Harvard Square

Virtual Event: Philip Plait
2023-04-19 18:00 (America/New_York)
presents
Under Alien Skies:
A Sightseer’s Guide to the Universe

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, and the Harvard Library welcome author and astronomer PHILIP PLAIT for a discussion of his new book Under Alien Skies: A Sightseer’s Guide to the Universe.
Contribute to Support Harvard Book Store
While payment is not required, we are suggesting a $5 contribution to support this author series, our staff, and the future of Harvard Book Store—a locally owned, independently run Cambridge institution. In addition, by purchasing a copy of Under Alien Skies on harvard.com, you support indie bookselling and the writing community during this difficult time.

About Under Alien Skies
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to travel the universe? How would Saturn’s rings look from a spaceship sailing just above them? If you were falling into a black hole, what’s the last thing you’d see before getting spaghettified? While traveling in person to most of these amazing worlds may not be possible―yet―the would-be space traveler need not despair: you can still take the scenic route through the galaxy with renowned astronomer and science communicator Philip Plait.
On this lively, immersive adventure through the cosmos, Plait draws ingeniously on both the latest scientific research and his prodigious imagination to transport you to ten of the most spectacular sights outer space has to offer. In vivid, inventive scenes informed by rigorous science―injected with a dose of Plait’s trademark humor―Under Alien Skies places you on the surface of alien worlds, from our own familiar Moon to the far reaches of our solar system and beyond. Try launching yourself onto a two-hundred-meter asteroid, or stargazing from the rim of an ancient volcano on a planet where, from the place you stand, it is eternally late afternoon. Experience the sudden onset of lunar nightfall, the disorientation of walking―or, rather, shuffling―when you weigh almost nothing, the irritation of jagged regolith dust. Glimpse the frigid mountains and plains of Pluto and the cake-like exterior of a comet called 67P. On a planet trillions of miles from Earth, glance down to see the strange, beautiful shadows cast by a hundred thousand stars.
For the aspiring extraterrestrial citizen, casual space tourist, or curious armchair traveler, Plait is an illuminating, always-entertaining guide to the most otherworldly views in our universe.
Praise for Under Alien Skies
“A rollicking, wondrous, and awe-inspiring introduction to the universe. Philip Plait’s writing transports us to other worlds and in the process helps us to appreciate our own world.” —John Green, author of The Fault in Our Stars and The Anthropocene Reviewed
“Reading Under Alien Skies is the next-best thing to traveling through space and time. Philip Plait is a funny, warm, and welcoming guide to the most marvelous places in the universe . . . You’ll experience what it would be like to actually be there, while learning some of the most mind-expanding science humans have ever figured out. When you look up at the night sky, you’ll think of this book and smile.” —Laura Helmuth, editor-in-chief of Scientific American
“Philip Plait takes us to nearby worlds and star systems far, far away, where we do plenty of exploration, a bit of astronomical science, and a lot of marveling. But it’s the descriptions of your spaceships and suits that will keep you strapped in and reading on. His flights of science fiction fantasy are scientific and absolutely spectacular. Enjoy the rides.” —Bill Nye, CEO, The Planetary Society
“As charming and personal as it is detailed and accurate, Under Alien Skies is a wonderful guide to what we know about the universe and how we know it.” —Zach Weinersmith, creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal and New York Times best-selling co-author of Soonish

Ulbe Bosma at Harvard Book Store
2023-04-19 19:00 | Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA, 02138, United States
presenting
The World of Sugar:
How the Sweet Stuff Transformed Our Politics,
Health, and Environment over 2,000 Years

Harvard Book Store welcomes ULBE BOSMA—Professor of International Comparative Social History at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam—for a discussion of his new book The World of Sugar: How the Sweet Stuff Transformed Our Politics, Health, and Environment over 2,000 Years.
A Return to In-Person Events
Harvard Book Store is excited to be back to in-person programming. To ensure the safety and comfort of everyone in attendance, the following Covid-19 safety protocols will be in place at all of our Harvard Book Store events until further notice:

Face coverings are required of all staff and attendees when inside the store. Masks must snugly cover nose and mouth.

About The World of Sugar
For most of history, humans did without refined sugar. After all, it serves no necessary purpose in our diets, and extracting it from plants takes hard work and ingenuity. Granulated sugar was first produced in India around the sixth century BC, yet for almost 2,500 years afterward sugar remained marginal in the diets of most people. Then, suddenly, it was everywhere. How did sugar find its way into almost all the food we eat, fostering illness and ecological crisis along the way?
The World of Sugar begins with the earliest evidence of sugar production. Through the Middle Ages, traders brought small quantities of the precious white crystals to rajahs, emperors, and caliphs. But after sugar crossed the Mediterranean to Europe, where cane could not be cultivated, demand spawned a brutal quest for supply. European cravings were satisfied by enslaved labor; two-thirds of the 12.5 million Africans taken across the Atlantic were destined for sugar plantations. By the twentieth century, sugar was a major source of calories in diets across Europe and North America.
Sugar transformed life on every continent, creating and destroying whole cultures through industrialization, labor migration, and changes in diet. Sugar made fortunes, corrupted governments, and shaped the policies of technocrats. And it provoked freedom cries that rang with world-changing consequences. In Ulbe Bosma’s definitive telling, to understand sugar’s past is to glimpse the origins of our own world of corn syrup and ethanol and begin to see the threat that a not-so-simple commodity poses to our bodies, our environment, and our communities.
Praise for The World of Sugar
“The world history of sugar and the world history of capitalism are tightly linked to one another. Ulbe Bosma, in this first truly global account of a most crucial commodity, takes us to the fields of Indian peasants, the countinghouses of Chinese merchants, the monopolizing efforts of New York industrialists, and the rebellions of enslaved sugar workers in Cuba to chart how something as mundane as sugar came to play a crucial role in the making of the world we inhabit today. Attentive to local specificities as much as to Earth-spanning connections, to culture and capital, power and poverty, this book is global history at its best.” ―Sven Beckert, author of Empire of Cotton: A Global History
“Sugar may play a unique role in the slow-motion tragedy that is the worldwide epidemic of obesity and diabetes. The World of Sugar is a remarkably researched, comprehensive, and indispensable book for everyone who wishes to understand how sugar and the sugar industry have shaped the world in which we live.” ―Gary Taubes, author of The Case Against Sugar
“How is it that a chemical that has no nutritional value, that is inherently poisonous, that is responsible for morbidity and mortality, and that is breaking the health care budget of every developed and developing country is the seminal thread running through human history for the last 3,000 years? The World of Sugar narrates the critical events that made sugar the dominant force in world politics from antiquity to our own era. In this magisterial history, Bosma offers a much-needed cautionary tale about how addiction leads to societal downfall. As we watch newer addictions destroy the climate and Earth’s inhabitants, we would all do well to learn the hard lessons of sugar.” ―Robert Lustig, author of Metabolical: The Lure and the Lies of Processed Food, Nutrition, and Modern Medicine
