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Newsletter Nr. 717
Amsterdam, June 10th, 2018

THE DISSIPATIVE UNIVERSE AND THE PARADOX OF COMPLEXITY - A Review of David Christian's Origin Story - FRANK VISSER

In a recent book by the Australian historian David Christian, Origin Story: A Big History of Everything (2018),[5] a more nuanced and believable treatment is given of the paradoxical relationship of evolution and entropy. Christian started the "Big History" movement in academia in the late eighties and the subject is currently taught in universities and graduate schools. Christian's TED lecture "The history of our world in 18 minutes" has been viewed over 8 million times.[6] He is also the initiator of the Bill Gates funded The Big History Project. The subtitle of the book is similar to Wilber's own A Brief History of Everything (1996) and A Theory of Everything (2000), and the genre has become popular these days. Wide-ranging and sometimes over-reaching narratives are brought forward from various angles to clarify our place in Nature. Yuval Noah Harari's Sapiens (2011) and Home Deus (2015) come to mind.[7] Christian's book is decidedly more scientific, since Big History is heavily based in astronomy and biology. Special attention is given to the energy flows that give rise to the various forms of complexity—cosmological, biological and cultural—which allows for the formulation of cross-domain principles.

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