We want to think of the family as a haven, a sheltered port from the maelstrom of social forces that rip through our lives. Within the family, we like to think, everyone starts out on equal footing.

In this groundbreaking book, Dalton Conley shows us that inequality in families is not the exception but the norm.

This pecking order is not necessarily determined by the natural abilities of each individual, and not even by the intentions or will of the parents. It is determined by the larger social forces that envelop the family.

Is the price of human life going down? Does it cost any less to protect the natural world?

Decisions such as removing arsenic from drinking water or weighing the risks of cell phone use while driving should not be left to back-room bean counters. Such issues call for informed public debate drawing on moral, philosophical, and societal considerations beyond market-based assessments.

The effective functioning of a democratic society—including social, business, and political interactions -- largely depends on trust.

Yet trust remains a fragile and elusive resource in many of the organizations that make up society's building blocks.

Edited by John Brockman, "Curious Minds: How a Child Becomes a Scientist" is a fascinating collection of essays from twenty-seven of the world's most interesting scientists about the moments and events in their childhoods that set them on the paths that would define their lives.

What makes a child decide to become a scientist?

Everyone knows that while different cultures may think about the world differently, they use the same equipment for doing their thinking.

But what if everyone is wrong?

As Richard Nesbitt shows, people actually think about -- and even see -- the world differently because of differing ecologies, social structures, philosophies, and educational systems that date back to ancient Greece and China and that have survived into the modern world.

The creator of the famous "Obedience Experiments," carried out at Yale in the 1960s, and originator of the "six degrees of separation" concept, Stanley Milgram was one of the most innovative scientists of our time.

In this sparkling biography, Thomas Blass captures the colorful personality and pioneering work of a social psychologist who profoundly altered the way we think about human nature.

Nature is full of complex and complicated systems in any shade of color, consistency and complexity, from quasars to quarks, galaxies to snowflakes and microbes to minds.

How and why did the world become so marvelously complex?

Revolutions in evolution are possible because evolution gets stuck from time to time when a large fitness barrier is reached. Evolution waits until massive catastrophes break these barriers or single agents are able to cross them.through a tunneling process. The emergence of complexity has a price.

The End of Oil is a "geologic cautionary tale for a complacent world accustomed to reliable infusions of cheap energy." The book centers around one irrefutable fact: the global supply of oil is being depleted at an alarming rate.

Which energy sources will replace oil, who will control them, and how disruptive to the current world order the transition from one system to the next will be are just a few of the big questions that Paul Roberts attempts to answer in this timely book.

The idea that we might be robots is no longer the stuff of science fiction; many esteemed scientists now believe that humans are merely the hosts for two replicators (genes and memes) that have no interest in us except as conduits for replication.

Accepting and now forcefully responding to this decentering and disturbing idea, Keith Stanovich here provides the tools for the "robot's rebellion."

Some have claimed that "War is too important to be left to the generals," but what about the business executives?

Corporations now sell skills and services that until recently only state militaries possessed. Their products range from trained commando teams to strategic advice from generals.

Private corporations working for profit now sway the course of national and international conflict.