Audiobooks by Henry Gee

The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire: Why Our Species is on the Edge of Extinction

'A marvellously engaging writer' - The Times In 'Humans Are Doomed To Go Extinct', an article in Scientific American published in November 2021, veteran Nature editor Dr Henry Gee predicted that Homo sapiens is on a rapid one-way ride to extinction. The article provoked media coverage and comment around the world. In The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire, Gee expands the themes of his much-discussed article to book length, charting both the rise as well as the fall of humans. After 10,000 years of exponential growth, the rate of human population increase is falling, and rapidly, from a peak of more than 2 per cent a year in 1968 to a shade over 1 per cent today. At this rate, in 10,000 years' time, our species will be extinct. Rapid climate change is threatening the capacity of human beings to survive on this planet. But there are internal stresses, too. The global economy has been stagnant for twenty years, and across the world, humans are not having children as often as they once did. The average human sperm count has been in decline for more than half a century. The reason for the decline is a mystery. Gee paints a picture of extinction within the next 10,000 years - and suggests ways that our exceptional species might avoid its fate.

Henry Gee (Author), Henry Gee, TBD (Narrator)

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Eine (sehr) kurze Geschichte des Lebens

Dieses Hörbuch macht die komplexe Entstehung des Lebens auf unserem Planeten erstmals für alle verständlich. Dabei stand das Leben auf der Erde schon mehrfach kurz vor der Auslöschung. Es gab zwei Millionen Jahre dauernde Vulkanausbrüche und mehrfach schwere Asteroideneinschläge. Katastrophen, ohne die allerdings etwa die Ausbreitung der Säugetiere nicht möglich gewesen wäre. Henry Gee schildert unterhaltsam und anschaulich, wie sich das Leben immer wieder durchsetzte: Schwämme filterten 400 Millionen Jahre lang das Meereswasser, bis das Meer bewohnbar war, und langwierige 20 Millionen Jahre brauchten die Pflanzen, um sich auch an der toxischen Erdoberfläche etablieren zu können. Am Ende steht die Erkenntnis: Das Leben findet immer einen Weg.-

Henry Gee (Author), Marlen Ulonska (Narrator)

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A (Very) Short History of Life On Earth: 4.6 Billion Years in 12 Chapters

‘A dazzling, beguiling story . . . told at an exhilarating pace’ Literary Review 'Henry Gee makes the kaleidoscopically changing canvas of life understandable and exciting. Who will enjoy reading this book? - Everybody!' Jared Diamond, author of Guns, Germs, and Steel For billions of years, Earth was an inhospitably alien place – covered with churning seas, slowly crafting its landscape by way of incessant volcanic eruptions, the atmosphere in a constant state of chemical flux. And yet, despite facing literally every conceivable setback that living organisms could encounter, life has been extinguished and picked itself up to evolve again. Life has learned and adapted and continued through the billions of years that followed. It has weathered fire and ice. Slimes begat sponges, who through billions of years of complex evolution and adaptation grew a backbone, braved the unknown of pitiless shores, and sought an existence beyond the sea. From that first foray to the spread of early hominids who later became Homo sapiens, life has persisted, undaunted. A (Very) Short History of Life is an enlightening story of survival, of persistence, illuminating the delicate balance within which life has always existed, and continues to exist today. It is our planet like you’ve never seen it before. Life teems through Henry Gee’s lyrical prose – colossal supercontinents drift, collide, and coalesce, fashioning the face of the planet as we know it today. Creatures are engagingly personified, from ‘gregarious’ bacteria populating the seas to duelling dinosaurs in the Triassic period to magnificent mammals with the future in their (newly evolved) grasp. Those long extinct, almost alien early life forms are resurrected in evocative detail. Life’s evolutionary steps – from the development of a digestive system to the awe of creatures taking to the skies in flight – are conveyed with an alluring, up-close intimacy.

Henry Gee (Author), Henry Gee (Narrator)

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