Bøger af David Barrie

A book about animal navigation - how creatures, great and small, find their way and how brilliantly they manage without benefit of maps or instruments - and what lessons there are for human beings.

In the tradition of Dava Sobel's Longitude comes this dramatic tale of invention and discovery--an eloquent elegy to one of the most important navigational instruments ever created, and to the daring mariners who used it to explore, conquer, and map the world.Barrie takes readers straight to the helm of some of history's most important expeditions, interweaving these heroic tales with the account of his own transatlantic passage as a young man. A heady mix of adventure, science, mathematics, and derring-do, Sextant is infused with a sense of wonder and discovery. At once a dramatic history of maritime endeavor and a love letter to the sea and sky, it is timeless storytelling at its best.

“Just astonishing . . . Our natural navigational capacities are no match for those of the supernavigators in this eye-opening book.”—Frans de Waal, The New York Times Book Review Publisher's note: Supernavigators was published in the UK under the title Incredible Journeys. Animals plainly know where they’re going, but how they get there has remained surprisingly mysterious—until now. In Supernavigators, award-winning author David Barrie catches us up on the cutting-edge science. Here are astounding animals of every stripe: Dung beetles that steer by the light of the Milky Way. Ants and bees that rely on patterns of light invisible to humans. Sea turtles and moths that find their way using Earth’s magnetic field. Humpback whales that swim thousands of miles while holding a rocksteady course. Birds that can locate their nests on a tiny island after crisscrossing an ocean. The age of viewing animals as unthinking drones is over. As Supernavigators makes clear, a stunning array of species command senses and skills—and arguably, types of intelligence—beyond our own. Weaving together interviews with leading animal behaviorists and the groundbreaking discoveries of Nobel Prize–winning scientists, David Barrie reveals these wonders in a whole new light.

This is the first book specifically devoted to exploring one of the longest-running religious, social and political controversies in nineteenth-century Britain ¿ the sixty five year campaign to legalise marriage between a man and his deceased wife¿s sister. The issue captured the political, religious and literary imagination of the United Kingdom and provoked huge parliamentary and religious debate and aroused national, ecclesiastical and sexual passions. The campaign to legalise such unions, and the widespread opposition it provoked, spoke to issues not just of incest, sex and the family, but also to national identity and political and religious governance.

In the tradition of Dava Sobel's `Longitude' comes sailing expert David Barrie's compelling and dramatic tale of invention and discovery - an eloquent elegy to one of the most important navigational instruments ever created, and the daring mariners who used it to explore, conquer, and map the world.