| Contents |
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. |
