In Chapter 11, “Surfer’s Ear,” author Peter Rhys-Evans describes a key piece of evidence he says supports his hypothesis of a brief period of semi-aquatic living in early hominins.

In Chapter 5, “The Messiah, the Plague, and Shipwrecks under the City,” author Valerie Trouet tells the tale of wooden structures crafted by Europeans millennia ago and how dendrochronology helped determine their age.

I have taken plants for granted. I pledge to change.

Not only can studying the growth patterns obscured within tree trunks tell us about the past, the field can also help us plan for the future.

The plant awareness revolution will be led by poets, philosophers, and hipsters; not just scientists.

In Chapter 14, author David Nutt describes the opioid crisis currently besetting the US.

Draconian drug laws harm citizens the world over. It’s high time to use sound science to change the landscape of prohibition.

In a small trial of deceased volunteers, a Seattle-based company called Recompose demonstrates that its method for “natural organic reduction” of a human body completely breaks down soft tissue.

The results shed light on a research culture that encourages “unkind and aggressive conditions.”