The Axemaker’s Gift

Technology’s Capture and Control of Our Minds and Culture

With James Burke

At the close of this century of creativity and discovery, humanists and scientists alike wonder: How could human beings in all their brilliance –those “axemakers” with the genius to invent, lead, inspire, heal, design – have brought the world to the brink of destruction? The answers can be found in this imaginative and brilliantly informed double-edged history of human culture.

“The book is a triumph. I don’t think there’s been anything like it in its combination of erudition of the highest order and of penetrating forward thinking of similar quality.” —Robert Cialdini, author of Influence

“… comprises millions of years of human history into an exciting page turner. Familiar events emerge from the narrative with sparkling freshness, interpreted by the authors’ keen intelligence and vast knowledge of human behavior. It is a book that defines some of the central issues of our times.” —Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, author of Flow

“This account of the development of human culture is a genuine tour de force. Burke and Ornstein’s description of the emergence of writing—enabling the manipulation and modeling of the world in radical new ways— is an especially brilliant synthesis.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“A detailed original and persuasive reading of cultural and intellectual history.” —Los Angeles Times

“This fascinating new book tells a  gripping story about how we humans have used our minds throughout history in a way that is led to both our biggest successes and our biggest problems.” —Thomas W Malone, MIT

Humanity on a Tightrope

Thoughts on Empathy, Family, and Big Changes for a Viable Future

With Paul Ehrlich

When we think of family, we most often think of our sisters and brothers, our cousins and grandparents, rather than our world family or even our community connections. We still identify with our differences more than our similarities, unless it’s convenient to do otherwise. Here, two seasoned thinkers tackle the question of family and what it means to us now and how it might change to help us address the problems that affect us all. Using specific examples throughout the work, they present a unique approach to what it means to belong to one human family. 

“… a blueprint for our survival in this globalized world. We got away with attitudes of ‘us versus them’ in the past, we can no longer get away with those attitudes today.” —Jared Diamond, UCLA, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of best-selling books including Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse

“In this superb book, Ehrlich and Ornstein explore the evolutionary biology brain science anthropology and psychology of how a ‘them’ can become an ‘us,’ how we can expand our sense of empathy, family, and relatedness. But the book is more than merely a masterful and readable review of the subject. It is also a clarion call about what will happen if we don’t get better at turning ‘them’ into ‘us.’ This is a deeply important book.” —Robert M. Sapolsky, author of Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers and A Primate’s Memoir

“Ehrlich and Ornstein , not for the first time, have cut to the heart of the problem we face. And do not for a moment think it can’t be done… we can work globally, but we’ve got to think through precisely the problems outlined here.” —Bill McKibben, author of Eaarth: Marking a life on a Tough New Planet

New World New Mind

Moving Toward Conscious Evolution

With Paul Ehrlich

When we think of family, we most often think of our sisters and brothers, our cousins and grandparents, rather than our world family or even our community connections. We still identify with our differences more than our similarities, unless it’s convenient to do otherwise. Here, two seasoned thinkers tackle the question of family and what it means to us now and how it might change to help us address the problems that affect us all. Using specific examples throughout the work, they present a unique approach to what it means to belong to one human family. 

Kindle edition available

“It’s a rare book that changes people’s lives, rarest still is a book that changes the world. In New World New Mind Ornstein and Paul Ehrlich not only have the audacity to attempt both things, but they offer just enough visionary rethinking and nuts and bolts research to carry it off.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“If we don’t act on this information, our grandchildren may never forgive us.” —Dan Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence and Vital Lies

“A brilliant book … we have to learn to think differently… this new way of thinking should begin in schools, colleges, and be taught on popular TV programs. There is still time to save ourselves if we listen to authors like these.” —Doris Lessing, British novelist and writer, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

“We will never look at our world and ourselves in the same way again after reading this book. New World New Mind is an astonishing synthesis of biological, social, and historical knowledge, one that points the direction for the future evolution of our society.” —Terrance Leighton, University of California at Berkeley.

“An extraordinary undertaking. Seldom have I read the book that combines it so effectively so many strands of human experience and interest—all beautifully blended.” —Norman Cousins, author of Anatomy of an Illness

“Should become required reading for all those who want to know where humanity has come from and the changes we now need to make to face our future.” —Donald C. Johansen, author of Lucy

“We shall have to bring mind and the world together, with proper respect and understanding of both. If we are to maintain any hope of human salvation on a beautiful planet. This book by two great humanists, one an expert on mind one on the natural world, points the way. Let us all, read and act.” —Stephen Jay Gould, Harvard University, author of The Mismeasure of Man and Panda’s Thumb.