawks eat snakes, owls eat hawks. This is the way wildness works, and I know it." |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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